This post was originally written in Italian by Paolo Gambardella. It has been translated by an AI agent and may contain inaccuracies.
Sensor Tower has published its first report on ad-based monetisation in mobile gaming. I read it in detail (summary article on Deconstructor of Fun). The figure that caught my eye: hybrid games that put in-app purchases first (IAP-first) earn roughly four times as much as those that put advertising first (IAA-first). Purely ad-based games can still reach nine-figure numbers, but they’re the exception, not the rule.
The report leaves one question open: in ad-based games, free rewards earned through ads compete directly with paid rewards from the store. Solving this cannibalisation is, according to the author, the opportunity still left on the table.
The playbook of someone who’s been building economies for 40 years
These reflections on the report reminded me of a talk by Teut Weidemann, recorded at Digital Dragons.
Mr Weidemann argues that a well-designed game economy is the real source of stable revenue — not flash offers or battle passes. And in making that case, without ever mentioning “ethics” or “player trust”, he lays out a set of rules that are, in practice, anti-manipulation (which brings me back to my own post from yesterday):
- Avoid discounts on premium currency, otherwise you destroy the price anchor and players just wait for a sale instead of buying;
- don’t do per-user dynamic pricing. Weidemann cites the Zynga case, which ended badly when players compared notes and discovered different prices for the same item;
- always leave at least one resource that even the wealthiest whale can’t buy. Even players who pay for everything still need to work for something, otherwise they finish the game in a week and walk away bored;
- don’t tie virtual items to a subscription: a portion of free-to-play players are happy to buy a premium account (more comfort, less grind) but consider buying an item “cheating” — so keep the two things separate.
The tension
Weidemann’s rules look a lot like the ones from Self-Determination Theory that I wrote about yesterday: respect player autonomy, don’t break trust, don’t treat players differently from one another without good reason. His stated motivation is: if you break the price anchor you lose revenue, if the whale has nothing left to work towards they leave, if players find out you’re treating them differently they’ll tear you apart in the reviews. It’s risk management, more than ethics. And as far as I’m concerned, that makes it even more compelling than my own thoughts from yesterday — especially when you’re talking business with people who only speak that language.
Which brings me to the question I find most interesting from a game design perspective: does motivation matter, if the outcome for the player is the same? Mr Weidemann proposes optimising for a long-term function, and that happens to coincide with respecting the player. Now I’m left wondering: maybe in the long run, serving players and exploiting them converge on the same rules — and what diverges are only the economies that are thinking short-term.