Stepping into a game designed for the younger generation is like stepping onto an alien planet. The culture is odd, the design unfamiliar, the purpose unclear – there’s a sense of unease as you try to decipher what’s going on. It’s similar to the uncanny valley. You half-recognise the world, but something feels strange.

That’s the feeling we had when we first logged into PK XD – a massively open sandbox game for youngsters. It’s hard to even define PK XD’s genre. Is it a platform for other games, like Roblox? Sorta. A metaverse? Maybe. An adventure game? Not really. We’re going to settle for… playground. It’s a playground. A big open sandbox world with loads of mini-games and people just… playing.

But that wasn’t what was so alien about PK XD. It was that the design philosophy was completely different – like they’d created the game under a different set of rules. It wasn’t until we spoke to the team that we discovered that was actually the case. Deliberately. And it was effective. PK XD has over 500 million downloads on Android alone. It gets 30 million views on YouTube every week. And their average session length is 25 minutes a session, with people playing around an hour and a half a day.

Clearly, there was something to learn here.

Kids play by a different set of rules

“You can’t blindly apply all the industry best practices to a game like PK XD,” said Charles Barros, CTO at Afterverse – the developers behind PK XD. “A lot of traditional game developers would think: Why aren’t you doing that? Well, it’s because it’s a different audience.”

That’s why PK XD feels so strange. It’s for younger players. We’ve grown up with games. There’s a whole language of symbols, tropes and traditions that are embedded in our subconscious – blue means mana, cassettes inevitably give you a voice-over of exposition, save points before a big room means there’s a boss battle coming up. Deliberate or accidental, we have a catalog of experiences to draw from.

A four-year-old doesn’t.

PK XD doesn’t have a tutorial, because kids don’t bother going through them. They avoid text labels, because a lot of their players can’t even read. They keep the rules simple, because a six-year-old just won’t understand anything too complicated.

But kids learn quickly. They explore, press buttons just to see what’ll happen and are quite happy to wander around until they stumble on something. So how do you design a game with that in mind?

Target your youngest player

“Most people are making games for someone between 12 and 20,” Charles said. “But it’s not that simple when you’re talking about kids. A kid at four is very different from a six or seven-year-old.”

This means that you need to consider your youngest players. You need to make your game extremely intuitive. Don’t rely on text, don’t bother with tutorials, and make sure you start the fun immediately.

“Fun and friends,” Charles said. “People come back because they like the game and their friends are there.”

What about designing with parents in mind?

One criticism we have for this design philosophy is that it only works for the kids themselves. Removing tutorials and streamlining the interface is all well and good for the kids, but what about the parents?

We don’t just learn by ourselves. Big brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, mum and dad. They teach us, too.

Perhaps there’s a simple solution to this. When creating an account, there could be an option to say you’re a parent or guardian. In that version, you could have more in-depth tutorials and onboarding.

Afterverse has solved this problem in a different way – by building a community of content creators.

Support your content creators

Content creators don’t just entertain your community, they teach tips and tricks, reveal upcoming news, and help players explore aspects of your game that they might have otherwise missed. And often in a much more entertaining way than an in-game prompt ever could.

This isn’t only for younger audiences. It’s true across the board. Almost every creator that focuses on a single game will eventually realize there’s demand for educational content.

One of the keys to Afterverse’s success has been nurturing their relationship with content creators. It’s a positive feedback loop. They help creators get subscribers, and the creators keep subscribers interested in the game.

“We have hundreds of official partners and a team to handle those relationships, advising and reviewing videos to help them grow their channel,” Diego Moreira, CEO at Afterverse explains. “

In fact, Afterverse does a lot to help their creators grow. They write a blog for creators, give early access to content, give access to their IP, and help them grow their channel. For example, they have billboards around the PK XD world that link to YouTube – promoting creators within the game itself.

This also helps Afterverse keep their finger on the pulse.

“You have to let your creators say what they think,” Diego said. “Our partners are still independent and they’re still players themselves, so they feel free to criticize us and they might even blast us. But that’s great. They’re amazing and they’re very close to the audience, so they’ll report back to us on what’s working and what isn’t. It’s very valuable feedback.”

Think about why creators would stick around

The key to attracting (and keeping) creators is to make sure that your game has plenty of replayability. Sandbox games work well, as there’s always another video the creator can make.

“If you move to another game as a content creator, you’ll start to lose your audience,” Charles explains. “For example, if you’re making videos about a racing game you might eventually run out of video ideas. But what do you do? If you switch to first-person shooters, you’ll lose a chunk of audience.”

This is why open sandbox games like Minecraft work so well for videos. There’s always another story to tell, a new challenge to attempt or a new update to feature.

Break fast, test often, keep moving forward

Behind the scenes, it’s important to experiment. Afterverse learnt a lot of lessons from their previous experience making children’s content. But it was from A/B testing and making quick changes that they found the right balance.

“We’re very aggressive about changes to the game. Break fast – that’s our philosophy,” said Pedro Almeida, Afterverse’s lead software engineer. “When it’s small changes, just release it and look at the data. Then use A/B testing for those bigger tests.”

But it’s important not to forget your purpose. When looking at your data, it’s important to group up your players and understand why you’re getting your results.

“Sometimes a player is looking for an experience that isn’t PK XD,” Pedro explained. “Maybe they’re too old for our game or maybe there’s a different game we should create for those players. Either way, we don’t want PK XD to lose its identity.”

So while it might be true that some players don’t like a change or new feature – it doesn’t mean it’s true for the main audience. That’s where those content creators come back. Afterverse can use their data to spot trends and then speak with creators to see whether it’s an anomaly or not.

Alien worlds need new approaches

All in all, returning to PK XD it’s suddenly clear why there isn’t a tutorial, why the first objectives are simple but with enough reward to afford a new home, and why everything feels just a little strange.

It’s because we’re old. And Afterverse hasn’t made PK XD for us. They’ve made it for their players and the content creators that entertain them.

Start your own journey

If you’re wondering what’s going on under the hood of your game and want to start figuring out how your various cohorts are reacting to changes in your game, download our free analytics tool and start digging into the data.

In this episode, Allison provides an in-depth look into the essential principles of tracking key success metrics in the gaming industry. She lays out a comprehensive understanding of the three core pillars: Acquisition, Engagement, and Monetization.

By watching this video, you’ll gain a clearer understanding of how to optimize important metrics like New Users, Retention, and Lifetime Value (LTV) – key aspects that can considerably impact your app’s performance.

This episode is packed with insights, practical tips, and strategies, making it a must-watch for all game developers, regardless of the stage of your game development journey.

Happy viewing!

The answer to this question depends on which metric you are taking into account. Based on our data in 2022, the ad networks with the highest average LTV were ironSource on Android, and Apple Search Ads on iOS. We delve into detail on the best ad networks to advertise hyper and hybrid casual games based on different metrics such as Ad LTV, IAP LTV, total installs, D1 and D7 retention in this blog post.

In this blog post, we expand on some of the highlights from our video interview with Korhan Cabalar – Founder of Voyager Growth.

Which hyper-casual industry trends from our report have been the most surprising?

“I am actually surprised that the number of IAPs increased by 34%. Due to the recession in the US, I would have expected to see a decrease in IAPs. I also think that this is a strong indicator that mobile gaming companies should switch to hybrid-casual games. I would expect IAPs to continue increasing in 2023.”

The illustration above depicts the trend of IAPs based on Tenjin’s 2022 data set. See the full report here.

Tenjin’s 2022 data set not only indicates a rise in in-app purchases (IAPs), but it also highlights a declining trend in eCPMs. This reinforces the need for gaming companies to transition from hyper-casual to hybrid-casual games in 2023.

The illustration above depicts the trend of eCPMs based on Tenjin’s 2022 data set. See the full report here.

