two & a half gamers

This is no BS gaming podcast 2.5 gamers session #14. Discussing the latest news, fun stuff and dropping knowledge. Don't forget, this is a 4am conference discussion vibe so let's not take it too seriously! Let’s dive in and enjoy it. Panelists: Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Matej Lančarič Youtube: https://youtu.be/m8k9OhVghlw Agenda 4:40 Meta numbers 10:10 Rovio revenue increase & quarterly results 13:40 ATT numbers, player segmentation & ad monetisation 20:20 Is Ubisoft getting bought?  25:10 Activision numbers  31:30 How to read Ad mon data for beginners? How to look at the data? Applovin and iS don’t really have a good guide for how to use their platform as it’s not in their interests. So it’s not your fault you don’t know this, it's by design! They’re both great companies but the perfect client for MAX and iS is a dev who signs up and does nothing. This is a short guide for beginners on how to look at admon data. This presentation is for Applovin and I’ll do Ironsource another time. I actually have slides so for you listening I’ll try to narrate as best as I can. There’s 2 topics that I’d like to cover are “Advanced reporting” and “AB tests” with an extra bonus CYA topic on “Network Comparison” if we have time. Slides: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1KdQeSzYzi4Ty6yicYT1hh7HIcbQ8uqSOZwUT3MUWLOI/edit#slide=id.g11b4a57a28b_0_18 Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me / lancaric.me

This is no BS gaming podcast 2.5 gamers session #13. This week we’re starting a brand new segment! The Mobile Gaming Company Happy Hour where we do a deep dive on a mobile gaming company from the perspective of Game Design, UA and Ad Mon. Don't forget, this is a 4am conference discussion vibe so let's not take it too seriously! Let’s dive in and enjoy it. Panelists: Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Matej Lančarič Youtube: https://youtu.be/p-9ls_UOFPM Agenda 2:00 Intro 3:10 Topline information about Rovio 8:20 Game Design 16:00 Same game different IP 28:30 User Acquisition 31:00 Diversifying UA channels 43:00 AdROAS UA campaigns 44:25 Ad monetisation 45:00 LAT traffic 52:20 Brand lift studies 52:50 Best practices for pre-prompt ATT window 56:00 Takeaways & Summary Topline information about Rovio: 2021 Revenue Eur286.2 million that’s 5% up from 2020 but down 1% from 2019 Pretty flat revenue growth 2017 revenue (year went public) EUR297m 66% Revenue from USA, 21% from EMEA and 12% from Asia 80% IAP, 15% Ads, 3% Licensing deals, 2% other deals 5m Daily Active Users in 2021 Claiming a 93% global awareness of Angry birds “Put 10 people in a room and only 1 hasn’t heard of me. That’s probably the baby who doesn’t have the internet yet.” Rovio went public at around EUR11.80/share and is currently trading around EUR7.20/share which is up from about EUR5 in late 2021. MarCap is around EUR603 meaning that Rovio trades at about a 2.1x rev multiple. New Rovio CEO commits to making more acquisitions Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me / lancaric.me

This is no BS gaming podcast 2.5 gamers session #12. Discussing the latest news, fun stuff and dropping knowledge. Don't forget, this is a 4am conference discussion vibe so let's not take it too seriously! Let’s dive in and enjoy it. Panelists: Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Matej Lančarič Youtube: https://youtu.be/5eHUepqV_zE Agenda 2:50 Metacore 20 million TV ads & 65 millions loss in last year 11:30 Meta will charge creators fees of up to 47.5% (Animated Avarat cirkus) 16:00 US government says $600M Axie Infinity crypto-heist was pulled by North Korea 19:00 Peridot is an upcoming AR game from Niantic about breeding unique creatures 23:00 Sonic the Hedgehog is coming to a new platform: Roblox 27:20 CD Projekt Red's 2021 sales generated $207m in revenue 33:20 Industry Conference Guide Conferences went offline or no conference at all status during corona. What was the value of offline conferences? Did you attend any? Did you get any value? Now that matters are returning back to their original state, how do you plan conferences? Going on Lectures? Roaming through Expo? Scheduling meetings? Where to meet/ mingle with folks? 3rd party vendor section? Which were the conferences you get the biggest value out of? What are your favorite industry events? Any stories? Where to spend most of your time? Which parties to attend? Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me / lancaric.me

This is no BS gaming podcast 2.5 gamers session #11. Discussing the latest news, fun stuff and dropping knowledge. Don't forget, this is a 4am conference discussion vibe so let's not take it too seriously! Let’s dive in and enjoy it. Panelists: Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Matej Lančarič & Steven-Elliot Altman Youtube: https://youtu.be/BjKFpDtcYzA Agenda 18:30 How to increase game revenue by 35% as a Loremaster?  22:00 What genres are more suitable for narrative design? 24:00 How story influences game KPIs? 26:40 Story as a retention driver 27:00 Wooga tracking if players are reading the story 28:10 What kind of data influence the story? 30:00 Different modes of writting 33:00 How do you prepare for writing a story for a mobile game? 47:00 How can movies inspire a storyteller? 51:00 Live ops & story telling  and much more ... Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me / lancaric.me

