two & a half gamers
00:00:00 路 Una, Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Matej Lancaric
[00:00:00] S0: We have the ad progression bundle, which is targeted at new users. That was an experience that we did some time ago. We did it as an AB test. Yeah, basically you get some of the items for free, some of them you have to watch a rewarded video. [00:00:16] S1: Yeah, it's mimicking the chain steps over. [00:00:18] S0: Yeah, it's been a very... I think it's been very successful in terms of converting new users into rewarded video watchers. I think that the impression uplift for the first day for new users was above 10%. [00:00:37] S1: On this scale actually. [00:00:39] S2: Yeah. Scale is huge. [00:00:53] S3: In game design too. Matej, Felix, Jakub, bringing the insight. We're rocking those vibes till the early daylight. Matej, UA, master eyes on the prize, tracking data through the cyberspace skies. Felix stacks dollars like a wizard in disguise. Jakub's crafter rels lift left us to the highs. You wanna have gamers talk and smack? Slow hockey stick. Got your back. Ads are beautiful. They light the way. Click it fast. Don't delay. [00:01:34] S2: Hello, and welcome to a fantastic and extra special episode of the two and a half gamers podcast. I can only say that we don't do that many ones alive, and I can only say that we're pretty much alive, I guess, from Mount Olympus because we've been doing this podcast for almost four years and there is [00:01:51] S1: Five years.
00:01:51 路 Jakub Remiar, Felix Braberg, Denise Farley, Una
[00:01:51] S1: Five years. [00:01:51] S2: Five years. That's true. And it's only a couple of games that we kind of avoided waiting for the perfect opportunity, and one of them is Hillclimb Racing from Fingersoft in Finland. So today, we're gonna be dissecting Hillclimb Racing two, one of the most downloaded games on the planet. But before we get started, my name is Felix Braberg. [00:02:10] S1: And I'm Jakub Remiar. [00:02:11] S2: And we are your host. And today we are joined by two titans on Mount Olympus, Denise and Una from Fingersoft. Do you guys wanna give a brief introduction of yourself? [00:02:20] S4: Of course. I'm Denise Farley. I am working for Google representing Europe, Middle East and Africa and focusing mostly on monetization. So we work with partners big and small and grow and scale their business. But we also work with Una and the Fingersoft team. So yeah, I'll pass over to Una. [00:02:39] S0: Yeah. Hi, I'm Ana Carpineen. I've been working at Fingersoft for six years now. I'm an Ad Monetization Manager, so working with ad networks, mediation, also working together with the game teams, thinking of what we should do with the app placements, how we can improve them. [00:03:05] S2: Perfect, so today we have a special episode because we're here in person. We're gonna talk about the game design of Hillclimb Racing two, the ad monetization and the UA Hopefully uncover why it's been downloaded so many times. But how many times has it actually been downloaded, you think?
00:03:05 路 Felix Braberg, Una, Denise Farley, Jakub Remiar
[00:03:05] S2: Perfect, so today we have a special episode because we're here in person. We're gonna talk about the game design of Hillclimb Racing two, the ad monetization and the UA Hopefully uncover why it's been downloaded so many times. But how many times has it actually been downloaded, you think? [00:03:20] S0: I know that all of the games combined have been downloaded, the Hillclimb Racing one and two, and then other games as well that we've published have been downloaded at least, like, two and a half billion times. Yeah. It's in [00:03:34] S4: the billions. Yeah. [00:03:35] S0: Yeah. It's it's... But it's been a long time already. Like, those games have been out in the stores over ten years. It's crazy. [00:03:44] S2: Yeah. Very crazy. So, Jakub, do you wanna start by maybe talking about the feature sets? I think we have a video as well. [00:03:50] S1: So Yeah. Yeah. We'll we'll support this. Yeah. So let me start what we have here. This is one of those games that are pretty much main pillars of the mobile stores. It's been there. Like, I still remember the comment of Tim Sweeney, Epic CEO, and he said, like, when you search Fortnite first game, you get this this instead of Fortnite. So that... That's that's a real tweet. And, yeah, it's it's been there in its first form of course, Hillclimber Sync one. We are talking about Hillclimber Sync two here, which we could say is pretty much like an arcade driving or arcade [00:04:23] S2: It's the arcade driving.
