Monetization reports and market data
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Tactical Advice for Building Healthy Player Relationships
Modern game development is shifting away from broad user acquisition toward a retention-first strategy that prioritizes personalized, ritualized engagement.
- Studios are shifting from broad user acquisition to a retention-first model that uses AI and machine learning to automate player segmentation and personalize in-game offers.
- Rising user acquisition costs due to privacy shifts are forcing developers to prioritize first-party data to deepen engagement and sustain long-term player relationships.
- AI-driven moderation tools and automated guardrails are now essential for managing user-generated content and maintaining game integrity at scale.
Privacy vs. Ad Monetization with Google's Ross Brockman and Kwalee's John Wright
The mobile advertising industry is undergoing a fundamental structural transition, moving away from legacy waterfall ad-buying models toward real-time bidding (RTB) systems.
- The mobile advertising industry is shifting from legacy waterfall models to real-time bidding (RTB) systems to reduce latency and increase market efficiency.
- Developers should anticipate a manageable 10% to 20% decline in ad revenue throughout 2024 as the ecosystem adjusts to ongoing privacy-centric mandates.
- To maintain access to personalized ad demand, developers must implement standardized consent management platforms in response to EU and UK regulatory pressures and Apple’s App Tracking Transparency.
India’s Gaming Revolution, Opportunities & Challenges, Vamil Doshi, Nazara.
The Indian gaming market represents a rapidly expanding sector, characterized by a massive user base and significant growth potential for international developers.
- The Indian gaming market reached 568 million gamers in 2023 and is projected to grow from $3.1 billion in FY23 to $7.5 billion by 2028, representing a 20% CAGR.
- India is the world's second-largest market for game downloads, recording 15.4 billion downloads in 2023, with 66% of the gaming population now residing in tier 2 and tier 3 cities.
- Monetization is shifting toward mobile casual games, with 25% of Indian gamers now making in-app purchases and the average revenue per paying user (ARPPU) growing 10x between FY19 and FY23.
Drive Profitable Business Growth With Meta’s app ads & Audience Network, Toby Wilkins.
Meta’s strategy for driving profitable growth for app developers centers on three pillars: optimizing user acquisition through AI-driven automation, improving attribution accuracy, and evolving monetization capabilities within the Audience Network.
- Meta has removed campaign limits for Advantage Plus app campaigns, allowing for unlimited creation to support high-liquidity, AI-driven performance optimization.
- The Meta Install Referrer for Android, which integrates with all major mobile measurement partners (MMPs), has demonstrated a 20% increase in attributed conversions by capturing edge cases missed by Google Play's standard referrer.
- Meta is transitioning toward privacy-resilient ad serving solutions for iOS and Android (via Google Privacy Sandbox) to move away from the traditional one-to-one user match requirement.
The D2C Iceberg: How top Games hit Record Profits Despite the ATT Crash (And how you can Too).
The gaming industry is currently undergoing a structural shift toward direct-to-consumer (DTC) models as developers seek to bypass the limitations and costs associated with traditional third-party app stores.
- Top-tier developers are bypassing 30% platform fees and mitigating the impact of Apple’s App Tracking Transparency (ATT) by shifting toward proprietary direct-to-consumer (DTC) web shops.
- Huuuge demonstrated the efficacy of this model by increasing its DTC revenue from 3% to 10% of its total intake in 2023, enabling record profits despite an overall decline in revenue.
- Major publishers including Scopely, Krafton, Tencent, Rovio, and Playtika have adopted web-based distribution to reclaim margins and gain ownership of first-party customer data.
Seizing the First Party Data Opportunity in Mobile Games Advertising, Fernando Pernica, Nefta.
The mobile gaming industry is currently navigating a challenging transition into a privacy-first era, characterized by stringent regulations and the widespread adoption of opt-out mechanisms.
- The mobile gaming industry has seen a 35% decline in in-app purchase revenue following the implementation of recent privacy-first regulations and opt-out mechanisms.
- The loss of traditional identifiers has caused significant drops in advertising revenue and eCPMs, forcing advertisers to struggle with effective user targeting.
- Large industry conglomerates are responding to privacy shifts by creating siloed, opaque data environments that prioritize their internal optimization over publisher transparency.
