You’re not Supercell: Why you should let your mobile games live

Best practices in mobile game development usually means developing and soft launching a multitude of games. Then if those games don’t hit certain minimum key performance indicators (KPIs), to cancel it, like Supercell does when they taking pride in being “serial killers” of their own games. Developers tend to gravitate toward the retention and engagement KPIs early and rush to soft launch as fast as possible, with the sole purpose of being able to derive how much they can afford to spend on user acquisition. This attitude has over recent years had a trickle down effect to independent studios who aspire to replicate the “Supercell success formula” for making games. In search of our own unicorn, we had to find an alternative.

When we laid the foundation for Riposte Games, we knew we needed to approach things differently. This was partly because we couldn’t afford to be another “serial killer,” but also because we wanted to send a different message to our team. Why should they put their work and names on the line if there is a chance it gets cancelled? Perhaps more importantly, it becomes near impossible to actually make games that people want to play when everything revolves around triggering certain parabolic KPIs. So we decided to stop putting a price on players or worrying about how much we can “acquire” them for. Here’s why this method might work better for your team.