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𝗔𝗻 𝗲𝗱𝘂𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗮𝗽𝗽 𝗴𝗲𝘁𝘀 𝟱𝟬%+ 𝗼𝗳 𝗶𝘁𝘀 𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗱 𝘀𝘂𝗯𝘀𝗰𝗿𝗶𝗯𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝘄𝗲𝗯𝟮𝗮𝗽𝗽 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗿𝘂𝗻𝘀 𝟯,𝟬𝟬𝟬 𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲𝘀 𝗮 𝗺𝗼𝗻𝘁𝗵. 𝗠𝗼𝘀𝘁 𝗴𝗮𝗺𝗲𝘀 𝗜 𝗸𝗻𝗼𝘄 𝗱𝗼 𝗻𝗲𝗶𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗿. 👇 𝗧𝗟;𝗗𝗥: 𝗗𝗲𝗲𝗽𝘀𝘁𝗮𝘀𝗵 𝗶𝘀 𝗿𝘂𝗻𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮 𝗴𝗮𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗴-𝗴𝗿𝗮𝗱𝗲 𝗨𝗔 𝗺𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗲 𝗼𝗻 𝗯𝗼𝗼𝗸 𝘀𝘂𝗺𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗶𝗲𝘀, 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗣𝘃𝗫 𝗶𝘀 𝗽𝗮𝘆𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗴𝗮𝘀𝗼𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗲. We had Vladimir (Deepstash) and Jeff Cohen (PvX) on the pod. Vlad’s web2app story is the honest version: it failed, he wanted to kill it, his co-founder kept iterating, and now it’s the majority of paid subs with healthy spillover into App Store organics. His take on why games can’t copy it: 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗳𝘂𝗻𝗻𝗲𝗹 𝗵𝗮𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗳𝗲𝗲𝗹 𝗹𝗶𝗸𝗲 𝗮 𝗰𝘂𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗺𝗶𝘇𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗷𝗼𝘂𝗿𝗻𝗲𝘆, 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗮 𝘁𝗼𝗹𝗹 𝗯𝗼𝗼𝘁𝗵. Jeff’s: subscriptions are one purchase decision then opt-out, games are a new decision every day, and friction compounds. The creative side is the part I loved. 30 people, niche organic pages testing what goes viral before it becomes an ad, tiered AI models (cheap ones for stickmen, expensive ones for trailers), and content hung on cultural moments: Nolan’s Odyssey, Halloween with Dracula, GTA 6 across all three apps. Contextual cross-promo between apps converts 10x better than generic. Still no AppLovin. Still no playables. Vlad, you have Webflow, you’re ten minutes away. Anyway, here you go: https://lnkd.in/dK-tNK-4

Tactile Games 𝗺𝗮𝗱𝗲 𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝗵𝗮𝗹𝗳 𝗮 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗼𝗻 🤑 on Lily's Garden. Their new game is a hole that eats things. Three months in, it's doing ~$30K a day and is about to become their biggest title. 𝗦𝘂𝗰𝗸 𝗶𝘁 𝘂𝗽. 👇 𝗧𝗟;𝗗𝗥: Suck It Up is a Hole 'Em All-style eat-and-grow puzzler with smart differentiators: live animals that jump and hide in levels, a level-based "album" of collectible objectives, and an untimed Zen Garden mode that conveniently makes the "no timer, no stress" creatives true - the main levels are timed. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗲 𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝗼𝗿𝘆 𝘁𝗿𝗮𝗰𝗲𝘀 𝗯𝗮𝗰𝗸 to one Steam trailer: Donut County, 2017, which Voodoo copied into Hole.io before the game even shipped, and Hole.io still does 300K downloads a day. Now Hole 'Em All, Moon Active, ironSource, Grand Games, and a spiky Hong Kong "Hole Busters" are all in the race. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗨𝗔? ~200-300 creatives, a healthy 60-playable / 90-video mix, running on AppLovin, Mintegral, and, to my surprise, Unity, which is genuinely working again. And zero Facebook since March. I defended Meta for years. I'm done. Right now the smart money runs everything except Facebook, and Tactile figured it out. 𝗧𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝗼𝗿𝘆 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗻𝗲𝘅𝘁 𝘀𝗼𝗿𝘁 𝗽𝘂𝘇𝘇𝗹𝗲𝗿: sticky, expensive, and about to get crowded, and Suck It Up needs ~𝟭𝟬𝘅 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝘃𝗼𝗹𝘂𝗺𝗲. A Danish success story is exactly what European mobile needs. Good luck, Tactile. 𝗦𝗲𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗥𝗮𝗱𝗮𝗿. Anyway, here you go: https://lnkd.in/dFenFm3P Love you PvX Partners + FastSpring + Kinoa + Sensor Tower + PlayableMaker

