Space Ape's Live Ops Stack: Engineering Mobile Games for Live Ops from Day 1

Watch the full presentation links.spaceapegames.com/liveops

http://links.spaceapegames.com/liveops



Watch the full presentation

links.spaceapegames.com/liveops





LIVE OPS MANAGER, ANDREW MUNDEN



Introduction



Who am I?2011

2013

2014



Who am I?2015



Live Ops 101



What is Live Ops?

A Bit More Detailed...Design, create, and execute events and promotions to maximize

revenue and player happiness; while minimizing fatigue and content burn.

● Incredibly Agile● Scrappy● Adaptive

Broad DefinitionDo what needs to be done for a live game to be successful.



Live Ops Workflow

Framework

Database

Design

ValidationApe WorkGame

Community



Live Ops Design

● Frameworks

● Estimated Value

● Design



Value

FrameworksFramework

● Provide Consistency● Broad Balancing● Feeds Into Others

Tools

Item T

Dimensions of Value

● Number of Angles

● Length of Sides

● Symmetry

Modifiers

Number of Angles = 80%

Length of Sides = 20%

Symmetry = 50%

$1.00

$1.50$1.00 * (80%+20%+50%)

a =

b =

c



EV and Design

sum()



Events vs. MonetisationType Event Monetisation

Item / Currency Sink High None

Item / Currency Tap Low High

Generates Gross Bookings Low - High High

Engagement High Low

Fatigue Low - High Low - High

● Not Mutually Exclusive● Complimentary Monetisation & Events are Best● Both Share Strong Similarities with Each Other● Spending Fatigue != Playing Fatigue; but is still very real!



Cadence



Space Ape Live Ops

Highly Technical Live Operations Planning Board



F

Live Ops Cadence

I II III IV

E $E $

F

E $ F E

$ F

E - Engagement $ - Gross Bookings F - Player Fatigue

Event Rating System Month

I

II

III

IV

IV

IVIV

I

I I III

III II

IV

Adapts and changes dependent on:

● Content Pipeline● Event & Sales Data● Player Feedback● New Features



Content



What is content?Game elements that can be consumed by players.

Examples:● Characters / Robots● Consumable Boosts / Potions● Dialogues / Cutscenes● Campaign Levels



What is content?

Consistently Hitting 70%+

Event Participation



Content Drives Revenue



Content Drives Revenue

Force of Nature

Malice Event Wyrm's Gambit

Birna Event

Ascended Alandra

Scorched Earth



Gacha

Rival Kingdoms Transformers

Rarities Yes (Now) Yes

Duplicate Handling Yes Yes+

More = Better No Yes

A Brand No Yes



So, about the bots?



LIVE OPS: LIFECYCLE MANAGEMENT

Event Release Bundles

Premium Crystal

Pool

Free Crystal

Pool

New Bot

Bot Crystal Sale

4 Weeks

3 Weeks

2-3 Weeks



Questions?



HEAD OF ANALYTICS, FRED EASEY



A brief history of targetingNov 2016



V1. The Stone Age: Shop only

• IAPs only displayed on shop page

• Bulk discount offered for higher spend



V1. The Stone Age: Shop only • Multiple price points offered, player

will usually see a price they are happy to buy

• Bulk-buy discount encourages players to purchase higher value IAPs

• Players average transaction size tends to stay around the same level for subsequent transactions

• Shop is tucked away in the HUD, players need to actively search for it to find it



V1. The Stone Age: Shop only

Interesting side-point: the bulk-buy discount for casino games is insane, more like 1000% EV vs 130% EV for non-casino games for top SKU

They have much less of a content burn issue from giving more away, as players tend to scale their bets to their balance



V2. The Iron Age:Time limited bundles

Time-limited bundle of in-game items offered, with much higher EV* than regular shop

*EV = estimated value: value of bundle contents compared to normal shop



V2. The Iron Age: Time limited bundles

Revenue (All Users)

Daily

Rev

enue

($)

Live Event + Themed event bundle generated the highest daily revenues



● Supercell recently added time-limited bundles to Clash Royale

● Very good UI sign-posting

● Triggers on new arenas + special events





10th Grossing

Top Grossing

Bundles Launched



V2. The Iron Age: Time limited bundles • Limited time to purchase + high EV +

high quality art = more players buy than normal shop

• Bundle toast “pops” during session, so all players will see it

• One danger is players are trained to wait for sales and stop buying from the normal shop

• Can lead to content burn issues if bundles are too generous

• Relationship between bundle EV and conversion is not linear

• Works best when combined with a live event



V3. The Steam Age: Timeline bundles

• Player sees a rotating group of bundles

• Prices are targeted based on the player’s historical spend



1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Non-spender($0.00)

20 starter launch autobot

20 builder autobot

20 premium character autobot

10 builder autobot

10 premium character autobot 20 battle

10 small alloy_energon 5 battle

low-spender ($4.99-$9.99)


20 med alloy_energon

20 builder autobot

10 premium character autobot 20 battle 5 battle

mid-spender ($19.99+)

