5. PROFIT MARGIN =
BUSINESS SUCCESS
value
generated
effort
requiredPROFIT
to cut costs while
increasing value?
HOW
?
6. In an
efficient market
costs to produce
the product
are driven
upward
competition
decreases
what customers
are willing to pay
margin
gets squeezed
from both ends
7. The hyper-competitive
F2P game market
is particularly tight,
because
Everyone wants in
Competition drives up UA costs
Demand for talent increases dev costs
Customers expect free & high-quality games
Mobile games can be highly profitable,
and lure many investors
Ad marketplaces are real-time and hyper-efficient,
driving CPI to where profit margins disappear
Huge demand for devs + efficient job marketplaces =
dev demand high pay
F2P has cratered customer willingness to pay for
entertainment
8. THIS LEAVES US
TWO VIABLE PATHS
Deliver value more efficiently
than your rivals
Make a differentiated product
that can’t be easily cloned
9. Deliver value more
efficiently than your rivals
the extreme
competitiveness in F2P
demands that we do
both!
STRATEGY #1
STRATEGY #2
Defensibility & differentiation
Topic for
another day
Topic for
this article
Actually,
11. Adequately differentiated
Polished & high quality
Offering as much value as possible
Controlling development scope
to minimize costs
To survive, game-makers
must create products
that are:
and
while
and
12. Initiatives
(Hypothetical RPG)
Benefit
(+% LTV)
Effort
(1-10)
ROI Score
(Benefit / Effort)
Raise Character Level Cap 12% 3 4.00
Add Nightmare Difficulty 8% 3 2.67
Character Gear System 20% 10 2.00
10 New Characters 8% 5 1.60
Guild Wars Feature 15% 10 1.50
Rewarded Video Ads 10% 7 1.43
New Live-Ops Event Type 8% 7 1.14
The result is a simple
ROI calculation
per feature with a few
low-effort, high-yield
candidates
at the top of your list
A SIMPLE RUBRIC FOR
PRIORITIZATION
Our north star
should be a high
RETURN
ON INVESTMENT
all potential improvements
(whether to retention,
to monetization, or otherwise)
either an arbitrary effort scale
from 1 to 10, or an estimate
of the number of actual weeks
of development time
14. DESIGN PATTERN #1
Have players replay content
at higher difficulty
Take something that already exists, duplicate it,
crank up the difficulty and add appropriate rewards
15. Can be played through three times,
on Normal, Hard and Hell difficulty
Duplicates the same event content 10 times,
by ramping up difficulty & rewards
Summoners War’s
Campaign
Marvel Strike Force
17. Candy Crush and Clash of Clans,
Get more mileage out of each game level by
incentivizing players to replay earlier levels to achieve
higher scores or more difficult goals
3-STAR
scoring system
incentivizes replay
of existing level content
19. DESIGN PATTERN #2
Reuse content,
with different rules / restrictions
Content can be repurposed by changing the rules so
the player is forced to alter her strategy and replay
20. RAID’s Faction Wars Feature
repurposes the same
campaign sixteen times,
with each instance
limiting hero selection
to one of the game’s
16 factions
RAID created a new, 21-level campaign,
then (effectively) duplicated it sixteen times
That’s sixteen campaigns for the price of one!
21. DESIGN PATTERN #3
Build an endless runway
of ‘meta’ goals that leverage,
stretch and re-use existing content
An achievements or progressive quest system allows
designers to churn out content with little effort
For high-ROI content ideas,
data-driven content is a great place to look!
22. A glorified Achievements System
Three independent, linear quest vectors
guide players through, and extend, the
base content
Merge Dragons
Fortnite’s Battle Pass
23. Immediate & longer-term rewards drive players to progress through,
and re-engage with (farm), existing content
RAID’s Progressive Quest System
24. DESIGN PATTERN #4
Create incentives for players
to repeatedly play (farm) existing content
Structure core gameplay and metagame incentives to encourage
playing the same content over and over
25. Players spend hours, weeks, months happily repeating
the same behaviors, over and over
Without the need
for additional content!
Pokemon GO
26. players repeatedly spin
the same slot machines to gain XP
and unlock later machines
Players repeat the same battles
to farm XP, currencies,
& equipment needed
for next milestone
RAID
Slots
progression arc
27. DESIGN PATTERN #5
Collection, Fusion Pyramid
Creates an exponential number of tasks for players to
complete, with very few game assets
first popularized by eastern, core-leaning character collector RPGs like
Summoners War, Epic Seven, RAID, and Idle Heroes
28. CCRPG FUSION PYRAMID
Building one, 6-star character requires collecting 720 1-star characters and leveling them up 3300 times:
Fusion pyramids
have undergone a casual
rebrand, by replacing
complex inventory systems
with more casual
merge mechanics
+ + + + +
Level 10
(Max)
Level 20
(Max)
Level 30
(Max)
Level 40
(Max)
Level 50
(Max)
Level 60
(Max)
29. The quintessential example; Merge three identical items
to produce one item, one step higher in the chain.
With just 10 art assets,
the chain pictured generates 310
or 59,000 tasks for players to perform.
Merge Dragons
30. DESIGN PATTERN #6
Extend existing level-up vectors,
or add new ones!
Adding level-up vectors to collectable items exponentially
increases player goals
If your game has characters, weapons, or other collectables that can be
leveled-up individually, increasing their level caps is an efficient way to increase
your content runway and spend depth
31. ~30
Levels
each
3 Abilities
each
~100 Cards
Roster Goals: 3,300
Grade: D
Client X
Comparing a recent client’s goal and spend depth to Empires & Puzzles:
The client’s game economy lacks dimensionality. Rather than adding more incremental cards or abilities, we could instead double
the level cap on cards, and add a level-up vector to each ability. The result: 4x as many goals to pursue, for relatively modest
development effort.
GOAL AND SPEND DEPTH
~260
Levels
each
20
Talent Tree
Nodes
each
8
Special
Ability
Levels
3
Ascensions
Roster Goals: 30,000+
Grade: B+
~100 Legendary Chars
Empires & Puzzles
”Can a player
spend $1M
in my game?”
?
VS.
32. ~260
Levels
each
20
Talent Tree
Nodes
each
8
Special
Ability
Levels
3
Ascensions
Roster Goals: 30,000+
~100 Legendary Chars
30
Levels
each
3 Abilities
each
~100 Cards
Roster Goals: 3,300
Client X Client X Empires & Puzzles
60
Levels
each 3 Abilities each
~100 Cards
Roster Goals: 15,000
30
Levels
each
With data and tuning changes only and no new content:
CAN BE TRANSFORMED INTO…
So, while lower effort than developing new cards, this could have 7x greater impact on goal depth and LTV.
33. How can you apply
these ideas right away?
What can we do
that could produce big results,
but costs little to try?
How can we multiply
what we already have,
before building something new?
OR
At your next roadmap review, just ask
34. Can I help your team?
80+F2P projects
Matthew Emery
Freelance Product Manager, Analyst
30+Clients
Schedule a call: calendly.com/appturbine/call
Connect on LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/matthewemery
35. matt@appturbine.co
www.appturbine.co
Thanks for reading!
If you enjoyed this, check out my recent series on “How to Fail in F2P Mobile Publishing”:
How to Fail in F2P Mobile Games, Part III: Nebulous Product Goals
How to Fail in F2P Mobile Games Publishing, Part II: Undisciplined Innovation
How to Fail in F2P Mobile Games Publishing, Part I: Start without a Business Case
