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Author profile
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Sarah Impey
Content Creator at GameAnalytics
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9 min read
#Guides
5 Steps to Building Discord Community
Building a community for your games is crucial to getting new players and keeping them loyal. And Discord is now the number one place to go. But how can you get the most out of this social media platform? Hereโs our guide.
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8 min read
#Game Deconstructions
Behind Lifelineโs Success: An Interview with 3 Minute Games
Lifeline was one of the first mobile games to use push notifications as a core mechanic for their game, which led them to over a million downloads and seven sequels. But what was the secret sauce that led to such success? We spoke with Mars Jokela โ Lifelineโs game designer โ and Dave Justus โ the writer behind the scenes โ to ask them what advice they had for other developers and what it was about Lifeline that worked.
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6 min read
#Game Deconstructions
Exploring Sugartown: Zyngaโs NFT-Powered Universe
As Zynga releases their first Web3 game โ Sugartown. Rather than in-app purchases or advertising, the game would rely on players buying, trading (and potentially earning) assets. Here's everything we know, and what it means for you.
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8 min read
#Game Design
Kid-Focused Design: The Secret to Engaging 750M Young Gamers
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. So what's the secret behind their success? Here's what we know.
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8 min read
#Strategies
Adapting to the changing games market: a Zynga spotlight
Every company has its ups and downs. But itโs how they regroup that matters. And Zynga is no different. so we thought weโd dive into what they did and how they came out the other side as one of the most successful mobile gaming companies in the world.
We dive into Zyngaโs strategy and how they recovered from losing half their revenue to rise back to $720 million a quarter.
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7 min read
#Game Deconstructions
How Tennis Clash scored a golden set
Tennis Clash was one of the most downloaded mobile games in 78 countries when it launched. And itโs had over 50 million downloads on Google Play alone. We look into some of the key factors of its success.
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6 min read
#Ads & Monetization
2023 will be the year of Hybrid Monetization
Many game studios have relied solely on a single strategy โ typically advertising โ to make their money. But as times change, weโve seen a shift in the market. Hybrid monetization might not be new, but itโs now more than ever becoming an essential tactic for game studios. So whatโs caused this trend? And how will it affect the industry throughout 2023?
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11 min read
#Game Design
Among Us VR dev talks about how to create immersive worlds
VR is all about immersion. Itโs about allowing players to lose themselves in more than just a game, but a new world. You have to build VR experiences the right way to make this happen. This goal is always top-of-mind for Schell Games. In this interview, we spoke to Schell Gamesโ Vice President of Product, Charlie Amis, to learn their story. โFor VR, you want to make the player feel like theyโre actually in the world youโve created. This isnโt as true or a high priority in PC and console games. If people start to lose that sense of presence and immersion, then a lot of the reason they put the headset on is hurt. They want to go to another world or be someone new. So you need to help them feel like theyโre really there and really that...
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10 min read
#Game Design
How to build successful VR games as a solo developer
Building video games has never been a simple task. You can have a brilliant idea for a game, but without the right skills, tools and resources, it can be near-impossible to tackle by yourself. Especially if we consider something as complicated and new as virtual reality. Not that this stopped Sergio Hidalgo. Being a one-man studio, Sergio managed to produce, release, and publish two successful VR titles. His first title, Dreadhalls, sold up to 250,000 units worldwide, and hit over 60,000 concurrent viewers on Twitch. (For comparison, Team Fortress 2โs highest was around 80,000.) While Cosmodread has had approximately 25,000 players on Steam alone. So to get his advice and learn his secrets, we sat down to hear his story and journey as a solo-game developer. Hereโs what he had to say. 1. You donโt have to have it all...
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6 min read
#Game Design
Splitting Point: how Field Trip Z got 45M players on Roblox this year
We recently spoke with Janzen Madsen, founder at Splitting Point Studios, to get his perspective on how to develop a hit on Roblox. Splitting Point has created multiple experiences, including Field Trip Z which this year alone saw more than 45M unique players. Janzen is intimately familiar with what makes a Roblox experience a success. Roblox is an absolutely massive platform, with over 32 million experiences and 52 million active users. But making a game there is unlike making a game anywhere else. Itโs much faster paced, the audience is much younger, and itโs much more tricky to design. The typical principles you might expect are quite different. 1. Donโt make it like a mobile game โOften, developers coming from the mobile gaming industry will assume that they can replicate their success by rebuilding their games on Roblox. This just...
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7 min read
#Game Deconstructions
Top gamification examples in mobile apps
We learn by playing. When we enter the world, weโre full of curiosity, and play has always been at the centre of how we satisfy that curiosity. Sadly, itโs beaten out of us when we go to school, and taking tests suddenly becomes a chore. But it doesnโt have to be. Itโs possible to learn while having fun. In fact, thatโs exactly what some apps are doing. And itโs working. Games are the most popular genre on the app store. Theyโre masters in the art of keeping users engaged and happy. So how can we learn from them? What is gamification? Youโve probably heard the term โgamificationโ before. But if you havenโt, itโs the act of taking gaming elements and mechanics and applying them to your non-gaming app. Often to ramp up retention and engagement. And it works. If we...
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6 min read
#Game Design
Reaching a +40M playerbase: advice from Trihex Studios
Unless youโve been living under a rock for the last few years, youโve probably heard of Roblox. Itโs a gaming platform with over 30 million games โ which they call experiences โ 52 million daily active users (DAU) and 12 million creators at the time of writing. One of the keys to its success is that it makes it exceptionally easy to create and release games on its platform. We spoke with Tae Kim and Eric Park, co-founders of Trihex Studios and the minds behind Redcliff City โ one of the most popular titles on Roblox which has, this year alone, amassed a community of more than 40 million unique players. During our conversation, we asked them what mobile developers could learn from Roblox and how they could make the move over to the platform. Hereโs their advice. First up,...
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7 min read
#Game Deconstructions
6 games that successfully layer in meta mechanics
As weโve mentioned before, the hyper-casual market is being forced to change. With more competition, higher CPIs and tightening margins, developers need to increase their retention if theyโre going to continue making money, now more than ever. And to do that, they must layer more mechanics and elements into their games. Weโve explored how and why developers can โ and should โ shift from hyper-casual to hybrid-casual. But if youโre still struggling to see how that might be possible, letโs look at a few games that have used meta mechanics to make their game more engaging. Here are six games that have a short, simple and satisfying core loop, but have layered in meta features to increase their retention. Letโs dive in. 1. Archero: How to add progression systems well Developed by Habby, released 24th March 2019. This was one...