100 builder autobot


40 large alloy_energon


10 builder autobot



high-spender-1 ($39.99+)


40 massive spark 100 battle

40 premium character autobot 100 builder


100 massive alloy_energon

40 massive fuel_cells

high-spender-2 ($200+ last 7D)


40 massive spark 100 battle

100 builder autobot

100 massive alloy_energon

100 large fuel_cells

V3. The Steam Age: Timeline bundles



V3. The Steam Age: Timeline bundles • Much better at upselling than single price-point bundles• No product team curation required after initial setup• The games we launched with timeline bundles generate more

than 2x the LTV of the previous game that did not have timeline bundles

• Work well in conjunction with time-limited bundles - the revenue will often stack rather than cannibalizing

• Same dangers as single price bundles - danger of content burn and cannibalizes shop sales



• When we analyzed the data, we saw that mean previous spend is a better predictor than max spend, for predicting next spend amount

lifetime_spend

max_prev_tiers

mode_prev_tiers

median_prev_tiers

mean+prev+tiers

previous_tiers

tiers_price

lifet

ime_

spen

d

max

_pre

v_tie

rs

mod

e_pr

ev_t

iers

med

ian_

prev

_tie

rs

mea

n+pr

ev+t

iers

prev

ious

_tie

rs

tiers

_pric

e

- 0.2

0

0.4

0.6

0.8

1

0.2

- 0.4

- 0.6

- 0.8

- 1



Coming next: The Rocket Age M-L targeted bundles

Timeline bundles targeted via machine learning to maximize player LTV

$10 Resource Bundle

$20 Character Bundle

$5 Builder Bundle


$40 Battle Bundle

$10 Battle Bundle


$40 Battle Bundle

$10 Battle Bundle

Many different types of bundles created by product team (+re-purpose existing ones). Covers all permutations of price + type + EV



• Each bundle is scored based on the chance of the player purchasing it • The approach we are working on is separate models for price and type• Price based on previous bundle conversion (nearest-neighbours model)• Type based on what types sell well given specific player conditions (eg the

resource bundle is more likely to be purchased by players running low on resources)

• All bundles are assigned a % chance of purchase. We then multiply by bundle price to give an estimated return for each bundle and serve the one with highest return

• A random element will be included to stop the system from stagnating on specific bundles

Coming next: The Rocket AgeM-L targeted bundles



Questions?





PRODUCT MANAGER, MITCHELL SMALLMAN



Rival Kingdoms:Trials, Tools, and Tricks in Live Ops



A Little Context

● Slide with RK launch stats



… but Rival Kingdoms had a problem.

● UA costs for RK were very high, super dark fantasy plus core RTS made it very expensive to market

● This is where many would consider the game in serious trouble, but our ARPPUs were so high it seemed like there was plenty of life left



More Trains… or more Track?

? ?



The Track In Front Of The Train

● Changed our sales strategy to event currencies (boosters) that provide ease of acquiring new exclusive content during an event

● Diamonds moved as a sink in frequently updated gacha chests, while staying a core loop currency



Controlled Currencies

● Introduced “Mithril” in late 2015, Crafting in 2016

● Currency are capped or distributed only in events

● Raise cap, sell more, change the balance, create new demand

● The key: Tied directly to events and live ops



Recipe of of a Successful Elder Game Event



A Choice of Spend and Activity

● Should be fun if you spend $0, $5 or $100

● Should be fun if your alliance has a wide make up of different players with different behaviours

● Should feel achievable to all



Social Connection & Competition

● Requires some co-ordination (this is fun)

● Keep in mind, heavy social can exhaust players, it’s harder to turn down your friends than a game developer



Our Tools



Live Event Config

● Allows us to change the goals, rewards and timings for an entire event

● If we use no new rewards or art, we could create a complete event in a matter of minutes

See video for live demo: https://youtu.be/Ct-885u1pAE?t=10m10s


https://youtu.be/Ct-885u1pAE?t=10m10s



Live Bundle Tool

● Using standardized SKUs, able to create bundles on the fly

● The answer to the “what if you have a weak event?” problem






Reward Systems

● We’ve also built tools for frequent long term events

● In general, if we do something frequently, we try to put it live






Streaming Art

● Fresh Art = More Excitement = Better revenue

● If we need to pivot an event and offer a new item, we can stream in the art instead of baking into content






The Space Ape VIP Program



Not Just Whales

● VIP includes streamers, large Kingdom leaders as well as large spenders

● Increased communication with devs is the primary benefit, not huge in game rewards, works both ways



Data Analysis: Day To Day



Measure Twice, Cut Once

● See how much each currency has changed after event

● Key segments: progression and spend tier

● What is the distance between segments?



Measure Twice, Cut Once

● As your game gets less DAU, averages become less useful

● Frequently look at smaller segments and distribution



Questions?



Space Ape's Live Ops Stack: Engineering Mobile Games for Live Ops from Day 1

Data & Analytics