Hello, everyone! We here at Mochi have been watching the games come and go, reaching their peaks and falling into their valleys, raking in the dollars and squabbling for the pennies. From all of the data we’ve collected and seen over the past few months and the Mochi Coins program, we have compiled some of the best practices we’ve seen to benefit developers the most. In turn, we have put this data into a three part series to provide some insight and advice for your own creations!

So take a load off, brew up a cup of your favorite caffeinated drink, and go enjoy a nice long bath. After that, you can come back and read the article.

Game Design and Planning

Plan Ahead

The best thing you can do is plan ahead of time. If you retrofit your game at the end to use Coins in a mad dash to the finish without a second thought, you’ll probably see a comparable trend in spending in your game. Taking the time to carefully consider all options on where virtual item sales can be made and how it integrates into the game flow will take some extra time, but the entire experience will benefit from it.

Types of Items to Consider

There are potentially an unlimited number of things you could sell within your game. It should be noted that as a developer, you should take the time to consider what extra value each item you’re selling adds to the overall experience. Adding a hundred new costumes to your game might seem like a very fun idea, but also think about its actual value to your players. Here are some ideas that may help you decide the type of items to sell:

• Trial to Pay – This is a very classic standard in the computer gaming space. You essentially release a part of the game, grabbing a player’s attention, and ask for them to pay for the full game. The game players in the Flash space often react negatively toward a game that is split up this way, but that is not to say it’s impossible to transact successfully. A very well made game and boasts an engrossing game experience can do just fine with this kind of model.

Windosill

• Extra Levels – If your game happens to offer levels or stages, providing new ones will allow fans of your game to stick around that much longer. Keep in mind that this is different from taking a complete game, splitting it in half and calling the second half “extra levels”.

Twin Shot 2

• Gameplay Enhancing Items – These are the types of things that make a player’s life in a game easier or more interesting. Some examples include new weapons that can’t be found in game (like a solid gold gun) or the ability to build structures twice as fast. In the end, a big extra chunk of in-game cash/gold/gil/credits may prove just as useful.

SAS Zombie Assault 2

• Time Saving / Unlock Items – Different from new items, they unlock ones that already exist in the game without having to work for them. Instead of having the complete the previous level to advance to the next one, you can just unlock them all (note that this is slightly different from providing the option to progress to the next level without actually completing/winning it). Maybe you decide to allow a player to unlock the entire arsenal of weapons from the beginning.

Guardian Rock

• Aesthetically Pleasing Items – I would lump these into the “fun” category. They don’t actually do anything to directly affect gameplay (though they could if the game design was right, such as changing your outfit color to blend into game surroundings). These usually involve adding new hats for your character or making it look like a mummy. They’re for fun, thus may not necessarily promote itself as a “must have” item to a paying player. One thing to remember, however, is that if your game is a multiplayer one and set within a social context, a visually aesthetically changing item may prove useful to set their avatar apart from others.

Crazy Go Nuts 2


Balance Your Items / Playtest Thoroughly

This goes hand in hand with the planning of your items and how to implement them into the game. Make sure that the items you create don’t make the game lose its “fun” and alluring qualities. If the items make the game too easy, then there’s no point in playing anymore as the challenge is gone. Also, if you make your game too difficult, players will probably never finish all 100 levels and make the plunge for those additional level packs.

How do you combat this? Iterate, iterate and iterate some more! We have enabled great tools, like Live Updates, to allow this kind of testing and many developers choose to beta release as part of their playtesting experience. Vary up the experiences and figure out what works and what doesn’t to improve your current game or make your next one even better. Get friends, family and fans within the community to give your game a try.

MochiCoins also allows users to place their game in Sandbox mode, which allows users an unlimited number of Coins to try each item. With that you will then be able to see what seems to work, what doesn’t and what may need general tweaking.

Play and Spend in Other Games

It’s really easy to sit in your ivory tower and just watch the Stats tab on the Mochi dashboard. It is, however, very important for you to also get down on the ground floor and play other MochiCoins enabled games. Not only to see what other developers in the space are doing and how they’re doing it, but to actually experience what players are experiencing in the space.

Funding your own wallet and playing around will give you hands on experience on what it’s like. Look at the games that are doing well and see what they’re doing in their games and try to learn from it. Keep in mind that this does not mean swiping game ideas and making exact replicas. It’s to educate yourself so your next endeavor can be more informed. You can then save time and effort to achieve a better return.


Knights Beasts & Magic 2


Level Your Expectations

As previously mentioned about the types of items you sell, make sure to keep your expectations reasonable in terms of the things that you have for sale. If you’re offering a “Level Unlock”, something a player can do if they spend 15 minutes with your game, you’re very likely not to have that player make that purchase.

Also keep in mind that this type of transaction service is new. The “industry standard” conversion rate of 1%-3% for casual downloadable titles doesn’t apply yet yet. There is no standard or ideal conversion rate for Flash games and we’ve seen major variance in the performance of individual games out so far. However, the determining factor of conversion rates are the difference between games that are providing items of value to the gamer, and games with items that are not as compelling.

If your expectations are leveled, then you are ready for what comes and can only be pleasantly surprised if things work out better. You don’t want to allow sales to be the sole factor on whether or not you decide to create/release another game.

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Read the rest of the series: ‘Mochi Coins Best Practices’

1. Mochi Coins Best Practices: Mochi Coins Best Practices – Part III
2. Mochi Coins Best Practices: Mochi Coins Best Practices – Part I
3. Mochi Coins Best Practices: Mochi Coins Best Practices – Part II