Slides from the presentation by Sebastien BORGET, COO & CO-FOUNDER at Pixowl (www.pixowl.com) on November 30th, 2012 at Game Connection Paris Sharing Development and Marketing Tips on The Sandbox (www.thesandboxgame.com) ★ GAME DESCRIPTION ★ The Sandbox is a unique powder game that provides you with your very own "physics sandbox" and gives you god-like powers, right on your iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad! Imagine creating your own universe (complete with amazing Pixel Art), composing your own music, and much, much more. The universe is yours to create or destroy, and the only limit is your imagination! ★ FOLLOW US ★ Website: http://www.thesandboxgame.com Twitter: http://twitter.com/TheSandboxGame Facebook: http://facebook.com/TheSandboxGame

1. POST MORTEM
A story of launching a mobile game
Sébastien Borget - COO / Co-Founder
seb@pixowl.com

2. "Pixowl is working on the next big thing since... well, I'll
just come out and say it... since Minecraft. There, I said it.”
Rob Rich, 148apps
TouchGen, 4.5/5, un-missable
"... a wonderful time killer that is perfect for people who
enjoy experimenting, destroying and building in a fun
sandbox environment"
TouchArcade, 4/5 stars
"... rewarding players for creativity while giving them
near-infinite possibilities”

3. Release Date: May 14, 2012
Genre: Simulation Game
Size: ~35MB
Target: Everyone Age 7+
Languages Supported: EN, FR, ES
Price: Free with In-App Purchases
The Sandbox is the best powder game made up
entirely of pixels, where you assume the guise of one
of God’s assistants
- Amazing pixel art graphic style
- Touch based controls: everything reacts at your
finger
- Create your own universe through the exploration of
resources such as lightning, lava, sand, glass, and
many others

4. Trailer Video

5. 
One programmer with a project

Genre: Powder Games

Kongregate

6. Our results 6 months after launch on iOS:
6 (major) Updates launched – 1 more under preparation
1.7+ Millions downloads
4.5/5 average score on AppStore with 20.000+ ratings
50.000 DAUs – a very active community!
100.000+ universes shared by players
225%+ content than original version
70+ elements
71 missions / 5 campaigns
30 daily quests
Monetization, low but acceptable

7. What went right?

8. INNOVATION

Full strong team

“Powder game” revival

Platform innovation

Aim to high quality

11. Documentation for everything

Campaigns

General design

Elements design

Artificial stupidity

Menus

Flow

...

16. Creative process 100% integrated to prototyping

Game design team cooperative

Brainstorming on google doc

Comments in the docs

Ideas convergence

Ideas filtering

Feasibility (tech team)

Milestones planification (time)

Company goals (management)

19. Creative process 100% integrated to prototyping

Prototyping & Iteration

Game Design + Programming side by side

Quick Protos: Processing

Tweeking & Visual testing on Protos

If everything goes OK:

Implementation + Final Art

Test

20. Several gamers type covered:

Deep gameplay -> hardcore players

Missions / story -> casual players

Narrative & tutorial integrated as story

Free-mode -> creative players

Sharing galleries -> social players (not perfect)

Achievements -> collector players

26. What went wrong?

27. 
Milestones rushes = dirty code

Story mode took 6 months to be defined

Economy definitions came TOO late

28. Technology and Maintenance
Unplanned tools updates every few months
iOS 6
xCode 4.5

29. 
Last minute integration of Flurry & Tapjoy

Piracy – hormonal guerilla

90% of the time: adding last minute
unplanned tasks

Multiple campaign

Daily quests (come back strategy)

Online Gallery

Headless server side development

Pink pandas running naked in a soccer match

30. Very hard genre to understand and to teach
Simple Mechanics Complex Dynamics

31. Cheat Codes
For a successfull launch!

32. It can only do you good  !
- Distribute via Testflight your build to friends and
testers
- Create a Beta Application Form, post it on Forums,
Twitter and your website to recruit
- Minimum Test Period : 2 – 4 weeks
- Iterate! Send more than 1 build to the testers
- A/B test if you can.
- Collect Feedback via Forum and Forms… and
Analyse the results.
- Go for very qualitative testing, with
UserTesting.com, uTest.com or equivalent services

33. Every 2 month updates with lot of new content
Blueprints
Backgrounds
Campaigns/Quests
Elements
Come back strategies
Daily Quests (random)
Constantly Updating
Community support (contests, announces)

34. Leverage the power of community
management!
- Facebook Page with regular updates (banners,
announcements, posts etc.)
- Twitter Feed with fun facts
- Official Game Forum to answer questions:
http://forum.thesandboxgame.com
- Organize regular Contests with Prizes (real or in-
game)
- YouTube Channel: 53 videos – 127.000 views in
total
http://www.youtube.com/user/TheSandboxGame/
- Feature the TOP of your players’ creations (Daily
screenshot on FB / TW + Weekly Best Of Video on
YouTube)
- Answer Emails!

35. If you have other apps, cross promote them
Very easy to do with Chartboost
Don’t forget to use PUSH messages
And traditional medium: FB, Email etc.
Developers should help each other!
Ask developers you know to promote your title
Get better rates on CPI / CPC
Know who are the players audience
Make friends at conferences like now 

36. For the launch…
1st week of marketing matters the most
Get ready to boost spendings if Top 25
… and after!
Keep in your budget enough $$$ to promote your next updates
Reinvest your earnings
So many ways to acquire users...
Limit your tests to $2000
Split your budget in a limited number
of campaigns
Rework your budget every day!

37. The Tools Set you need
AppFigures / AppAnnie
Flurry or ApSalar wih Events, Funnels and Cohorts
Analytics in Chartboost
MobileAppTracking (by HasOffers)
Our recommandations
Choose wisely your campaigns: CPI vs ARPU
Target only countries where you make Profit
Profits matter more than Revenues

38. Sébastien Borget
seb@pixowl.com
skype: borgetsebastien
www.pixowl.com