What advantages does increasing your IAP share offer in your monetization strategy?

“Increasing your IAP share in your monetization strategy would mean you should go for blended ROAS campaigns, which account for both ad revenue and IAP revenue. This would allow you to scale more in terms of your ad spend – which is a really good indicator for mobile games. ”

Which channels should hyper-casual studios utilize in 2023 to expand the reach of their mobile apps?

“If you have a really low CPI, I suggest that in the first stage you should go for TikTok. This would help you scale a lot. Meta could sometimes also be a good option for this stage, but TikTok works better. You should also support this UA spend with SDK networks such as Applovin, ironSource, Unity, Mintegral, and so on. In my experience, TikTok and Applovin are the best combination. But it depends on your metrics.”

Would there be significant changes in the user acquisition (UA) channels for those transitioning from hyper-casual to hybrid-casual games?

“In my opinion, the first thing you should do when transitioning from hyper-casual to hybrid-casual games is to change your campaign structure. As I mentioned earlier, if you have revenue from advertising and IAP, you should start with ad ROAS campaigns in the first stage. If you are generating a lot of revenue from IAPs, you should go for blended ROAS campaigns that focus on both IAPs and ad revenue. There are many channels in the market that you can advertise on. As long as you have a positive ROI, you can launch these games on any platform. One big difference between the two genres is that with hyper-casual games, it is less likely for people to spend on Apple Search Ads (ASA). However, with hybrid-casual games you can find an opportunity to spend on ASA as well.”

What are the most common mistakes developers make when they transition from hyper to hybrid-casual games?

1. Focusing only on CPI numbers

   “Previously, with hyper-casual games and their low CPI, money could be recouped within 4 days, sometimes even within 2 days. However, the landscape has changed. Now, it typically takes 15 to 45 days to regain the investment. When transitioning, it’s crucial to shift focus from CPI alone and prioritize retention metrics. Rather than making a hasty decision to abandon a game based on slightly higher CPI, developers should examine retention metrics such as D7, D10, D14, and D30. If these metrics show strong retention, the higher CPI can be offset. Multiple factors, including Retention, Play time, the difference between Ad revenue and IAP revenue, among others, should be carefully considered before deciding whether to discontinue a game.”

2. Putting too many interstitial ads within a game

   “Another mistake is to put too many interstitial ads within a game. The aim is to have a good retention to sustain strong growth over time. This means you need to adjust the time between interstitials. Rather than putting too many interstitials in the first few days, people should focus on the long term return.”

3. Underestimating the power of creatives

   “I also see that many mobile gaming companies also underestimate the power of having a creative strategy. I think creatives are one of the most crucial aspects in the mobile gaming industry. Hiring an experienced creative professional can do wonders to your mobile games profitability.”

Which genres should be explored beyond hyper-casual games?

“I believe hyper-casual games are not dying, but evolving. You just need to adjust your focus strategically. If I was a publisher, I would definitely go for hybrid puzzle games. A good hybrid puzzle game can sustain growth and income for more than 3 years.”

Editors note: This article was written by Matej Lancaric, user acquisition mobile games consultant. You can read his original version here.

Nope, nothing is dead. But everything is changing. What was enough a few years ago, is not enough now. Cloning games, reskinning games, not adding any value. Those times are over. You need to work hard to get to the top! Let’s take a look at how you can do it. Well, of course with UA!

Current mobile market landscape

Two great talks about how the current mobile environment looks were presented at Istanbul Gaming Summit by Eric Kress & Alpagut Cilingir to set the scene!

Launching new games in the post IDFA world?

Playtika has temporarily suspended the development of new games, and will not launch any new titles for the foreseeable future. The change in strategy was announced alongside the publisher’s Q4 financial results, MobileGamer.biz reported and was attributed to various challenges in mobile marketing.

They saw that their new games received positive feedback from our players and achieved strong retention numbers. The marketing environment and increasing CPIs for new games made it challenging to scale these games profitably BECAUSE THE CPI VS LTV didn’t work.

Based on the current marketing environment, Playtika temporarily suspended the new game development pipeline until the ROI for new games is economically viable. I guess some companies can launch new games in this brutal environment. Just look below or read the case study here:

UA driven Game design

Recently we have seen multiple games using the strategy of having a hyper-casual gameplay funnel game that onboards the user to the „actual“ game. Later, the whole game is presented to the player and the original „funnel game“ is made irrelevant regarding overall progression.

This mainly helps to offset the “fakeness” of the user acquisition creatives, where the new “hyper-casual” gameplay prolongs the experience through the funnel of creative – store screenshots – install of the game – first session.

UA creatives

Previously games just used “fake gameplay creatives“ to lower the CPI and widen the funnel, but now developers are building full-fledged onboarding gameplay to smoothly translate the user between this install funnel and the main money-making game.

Topwar: Battle Game (Topwar studio)

This game still makes steady 22 Million USD per month. They are clever! A/B testing tutorials and onboarding based on the best performing creatives.

Top war onboarding gameplay

 Listen to no Bullshit gaming podcast two & a half gamers

• two & a half gamers session #57 – Deep-dive into Google Privacy Sandbox. Same disaster as Apple ATT?
• two & a half gamers session #56 – Frozen City vs Whiteout Survival, admon potential, UA & GD review
• two & a half gamers session #55 – Deep & actionable SKAN 4.0 breakdown with Eran from Singular
• two & a half gamers session #54 & Eric Kress – Everything is dead & new frontier of game development

Topwar Main 4x game

Tutorial

UA creative

First Screenshot

As outlined here, these guys are creative masters. Constantly testing a shit ton of new ads. Like this one:

Warpath: Ace shooter (LilithGames)

Warpath mashed up their 4x with some sniper gameplay (and creatives). Pretty solid mashup! I was expecting higher monthly revenues to be honest.

Warpath Onboarding gameplay connected to creatives

The actual 4X gameplay of the game

How to build a game these days?

In the pre-IDFA era, the strong core gameplay was always a reflection of D1 retention.

Changes in core gameplay were always reflected in it and usually got early retention.

Long-term retention was the norm of building a strong-performing game.

In the post-IDFA era this still applies but getting great retention is not enough these days.

As the CPI vs LTV formula broke down, everyone is looking at the possibility of acquiring as many users as possible as cheaply as possible as the targeting got thrown out of the window anyway.

Don’t get me wrong you still need a kickass game with badass metrics but the stakes just got higher and you also NEED these new tricks that cool kids are using on the UA streets in order to stay competitive in the user acquisition game which eventually translates into your CPI vs LTV scalability formula. Playtika is not able to figure it out, but actually, some companies are. Let’s look at the examples again.

Stormshot (Funplus)

This game is still pretty fresh. Global launched a few months ago, with revenues growing steadily.

In Stormshot, we can clearly see that they took their time to not just copy the usual pin puzzle lava creative that Playrix uses for Hero wars, but they actually develop a pretty lovely puzzle game with a full-fledged physics element that is stitched carefully into the onboarding of the game.

Onboarding gameplay tied to creatives

Honestly, this is my favorite game in terms of creatives. I love these concepts! Super funny, really simple, and has a hypercasual feel with headlines + enemies dancing. What else do you need?

The genius move in this game is the fact you only see these „shooting“ levels in the creatives and in the store. There is no sign of 4X anywhere! You can see that the characters and the game have the same setting/theme of graphics and no longer are just slapped playables like the previous generation of games that used this tactic.

On the left: Onboarding gameplay, on the right: main 4x gameplay

We have seen this second iteration start mainly in the 4X genre, but it seems that it is slowly translating throughout other CPI-intensive genres. We are talking about the strategy of having essentially a funnel minigame + main game on top of it.

Some latest prominent examples are Frozen City, Gold & Goblins, Fiona’s Farm and Stormshoot.