Insights on Live Event Frameworks, Ivy Zhou, GameRefinery (A Liftoff Company).
The live event landscape in the mobile and HD gaming industry has evolved into a highly competitive environment where player engagement is driven by sophisticated, data-informed frameworks rather than sheer development volume.
- Live operations success now depends on data-informed, recurring event frameworks rather than high-volume content production, as players increasingly abandon games that lack active engagement schedules.
- Puzzle games optimize retention by aligning with gender-based preferences, specifically utilizing a weekly cadence that alternates weekday one-on-one competition with weekend guild-based cooperative tasks.
- Mid-core titles, such as Call of Duty: Mobile, drive monetization by leveraging intense competition and character progression, effectively positioning the game as a high-fashion platform through interconnected cosmetic reward cycles.
Fireside Chat: Great User Experiences vs. Successful Monetization: Perspectives From Industry Vets.
This discussion explores the tension between delivering high-quality user experiences and implementing effective monetization strategies within the mobile gaming industry.
- The core mobile game business equation is LTV (lifetime value) > effective CPI (cost per install), and if this flywheel falls out of balance for any user cohort, the game's commercial viability fails.
- Successful game development requires building mechanics that fit the monetization model from the start, such as optimizing for turn frequency in asynchronous games or transaction velocity in strategy titles.
- Engineering stability metrics, such as ANRs (Application Not Responding) and crash rates, are critical KPIs that directly impact user retention and store rankings; poor performance can lead to immediate user loss and negative reviews.
AI is helping drive game monetization, player retention and UA for Games. John Kavanagh, Scuti.
Scuti provides a rewarded g-commerce platform designed to enhance game monetization, player retention, and user acquisition by integrating a non-intrusive, Amazon-like shopping experience directly into game lobbies.
- Scuti provides a g-commerce platform that integrates an Amazon-like shopping experience into game lobbies, allowing players to purchase physical goods and branded in-game packs without interrupting gameplay.
- The platform currently supports over 120 games and is projected to reach 150 million players by the end of the year.
- AI-driven analysis of player spending habits and demographics enables personalized product recommendations, helping developers monetize non-spending players and increase overall user lifetime value.
How to Advertise Hybrid-Casual Games in 2024
The hybrid-casual gaming sector has emerged as a strategic evolution for developers transitioning from hyper-casual models, which often suffer from low lifetime value (LTV) and retention challenges.
- Hybrid-casual games should target a revenue split of 40% to 50% from in-app purchases (IAPs), with the remainder derived from in-app advertising to balance monetization between spenders and casual players.
- Success metrics have shifted from hyper-casual CPI benchmarks to long-term ROAS and LTV, with day-30 and day-60 ROAS serving as the primary indicators of sustainability.
- The Asia-Pacific region is projected to dominate the market, accounting for approximately 64% of total ad spend revenue in 2024.
AFK Journey: A Highly Polished & Innovative RPG Game, captivating storytelling with stunning visuals
AFK Journey represents a significant evolution in the idle RPG genre, building upon the foundation of its predecessor, AFK Arena, to capture a substantial global audience.
- AFK Journey generates approximately $1 million in daily mobile revenue, demonstrating the commercial viability of high-production idle RPGs in Tier-1 markets like the United States and France.
- The game utilizes a resonance leveling mechanic and simplified equipment structure to eliminate inventory management friction, successfully bridging the gap between mobile accessibility and PC-level depth.
- A cross-platform strategy featuring a dedicated PC client and a web-based monetization ecosystem serves as a core pillar for the game's user retention and revenue scaling.
Kress's Corner with Second Dinner's Matt Wyble, the creators of Marvel Snap
The success of Marvel Snap stems from an inside-out development philosophy that prioritizes polished, moment-to-moment gameplay before integrating meta-progression and monetization.
- Second Dinner is scaling operations following a $100 million funding round to support the long-term growth of Marvel Snap, including expansion into the Chinese market and enhanced PC support.
- The studio is shifting its development strategy from a core-gameplay-first approach to a more robust, proactive live-service model to avoid post-release operational strain.
- Artificial intelligence is being deployed as a productivity multiplier for tasks like code review, balance testing, and data analysis rather than as a cost-cutting tool.