A F2P Monetization Presentation and Clicker Heroes Case Study given by David P. Chiu at Game Connection Europe 2015. This presentation includes best practices, stats and learnings for F2P mobile and browser games targeted at a midcore gamer audience.

1. Stats, Best Practices and
Common Mistakes for F2P Core Gamers
David P. Chiu
Vice President

2. Who Am I?
• 5+ years at Intel in Gaming Developer Relations & Business Development,
Gaming Consumer Marketing and Campaign Strategy
• Former Senior Director of Business Development and Developer Relations
at Kongregate heading BD worldwide for Kong web and mobile
• Worked with hundreds of developers on F2P games
• Currently Vice President of R2 Games USA

3. Reality Squared Games
• R2Games is a leading international publisher of free-to-
play browser and mobile games for core gamers
• Games includes hits like Wartune, League of Angels,
Blade Hunter, Dragon Pals and Monkey King Online.
• R2Games.com is a leading platform for F2P games serving
40M+ users in 8 different languages worldwide
• #1 publisher on Kongregate.com, Kabam.com and many
other platforms

4. Reality Squared Games
• One of the fastest growing online game companies
• May 2010 – Reality Squared is founded
• Sept 2011 – 1st exclusive game Crystal Saga launches in
NAR, USD$1M in 1st quarter
• Aug 2012 – R2 publishes Wartune in NAR, breaking $1.5M in
its first quarter and $7M in its 2nd quarter
• 300+ employees with offices in Hong Kong, Shanghai,
Shenzhen, Seoul and the San Francisco Bay Area
• CEO Jared Psigoda named 2014 Forbes China 30 Under 30

5. R2 Games Portfolio

6. • Asian F2P games have much higher ARPPUs versus Western F2P games
• What can a Western developer learn from the Asian F2P games to improve their monetization?
• Remember that F2P was born in Korea
• And perfected in China (and quickly became the dominant biz model due to piracy)
Last talk at GC: Asian F2P vs Western F2P

7. • I can now tell you that the giant bubble on the top right
is a Chinese MMO game called Wartune, published on
Kongregate.com by R2Games
• 25+ months since Wartune launch and still going strong
• ARPPU has increased to $533 (11/6/2014)
• Why is Wartune so successful?
Graph From Last Talk
R2Games

8. Source: Kongregate
Long Term Retention Matters

9. • The more someone plays a game, they more likely they are to convert from a player to a buyer.
• Becomes a hobby and most committed fans can choose to spend
• Real world example: You can watch baseball for free on TV but hardcore fans choose to spend money on tickets
Long Term Retention Matters
Wartune Lifetime % Buyers by Monthly Cohort

10. • The more someone plays a game, the more they spend
• More time = More transactions
Long Term Retention Matters
Wartune Lifetime ARPPU by Monthly Cohort

11. • Therefore, user LTV increases with time
Long Term Retention Matters
Wartune ARPU or User LTV by Monthly Cohort

12. Majority of Spending Comes From Most Committed Players (Wartune)

13. Best Practices from Wartune and
Asian F2P Design for Increasing Retention

14. • MMORPG with turn-based battles, city-building and isometric-perspective exploration
• Top grossing game in China before making it to the West
Wartune Quick Intro

15. • Solo and team PvE
• Solo and team PvP
• Asynch raids
• Guild battles
• World boss raids
• Farming
• Fishing
• City Building
• Weapon/Gear
• Synthesizing & Upgrading
• Astral Collecting and
• Combining
• Etc.
Pace the introduction of new features/gameplay modes to not overwhelm players with a long and intimidating tutorial.
Keep Players Busy!
More things to do = more players staying

16. • Simple Daily Tasks to earn rewards
• Scheduled Limited Time Events
• Daily Quests
Keep Players Busy!
More things to do = more players staying

17. • Daily play bonuses are good to get users coming back regularly
• But improve on the typical 5-7 day daily bonuses
• Wartune players get a stamp for every day of the month they play the game
• Rewards for playing 2 days up to 26 days
• Incentivizes longer term play
• Doesn’t “punish” players for missing a day
Keep Them Coming Back

18. Keep Players Busy!
Mini games with additional free plays each day to earn rewards

19. • The foundations of a F2P game are a strong RPG elements and a sense of progress over time
• Building up account, leveling up, adding/improves skills and stats, etc
• Deep RPG mechanics and multiplayer matter:
• 25x ARPU for Multiplayer RPG vs Single Player non-RPG!
Data From Last GC Talk
Type % 50+ Plays % Buyers ARPPU ARPU
Multiplayer RPG 2.6% 0.75% $69 $0.51
Multiplayer Non-RPG 1.0% 0.45% $9 $0.05
Single-player RPG 1.8% 1.29% $12 $0.10
Single-Player Non-RPG 0.2% 0.53% $4 $0.02

20. • Motivate players to get to the next milestone
• Leveling up unlocks features, content, rewards
• Positive reinforcement for progressing
Aim for the Stars

21. • Character level provides a sense of progress
• But also give players ways to measure their strength
à Wartune’s Battle Rating
Aim for the Stars

22. • And tap into their sense of competition
• Leaderboards for everything
Aim for the Stars
• Lifetime, daily gain and weekly gain
• So players can compete in many ways

23. Best Practices from Wartune
and Asian F2P Design for Increasing Monetization

24. Depth of Spend
• The longer someone plays your game the more likely they are to buy and
the less price sensitive they become
• Give committed players the ability to spend at $1,000+ if they want
• Have lots of items that are appealing and useful to all players from
beginners to elder players who have played for months or years
• Unlock new items to buy as players level up
• But must also create reasons to want the elder items
• Don’t create a situation where spending is capped by availability or utility.

