Pocket Gems: how to extend the life of a mobile game?
Last week Pocket Gems celebrated the birthday of its leading title – time manager Tap Paradise Cove. In honor of this event, the CEO of the company Ben Liu shared the secrets of the success of the project on the pages of Gamasutra.
According to Liu, at the time of the release of Tap Paradise Cove in 2012, the average life expectancy of a mobile game was no more than one month. And this is at best. The experience of Tap Paradise Cove support, in turn, led the developers to a rather banal idea: if the players like the project, and the developers do not give up its active support, the game can live for years. And, accordingly, to earn throughout his entire life. Tap Paradise Cove was in the box office top 50 in the American App Store for 100 weeks.
Pay attention to the number of updatesThe team achieved such results because it was growing (both quantitatively and professionally), and also regularly added not only new content to the game, but also new features, and even new game mechanics.
As for specific tips.
1. Release updates regularly
Successful mobile games are constantly evolving ecosystems. It’s not enough to release the game and then sit back and watch her life. Developers must be constantly engaged in the project in order to retain their player.
According to Liu, they have released about 300 updates for Campus Life alone.
The more often the pictures in the game are updated, the more characters appear in it, the better. Also, a great way to increase interest in the game from those users who have “cooled down” a little is to add side tasks (of course, this is primarily about time-managers).
Using old assets in an unexpected way also works great, as well as adding custom works to the game.
But we need to App2Top.ru it seemed the main thing was something else. Liu noted that Pocket Gems has created a technology that allows you to “easily and quickly” change variables and assets in the game.
2. Constantly update the list of features
A mobile game developer should understand that the launch day is the “first day” of game development. And it’s not just about the content. Users may get tired of the usual gameplay, so that this does not happen, it is necessary to constantly dilute it with new features.
A few months after the launch of Tap Paradise Cove, the developers added a new game mechanic in which pirates attacked the player’s city (they besiege the settlement until the player returns to the game). A month later, based on this mechanics, they added PvP. As a result, the project has become much deeper.
3. Don’t forget about social mechanics
Every successful mobile project has one or another “social body kit”. In each particular case, it is thoroughly worked out. And according to Pocket Gems, it is the toolkit for interacting players with each other that is one of the key ones in modern mobile games today. Only we are not talking about “push” and messages, but about direct contact of players with each other. The appearance of PvP in Tap Paradise Cove, as Liu assures, seriously affected the level of engagement.
4. Increase the game cycle
It seems to us that Ben Liu was the first to say that in order to maintain success, it is necessary to constantly expand the game cycle.
According to him, Tap Paradise Cove was a casual game at the time of release. Today it is, to a greater extent, a midcore project.
The guys introduced a large number of new components into the game cycle. In the current version, the player can not only build buildings and collect resources, but also create items, go hiking, fight pirates and much, much more. Thanks to the innovations, users not only do not quit playing, but also the length of their sessions is growing.
As Liu notes, it is much easier and cheaper to retain already involved players than to get new ones. Increasing the game cycle is one of the best ways to save them.
5. Talk to the players
Community management is considered one of the most important aspects in running a mobile game in Pocket Gems. It is necessary to constantly listen to the players, build on their feedback for the implementation of new game features and, of course, further retention of users.
Original: http://gamasutra.com
