The history of Fatal Fight began in 2015. The times when going to the global market, as well as 5 million downloads in the Google Play Store seemed like the dream of every game developer.
Below I have described the main points in the development of Fatal Fight and much more.
Research
The idea of Fatal Fight did not appear out of nowhere. Before understanding which game to develop, we identified the current problems in the mobile games market. And to come to this conclusion, we took several steps.
First, we analyzed which mobile games are the most common among users when searching in the Google Play Store.
It turned out that the three main games users were looking for were the following:
- Puzzle
- Car games
- Fighting games
We have narrowed down our research here.
We tested these three genres of games on Google Play to see if the mobile games market is meeting the needs of users in that market. After all, there were a sufficient number of users who entered "Puzzles", "Car games", "Fighting" into the Google Play Store search line.
We were surprised that we could not find any suitable game with satisfying characteristics. I think not only us, but also dozens of users who craved a pleasant experience from a mobile fighting game.
Asking yourself the question "Why?" we found out that the main reason was the gameplay. In other words, gameplay. The interaction between users and games was absolutely complex. Controlling the blows of hands, feet, jumps and other possible movements on the smartphone separately or even immediately was uncomfortable.
Well, all this for us was a subtle hint of fat circumstances. Fighting games did not meet the needs of existing users in the mobile games market.
Moreover, according to Google Play Store search rankings, the keyword phrase “addictive games” was one of the most popular. Then we realized that users need something that will inspire them to play the game every day.
This information is of additional value to the conclusion that we have reached by that time:
"We need to create a fun fighting game with easy-to-use gameplay."We wanted to come up with a gameplay that was not difficult to use in the first place.
We asked ourselves the question: "What if we copy the gameplay of a computer game?" This question seemed to be a controversial one, but it came about because we found a computer fighting game called "One Finger Death Punch".
This game had a simple gameplay. Game control consisted of clicks on the right and left sides of the mouse. This type of gameplay was completely in line with what we imagined in our mobile fighting game. As a result, we applied the same gameplay, adding Right and Left taps on the mobile device as an alternative to the same on the mouse.
We were grateful for the gameplay we got from this game. But beyond that, there was no need to apply anything else. Even the name of the game screamed, "I am the name of the game that no one will ever remember." For ourselves, we realized that their marketing strategy was probably not delivered.
We created a prototype of the game to make sure that the gameplay we created actually meets the needs of the users. In the picture I inserted below, you can see that graphics are not what we wanted to test, our main task was to understand how comfortable the interaction between users and the game itself is.
The million dollar question: What is the correct name for the game?
The name of the game is another important point to consider when developing a mobile game. It should be something that is easy to remember and adapted for Play Store optimization. The reason we named our game “Fatal Fight” was the popular game “Mortal Kombat”. Yes, the game that has won the admiration of billions has been a source of inspiration to us in many ways.
Then (in 2015 for those who have forgotten) there was no mobile version of Mortal Kombat. However, the keyword "Mortal Kombat" ranked high on Google Play. In other words, many people searched for this game on mobile devices but could not find it.
The truth is, if SEO (or Play Store Optimization) can't find the exact keyword, it always looks for synonyms.
Based on this, we decided to use synonyms for the words "Mortal" and "Combat" and combine them. And as a result, the name "Fatal Fight" was created.
For us, this meant that viewers looking for Mortal Kombat would find Fatal Fight on the front pages of the Google Play Store. Feeling a great responsibility, we did not want to disappoint the fans of Mortal Combat, but to surprise them with a versatile mobile fighting game.
Another thing inspired by Mortal Combat is the graphics. We were inspired by some heroes like Louis Kang. Raiden, Kung Lao, etc. This was one way to meet the expectations of Mortal Kombat fans who were actively looking for this game online in the mobile version.
Having finished with all this, we were focused on one thing: "We want to enter the world market."
Soft lunch
Before entering the world level, we made a soft launch. A soft launch is testing your product in a market that you are not interested in. The goal is to create feedback from users. When you receive feedback from users, you design the product according to the needs of the users.
Another thing to track during this period is the following key metrics in the Play Store:
- LTV - Lifetime Value (User Lifetime Value)
- ARPU- Average Revenue Per User (Average revenue per user)
- ARPPU - Average Revenue Per Paying User (Average revenue per paying user)
LTV is a metric that measures the average income associated with all future relationships with the user and the game. It is in the interests of the Play Store to bring users back to your app (in other words, those who don't uninstall the game right after the first try, but consistently use the game in the long run). Heavy users actually generate revenue from in-app ads via AdMob (which is also a Google product). This is where the ARPU growth occurs. Of course, this also affects the AVPPU score in the same way. By tracking these indicators, you can assess whether you are developing the game in the right direction. The better the scores, the more likely your app will appear on the first page of the Google Play Store.
We launched the game in Azerbaijan, where we aimed to get as many reviews as possible. So, we wanted to fix all the errors that users could potentially encounter. And thus, it is better to prepare for the market we have targeted. As a result, we fixed all the major bugs in the app and got a 4.8 rating in the Play Store.