Frozen City pretty much implemented an Animal Warfare Hypercasual game on top of itself, which enables it to use different creative concepts than the usual idle genre gameplay and still remain true to the game

Frozen city vs Animal warfare autobattle gameplay

The same applies to Gold & Goblins, which uses unique creative concepts that again are translated in the game with the puzzle block-destroying minigame that is present through all of its mine levels and nicely smoothens the whole experience.

Not only in midcore/RPG or 4x

This is also not exclusive only to midcore/RPG games. We also saw games such as Fiona’s Farm, which pretty much combines three core gameplays:

• Match 3 levels of a typical puzzle game
• Production puzzle of Township
• Energy exploration of Family Island.

This again enables the game to use the full potential of creative concepts with all of these gameplays without being labeled “fake” and again meeting player expectations in the onboarding funnel. G-E-N-I-U-S!

 Listen to no Bullshit gaming podcast two & a half gamers

• two & a half gamers session #57 – Deep-dive into Google Privacy Sandbox. Same disaster as Apple ATT?
• two & a half gamers session #56 – Frozen City vs Whiteout Survival, admon potential, UA & GD review
• two & a half gamers session #55 – Deep & actionable SKAN 4.0 breakdown with Eran from Singular
• two & a half gamers session #54 & Eric Kress – Everything is dead & new frontier of game development
• two & a half gamers session #53 – Eversoul, a trending waifu game with full GD, UA, Admon review

I know, I know, not as impressive as the previous examples. It will get there. Don’t forget. This is the game Playtika invested in when saying they won’t be launching new games:

Instead, the company will focus on „high growth potential studios,“ such as Fiona’s Farm developer Ace Games, which Playtika invested $25 million into back in November.

Fiona’s farm vs Toonblast puzzle levels

Fiona’s Farm vs Family Island resource production

Whiteout survival

Actually, we spoke about this game on our last podcast. Enjoying the smooth transition from an idle game to 4X game. Listen to the episode below. You can see the gameplay of both games next to each other, so check it out!

Bonus Examples: Dragonscapes Adventure

Since I spent a lot of time analyzing Frozen city and Whiteout survival, I came across this cute-looking game with super weird creatives. What the hell is happening here? Jesper noticed as well!

UA Creatives? Oh boy!

Weird shit, but it’s in the game. You will encounter that minigame after playing 2 minutes! Still weird as fuck!

What to expect?

Have you seen the pattern here? No? Okay, let’s unpack a little bit.

Even though many dislike the genre of Hypercasual and it is being proclaimed dead almost every year. Last time even by Voodoo itself, it seems its legacy will continue.

Impacting our industry forward is a go-to trick to survive in the current hostile landscape of rising CPIs and lower LTVs.

The unique accessibility and the ability to capture a truly wide audience, be it 4X, RPG, Idle or Casual, is currently the only way to scale these CPI-hungry machines consistently.

X-Hero did it well last year, Kingdom Guard and Top war seem to be masters. There is the new frontier of games like Stormshot, Frozen City, Gold&Goblins, Whiteout Survival or Fiona’s farm that are development heavy, but capable of scaling.

In the upcoming months and next year, we are going to see more genres implementing this strategy to tackle the ever increasing CPIs.

In May 2021, Anime Dimensions leapt from 122 unique users to over 10 million within 60 days, with around 200 million unique sessions. It was one of Roblox’s best launches ever, and they managed it with just three months of development. Since then, it’s reached over 31 million users and 680 million sessions. We spoke to their founder, who goes by the username Coolbulls, and they very kindly agreed to share what they learnt along the way.

Coolbulls explained that they have been using GameAnalytics since 2017, and they were one of the first Roblox developers to integrate our Roblox SDK, even back in May 2021 when they had just 122 users. They added that “learning to use analytics was a key skill as part of my developer journey.”

So let’s explore their journey and find out what first-hand experiences led to such meteoric success.

Massive hits can be made in three months

In late March of 2021, Albatross Games began working on Anime Dimensions. The game itself is akin to an action RPG like a souped up Diablo. Players traverse through dungeons (called dimensions), upgrade their character, and switch out abilities.

“The game is also multiplayer, with up to 50 players at once,” explained Coolbulls. “I think what made it successful was its accessibility. It’s very simple to pick up and learn compared to other Roblox games in the same niche.”

The game launched just three months after they started developing. Through Roblox, they were able to launch on PC, mobile and Xbox. This likely contributed to the fact it was an instant success – hitting over 90,000 concurrent users in the first week, and over 200 million sessions within the first 60 days of launch. It holds the record for best review scores of any game launch in Roblox’s history. And it has now been played over 680 million times.

A large part of this success also comes from regular updates, Coolbulls explained. Since the launch, they’ve released 30 updates – and several of these have boosted engagement back to levels they saw at launch, keeping Anime Dimensions an ongoing success story.

Experience matters, not team size

There’s an apocryphal story that Pablo Picasso was once approached by a woman in a restaurant and asked for a drawing. Picasso scribbled on a napkin and asked for $10,000. Furious, the woman complained that it only took Picasso thirty seconds to draw.

“No,” Picasso apparently said. “It has taken me forty years to do that.”

The same seems true of making Roblox games. With a team of only two – Coolbulls and a 3D modeller called d5no – Albatross Games was able to create a hit title with just three months of development time. But Coolbulls has been making games on the platform since 2008 – back when developers did it purely for the kudos.

“My first popular game was a war-themed tycoon I made in 2009,” they explained. “And I’ve made a few more since then that have become hits.”

This experience – of developing and playing on the platform – is how Coolbulls was able to spot an opportunity. They were inspired to create Anime Dimensions because of two games that launched earlier in 2021. Those two games were unpolished and the developers abandoned them – but it meant that Coolbulls had spotted a gap in the market. People wanted something like Anime Dimensions.

Learn the culture of Roblox

“It’s worth remembering that Roblox is a completely different culture than you might expect. The game engine, virtual economy and publishing platform are all within the same ecosystem,” Coolbulls said. “It’s easy to reach tens of millions of people by just clicking publish. And this makes it simple for younger developers.”

But while it’s easier to develop on Roblox – and possible to develop much more quickly – newer developers often misunderstand the culture.

“Nearly every company I’ve seen come onto Roblox does so believing that their experience will translate over,” Coolbulls explained. “It doesn’t. Because of Roblox’s closed ecosystem, a unique culture has formed and you need to adapt to it to succeed. Long-time Roblox developers are going to have a significant edge over you in understanding what works and what doesn’t.”

So it’s best to go in and assume you know nothing. Go through all the top games and see how they’re made and what styles appeal to the players. It’ll take time before you’ll understand the culture.

Hire and talk to Roblox developers

The best way to learn that culture? Speak to the developers themselves. The community is friendly – and always willing to help. And you’re going to need their expertise.

“Bringing in developers from outside of Roblox has a big culture gap,” Coolbulls said. “While Roblox isn’t as difficult to pick up as other game engines, the intricacies of the platform and the design of the games themselves are best understood by those who’ve been playing since childhood.”

If you can, try and see if you can hire successful developers. However, Coolbulls points out that this might be difficult.

“The most financially successful developers won’t be for hire,” they said. “And those willing to be hired usually don’t have knowledge of how to make a financially feasible game.”

It’s a fair warning. So what to do? Instead, make sure to speak to many different developers. And make sure you’re giving the correct incentives if you’re trying to hire those that have been successful. They’re going to need a good reason to come to you.

Understand the competition

Your competition – and the players themselves – are much younger than you’d expect. Over half of Roblox’s players are under 12 years old. This presents a strange challenge, as there will be fads and ideas that you won’t be privy to.

“It can seem enticing to think: ‘If all these kids are making money, why can’t my team of professionals do the same?’” Coolbulls said. “But this young mindset presents a unique form of competition. They understand the audience better – their taste in games, what’s trending, and what’s on social media.”

