Seasonal Events

HOW TO CREATE ENGAGING SEASONAL EVENTS THAT BOOST YOUR MOBILE GAME REVENUES

Kalle Heikkinen, senior market analyst at GameRefinery Whether it’s dressing up at Halloween or getting together with friends and family to celebrate religious holidays, events give all of us something to look forward to. And mobile game events, whether they’re seasonal promotions, brand partnerships or one-off events, give players something to look forward to. Not only that, they’re the perfect way to strengthen relationships with your players and increase player retention while capitalising on the hype around real-life events and trends.

Outside of significant updates and DLC, events are an opportunity to make your game feel fresh again to lapsed players with a content overhaul, whether that’s by introducing new seasonal items or creating new worlds to explore – all of which can be monetised. Events are also a great way to test and trial new gameplay mechanics without giving anything away to new players.

When they’re done correctly, in-game events can cause a surge in player engagement, introduce new players to your game, get the press talking and lead to sustained media coverage through journalists creating eventspecific game guides for collectibles. But pulling this off effectively requires a lot of time, effort, and research to ensure you don’t run the risk of alienating certain player demographics. All of this might sound tricky but it doesn’t have to be.

Whether you’re planning for a festive update or looking ahead to next year, here are our top tips to help you pull off your in-game events without a hitch, along with some great examples of successful seasonal events for reference, as seasons are a great excuse to host in-game events.

TIPS FOR CREATING WINNING IN-GAME SEASONAL EVENTS

THINK GLOBALLY: ARE YOUR EVENTS RELEVANT?

Some of the most common event themes in console and mobile games are Christmas, Easter and Halloween, but not everyone celebrates them! Whenever you’re planning for an event, it’s essential to consider other cultures and religions so that you don’t risk alienating certain players. The more people you can involve in your events, the better.

If you’re working on a seasonal holiday event that adds new items to your game, make sure these items feel relevant to as many players as possible. Depending on where your players are based, you may wish to implement other religious holidays such as Hanukkah and Ramadan as part of Christmas celebrations. Garena Free Fire, a battle royale third-person shooter, has introduced a variety of new weapons, events and bundles into the same as part Ramadan celebrations and Diwali in the run-up to Ramadan.

Other major events such as Lunar New Year should also be considered alongside annual events such as Singles’ Day; China’s largest sales day of the year is a fantastic opportunity to run timed promotions on in-game items and cosmetics.

ADD A LIVE-EVENT CURRENCY

If your game uses its own currency, consider introducing a live event currency that can be spent exclusively in limited-time shops to create a seasonal boost within your game’s economy. As well as allowing players to purchase this currency, you can introduce it so it’s rewarded to players as part of daily log-ins, encouraging them to keep coming back to grow their virtual wallets and spend that currency in event-specific shops.

CREATE HYPE IN THE RUN-UP OF YOUR EVENT’S LAUNCH WITH A STAGGERED RELEASE

Don’t surprise players by launching your event out of nowhere. The run-up to an event can be just as important as the actual launch. Consider how in-game pop-ups and ads can be used to get players excited in advance of launch or how your game world might change, whether that’s new dialogue for characters hinting at the upcoming event or changes to the game-world environment.

BUILD ON THE DEMAND FOR RARE ITEMS WITH EXCLUSIVE SEASONAL CONTENT

If your game has a focus on rare collectibles, align this with your events strategy to create exclusive seasonal items that are only available for a limited time. Doing this effectively doesn’t have to be complicated; it may only involve a slight design change or reskin to existing items.

For minimal effort, the appeal of owning something that was only available for a limited time can be an irresistible sell to some players, especially in games where items can be sold to other players through in-game markets – just take a look at the party hats in RuneScape, an online MMORPG originally launched as a PC title but now available on mobiles. Released as a one-off item for Christmas 2001, they’re now one of the game’s most valuable and sought-after items.

CONSIDER WHICH SEASONAL GAME MODES ARE THE BEST FIT FOR YOUR GENRE

If your game has a strong narrative focus, whether it’s a story-driven click-and-point adventure or mobile RPG, make sure you update character scripts to represent the fact that changes are happening

within the game world. If you’re a shooter, consider how time-limited weapon skins or projectiles can be designed to reference seasonal events. Could you replace projectiles with seasonal items such as snowballs, eggs or stars?