At this stage, the soft lunch could have ended, but no. We entered another alternative market - Russia. Different culture, possible different user habits and other factors made us understand that it is worth trying a soft lunch in a new country. Another reason is scale. In Russia in 2015, the number of smartphone users was about 51.3 million people. We saw this market as a good platform for testing our application.
A few weeks after launching the game in a new market, we started getting negative reviews, while losing traffic.
All of them concerned one thing: the majority of Russian users did not have a Facebook account where they needed to invite their friends. And also, they did not want to pay $ 1 (When the 10th stage of the game was reached, one of them had to take actions to proceed to the next stage).
This made us realize that for this stage of the game we need to come up with something universal. We replaced Facebook invitations with a “collect 30 coins before stage 10 and go to the next level” solution.
After all these procedures with a soft lunch, we got pretty high ratings in the Play Store. As a result, we appeared on the first page of the Play Store.
The Google Play Store gives you a rating based on the countries in which you have already launched the application previously. As a rule, if you launched a mobile application in certain markets and received good ratings from users of this market, then this means that when the game is launched on the global market, the game will already have high ratings in the Google Play Store. This was what supported our vision.
Operating system selection
You may have noticed that so far in the article I have mentioned everything about Android and its Play Store. And this is no coincidence.
Typically, developers rely on different arguments when first launching mobile applications on the IOS operating system. Such as "Most people are iOS users" or "The purchasing power of this segment is higher than that of Android users." We questioned this universal understanding, because to us it seemed like a myth.
We compared the Average Revenue Per Paying User (ARPPU) and Average Revenue Per User (ARPPU) metrics. The sum was the same for both operating systems. In our case, the weight of the game Fatal Fight was already heavy, which meant that the game would only work on flagship smartphones, which are expensive anyway.
In addition, we had several other reasons why we deliberately chose Android over IOS:
Market share. As reported by Sensor Tower, approximately 75.7 billion apps were installed on the Google Play Store in 2018. By comparison, in the same year, only 29.6 billion were installed in the App Store.
Fast process. Updates on Android are confirmed faster than on iOS. When creating our first build for iOS, it took 3 months to add the game to the App Store.
The difference is in the algorithms.Google Play Store has more organic traffic. If you've built a great app, it will reward you with organic traffic. However, this picture is different on iOS. Basically, you need to buy traffic for money. Popularization of applications by stimulating traffic (incentivized traffic) has long been the leading strategy of the Apple App Store. With this traffic, the User Life Value (LTV) is low. When users are encouraged by rewards, they are more likely to install your app without actually wanting to. This often makes it easy to uninstall your application after a few days. We wanted users to choose us themselves. Users who decide to play the game out of personal interests have been a priority for both our team and Android.This is why we love the Google Play Store more than the Apple App Store.
Entering the world market
When we finally launched Fatal Fight on iOS, Apple ranked us in the Best New Games category. It wasn't just luck. For both operating systems, the game was developed using the Unity 3D engine. The secret was the journey that this product took with Android. The sheer number of devices available on the Android operating system allowed us to run into many bugs, and as a result, we launched a debugged product for the App Store.
Famous British blogger Dedji also featured the game in his Paintball Challenge video on Youtube. Immediately after that, we took first places in the ratings of the USA and Great Britain.
Now that we have entered the global marketplace and Fatal Fight was in both stores, our goal was to be as flexible as possible to the feedback we received. At the same time, maintain high ratings both in Google Play and in the App Store. In the beginning, we were pretty successful. However, there were some bugs that we couldn't fix.
One day we started getting a series of reviews. All were with the same problem: “I can't hear music and sounds,” users reported. Samsung smartphones were the devices from which reviews came. When tested on several Samsung devices that we had, there were no sound problems. Then we noticed another pattern. All reviews came from one Samsung model - Galaxy Tab 2. It turned out that this particular type of device does not reproduce sound. We bought a Galaxy Tab 2 and reproduced the bug, and as a result we fixed it and released an update.
Time passed, and with the release of a new update, we faced a serious problem. It turned out that all Fatal Fight users lost their game progress.
Imagine losing progress in a game in which you spent your time, energy, and money on digital goods. Not the best feeling, is it?
In other words, millions of users have had to abandon the mobile game, which has already become a part of their lifestyle.
After 3 years on the market, we sold “Fatal Fight” to ITech Media Solutions in Estonia. They later entered the Chinese market and hosted taptap.com, which was one of the largest markets for Android mobile apps in the country. Fatal Fight has become the most downloaded app on taptap.com.
It's a long journey with Fatal Fight that got me into serious trouble when it seemed like all the risks were minimized. On reflection, I realized that if there was a platform on which all types of devices were available for testing, any game would be successful.
For me, this awareness was a turning point, and at the same time an inspiration for my next startup.I created Buglance to help other developers deliver better mobile apps. Buglance includes a network of 50,000 testers worldwide representing over 10,000 unique devices. Here you can choose the device type, country, and demographics to test your app to make sure it works best for your audience. In other words, we created a product that could keep Fatal Fight intact.