25. • Location, location, location – make the store easy to find!
• Show balance of hard currency (Balens)
• Shortcut to buy more (Recharge button)
• Make it easy to find the what you want
o Meaningful categories and item descriptions
o No massive scroll bars
Make the Shopping and Buying Experience as Frictionless as Possible

26. • Bonuses % or/and items for larger hard currency
packages
• Clearly call out bonuses of larger packages!
• Make all packages visible in one page for easy
comparisons (no scroll bars)
• Hide large packages until after first purchase
Buy Currency Screen

27. • First time buyer/ Starter packages
• Seed players with some paid/hard currency and guide “intro
purchase”
• Deals/events to get people into the habit of spending regularly
• Offer items that enhance the gameplay experience (not just
speedups)
Make the Shopping Experience Interesting
• Intro the right items at the right time
• Lvl 1 players should not be shown the lvl 100+ holy sword
that’s on sale for $100)
• Keep them coming back – keep store fresh by adding new items,
unlocking items as players level up and featuring seasonal and time-
limited items/ sales

28. Create Sense of Urgency

29. Other DO’s and DON’T’s

30. Timing is Everything: Server Times
• F2P: games-as-a-service with players all over the world in different time zones
• Don’t let players wondering what time zone the game is in
• Specify time zones or set a server time and have it be visible so there is no confusion leading players to miss events/sales
• Minimizes confusion and player frustration
• Bar on top of all of R2’s games clearly lists:
• The server time
• The next event’s start time and a countdown to it

31. Timing is Everything: Server Time Zones
• DON’T do separate servers if your CCUs are too low
• DO ensure the CCUs are high enough for competition, and merger servers if needed
• DO have at least 2 instances of an event if you do not split servers by time zone
• For event-centric games, consider separate servers by time zone
Wartune (English) servers
• DON’T forget to make adjustments for Daylight Saving
Time changes

32. • Events drive up player engagement
• Schedule events during periods of highest CCU
• For core gamers, primetime is in evenings and weekends
Timing is Everything: Primetime
Monkey King Online PCU by day

33. Keeping the Balance
• Have a robust matchmaking algorithm
• Prevent elder players and big spenders from slaughtering new players
• Offer protection time or shields after getting attack

34. Why is it Important to Understand F2P?

35. The Mobile Landscape
• F2P is the dominant business model
- iOS Top 50 Grossing Charts has 1 paid game (Minecraft)
- iOS Top 100 Grossing Charts has 2 paid games
• Players used to downloading free games now
• Free games offer minimal barrier to entry and yield
much higher download rates

36. Mobile F2P vs Paid
• Threes was an original puzzle game priced at $1.99
• 2048 was a copy of a clone of a clone of Threes and was free
• Threes found moderate success while 2048 became a
worldwide phenomenon
Creator of Threes:

37. Mobile F2P vs Paid
• Difficult for paid games to compete with free games
• And F2P is complex
• Takes time and live servicing a F2P game to really learn
• Particularly difficult if you are used to making paid games
instead of games-as-a-service

38. Mobiel User Acquisition is Expensive
• Need solid grasp of F2P to have high monetizing game
• Need a lot of capital to do paid UA

39. App Store Features are Incredibly Powerful
• Minor feature: 10k to 100k+ installs
• Medium feature: 100k-500k+ installs
• Major feature: 500k to 2M+ installs
***For F2P games, not paid

40. Best App Store Features Are Hard to Get
# of Apps 1.96M
Approx. # of apps each week ~9k
# of Games 439k
Approx. # of games each week ~3k
Promo slots of new games 16

41. The Mobile Landscape
• Mobile distribution is very challenging
• Competition is fierce:
o 283k existing games and thousands
new games each week
• App store features are hard to get
• Viral hits are rare (Flappy Bird)
• User acquisition is expensive
• Can lower CPIs with big IP (also costly)

42. Self-Publish?
Evaluate your game and team:
• What are your goals for the game and studio?
• Does your team understand F2P?
• Do I have the key talent to do a F2P game?
• Do you have enough runway to learn F2P and iterate game in test markets?
• Do you have enough capital for paid UA?