It’s also worth remembering that younger developers have less financial responsibility. These games could be a passion project they work on after school or college, while they live at home. They don’t need a stable paycheck to survive.

“This lets them take more risks and spend more time on otherwise financially unfeasible projects,” Coolbulls added.

Instead, Coolbulls has noticed that companies have needed to find large brands to sponsor their game or they’ve had to buy out established games if they’re ever going to compete against the local developers.

Use metrics to take the next step

Much like the other younger developers on Roblox, Coolbulls started out adding whatever they thought was fun or cool. But over time, they realised that it wasn’t quite working.

“Analytics has completely reshaped the way I think about and design games,” Coolbulls said. “Now, I focus on what’s lacking from looking at the analytics. It lets me track how much a feature gets used, or whether or not something was successful. It lets me learn and iterate much more effectively than what I’ve done in the past.”

Using analytics to track metrics and test their ideas, Coolbulls has been able to get an edge over other developers on the platform.

Start your Roblox journey

If you’re considering developing a Roblox game and want to make sure it’s the best possible game you could make, make sure you’ve got your analytics set up.

“GameAnalytics was easy to set up, easy to learn, and was – most importantly – free,” Coolbulls added. So make sure you try out our Roblox integration for yourself.

Editors note: This article was written by Matej Lancaric, user acquisition specialist and mobile games consultant. You can read his original version here.

A city-building simulation game set in an ice and snow apocalypse. As the chief of the last town on Earth, you have to gather resources and rebuild society. Collect resources, assign workers, explore the wilderness, conquer tough surroundings, and use various methods in order to survive.

Let’s start with introducing the company Century Games. They have over 1,000 employees in 8 countries across four continents. Century Games is a global game developer and publisher. Actually pretty interesting case. From $1 million/month in 2020 to $20 million/month now. Holy shit! What a ride!

Is this even possible in the post IDFA world? But UA is dead?! I must be dreaming..

Since 2010, they have released numerous popular online and mobile games ranging from casual to mid-core genres. You can see a few of these in the picture below. How did I find this company? I was doing some fake ads research and one of their games Valor Legends was using the Save the dog icon.

We already recorded a podcast about the global launch of Frozen City a while ago:

I also like to look into the numbers post-global launch, and it seems now its a good time. In the middle of writing this, I received an exciting message from Jesper Gustavsson about a new game that was just global launched, and it looks very similar to Frozen City – Whiteout Survival. Let’s talk about both games!

 two & a half gamers

• two & a half gamers session #56 – Frozen City vs Whiteout Survival, admon potential, UA & GD review 20. marca 2023
• two & a half gamers session #55 – Deep & actionable SKAN 4.0 breakdown with Eran from Singular 13. marca 2023
• two & a half gamers session #54 & Eric Kress – Everything is dead & new frontier of game development 6. marca 2023
• two & a half gamers session #53 – Eversoul, a trending waifu game with full GD, UA, Admon review 27. februára 2023
• two & a half gamers session #52 – Admon gossip corner, Unity expensive bug, APS, Google 3 placements 20. februára 2023

Frozen City overview

It is a pretty good & fun game!

Frozen city consists of character well-being, town/city/settlement development, and the ability to create and own settlements. As soon as the player enters the game, they are introduced to the game through a conversation between survivors. The players see the conversation about how they need to set up a fire and survive.

When the player enters the game, they see a conversation between survivors. The player has to assign and use the survivors and assign tasks to them to help them survive and sustain life in their newly built community.

As soon as the player enters the game, their first task is to find wood and use it to ignite the fire. Then the players will move on to other tasks while they make sure to keep the fire burning, while they build their community to fulfill their various needs.

The player has to do the tasks while taking care of the well-being of the survivors. Each survivor needs rest, food, and warmth. When any of the survivor’s need for necessities is on the lower side of the bar, the player can revive them using the facilities built in the community.

As the player keeps playing and improving the community, it will reach a maximum level. The player can move onto another city/town on the map to search for new resources and enhance their lifestyle differently. Once the player reaches the maximum level of a community, the help of that place will become an unlimited source.

USER ACQUISITION & NUMBERS

When we discussed the Top 10 revenue countries on the podcast, the United Kingdom and Germany earned more than South Korea. But that changed in the last few weeks. Revenue per download is looking pretty good in US & in KR.

When global launching a game, it’s important to have full team on the UA, analytics and creative side. If you don’t have it, you either work with publisher/partner or an agency/consultant. Let’s get to the actual UA operation:

Channel mix

Applovin is the most extensive channel in terms of spending on both iOS and Android.

• Not surprising at all. I remember talking to Mr. Felix about Idle games scaling exceptionally well on Applovin on AdROAS campaigns both on iOS and Android! This is what is happening here!
• We can see both videos and playables in their creative mix. But 50% of their overall spend goes to playable on Applovin!

Facebook

• What is surprising is the fact that I have downloaded the game immediately after our podcast and I still see Frozen City creatives! As Mr. Jonathan Winters mentioned, this could be a global launch tactic to get more eyeballs and remind players about the game.
• I don’t know. Feels like such a waste of resources. In my world, it’s called excluding existing players.

Google

• They started scaling on Youtube quite heavily in the last few weeks.
• Using mainly 30 second videos + some static images.

 Unity

• Started relatively big, but now scaling back

We can see they are utilizing all big UA channels: Facebook, Ironsource, Google, Applovin, Vungle, and Unity, and started running some tests on TikTok!

Diversifying the UA portfolio efficiently is not an easy job. Here, we can see a good baseline of plenty of channels and looks like they are optimized. I did some publisher-level analysis again, and they seem to be in excellent shape.

They are showing their ads in games like Idle coffee shop tycoon, Tiny island survival, Bitlife life simulator, earth, and some hypercasual stuff. Not bad!

Also, in February, they already made $5 million in revenues—a pretty exciting story since they global launched the game at the end of December.

Editors note: This article was originally written and published by Mindworks, a leading self-service creatives platform from Mintegral. You can find their original version here.

Mindworks is giving GameAnalytics users exclusive trial access to create countless playables and advertise them for free with Mintegral. Hurry, this amazing offer is for a limited time only.

Activate your free Playturbo trial

How powerful can a premium playable ad be when it comes to user acquisition? Quite powerful, actually. Here is an example: a single playable ad created by Mindworks generated the lion’s share of downloads for ITI Studio’s game ‘On Ice!’.

ITI: top hyper-casual developer with high quality standards for its ad creatives

ITI is a well-known hyper-casual mobile gaming developer in the Japan market. Its hit title Rescue Cut, released in 2019, was named one of the best games of the year at the App Store Awards, which catapulted the company to global fame. As of today, ITI has amassed a whopping 350 million downloads with its portfolio of games, making it a veritable industry veteran.

As an experienced hyper-casual games developer, ITI is well aware of the playable ads’ built-in advantages: good user experience, outstanding ROI performance, and premium users acquired.

But on top of those, ITI wanted to further boost the playable ads’ UA results by leveraging the expertise of a leading creative team.

After many successful partnerships, ITI once again chose Mindworks as its playable creative partner for its newly released game On Ice!, with the aim to acquire high-quality users worldwide.

Creative strategy: gameplay-focused approach designed to attract users

As part of the effort to design effective ad creatives for On Ice!, we developed a comprehensive creative strategy based on an in-depth analysis of the game’s core gameplay, in order to better get players’ attention and bring out their competitiveness, thereby driving conversions.

1. Carefully selected levels and simplified trial to better highlight gameplay

On Ice! is an easy-to-play hyper-casual game with a competitive aspect that combines elements such as parkour and item collection, with a progressive difficulty curve for its levels. After a deep dive into its gameplay and an in-depth round of research to better understand target players’ preferences, we discovered that “gameplay experience” is one of the key aspects that players care most about.