𝗔𝗳𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝟮𝟬 𝘆𝗲𝗮𝗿𝘀 𝗮𝘁 𝗞𝗶𝗻𝗴, 𝗦𝗰𝗼𝗽𝗲𝗹𝘆 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗥𝗼𝘃𝗶𝗼, 𝗟𝘂𝗶𝘀 𝗱𝗲 𝗹𝗮 𝗖𝗮𝗺𝗮𝗿𝗮 𝗷𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝘀𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗰𝗵𝗲𝗱 𝘀𝗶𝗱𝗲𝘀. 𝗛𝗲 𝘁𝗼𝗹𝗱 𝗙𝗲𝗹𝗶𝘅 𝘄𝗵𝘆 𝗼𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗽𝗼𝗱 𝗯𝗲𝗳𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗮𝗻𝘆𝗼𝗻𝗲 𝗲𝗹𝘀𝗲. 👇 𝗧𝗟;𝗗𝗥: 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗻𝗲𝘁𝘄𝗼𝗿𝗸𝘀 𝗸𝗻𝗼𝘄 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗯𝗲𝘁𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝘁𝗵𝗮𝗻 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹. 𝗦𝘁𝗼𝗽 𝗳𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗶𝘁, 𝘀𝗲𝗴𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗼𝗻 𝗶𝘁. Luis ran marketing at Rovio through the Sega exit, worked on Angry Birds and Candy Crush, and his honest take is that nobody has cracked brand on top of performance. Rovio’s broad awareness tests brought in the same quality players, just at a much higher CPI. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗹 𝗽𝗼𝘄𝗲𝗿 𝗼𝗳 𝗯𝗿𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗶𝘀 𝗰𝗵𝗲𝗮𝗽𝗲𝗿 𝗨𝗔, 𝗻𝗼𝘁 𝗳𝗿𝗲𝗲 𝘂𝘀𝗲𝗿𝘀. And if you’re bidding on your own IP in App Store search, incrementality testing is the only way to know whether you’re growing or just paying rent. The tactical gold came from the UA Society: a user a rewarded network paid to install should see an ad in the first 30 seconds, not at level 18 like your AppLovin IAP traffic. Felix added his own hack: watch eCPM decay per user, shallow curve = IAP-optimized cohort, steep drop = ad-ROAS cohort, and you can read who will ever pay. Then the news: Luis is the new CMO of Smadex. His pitch for why DSPs are winning is simple: as marketers get more sophisticated, the platforms that find ready-to-play users win, and the client-side backlog (TikTok? X? CTV? retargeting? incrementality?) is too long to run on an on/off switch. Treat your DSP like a roadmap partner. Felix calls QPS the yardstick for a DSP. Luis calls beer his spinach. Ask him both again in two years. Anyway, here you go: https://lnkd.in/dkC2u2PQ

Voodoo took a game, Jakub, and I worked on it that died at ~$10M lifetime, and turned it 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗼 $𝟭𝟮𝟬𝗞+ 𝗮 𝗱𝗮𝘆. 👇 𝗧𝗟;𝗗𝗥: 𝗗𝗿𝗮𝗳𝘁 𝗦𝗵𝗼𝘄𝗱𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝗶𝘀 𝗕𝗮𝘁𝘁𝗹𝗲 𝗟𝗲𝗴𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗳𝗿𝗶𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗿𝗲𝗺𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗱 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗺𝗼𝗻𝗲𝘁𝗶𝘇𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝘄𝗲 𝘄𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝘁𝗼𝗼 𝗽𝗼𝗹𝗶𝘁𝗲 𝘁𝗼 𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗽. Same auto-battler core, same unit meta (literally the same designer), but: four-card deck instead of army placement, a roguelite draft mid-match so you counter your opponent live, comeback units when you're losing, and legendary units locked behind the battle pass. Battle Legion's community would have killed us for that last one. Draft Showdown's season launch just spiked to $𝟳𝟬𝗞 𝗜𝗔𝗣 𝗶𝗻 𝗮 𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵 𝟰𝟬𝟬𝗞 𝗗𝗔𝗨. Not bad! 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗺𝘂𝗻𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗱𝗼𝗲𝘀𝗻'𝘁 𝗽𝗮𝘆 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗹𝘀. On the UA side, it's 30K paid installs a day, 1,200 new creatives, Facebook still the biggest channel, and every creative is fake: mass battles, 4X hooks, Mob Control tubes, Plants vs. Zombies, a dinosaur you never get to pick. 59 seconds each. 𝗙𝗲𝗹𝗶𝘅'𝘀 𝗽𝗮𝗿𝘁: seven rewarded placements, a two-free-plus-one-refresh ad shop, interstitials swapped into rewarded slots after 8–9 views, and two back-to-back interstitials from two different networks. $38–43K a day in ads, roughly half the revenue. 𝗝𝗮𝗸𝘂𝗯'𝘀 𝗽𝗿𝗲𝗱𝗶𝗰𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻: peak $200K/day, then cruise. Voodoo's strategy: stack ten of these. Anyway, here you go: https://lnkd.in/dBwZ8B4r Love you PvX Partners + FastSpring + Kinoa + Sensor Tower + PlayableMaker