CREATE NEW QUESTS AND ITEMS THROUGH BRAND PARTNERSHIPS AND CROSSOVER EVENTS

We’re not suggesting that you do a Fortnite and start paying out huge sums of money to license some of the world’s most iconic brands and characters (unless you’ve got that kind of budget!) but there are plenty of brands out there that are eager to find an audience within the gaming world.

If you’ve got a decent amount of active players, consider which brands you could approach to collaborate with to implement new content and items into your game. If you’re a developer with multiple games/franchises with strong, identifiable characters, consider how these different worlds could crossover as part of an event.

Merge Dragons! Rick ‘N’ Morty collaboration is a great example of how existing in-game items can be reskinned and repurposed. The collaboration made sense because dragons feature in an episode in the latest season, so both parties had a mutual benefit.

SUCCESSFUL EVENTS

If you’re looking for inspiration on how to incorporate all of the tips we’ve mentioned above, just take a look at what some of the most successful mobile games are doing for their seasonal events.

MERGE MANSION - HALLOWEEN

Metacore Games’ narrative Merge title, Merge Mansion, only launched in September last year but has already executed its first successful event as part of this year’s Halloween festivities. A special Halloweenthemed Merge board was introduced to the game along with new mergeable items such as bones and baby spiders, which can be merged to create skeletons and giant spiders.

A Halloween-themed shop with exclusive items and a new currency was also added to the game. The new currency can be earned through completing Halloween tasks and as there’s a decent selection of rare collectibles up for grabs, players are encouraged to keep playing and coming back for more.

BRAWL STARS - BRAWL-O-WEEN

Another Halloween focus, but this one is a great example of how small changes made to existing gameplay features over the years can create an exciting experience. The 3v3 multiplayer and Battle Royale game introduced a GraveYard shift modifier in Halloween 2020 that slowly drained the health of players but could be gained back

by attacking other players (basically a Vampire mode!) Another modifier made players invisible every seven seconds to keep them on their feet. It just goes to show that you don’t need to create all-new game modes to capitalize on seasonal events.

THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS (JP) - VALENTINE’S DAY

Based on the popular anime of the same name, the developers for this mobile RPG made its last Valentine’s Day event so successful by building on what it does best. RPGs are known for their strong characters and narrative focus on character development, which is explored in the Japanese game through Valentine’s themed quests such as collecting chocolate from a crooked cupcake, gifting chocolates to characters and unlocking new dialogue, and decorating one of the game’s main areas in Valentine’s attire.

THE SIMS MOBILE - WINTER HOLIDAYS EVENT

In-game events in The Sims have always managed to impress, whether it’s artists such as Katy Perry and Japanese Breakfast performing in the PC games or the stellar line-up of holiday events in Sims Mobile. Treasure hunts based around Christmas and Easter were launched in 2020 where players searched for clues that can then be used as ‘event currency’ to launch specific events. Completing these events awards players with exclusive currencies to purchase holiday-themed decorations and items.

DRAGON QUEST TACT (JP) - GOLDEN WEEK EVENT

A fantastic example of a country-specific event, the Japanese tactical RPG, Dragon Quest Tact, introduced special log-in rewards, gachas, and a celebratory battle for its Golden Week Event – a collection of four national holidays within seven days in Japan. Taking part in the battle rewards players with a massive reward of 1400 gems for defeating a slime with just 25 HP. Golden Week celebrations are incredibly important in Japan and the popularity of gachas in the country also makes them a great choice for implementation. It’ll be interesting to see which seasonal holidays are implemented and how, when the game is released in the West.

Think outside of the box when it comes to events. You can use online event calendars (available for free on plenty of websites) that list all of the important holiday dates specific to religions and countries that take place across the year. Analyze your game’s demographic to consider which events would be the best fit for your audience. And if you’re still stuck for ideas, you can register for a GameRefinery account to tap into our massive database and take a deeper look at the impact these events are having on the most successful mobile games.

Kalle Heikkinen is Senior Analyst at GameRefinery by Vungle