Therefore, to improve player engagement and increase conversions, we came up with a two-step advertising strategy that focused primarily on the core gameplay while simplifying other aspects of the game:

Step 1: easy trial run to maintain retention rate for interested users

To improve users’ willingness to play the game, we selected low-difficulty levels for the playable creative and added clear visual guides, making it easier for them to understand the game.

Step 2: simplified design to highlight the smooth gameplay

Too many details will only blur the focus. To give players a clear idea of how the game is played, we did away with many of the effects and features throughout the original levels, such as coins and “guiding cakes”, to present a simple, clean and clear playable that focused on gameplay experience.

2. Innovative game rules to stimulate players’ urge to win

With the playable ad creatives in place, we decided to further boost downloads by working on ways to stimulate players’ competitive side, the urge to win:

• We replaced the original “points system” with a “score system,” set the maximum score to 95/100, and paired it with creative copy designed to challenge and taunt players.
• We set the endcard to display various skin rewards along with a call to action, “Next Round,” to encourage taps and drive conversions.

Mindworks designed the playable ad for On Ice! based on a deep dive into player preferences and it turned out to be a smashing success: the ad alone contributed 95% of the game’s downloads, and helped increase IVR on both operating systems by 77%, while also lowering CPI by 56%.

Those stellar results encouraged ITI to take things further and use 96% of its advertising budget on playable ads, helping the company continue to acquire users more easily and efficiently than before.

“The playable ad Mindworks designed for On Ice! has been incredible. We’re genuinely amazed,” said ITI’s Chief Brand Officer Masaki Otomo. “We’ve worked with the Mindworks team many times and they have always provided us with effective, relevant, product-centered ad strategies and suggestions. They are truly a reliable partner.”

What are you waiting for? Setup your free playables today

If you would like to try the Playable Ad Editor and Playable Templates from Mindworks, then make sure you register your interest and our team will get in touch with you as soon as possible. And if you want to learn more about Playable Ads, have a read through how MondayOFF increased IPM by 57% with playable ads.

Activate your free Playturbo trial

Editors note: This article was originally written and published by Mindworks, a leading self-service creatives platform from Mintegral. You can find their original version here.

Mindworks is giving GameAnalytics users exclusive trial access to create countless playables and advertise them for free with Mintegral. Hurry, this amazing offer is for a limited time only.

Activate your free Playturbo trial

The success of playables in Asia

In Japan and South Korea, where banners and video ads dominate, the emerging playable ads have significantly changed people’s perception of ads, thanks to the immersive, highly interactive ad experience they provide. At the same time, these playable ads are also helping the games break out and make a splash on the global market.

According to UA data from Mintegral:

• Playable ads increase IPM by over 85% on average in Japan and Korea, and 40% in mature markets such as Europe and the US;
• In Japan and South Korea, the Day 2 retention rate of users acquired via playable ads is 10-13% higher than those who are converted by regular video ads; in Europe, the US, and China, that number is 5-9%.

Based on insights showing the remarkable strength and ROI of playable ads, MondayOFF, one of Korea’s leading hyper-casual game publishers, partnered with Mindworks to use 3D playable ads. This partnership revolved around promoting a number of games including Sneak Out 3D, Time Walker 3D, Agent Twist, Tiny Run 3D, and Wacky Jelly, with some of them reaching the top of the charts in the US, Japan, South Korea, China, and other countries.

On top of that, to maximize their campaign efficiency, MondayOFF also iterated and optimized the ads using Playturbo, our playable ad creative platform, which allows advertisers to create multiple variations of playable ads in a matter of seconds.

How did Mindworks help MondayOFF build those high-quality playable ads? What were the secrets behind their success? Read our Wacky Jelly case study to learn more.

Customized playable ads to acquire high-quality players

MondayOFF is a leading hyper-casual games developer and publisher in South Korea, with over 3 million MAUs in the US market soon after its launch in 2018.

Growing at such a fast pace, MondayOFF has quickly become a leading company in South Korea’s hyper-casual gaming industry. The company currently has nearly 50 hyper-casual games around the world and has had its games ranked among the top 10 free games downloaded on iOS in 33 countries and regions so far.

Wacky Jelly, one of Monday OFF’s top hyper-casual mobile games, has won the hearts of many players with its cute design and innovative gameplay since its launch. To attract more users, MondayOFF decided to use playable ads as a booster to help it ramp up in the global market.

When building custom ads for MondayOFF’s Wacky Jelly, we developed a complete set of creative strategies based on in-depth research, combined with the game’s core gameplay elements to quickly engage players and reach strong conversion rates:

1. Pick the game’s most fun and eye-catching levels

After an in-depth research into the game, we made “eye-catching” and “fun” as the core elements to showcase, so as to cater to the target players’ game preferences. Based on that, we selected 2 levels from the game as the base for the creative.

Compared with other levels which included various objects, the “bald bodyguard” image stood out more, not to mention it was a great gag, enough to get people’s attention in no time and get them interested. The “Coke bottle cap” level is easy to play, and compared to the more complex and difficult levels, this one effectively lowers the entry bar for people willing to give it a try, thus improving the retention and conversion rates.

2. Add “bullet screen” effect to reinforce positive feedback

As we wanted to reduce player churn and improve the playable ad’s retention rate, we also added some improvements to level 1 while keeping the original level design, just to make it more fun and let players get a better feel for the game:

• Add a “bullet screen” and facial expression effects to improve the user experience: In the original level, whether the player passes or fails, the bodyguard remains expressionless, whereas in our creative, we added facial expression effects to respond with a smile or an angry face depending on different outcomes. We also added a “bullet screen” effect to reinforce positive feedback that will keep players engaged and reduce bounce rates;

• Add background music and amplify the relaxing “jelly effect”: The jelly-like bump and bounce effect is at the core of this game. To emphasize it, we amplified the wig’s bump sound effect and chose some background music to go with it. This audio-visual combination provides a relaxing and immersive user experience.

3. Clever level design set to peak players’ interest

In order to avoid player churn, we set the number of playable levels to two across all our ads:

As tested by Mindworks, putting two levels in the demo allows advertisers to fully showcase the gameplay while keeping the game fresh at the same time. This helps reduce the churn rate and maximize conversions while keeping the players interested and excited about the game.

Taking UA performance to the next level with the power of Playturbo

With the high-quality playable ads produced by Mindworks generating tangible user acquisition results, MondayOFF decided to further unlock the potential of these ads with our playable ad creative platform Playturbo, in order to optimize and iterate the custom playable ads we provided.

With Playturbo, MondayOFF optimized and iterated the wig spinning speed and other parameters, and quickly output multiple versions of the playable ads for A/B testing. This not only saved a significant amount of production costs and time, but it also improved the UA results as it enabled the advertiser to quickly identify the creative combinations that best meet their target users’ expectations.

Thanks to the creativity of the Mindworks team, compared with regular video ads, Wacky Jelly’s playable ads saw a 57.48% increase in IPM as well as a CTR of 62.11%, and helped the game enter the Top 10 Casual Games download charts in the US, acquiring massive quality players across different regions and markets, including the US, China, Japan, and Korea.

Top tips from Mindworks

• Know what players like and get their attention: Knowing what players like is the no.1 rule in creating good ads. Whether it’s the ad design or the game level selection, they should all be based on solid user research – that’s the only way you can produce great ads that appeal to your target users.
• Fun ≠ complex; reducing churn is key: the ultimate goal of playable ads is to get users to download, so advertisers should find a good balance between many elements including gameplay difficulty, level settings, and interaction mode. Don’t make the level design too complicated or you will lose players.
• Make the best of your ad through constant iterations: Having fresh ads is becoming increasingly important in the fight for user acquisition. This is why you need to consider tools like Playturbo to iterate your existing ads, which will reduce costs and improve your ad effectiveness, while not needing to produce dozens of new ads from scratch every time.

