The Singapore studio gained 10 million downloads and a DAU of 100 thousand per year due to the fact that it did not follow market trends.
Family gaming business? Why not, decided a young couple from Singapore – Jeffrey (Jeffrey Chee) and Kayee Chee (Kayee Chee), after leaving Koei Tecmo (Dynasty Warriors, Ninja Gaiden) and began to develop time managers.
This step can be considered strange, given that at the time of the work and release of the studio’s first game – Toy Craft – everyone in the Asian (and not only) market was saying: only battlers bring money and popularity. But it was the studio’s focus on such projects that allowed the young studio to rise quickly.
The total downloads of the second game Happy Mall Story and its ruskin Hotel Story now amount to 10 million. The number of their active players per day is 100 thousand.
Another reason for Jeffrey Chi’s success is the lack of paywalls in the game.
Chi is sure that monetization is paradoxically ruining the f2p games market. In the past, he notes, games were designed to be fun to play. Now everything is tied to getting benefits. One of the reasons why Happy Labs did not consider for itself the opportunity to turn to investor money is that investors are interested in introducing paywalls into the game. Without pressure from investors, the studio can afford to concentrate on how interesting their games are to play. This, the owner of Happy Labs is sure, attracts players to them.
The studio plans to launch another project in the near future, Happy Pet Story. This is a casual project that the creators themselves describe as “a combination of mobile and social games.” However, Chi notes, perhaps this is the last casual game in the history of the studio – you need to move on to remain competitive.
A source: https://www.techinasia.comOther materials on the topic:
Shake gently: it’s time to change the usual free-2-play model