43. Is a Publisher Right For Me?
• How can a publisher help me?
• Allow you to focus on the game while they handle:
• Marketing (screenshots, ads, videos, ASO, split tests, PR, etc)
• App store relations and featuring
• Analytics
• Customer Service and Community Management
• Functional QA Testing
• Localization and localization QA, etc.
• Royalty advances to help you finish the game (not all publishers do this)
• Or/and provide marketing guarantees (not all publishers do this)
• May help negotiate and secure IP for the game

44. Is a Publisher Right For Me?
Evaluate the publisher:
• Are your goals and interests aligned?
• Are they putting some skin behind the game (advances, marketing,
resources for localization, QA, analytics, etc)?
• Potential for long term partnership (e.g. strategic investments)
• Do they understand F2P and have a track record of success?
• Do they have the right talent at the company?
• Does the publisher have 1st party and 3rd party games?
• Does your game fit into their audience and portfolio (casual vs core)?

45. CLICKER HEROES
The idle RPG that started the subgenre!

46. Apple’s 10 Greatest Clickers

47. HOW IT ALL GOT STARTED
• First game to combine idle and RPG mechanics
• Originally developed by developer Playsaurus as a PC browser game and it took
the internet by storm!
• Ported to Steam and became an instant hit!

48. GOING MOBILE
• Playsaurus partners with R2 Games for mobile version and all future platforms
• The mobile journey begins!

49. GOING MOBILE: CHALLENGES
• Clicker Heroes originally built as Flash game
• Convert to AIR for mobile
• PROBLEM: Vector art performs poorly on mobile processors
• SOLUTION: Use Dragonbones and covert to bitmaps
• PROBLEM: Few 3rd party SDKs support AIR (SDKs for attribution, analytics, push notif, etc)
• SOLUTION: Create custom AIR native extensions (ANE) and plug-ins and let the
developer focus on actual game development
• PROBLEM: Many clones launched on mobile before Clicker Heroes mobile even
started development
• SOLUTION: Improve the game experience and add new differentiating features
• PROBLEM: Many stolen copies on the app store and websites, especially in China
• SOLUTION: R2 Legal team in China took down all IP-infringing copies

50. GOING MOBILE: NEW MOBILE FEATURES
• FTUE
• Cloud Saves
• Rewarded video ads
• Mobile UI

51. GOING MOBILE: NEW MOBILE FEATURES
• Clans and clan-based battles against Immortals

52. GOING MOBILE: LOCALIZATION
• Clicker Heroes originally only in English
• Added language support for:
• French
• German
• Spanish
• Russia
• Portuguese
• Simplified Chinese
• Traditional Chinese

53. SOME LOCALIZATION TIPS
• Localization helps with app store featuring in non-English speaking countries
• Be aware of differences between
- Traditional vs Simplified Chinese
- Portugal vs Brazil Portuguese
- Spain Spanish versus Latin America Spanish
• BEWARE of bad translations when outsourced to external vendors versus in-house,
especially automated translations
• Be sure to do extensive Localization QA to make sure translated text fits into where
they are supposed to

54. SOME LOCALIZATION TIPS
• Examples of bad translations from another game:
- Heavy use of machine translation
- Incorrect grammar and spelling
- Lack of gender concordance
- Inappropriate translations

55. SOME LOCALIZATION TIPS
• It’s not just about translation/localization but also culturalization
- Jokes/puns, pop culture references, events/holidays, etc.
- Adjust UI
- Adjust Economy
- Adjust difficulty
• Avoid subpar translations/localization. Work with localization experts that are:
- Gamers that understand gaming lingo
- Native speakers of the target language
- Have played the game and translate in the context
• Fortunately, R2 has a localization team that handled all that

56. Featured by both Apple and Google App Stores
Clicker Heroes Global Launch
US Apple App Store
US Google Play

57. Clicker Heroes Global Launch
Featured in 122
countries by the Apple
App Store!
Russia France
Germany
UK Italy

58. Featured in
122 countries
by the Apple
App Store!
Clicker Heroes Global Launch

59. iOS Best of August
iOS What We’re Playing

60. Press Coverage

61. Top #1 Adventure Game!
Top #1 RPG!
Clicker Heroes Global Launch (iOS)

62. Clicker Heroes Global Launch (iOS)
Top #3 Downloaded Game on US iPhones!
Top #10 Downloaded App on US iPhones!

63. Clicker Heroes Global Launch (iOS)
Top #3 Downloaded Game on US iPhones
Top #104 Grossing Game on US iPhones

64. Clicker Heroes Global Launch (Google Play)
Top #4 Downloaded Game on Google Play (US)

65. Clicker Heroes Global Launch (Google Play)
Top Downloaded Game and App on Google Play!

66. Top #2 Downloaded RPG!
Top #34 Grossing RPG!
Clicker Heroes Global Launch (Google Play)

67. LEARNINGS
• Clicker Heroes has pretty crazy high retention #s
• Mobile vs web 30-day LTV: 3x
• High retention games are ideal for ads
• Rewarded video ads are a better UX vs. interstitials
• Find a good ad mediation partner with a robust real-time dashboard
• Good localization helped get great app store features in other countries
D1:  66.7%
D7:  42.8%
D14:  32.9%

68. Thank You
Questions?
david@r2games.com