Welcome dear listener! This is a 2.5 gamers podcast with an honest interviews segment #1. Asking tough questions, having fun and dropping some knowledge with gaming industry peeps. Youtube: https://youtu.be/wkEcGZ1-3So Matej Lančarič & Joakim Achren Questions: Why did you start elite game developers and not a new gaming studio? How can someone become a partner at Play Ventures? What are the requirements/skills you need to do your job? What is your due dilligence process? How do you do your homework? -How do you apply that diligence process to crypto games? Is that done more by feel than data as there is no data yet? -When investing in crypto games is token/coin allocation pre drop more important than stock? (Justified that owning stock can take 10 years + to get payback and multiple and having token/coins you can sell as soon as the drop takes place) -If token is important / does that not create the incentive to finance hype pump and dumps? Could you explain what pre-seed, seed or Series A mean? How do you define those stages? What are you looking for when investing in companies in different stages? Pre-seed, seed, series A? How do you really decide where to invest? What is THE KPI?  Why are you as an investor so keen for companies to have internal UA manager? Could you tell me a bit more about the syndicate? Why having only one line on the cap table is better than 20 names.  Why do you think a lot of gaming companies with mediocre/decent results pivoted super quickly to web3? Free money? Why There's Never been a better time to start a games company? Let’s discuss your anti portfolio - what’s the biggest regret so far of a company that you passed on? Model situation: I want to start a gaming studio. I have around 500k from my previous jobs. Should I use this money and bootstrap or should I try to get an investor (just in case)? Why boostrap? Why investor? What is Joakim's favourite book? https://www.amazon.com/Stillness-Key-Ryan-Holiday/dp/0525538585  Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me / lancaric.me

This is no BS gaming podcast 2.5 gamers session #10. Discussing the latest news, fun stuff and dropping knowledge. Don't forget, this is a 4am conference discussion vibe so let's not take it too seriously! Let’s dive in and enjoy it. Panelists: Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Matej Lančarič Youtube: https://youtu.be/SjtrJ1wG0I8 Agenda News 3:00 Netflix boosts mobile games approach with acquisition of Boss Fight Entertainment 10:20 KRAFTON, INC. SIGNS LONG-TERM COOPERATION AGREEMENT WITH SOLANA LABS FOR BLOCKCHAIN-BASED GAMES AND SERVICES 12:25 Crypto investor Katie Haun raises $1.5 billion, the largest debut fund ever by a female VC 18:40 In-game ads are getting more misleading, sexist and misogynistic, says Meretzky 27:00 Pre softlaunch activities https://lancaric.me/how-to-save-millions-with-marketability-testing/ What can we do pre-soft launch of our game? What to do before we decide to develop a game? Which questions to ask? Market research Target audience USP Game genre Marketing team capabilities Company strategy How to do market research? Tools? Competitor ads? How to define target audience? Demo, motivations, profiles, persona Playtesting What? How? Why? When do we start with UA/marketing? Marketability tests campaign optimisation Fake store pages (tools or DIY) Which channels? What to test? Player survey at the end (what questions to ask?) no suggestive questions! Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me / lancaric.me

Hello & welcome everyone. This is no BS gaming podcast 2.5 gamers session #9. Let’s dive in. Youtube: https://youtu.be/0swB8x-YB5U Panelists: Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Matej Lančarič Agenda: News Ad monetization fundamentals AMA Ad Monetization fundamentals discussion: What’s the most important ad revenue metric? How’s eCPM calculated by ad networks? Which ad network is the most trustworthy? Which ad network is the least trustworthy? How do ad networks make money? What is the cutoff point of eCPM degradation? How players become Ad Whales? Ask Me Anything section I have ads in my game, using unity ads only because I have a good deal with them. Should I earn more? Why is admon and UA super connected in hypercasual games? Its usually one person. Why? When do you hire an internal admon person? What scale? Or is there a KPI to look for? (Daily revenue, impressions, number of ad networks in the waterfall) Do you ban competitor ads in your game? If yes why, if no why? Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me / lancaric.me Latest News: $2 billion invested into blockchain game sector during 2022 https://gamestx.substack.com/p/2-billion-invested-into-blockchain?s=r Idle Miner Tycoon Launches on Facebook Gaming https://www.kolibrigames.com/press/idle-miner-tycoon-launches-on-facebook-gaming/ Google launches Google Play Partner Program for large game devs https://venturebeat.com/2022/03/15/google-launches-google-play-partner-program-for-large-game-devs/ Mark Zuckerberg confirms NFTs are coming to Instagram https://www.engadget.com/mark-zuckerberg-confirms-nf-ts-are-coming-to-instagram-204435805.html Interest In NFTs And The Metaverse Is Falling Fast https://www-forbes-com.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2022/03/10/interest-in-nfts-and-the-metaverse-is-falling-fast/amp/