00:04:23 路 Felix Braberg, Jakub Remiar, Una
[00:04:23] S2: It's the arcade driving. [00:04:25] S1: It's played landscape. You have these two controllers, basically. One is hitting the gas. The other is actually lowering the speed or braking. But what's really important is that you actually need to balance your car around the fact that you shouldn't drop on your head. Otherwise, you are pretty much ending the race there. On top of it, of course, you... Yeah. There we go. Of course, you are collecting coins and fuel. Fuel is still quite important because if you run out of it, of course, you're going nowhere. And then the car has different parameters that are scaled throughout the game on different progression layers, basically. And this is one, I think, one of the things that Hillcar racing two does much better, or you can see the evolution between the two games. It has many power progression layers that the, like, the game kinda expands on. Again, each car is different, and you need to upgrade each car separately, which already offers you a big soft currency sync, but the real gacha or the loot box system comes from the parts because each car can be fitted with different parts that are boosting its performance going all the way from boosts, special abilities, and so on and so forth. Yeah. Here we have the chest opening as the parts were right there. The game has many modes. And, again, it's been... Think... Yep. How how long has been in? Around? [00:05:47] S0: Hill Climb Racing two, I think it was released, if I'm remembering correctly, 2016 end of the year.
00:05:47 路 Una, Jakub Remiar, Denise Farley, Felix Braberg
[00:05:47] S0: Hill Climb Racing two, I think it was released, if I'm remembering correctly, 2016 end of the year. [00:05:53] S1: So I think it's ten years anniversary. Happy anniversary. [00:05:57] S0: So, [00:05:59] S1: yeah, I think there were a lot of changes to these progression layers, I think there were a lot of them were added throughout the years now. [00:06:04] S0: Yeah, there's been lots of visual changes and improvements, I think, game modes. Also the social features have been developed further, I think, during the past years. And I think the competitiveness and the social aspects really increase the motivation. Probably increase your motivation to get cool skins for your car. [00:06:28] S4: Think part of it is that you can play with three other players as well. That's a big distinction. So that brings out its sophistication and I think that really from a competitive progression perspective that really like encourages users like under the hood. Yeah. I think it's a big unique selling point. [00:06:47] S0: Yeah, exactly. And besides the competitiveness, like the team features where you're playing like in cooperation with other players that kind of puts pressure on you as well. [00:06:58] S4: Yes, exactly. [00:06:59] S2: It's hard to master as well. I can avoid that. Like, it's very easy to play, but hard
00:06:59 路 Felix Braberg, Jakub Remiar, Una
[00:06:59] S2: It's hard to master as well. I can avoid that. Like, it's very easy to play, but hard [00:07:04] S1: to master. Physics plays a really big part in it, and you need to really make sure what you're doing. And even the level design in this one is, I guess, much more advanced because, again, different cars have different attributes that let them, for instance, jump or move or do different pretty much actions there that are required by the environment themselves, which is driving, of course, the collection aspect of you needing to upgrade every single car. Because otherwise, again, if you upgrade just one car and solve all our problems, it's not going anywhere. That's, like, main design mistake there. But as I said, the parts gotcha is the one that's that's been, I guess, driving most of the revenue on IP, Sam, I'm guessing. Like, it's Wait. [00:07:40] S2: Wait. What is the split between IP and ad revenue? Because the first game was completely ad revenue based. Right? [00:07:45] S0: Yeah. Yeah. It still kind of is because of the nature of the game because it doesn't really have that much of social and competitive feature, if at all. [00:07:54] S2: Yeah. [00:07:54] S0: But I I think in Hillcrest racing two, the last time I checked, it was close to, like, 30, 70 majority for IAPs.