What are you waiting for? Setup your free playables today

If you would like to try the Playable Ad Editor and Playable Templates from Mindworks, then make sure you register your interest and our team will get in touch with you as soon as possible. And if you want to learn more about Playable Ads, have a read through how ‘On Ice’ got 95% of its installs from a single playable ad.

Activate your free Playturbo trial

Editors note: This article was originally written and published by Mindworks, a leading self-service creatives platform from Mintegral. You can find their original version here.

Mindworks is giving GameAnalytics users exclusive trial access to create countless playables and advertise them for free with Mintegral. Hurry, this amazing offer is for a limited time only.

Activate your free Playturbo trial

What’s the deal with playables?

Playable ads have quickly become one of the most popular ad formats among apps and brands due to their premium user experience, accessibility, and superior conversion performance. And while playable ads are effective, they are typically expensive and time-consuming to produce, posing a significant challenge to scalability. It’s for this reason we’ve launched the Playable Ad Editor on the Playturbo platform.

The Playable Ad Editor now provides advertisers with a zero-coding, drag-and-drop online editor to easily create personalized playable ads – compatible with the leading ad networks.

Read on and find out more!

Create Your Own Playable Ads With Our Drag-and-Drop Editor

Playturbo by Mindworks is a self-service element-based creative production platform for playable ads.

The Playturbo platform provides fully customizable playable ads by providing hundreds of Mindworks’ premium pre-made playable ad templates. The new drag-and-drop feature gives full control over production and brings your playable ads to life in just one click.

1. Zero-coding, beginner-friendly, and zero learning curve

Whether you’re a beginner or a playable design pro, simply drop in the elements and effects to produce a stunning playable ad in an instant.

2. Wide range of design assets at your fingertips

Stand out from competitors and explore our curated library of premium images, text, background music, videos, and effects.

3. Compatible with major ad networks

Playable ads created on Playturbo can be exported and deployed across all the major ad networks on the market, including Mintegral, Facebook, Google, Unity, AppLovin, Vungle, TikTok, and more. In addition, the language, device orientation, and package size of your creatives can also be altered in clicks – helping you succeed in the global market.

4. Get inspired: Premium templates and experts’ insights

Games, apps, eCommerce and brands all stand to benefit from our playable template library. Receive in-depth insights from our expert team, helping you to earn more attention, clicks, and conversions.

5. Automatic assets replacement

By saving your playable ad as a template, Playturbo can replace the ad assets automatically including CTA buttons, characters, skins, background music, game difficulty, text content, and more – helping you quickly export multiple variations for A/B testing.

6. Optimize with real data

Playturbo allows advertisers to track various in-ad interactive points. Advertisers can get a better understanding of their users and further optimize their playables accordingly, improving UA effectiveness as a result.

Trusted by global partners

Many top advertisers have already utilized Playturbo’s Playable Ad Editor for creative production. including popular brands like Duobite, XMiles, Triwin, and more.

“It really takes time to adjust playables’ package size and device orientation for various ad networks, especially for the global UA campaigns,” said Yiping Cai, the co-founder of Duobite Games, “Playturbo really helps us on reducing time and effort on creative production, which we appreciate a lot.”

“With the launch of the Playable Ad Editor, Playturbo now covers the entire process of playable production – from zero to hero,” said Stella Zhu, the Head of Mindworks and Creative Director of Mintegral. “A variety of advertisers can benefit from Playturbo, including those who customize their ads through the Mindworks team, or those who wish to produce playable ads in-house.”

How Playturbo helps with your playable production:

1. Playable Ad Editor. Advertisers can build up their own playable from scratch with the drag-and-drop editor
2. Playable Ad Templates. With premium pre-made playable ad templates, advertisers can quickly produce their own creatives
3. Customized Playable Ad. Iteration For playable creatives produced by Mindworks, advertisers can use Playturbo to adjust creatives and export multiple variations in seconds

What are you waiting for? Setup your free playables today

If you would like to try the Playable Ad Editor and Playable Templates from Mindworks, then make sure you register your interest and our team will get in touch with you as soon as possible.

Activate your free Playturbo trial

When you’re developing a hyper-casual game, it’s not enough to just publish it and hope it takes off. You need to do extensive, iterative testing to get an indication of the best possible UA performance as well as in-game metrics. 

So where to start? Here are our top tips for maxing out your metrics:

Know what you’re testing for and what KPIs you’re looking at

Vague testing methods will only get you vague results. The first thing to decide on is what the purpose of your test is. Are you running a marketability test? Exploring a game concept? Or are you testing creatives?

Once you’ve decided what question you’re trying to answer, be clear on what KPIs you’re going to measure with. Is it the CPI? IPM? CTR? Retention? You need to know all of these before you start testing.

Set a test strategy

Regardless of your initial results, you will need to have a clear idea of what your next steps should be. You should also decide on the scope of your test. The main question here is: do you test on multiple networks or just one? If it’s multiple networks, consistency is key. (More on that in a moment.)

Establish your benchmarks 

When you get your results, you need to be able to understand how promising they are. So study the game genre, platform, regional market and ad networks you’re testing on – and take all of them into account. What kind of result would represent progress? 

At JoyPac we mainly focus on CPI, IPM, retention and playtime when we run our initial tests. 

Work on a creative approach

How many creatives are you going to test? Are there any specific concepts you can use across different game genres (like tutorial style or good/bad gameplay)? If your first creatives don’t perform well, be sure to have a new batch ready to go. 

We test various concepts in the beginning and will then produce new variations of the best performing. 

Keep your demographics consistent

When you have the results of one test, you can only compare them to other results with the same targeting. If any one thing is different (geo, platform, network, demographics, etc.), it’s not going to be a direct comparison and your overall results will be unreliable.

Use the right tools

Getting large amounts of data is only useful if you have the tools to analyze and understand it. So you’ll want to have attribution and analytic tools in place before you go live. Some good options are GameAnalytics, Appsflyer, Adjust, or Tenjin. 

And finally: be patient

Don’t over-optimize and target broadly. You shouldn’t draw premature conclusions or make changes to your campaigns before you have reliable results. 

If you’ve followed all our advice, you should be well on the way to be running your own tests and getting useful results that you can have confidence in. So have faith in the process. Let the ad networks’ algorithms do their job and use the results to give your game its best possible chance of success.

If you’d like to learn more about publishing in China, then feel free to get in touch with us here. Or, if you’re interested in finding out how we use GameAnalytics, take a look through our case study here.

Editor’s note: a little while ago we discussed how to market your game on a $0 budget. It was a popular post with a lot of useful tips. We thought we’d get more advice from another industry expert. This time it’s from TheTool’s ASO and mobile marketing lead, Katerina Zolotareva.

Overview

Getting a mobile game discovered by users is a tricky task and many developers have a perception that it will inevitably cost a lot of money. However, this doesn’t have to be true! There are many ways to promote an app on a low budget. App Marketing is all about creative approach!

Good communication with potential players and existing ones is essential to achieve visibility and help your game to achieve maximum exposure.

Today we will share some tactics that will make your life so much easier when you need to get downloads (without investing a single dollar). Let’s go!

Before launch

1. Create a teaser

Video and screenshots are the perfect examples of visual content that you will need at this step. A striking video teaser of your game will evoke the interest from the audience and create a desire to try it. Tell a story with your video and try to grab the attention from the first seconds. Use real footage from your gameplay – in the end users want to see what is inside!

“Users who watch your video are 3x more likely to install (Apptamin)”

Prepare a good selection of screenshots and provide them with explanations. Showcase characters and locations and provide the screenshots with a powerful and engaging call-to action.

