F2P mobile games and keeping their players

We had 2 lecturers today, started with Mikko Lehto, senior game/UI/UX designer for Nitro games. We are once again talking about F2P games, but this time it's concentration on game designers POV. Our second lecturer was Jussi Tähtinen, CEO and co-founder of Nitro Games, who talked about F2P business model on mobile.

Here are some abbreviations I learned today:

KPI - Key performance indicator
DAU - Daily active user
MAU - monthly active users
D0 - First day of gameplay ("day 0")
D1 retention - what % player return on day two
D7 retention - what % players return on day 7
ARPDAU - Average revenue per daily active user
CPI - cost per install
LTV - Life time value

I don't necessarily use the now on my writing but I want to have them for later usage, and so I can remember them better.

It's important to remember your target audience, find out what is fun for them. This mean using data to find out what players find engaging. Looking at how long sessions the players have, how many active users you have and many more data. Player retention is very important of F2P games lifespan, it is usually something like day 1, 75%, day 7, 25%, day 30, 5%, so the % that stays for a month is likely the group that is going to stay.

These days it is also good to keep in mind that the game should be fun to watch, as there are streamers who might pick up the game and that could give it a lot of attention. Good example for this 2018 game Among Us, which just recently got hugely popular as popular streamers started streaming it.

My strip of potential bad and good first time experience

So how to keep players? For example, first time experience is a thing to invest in. The UI should be functional and good-looking, and good interface gives the player all information they need. If the player feels frustrated and doesn't feel like they can get better at the game they are not going to return. This doesn't mean that the game needs to be easy, but again remembering your target audience for the game you have. Player wants to feel progression, that they are getting better and are getting new items or something like playable areas. It's also a good thing to keep in mind session controls, if the player can access everything on their first playthrough they might burn themselves out of the game. 

For this purpose there are things called hard and soft session stoppers. Hard session stopper for example is using stamina for the gamer, they can't play further without paying for a stamina potion or waiting for a certain time. This isn't ideal way to control the session, and may make the player just frustrated. I think however that it works on visual novel games, where you use for example keys to read and you only have certain amount per day, and you can buy more keys to read if you so desire. Even so you need to use the data to see what is the perfect amount to keep the player interested to keep on going.

Soft session stopper is allowing the player to game as long as they want, but that they get less rewards (or none at all), and if they want to play efficiently, they will be more interested in taking breaks and continuing later when they can get better rewards.

Adding social events throughout the year can be a good way to keep the player coming back, specially if the player can obtain items they otherwise would not be able to get. 

Elder Scroll Online uses events to keep the players interested.

This Example isn't from mobile games, as I don't myself play them, but in a PC MMO called The Elder Scrolls Online, there are events that give buffs that give the player experience, and couple collect special currency per day to buy different items, for example armor styles and mounts. Usually during these events their store sells things that can only be bought then, and it is bought with real money. (well they have their own currency crowns, but you need to use real money to buy these).  I personally like this style, and they have made me comfortable buying more content to the game, and I am very stingy about my money.

Then we learned a bit about good monetization, again with this data is very useful, to look at data seeing how many players are paying users, and how many are second time purchasers. From this data you can see what works and what doesn't, and try different methods to improve monetization. 

Usually things you can buy should be items that give player convenience, rather than items being necessary to continue the game. If the system is play to win this can discourage the player from playing. Some people prefer paying rather than grinding for goods, but the grind should still be fun for the players who'd rather not pay, so in in the future if they invest a lot of time in this game they might be swayed to buy these. I personally need to be very invested in the game before I am even thinking about buying anything more, but I still would buy DLC, if I really like the game. Of course there are players who are more loose with their money, but it's important to try to get both of these players in the game. Well obviously, more the better. 

Then if player sees others wearing armor or skins that look amazing, they might be more inclined to purchase these cosmetics, battle passes or gacha boxes. I can relate to this, as whenever I see some cool armors or weapons I really much would like them. If I was rich I would have spent so much money on these.  

Battle pass is monetization mechanic that requires the player to play the game still. It is based on tiers, as you complete challenges and get experience you get to better tiers, and can earn things like player skins, that are not available to the other players, but they might be able to buy these later. 

In Overwatch you can earn loot boxes, and you can buy them

Then there are the controversial gacha systems, which resemble bit like gambling. We briefly went trough this topic, and it is something that works as a monetization system, but how moral it is to use is debatable. It is a system that is improving, hopefully it can become a system that is not exploitative.

I personally don't like loot crates (which I think count on gacha systems) unless they are free. I don't like to buy boxes wishing for a random drop, I'd rather pay more to buy the specific item in that case. In these it is possible for people to become addicted to this system, and it is not regulated well enough yet.

So main points were that you need to design based on your audience, and listen to the feedback, whether straight from player or data. F2P mobile gaming is something that is very alive and needs to have fast changes to get players and to keep them.

From all this, it is said that for creating a new F2P game about 80% is something borrowed and 20% is innovative.