5 tips for indie game success, from indie game developers

Posted by Sarah Thomson, BD Partnerships Lead, Indies, Google Play
Games




Mobile gaming is a fun place to be right now. It's a landscape seeing tremendous
success year after year with great potential for additional growth and
innovation. It's also a space where developers can express themselves with
creative game styles, mechanics, design and more. This is what the indie
community does best.




Here are 5 tips for indies by indies, shared by our gaming partners at 505
Games, About
Fun, Disruptor
Beam, Klei
Entertainment, and Schell
Games.

1. Embrace being indie

Indies are inherently smaller operations and should embrace their agility and
ability to take risks. Petr Vodak, CEO at About
Fun, recommends getting your product out there so you can
start taking feedback and apply your learnings to future projects. Don't be
afraid to fail! Remaining flexible and building in modularity so you can evolve
with the business needs is a strategy embraced by Pete Arden, CMO at Disruptor
Beam. For instance, with their game Star Trek Timelines, the initial user
experience was tailored to avid Star Trek fans. Over time, as user acquisition
costs increased, they've changed the new player experience to appeal to their
evolving user base of gamers looking for a fun entertainment experience and less
the specific Star Trek IP.

2. Find a way to stand out

To help stand out in the ultra competitive mobile space, Jesse Schell, CEO of Schell
Games, recommends doing something clever or very different. This strategy
has led them to explore the growth areas of new platforms such as AR & VR. While
new platforms present a field for opportunity and creativity, they're best to be
approached with the long term in mind allowing you to sustain the business until
critical mass is reached.

3. Build a community

There are many ways to build communities. If you have an existing fan base on
other platforms, cross-promote to drive awareness of your mobile offerings. You
can also look at porting titles over, but be aware of the differences in mobile
gaming habits and ensure you adapt your game accordingly.

4. Engage after install

Both 505
Games and Klei
Entertainment recommend running your premium titles as a service. Through
monitoring user reviews you can gain invaluable feedback and trends helping you
better understand user pain points and desires. In addition, by releasing
regular content updates and in-game events you create reason for users to get
back in the game. This not only drives reengagement, but 505 Games also sees
strong spikes in new installs aligned with major game updates.

5. Monetize in different ways

Similar strategy to above, dropping regular content refreshes and game updates
while offering a variety of monetization options gives users more ways to engage
with your game. Keeping your games fresh gives users reason to come back and
builds loyalty so you can cross-promote to your users with future game launches.




If you're looking for a fun new game to play, check out the great selection on
Indie
Corner on Google Play. And if you're working on a new indie game of your
own, nominate your title for
inclusion.




Watch
more sessions from Google Developer Day at GDC17 on the Android Developers
YouTube channel to learn tips for success. Visit the Android Developers website
to stay up-to-date with features and best practices that will help you grow a
successful business on Google Play.

How useful did you find this blogpost?

? ? ? ? ?

5 tips for building communities on mobile

Posted by Dave Geffon, Partnerships Manager, Google Play Games




The most successful games usually have the strongest communities. They are a
powerful force in driving additional engagement and increasing awareness for
your titles. At GDC 2017, we spoke with a few game developers about best
practices for successfully building their own communities. Watch the panel
session below to hear advice from Seriously,
Social
Point, and Super
Evil MegaCorp.

1. Be authentic

Community is a mindset; be honest, transparent & patient with
your communications. Loyal users are extremely valuable, thus the folks at Super
Evil Megacorp say that you should act like you have to earn every player.



2. Start small

Build a plan and start today. Launch your social media
channels, look into influencers, and create a strategy. Whether it's sharing one
piece of fan art a week across your network, or running a closed beta to gather
feedback from your most valued users, take action and learn what works best for
you and your users.

3. Play match-maker

When finding influencers to support your game, ensure
they're a genuine match. Make sure the influencer's audience is a good fit with
your game and existing community.

4. Seek feedback 

Communities are passionate. Use feedback to understand what
kind of game and features your users want. Be flexible and iterative so you can
react and evolve your game with the needs and desires of your community.
However, don't be afraid to stay true to what you stand for as sometimes you'll
need to agree to disagree with some players.

5. Build for the long-term

The lifespan of games is continuing to grow. Plan
your business strategy, update cycles and community efforts to roll out over
time and expand with your growing experiences and user-base.

Watch
more sessions from Google Developer Day at GDC17 on the Android Developers
YT channel to learn tips for success. Also, visit the Android Developers website
to stay up-to-date with features and best practices that will help you grow a
successful business on Google Play.

How useful did you find this blogpost?

? ? ? ? ?

        

5 tips for launching successful apps and games on Google Play

Posted by Adam Gutterman, Go-To-Market Strategic Lead, Google Play
Games




Last month at the Game Developers Conference (GDC), we held a developer panel
focused on sharing best practices for building successful app and game
businesses. Check out 5 tips for developers, both large and small, as shared by
our gaming partners at Electronic
Arts (EA), Hutch
Games, Nix
Hydra, Space Ape
Games and Omnidrone.

1. Test, test, test

The best time to test, is before you launch; so test boldly and test a lot! Nix
Hydra recommends testing creative, including art style and messaging, as well as
gameplay mechanics, onboarding flows and anything else you're not sure about.
Gathering feedback from real users in advance of launching can highlight what's
working and what can be improved to ensure your game's in the best shape
possible at launch.

2. Store listing experiments

Run experiments on all of your store listing page assets. Taking bold risks
instead of making assumptions allows you to see the impact of different
variables with your actual user base on Google Play. Test in different regions
to ensure your store listing page is optimized for each major market, as they
often perform differently.



3. Early Access program



Space Ape Games recently used Early Access to test different onboarding
experiences and gameplay control methods in their game. Finding the right
combination led them to double-digit growth in D1 retention. Gathering these
results in advance of launch helped the team fine tune and polish the game,
minimizing risk before releasing to the masses.

"Early Access is cool because you can ask the big questions and get real
answers from real players," Joe Raeburn, Founding Product Guy at Space Ape
Games.

Watch the Android Developer Story below to hear how Omnidrone benefits from
Early Access using strong user feedback to improve retention, engagement and
monetization in their game.

Mobile game developer Omnidrone benefits from Early Access.

4. Pre-registration



Electronic Arts has run more than 5 pre-registration campaigns on Google Play.
Pre-registration allows them to start marketing and build awareness for titles
with a clear call-to-action before launch. This gives them a running start on
launch day having built a group of users to activate upon the game's release
resulting in a jump in D1 installs.



5. Seek feedback



All partners strongly recommended seeking feedback early and often. Feedback
tells both sides of the story, by pointing out what's broken as well as what
you're doing right. Find the right time and channels to request feedback,
whether they be in-game, social, email, or even through reading and responding
to reviews
within the Google Play store.




If you're a startup who has an upcoming launch on Google Play or has launched an
app or game recently and you're interested in opportunities like Early Access
and pre-registration, get
in touch with us so we can work with you.




Watch
sessions from Google Developer Day at GDC17 on the Android Developers YT
channel to learn tips for success. Also, visit the Android Developers website to
stay up-to-date with features and best practices that will help you grow a
successful business on Google Play.

How useful did you find this blogpost?

? ? ? ? ?