Read more about screenshots here and be sure to check this guide for video marketing to create an amazing video for your game – and be ready for the new App Store update with iOS11!

2. Get web exposure

Before launching a mobile game in the app stores, ensure its web presence. It can be as simple as a one page site that will showcase your game’s best features and include the promo content (screenshots, videos). Follow the examples of Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja or Homescapes.

Describe your cool characters, their virtues and the hot moments of your game – make it desirable!

Use your website to promote your game in web search engines and to collect emails of those who are interested in getting the news about the game launch. Start a blog and publish interesting game-related content frequently – see this example from the Two Dots blog.

Never stop collecting emails, as direct email marketing still remains the most powerful tool to communicate with users. Emails can, any stage to get, help you to attract, retain and engage your players. Gather emails from your website, landing pages, Twitter or Facebook pages.

When the game is out, your website will become a powerful SEO tool for promoting it. Include download links from the app stores, and stimulate web visitors to try a game with interstitials or links in page headers. Read more about how doing SEO for mobile apps can help you drive more organic installs in this article.

3. Create a hype

People enjoy all things exclusive. A great example is when Spotify entered the US market being an invitation-only platform. People always want what they don’t have, so they went crazy about it!

A good trick is to launch the first version of a game and open it only to beta-testers in the beginning. You will create a buzz around your game, and the beta-testers will soon become loyal players and your strongest advocates, thus increasing your reach to your target audience. Try Betabound to look for beta testers for your upcoming game.

4. Get ready for press attention

Having media attention is essential to reach wide audience and get your game exposed to new users. Pitch to journalists, apply for awards, speak at the conferences or other industry events, give interviews to local media, write guest posts.

Search Google to find popular blogs in your niche to reach out to. Think Android Authority, Macworld and similar. Try these app review sites: Here you can find a list of 112 app review sites to submit your app.

Have your PR kit prepared – it usually includes:

• Game Description – A summary of what your game does and who it is targeted to.
• Press Release – A story behind the creation of your game, biographies and photos of founders, and statistics and curious facts about your game.
• Design Materials: Logos, Icon, etc. Include all sizes and the hi-res images to avoid any complications.
• Screenshots & Video to show your game in action and help readers get an instant overview of what it is about. Include a lot of visual materials to give different media a chance to pick the ones that haven’t been previously used by anyone else.

Reaching out to influencers will also do you good – try Buzzsumo to find the content on the blogs with most shares.

5. Do App Store Optimization

App Store Optimization, or ASO, is essential to market a game on the app stores. ASO is the process of optimizing the visibility and conversion rate on the stores in order to drive app installs. ASO is the instrument that will open your game to the market and help it stand out from more than 7.6 million other apps (just on App Store and Google Play Store together, not counting the numerous other app stores that exist out there).

The main elements of ASO are: Keyword Research & Optimization, Conversion Rate Optimization, and constant Tracking and Improving the results.

App Store Optimization helps you show up in the app stores search results, where the users are browsing to find new apps and games, and with a boost of installs your game will also have a chance to rank higher in the top charts, and ultimately it might get featured by the stores’ editorial teams.

To learn more about App Store Optimization, read these Guides for Google Play ASO and App Store ASO.

After launch

6. Localize your game and its listing on the stores

Localization is a powerful tool to open your game internationally. Mobile is global, and by localizing an app and its product page on the stores you can reach a far larger audience and possible fans of your game.

Be sure to prepare your app to localization technically at an early stage, and to evaluate the potential market, first make an app available on a new country in English but with a store listing in the target language. When you start getting installs from this country, you can evaluate the possibility to translate the game’s full content.

For more examples of quick and clever game localization tactics, check this interview with FRVR.

7. Take care of your user ratings and reviews

User reviews and ratings have a lot of weight in the app stores’ algorithms (for determining ranking apps and games in search). The Google Play Store even takes into account the keywords found in user reviews. Moreover, user feedback heavily influences conversion rate, as the users are keen on checking the reviews before downloading an app.

The good news is that the app stores provide developers with an opportunity to reply on users’ comments and sometimes that makes is possible to resolve the problem and change user feedback from negative to positive.

Listen to your users – from their comments you can find interesting ideas to include in your roadmap, fix bugs and provide them the excellent customer support that will turn them into loyal users.

Encourage your players to leave feedback. It is important to find great time points to ask for a review – for example, after the user has passed a difficult level, unlocked an achievement or new character. Make sure you are not asking your new users to leave comments – they probably won’t leave a nice feedback as they haven’t yet had a chance to discover all the virtues of the game.

The best option in this case is to prompt the users to confirm whether they are happy with the game or not – if yes, take them to the store to leave their positive feedback, and if not, provide them with a support page where their problems can be resolved or bugs fixed before they write a negative review on the store.

8. Get featured by influencers

Gamers love reviews. The quickest way to get them to know about you is to get endorsed by an influencer or get your game reviewed by an authoritative YouTuber.

For example, here you can find the 100 most viewed YouTube gaming channels worldwide.

9. Use social media channels like a ninja

Use the powers of Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Reddit, Flickr or Tumblr to promote your game. Don’t underestimate the audience you can get from these channels and collect their emails to directly promote your offers to them in the future. Grab this guide on what to post on each social media platform!

Create a community – you can publish walkthroughs, run championships, organize contest and grow an audience of loyal users that are engaged with your game and become your fans on social media. Monument Valley has created an amazing community in Tumblr – take a look here.

Publish your own content in a blog and transmit your news to your audience through social media. With a minimal budget you can try to increase the organic reach of your posts by publishing it a few times, once a week.

Communicate important news and listen to your users – follow the example of Tap Tap Fish’ Facebook page.

10. Use the power of word-of-mouth

Encourage your users to spread the word about your game! Include a social component to provide users with an opportunity to share their achievements, and consider bonuses for doing so – like unlocking new levels.

Run a contest or giveaway of your premium content – for example, pick a winner from those who have shared your content and give something as reward. Encourage your users to invite friends to the game, providing cool incentives in exchange.

Offer rewards for inviting friends, connecting social accounts, sharing achievements and records! You can even use unlocking new locations or characters as rewards or incentives. The best rewards are unpredictable or random – this is why things like one-hand jack or fortune wheel are so addictive!

Another example is to let the users personalize their characters to create a greater affinity to your game. Users will actively share their records and achievements on social media, creating an amazing word-of-mouth powered marketing for your game.

In a nutshell…

A big budget is not necessary for a high visibility and success of a game. More than that, a good combination of app marketing tactics, such as App Store Optimization, can help you refine your paid acquisition strategies by improving conversion rates and getting you more organic and non-organic visitors.

A few takeouts to have a killer app marketing strategy:

• Create an attractive video teaser
• Work on a press kit and reach out to specialized media
• Take advantage of web users to convince them try your game
• Use the power of social media and influencers
• App Store Optimization is a MUST!
• Listen to the users reviews and encourage them to leave feedback
• Localize a game (content + listing) for a wider audience reach
• Encourage word-of mouth marketing with rewards

See you in the Top Charts and Search Results!

With more than 500 games submitted to the App Store every day, it’s hard to imagine a more competitive environment to get noticed. That’s why every little improvement to your listing is particularly important. With an average conversion rate of 4.47% (for games on the iOS App Store), even the smallest of changes can be hugely influential to your success or failure.

Of course, a quality app or game is what matters the most. A well-optimized listing won’t fix this. Yet, what steps should you take once your game is polished? When your UI is on point, gameplay is fine-tuned, well balanced, and all bugs and glitches are detected and fixed.

Once you’ve dealt with all of the above, you’ll want to pay closer attention to App Store page. In fact, optimization of each product page element can take your conversion rate to a whole new level. However, such great results require thoughtful A/B testing, consistency, and patience.