𝗥𝗼𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗥𝗶𝗻𝗴𝘀 𝘄𝗮𝘀 𝗮 𝗳𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝗮𝗱 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗮 𝘆𝗲𝗮𝗿. Now it’s a game with 1.3M DAU and 700K downloads a day, two weeks after launch. 👇 𝗧𝗟;𝗗𝗥: The best game concept of the month was sitting in a Century Games ad library and other casual games the whole time. Rotating rings, disconnect a piece and it shatters. Multiple casual games run it as fake gameplay across their games portfolio, Tasty Travels had it as a minigame in early 2025, and nobody shipped it as a game until Nebula did. Also, Felix’s “someone I know told me” says it’s Hungry Studio, and the admon fingerprints match: interstitials delayed until deep into the session (Jakub reached level 34 without one), segmentation by eCPM, the Block Blast long-game retention playbook. That’s why it’s “only” $45–50K/day right now on a US/Mexico/Turkey/Brazil mix. 𝗜𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗯𝗲 𝗮 𝗹𝗼𝘁 𝗺𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗼𝗻𝗰𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗿𝗲𝘁𝗲𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝘀𝘁𝗮𝗰𝗸𝘀. On the UA side: now more than 6000 creatives, 90 playables, AI IQ-test guys, Einstein, Daniel Craig from Wish, and sunglasses on everyone because eyes are the AI tell. As Jakub says, UA is 70% of the success. 𝗪𝗵𝘆 𝗰𝗼𝘂𝗹𝗱𝗻’𝘁 𝗵𝘆𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗰𝗮𝘀𝘂𝗮𝗹 𝗱𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀? Because hypercasual wasn’t puzzle. Puzzle gives you thousands of levels, patience gives you D365, and the ads come later. Clones incoming. Grand Games will do the IAP version. You heard it here first. Anyway, here you go: https://lnkd.in/dsTkf27V Love you FastSpring + Kinoa + PvX Partners + Sensor Tower + PlayableMaker

Soooo, I launched One Mage Army this week with no creatives, no gameplay footage, and no designers available. 1𝟬 𝗔𝗜 𝘃𝗶𝗱𝗲𝗼𝘀 𝗺𝗮𝗱𝗲 𝗳𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗮 𝘀𝘁𝗼𝗿𝗲 𝗹𝗶𝗻𝗸 𝗶𝗻 𝟵𝟬 𝗺𝗶𝗻𝘂𝘁𝗲𝘀. They're my best performers. 👇 One solo dev told Jakub at Gamesforum that our content took his game from $0 to $25K/month, now heading to $50K. So this one's a case study for exactly that person. So I fed Layer the store page and one brief: 59-second, story-driven, one mage vs. a horde, keep the store's art style. 10 videos, zero gameplay, 90 minutes. Then PlayableMaker playables, plus more playables built in Layer from the game's own sprites. The rule I keep repeating to clients applied to me: 𝘃𝗼𝗹𝘂𝗺𝗲 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗱𝗶𝘃𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗶𝘁𝘆 𝗯𝗲𝗮𝘁 𝗽𝗼𝗹𝗶𝘀𝗵. Ten imperfect videos beat one perfect one, everything is 59 seconds now. The campaign setup was completely different from what I would normaly do but 𝗣𝘂𝗿𝗰𝗵𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝘄𝗮𝘀𝗻'𝘁 𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗻 𝗶𝗻 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗙𝗮𝗰𝗲𝗯𝗼𝗼𝗸 𝗱𝗿𝗼𝗽𝗱𝗼𝘄𝗻 𝘆𝗲𝘁, so: (1) 𝗮𝗻 𝗮𝗱-𝗶𝗺𝗽𝗿𝗲𝘀𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗰𝗮𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗴𝗻 worldwide just to get data in ($0.18 CPI, 200 installs, pause). (2) 𝗮 𝗹𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹-𝟱 𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗲𝘃𝗲 𝗰𝗮𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗴𝗻 on tier 1 that started producing purchasers on its own - 10-13 IPM, ~$0.90 CPI, Germany is killing it.. 3) 𝘁𝗶𝗲𝗿-𝟭 𝗽𝘂𝗿𝗰𝗵𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝗰𝗮𝗺𝗽𝗮𝗶𝗴𝗻 at $150/day (~€2 CPI, US ~$4.00). AppLovin was the opposite of what I expected: blended-ROAS worldwide opened at a $60 CPI, then $30, $7, now $3.60 and heading for $2. I've done this a hundred times and still panicked a little on day one. The discipline is the same either way: stay calm, get data, optimize toward profit. Now Applovin is better than Facebook. 𝗝𝘂𝘀𝘁 𝟯 𝗱𝗮𝘆𝘀 𝗹𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗿! Then iterate the winner, not the batch in Layer. "The Last Wizard" won, so the next prompt was just: three iterations, same direction, different colors, slightly different plot twist. 𝗧𝗵𝗮𝘁'𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝘄𝗵𝗼𝗹𝗲 𝗹𝗼𝗼𝗽 - get something in front of the audience, find what works, and multiply it. Anyway, here you go: https://lnkd.in/d3_xqHh4 Love you Potensus + PlayableMaker