Game Development Reference
In-Depth Information
In-App Purchases consist of stocks of consumable items that allow players to obtain
currencies to be spent in the game to perform actions. It can be time to quickly build
structures, currency to spend in gambling in a game, or mana to cast spells in a RPG
title.
While using IAP it is very important to gather as many statistics as possible about
your daily and monthly users, such as how many they are, how much time they
spend playing, how many times they play each day/each month, how much virtual
and real currency they spend every day/every month, and how much are they willing
to spend on a single purchase. You will use this data to constantly adjust prizes and
craft targeted offers to maximize revenue and players' engagement.
If you'd like to have your jaw drop as you read the revenues, Freemium games can
make it happen. We suggest you to read the following Forbes' article about Su-
percell's Clash of Clans at
http://www.forbes.com/sites/karstenstrauss/2013/04/18/
Ad supported
Ad supported games include several kinds of in-game advertising to be displayed
in the game. They range from banners constantly displayed on screen, right outside
of the gameplay area to interstitial videos of 15 to 30 seconds in length displayed
during breaks of the game (careful with these, they can have a strong detrimental
effect on users' retention!), to offer walls, which provide users with free contents in
exchange of taking actions, such as signing for a free trial of a different app or linking
the game to Facebook or Twitter.
Imangi Studios' Temple Run is an Ad supported game of success, though this busi-
ness model is generally used by utilities that are so essential that people need to
open them every day or which promote long session times.
Ad Supported business models work as they offer a way to monetize the majority of
users who usually don't pay, giving the opportunity to non-paying users to earn free
game contents and allow to cross-promote third parties' apps.
It's not uncommon that games feature advertising as part of a hybrid business model,
such as Freemium plus in-game Ads.