This guide will help to get your bearings in the art of crafting a high-converting app store page for your game. We will deconstruct optimization of the most impactful product page elements, such as app icons, your app name and subtitle, your screenshots, the app preview, and the description.

[bctt tweet=”The 5 essentials of a top performing app store page for games #gamedev #indiedev” username=”GameAnalytics”]

1. Icon selection

Careful selection of your icon is essential. It’s the first thing your potential user will see so it should capture their attention and instantly convey the genre of game. Core ingredients of a converting icon are simplicity, lack of excess visual elements, ability to stand out among competitors without losing touch with conventional principles of your store category.

The truth is a game icon matters more during an app discovery process. Once App Store visitors get to the product page of your game, they pay very little  attention to the icon. So, the best way to perfect an icon is to run a series of category tests on the App Store. This will help you identify which of your icon variations perform better in the competitive surrounding.

If you study the icons of the top games, you’ll notice that the overwhelming majority use the same pattern: an icon depicts characters with their mouths open. It may seem silly, but the trick works. You can use this layout in designing one of your variations.

Indeed, numerous examples proved that placing a character in the game app icon impels a sense of action. Thus, a user wants to start playing right now. Sure, an open mouth is not the only option and it’s worth taking time to play around various facial expressions.

Testing of different characters on your icon is another highly recommended path which can lead to remarkable results. To give a recent example, MyTona ran a series of icon experiments for their game, Seekers Notes: Hidden Mystery. They started by testing a human character against a pumpkin head. The latter performed 9.3% better than the first one.

This result could arise from the fact that, for gamers, the male human character was less appealing than an inanimate object or maybe the open mouthed smile trumped the serious face. MyTona decided to go further and they added another smiling character during their next experiment.

The icon with the pumpkin head beat the serious man in a hat once again, but performed only 3.5% better this time. The new icon with the smiling witch smashed the previous two, with a 9.1% conversion lift. This experiment once again proved efficiency of ‘open mouth’ strategy and the significance of testing characters.

There are a few essential steps you should take when optimizing your icon:

1. Study the icons of games in your genre, notice common features;
2. Reflect best practices in your variations for testing conversion rates;
3. Play around with characters, their facial expressions, angles, etc.;
4. Opt for search or category experiments rather than store product page A/B testing.

2. App name and subtitle

App name is subject to a subtle yet important change with iOS 11 emergence. Now game titles in the App Store can have only 30 characters, so it’s high time to forget about packing them with excessive keywords.

We’d even recommend that you keep the name of your game under 15 characters. This will prevent it from being cut short in the search results and ensure a slightly better tap-through-Rate.

Subtitles familiar to Android users are among iOS 11 debutants. This new App Store product page element will follow the app name and be limited to 30 characters as well. It’s a good idea to use a call-to-action in your subtitle (“Explore a new world”), as according to our recent study, this alone can improve conversion rate by 15-20%.

Our tests also proved that abstract subtitles generating vision, idea or intent and using powerful language that resonates with your target audience can result in rise of direct installs. At the same time generic descriptions with no pragmatic information (#1 game) won’t help that much.

3. Screenshots

Landscape screenshots always ruled the show when it came to the gaming category. This trend is likely to become even more prominent with iOS 11 App Store updates.

The major change is that redesigned search results will show 3 portrait screenshots instead of 2. Therefore such portrait screenshots will get smaller making captions nearly unreadable and layout details incomprehensible.

Our recent study showed that the first screenshot that looks like an ad banner can result in 45% conversion increase in Search. Moreover, the usage of banner-like landscape screenshots can help to repel your game’s closest competitor, turning its app listing into a blind spot.

Social Point decided to test this theory on their game Monster Legends. They launched a search results experiment with two variations to test the original portrait screenshots  set against banner-like first screenshot in a landscape mode.

The latter variation beat the first one and reached 15.4% conversion. The result of the closest competitor was only 4.7% which proved the initial hypothesis about impressive banner-like screenshot performance in the search results.

Nevertheless, A/B testing of screenshots orientation is a must for every game developer. What works for other games might be toxic for yours. Angry Birds 2 is the brightest example.

They ran a series of A/B tests before game launch. Rovio compared the performance of  vertical screenshots with horizontal ones in the course of one of those experiments. Once the test yielded 99.7% confidence level, we got down to results analysis.

It turned out that portrait screenshots performed way better. Such surprising results could be explained by the fact that Angry Birds fans are not hardcore users on the whole and are more used to holding their phones in a portrait mode.

[bctt tweet=”How A/B testing app store screenshots helped Rovio improve conversions by 13% #gamedev” username=”GameAnalytics”]

The usage of portrait screenshots contradicted the game industry standards but helped Rovio enhance the converting power of Angry Birds 2 product page by 13% and get additional 2.5M installs just in a week after the launch.

If you examine screenshots of game-leaders you’ll notice a few patterns you can apply in your screenshots layouts. A golden rule for a game screenshot can be formulated: battlefield/gameplay background + favourite character + powerful Call-to-Action or key feature caption.

ZiMAD decided to test the above mentioned layout before uploading redesigned screenshots to the App Store. The renewed screenshots for the game Bubble Birds 4 depicted the favourite characters of gamers, captions became more action-packed and brief, new background represented a mix of art overlays, real screenshots, and gameplay elements.

It’s definitely worth testing the following screenshots set: a banner-style landscape screenshot should go first, the rest of screenshots should reflect the abovementioned best practices in their design.

Don’t forget about orientation, experimenting with it is a must. It also makes sense to play around different characters of your game and identify top picks of your target audience.

4. App previews

One of the major product page changes in Apple update is related to app previews. Renewed product pages can have up to 3 app previews on them. The length of each video is limited to 30 seconds.

They will be auto-played in muted mode directly from the Store, it concerns both search results and product pages. Changing pictures in a loop will catch more attention of users than static video posters. Yet, it’s vital to use new opportunities wisely.

First of all, it’s forbidden to show UI outside of your game. And it goes without saying that app previews should include the most relevant content, the one the App Store visitors will get without thorough explanations.

It’s a good idea to start your game preview with something visual like users’ favourite gameplay or text animation (static text will look like an old video poster). Once you decided to use text in your video, make certain it’s easy to read even in reduced mode shown in search results.

The function of the first app preview is to give a brief and dynamic game overview which should trigger desire to learn more about it. The second app preview can be a bit slower and more introspective focusing on a few features that make your game unique. The third video can show advanced features a gamer can experience within your gameplay.

The App Store allows you to localize these videos for all markets, but you’ll need to be sure that the impact of localization is worth resources spent on it. So, it’s recommended to start with optimization for silence. A muted app preview is to be as understandable as one with the sound on.

5. Description and promo text

Our statistics state that only 2% of users read full app description tapping on the “Read More” button. Changes of iOS 11 will barely change this trend. There are a few common rules for description: make it brief and informative, give solid reasons to install your game, highlight best features and uniqueness of your game.

However, the first 170 characters of your full description which represent promotional text deserve your close attention and consideration.

In general, smart promotional text can help to increase conversion on the average by 35% according to our research, (we’ve witnessed maximum lift of 75%). Above all, you should use game promo text to promote special offers and the most important updates.

Afterthought

There are more and less impactful app store elements for sure, and it’s necessary to start optimization with the most powerful ones: subtitle, screenshots and app preview. Nevertheless, a key to game success in app stores hides in complex approach to ASO. Maximisation of game product page conversion is impossible without constant testing and experimenting.

[bctt tweet=”The 5 essentials of a top performing app store page for games #gamedev #indiedev” username=”GameAnalytics”]

Great performance in an app store isn’t a reason for wrapping all ASO activities. It’s vital to remember that every app store is an ever-changing system. What works today might make your game gravitate to the bottom tomorrow. So, equip yourself with patience, precision, and diligence and get down to polishing your product page.