Hello & welcome everyone. This is no BS gaming podcast 2.5 gamers session #8. Let’s dive in. Youtube: https://youtu.be/f_3GRQ8Wl-Y  Panelists: Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Matej Lančarič Game Design fundamentals discussion: Remo asking questions Felix & Lanco answering then Remo using militant pessimism How to start with Game Design? Mobile industry vs Premium/ Indie games? What is hard and challenging about GD? Can everybody do it? (everybody does it already :D) What are the main skills that define a game designer? How do game design tests work? What is an ideal background for a game designer? “Let’s clone this game what can go wrong it is making so much money on the charts we can make at least ⅓ of that” How ideas for new games are born? Ask me anything What’s the most you’ve been able to affect D1, D7, D30 retention with game features? When should you kill (give up) on a game? What’s the difference between a good game designer and shitty one? Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me / lancaric.me

Hello & welcome everyone. This is no BS gaming podcast 2.5 gamers session #7. Let’s dive in. Youtube: https://youtu.be/cpR3YZBB5Us Panelists: Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Matej Lančarič  Special Guest: Nicolas Vereecke As NFTs, Crypto and blockchain gaming are filling up the headlines we are doing a special episode on the current state of crypto gaming - not the peak of November 2021 but the fresh look at the end of Feb 2022. Play to Earn - Play & Earn - Play to Own I would start that discussion with the point that  the current consolidation in the big crypto games is more and more pointing to the fact that play to earn is unsustainable as there is “no free lunch” Therefore the buzzword is changing to Play & Earn or even Play to Own as the “earn” part is becoming harder and harder to realize - this is mostly seen in the depreciation of the Axie economy. One other milestone can be considered the recent blog post from Philip La Phil's Views: Axie Infinity Economy and Reasons to Play where admits this and refocuses the view on the original model of any game - to create fun and engaging experience as the primary reward for the player - not an investment vehicle. “we will not be optimizing our game or experiences to drive short-term returns as it’s simply not sustainable” “we will focus on is creating a balanced game economy with proper sources and sinks, just like non-blockchain games have done for years.” Does this imply that Skymavis wants to compete with companies like Supercell, Playrix or King? The biggest innovation of the free to play model is removing the initial friction of a payment before the player plays the game - the first wave of crypto games have even bigger friction funnels on top of reversing this problem. What is the current state of the friction funnel for a block-chain based game? Friction to play a crypto game: current models: Buy crypto assets first to even play - Browser/PC only (Axie infinity, Crypto Raiders) Download the game for free (find out about the secret crypto layer somehow from the game website - sell NFTs there) (Thetan Arena) Have the game on the store and streamline the funnel to crypto wallet Skyweaver Have a functional F2P game with F2P economy and implement the crypto layer into a later stage of the player progression - Future in hybrid? (Chromatic Souls: Afk Raid, Axie Origin?) Burning questions about block chain games: UA Open economy NFT design Gass Fees Business model - the most burning of them all! Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me / lancaric.me

Hello & welcome everyone. This is no BS gaming podcast 2.5 gamers session #6. Let’s dive in. Youtube: https://youtu.be/d_BDO5jnRTk  Panelists: Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Matej Lančarič Google to limit ad tracking across apps on Android Google has announced new measures that will limit tracking across its Android operating system, following a similar move by Apple to introduce restraints in the way the online advertising industry can target users. The changes, which will not be implemented for at least two years, are intended to curb the sharing of user data with third parties, restricting advertising tracking for users who move between different apps on billions of devices running Android. Google said it planned to eventually phase out advertising IDs, a code that allows marketers to track individual user behaviour, in favour of alternatives that protected user data while still supporting advertising efforts. Supercell revenue increases 45% to $2.24bn in 2021 Supercell published its financial results for 2021, with revenue reaching $2.24 billion (€1.89 billion) compared to $1.48 billion (€1.30 billion) in 2020 -- a 45.3% increase year-on-year. The studio generated profits before taxes of $852 million (€734 million), an impressive 80.3% growth compared to 2020's $463 million (€407 million). But it's still not quite back to the level of its 2015 heydays, when the company made over $2 billion in revenue and $965 million (€848 million) in EBITDA. The post also said that Clash of Clans and Clash Royale have now made over $10 billion in combined revenue since their respective launches. Spotify is acquiring two major podcast tech platforms  Spotify is making more podcast acquisitions. The company announced today it’s acquiring both Chartable and Podsights — two of the most prominent podcast marketing and ad attribution companies. The deal price hasn’t been disclosed, but this marks the first major acquisition the company has made this year in a long line of audio purchases. This deal is particularly critical for the company as it tries to make its ad platform the best and most powerful in audio. If it wants everyone to purchase ads through its marketplace, then it needs technology to better figure out who’s listening to those ads and what they’re doing after hearing them. AudioMob and Odeeo up next? UA fundamentals discussion - Matej asking questions - Felix, Jakub answer & Matej gives his opinion at the end! How or why to start with UA? My game has amazing organics. I don't need UA! Is that true? Why not? Are all UA channels equal? -Break down the benefits and drawbacks of top 4 UA channels? How to structure an UA budget? What is the payback period we should look at? What is hard and challenging about UA? Can everybody do it? Listen in to learn more! Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me / lancaric.me