Brutally Honest #143

Hey, FAM! What’s up? 🥃 Drink talk Back home in Slovakia. So many new ideas. Looking forward to start executing. Stay tuned. The new AI section is here! Check it out at the end of the newsletter! 🦩Tip of the week How do you evaluate creatives before spending a dime testing them? Ever had that gut feeling—"this will flop" or "this will crush it"? We’ve all been there. I used to be the “no feelings, only data” person, but as I started producing more creatives myself, I developed a solid framework to pre-evaluate ideas. Here’s how: The Boring Test When you watch the creative, ask yourself: Where do you lose interest? Is it the 1st second? The 3rd? Are you watching until the end? Try this with your team. Watch together and ask for a show of hands—“Who got bored, […]

Matej Lancaric December 20

Journal

Creative Trend: Near-Death Snake Experience

🐍 𝗖𝗿𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗧𝗿𝗲𝗻𝗱: 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗘𝘃𝗼𝗹𝘂𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗼𝗳 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗡𝗲𝗮𝗿-𝗗𝗲𝗮𝘁𝗵 𝗦𝗻𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝗘𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲 in Gaming Ads 👇 When you hear "snake" in gaming, it immediately calls to mind ads from Royal Match, Kingdom Guard, Rush Royale, or even Royal Kingdom. But where did this trend really start? Let’s dive into the snake pit of creative evolution in gaming UA.𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗢𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗶𝗻𝘀: 𝗥𝗼𝘆𝗮𝗹 𝗠𝗮𝘁𝗰𝗵 𝗕𝗿𝗲𝗮𝗸𝘀 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱 (𝗗𝗲𝗰 𝟮𝟬𝟮𝟮)Royal Match was the first to introduce the snake concept in its UA mix back in December 2022. While the snake creative wasn’t the focus then (we were too busy saving the King from fire, drowning, or freezing), it quietly entered the mix. At this point, Royal Match (Dream Games) experimented with many "near-death" scenarios, laying the groundwork for what would come later.𝗥𝘂𝘀𝗵 𝗥𝗼𝘆𝗮𝗹𝗲 𝗥𝗲𝘃𝗼𝗹𝘂𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗶𝘇𝗲𝘀 (𝗙𝗲𝗯 𝟮𝟬𝟮𝟯)Rush Royale (MY.GAMES) took the concept to the next level in February […]

Matej Lancaric December 16

Highlights

Brutally Honest #142

Hey, FAM! What’s up? 🥃 Drink talk Last few days in Santa Barbara before going home. I've enjoyed it here. It's quiet time, but I've met lots of interesting people here and in San Francisco. See you next year. 🦩Tip of the week I’ve often talked about identifying trends in creatives, but what about structuring your creative team and output requirements based on your UA budget? IMHO, You need five motion designers for 1 UA person in the team. Period! Ideal scenario: 1 Motion Designer (for animations and video creatives) 2 Illustrators (to craft unique assets and maintain visual consistency) 3 Graphic Designers (to adapt, iterate, and tweak creatives for scale) 4 Flying Unicorns 🦄 (because, let’s face it, magic helps) Jokes aside. In the era of AI where, UA managers can do almost everything by themselves. It would be […]

Matej Lancaric December 12

Highlights

Brutally Honest #141

Hey, FAM! What’s up? 🥃 Drink talk Good people still exist. My daughter got flu last week and still has not recovered. We are still in the US. I wanted to buy some stronger meds, but since I don’t have a US ID, they couldn’t give them to me. God bless Nick from tvScientific, who bought them and even delivered them to my house here in Santa Barbara. We met only once for lunch a few weeks ago. Good people still exist. Thanks, buddy! Have you already filled out this form about the UA landscape? Could you please help me map the UA activities, spending levels, creative testing methodologies, and ROAS targets? I will make a nice report out of it with anonymized data. From what I already see, there is some interesting shit. https://forms.gle/wdutk2PvA7qTm84o7 ← Only 5 minutes of your time! […]

Matej Lancaric December 5

Journal

Capybara GO Global Launch UA Case Study

Fond of Capybaras? Then, you can now play with the lovable, oversized creature in Capybara Go! It’s a text-based roguelike RPG from Habby, the team behind hits like Archero and Survivor.io. So, is it a typical cute pet game? Almost! I already published a Capybara GO global launch case study, but this one is now updated with the US global launch data and some additional interesting soft launch stuff! Keep reading to know. Why Capybara GO is Unique The game lets you dive into the world of the adorable rodent in a completely unexpected way. It puts you on an epic journey where chaos and adventure go hand in hand. Your adventure begins and ends with a capybara, literally. You’ll bond with your new furry friend, kit it out with gear and set off on an endless series of randomized […]

Matej Lancaric December 5

Journal

Capybara GO Global Launch is a Flop

𝗖𝗮𝗽𝘆𝗯𝗮𝗿𝗮 𝗚𝗢 🚀 $𝟭𝗺𝗶𝗹/𝗱𝗮𝘆 𝗴𝗮𝗺𝗲 & 𝗴𝗿𝗼𝘄𝗶𝗻𝗴, but not as expected after US global launch. 𝗦𝗽𝗼𝗶𝗹𝗲𝗿 𝗮𝗹𝗲𝗿𝘁, 𝗶𝘁𝘀 𝗮 𝗳𝗹𝗼𝗽 𝘀𝗼 𝗳𝗮𝗿. 𝗕𝘂𝘁 𝘄𝗵𝘆?👇 The updated global launch case study is here:📌 Case study📺 Watch on YouTube🦄 Subscribe to the Brutally Honest newsletter: lancaric.substack.com

Matej Lancaric December 3

Journal

Dark War Survival makes $300K a Day

𝗗𝗮𝗿𝗸 𝗪𝗮𝗿 𝗦𝘂𝗿𝘃𝗶𝘃𝗮𝗹 𝗺𝗮𝗸𝗶𝗻𝗴 🤑 $𝟯𝟬𝟬𝗸/𝗱𝗮𝘆 with 120K downloads a day and will be attacking top ranks in 4X genre in 2025. 𝗧𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗶𝘀 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗳𝘂𝘁𝘂𝗿𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗨𝗔 & 𝗴𝗮𝗺𝗲 𝗱𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗹𝗼𝗽𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 thanks to the use of 𝗔𝗜. You won't like it👇 It was made by Rivergame, the same team that did Last War, Top War, and Top Heroes. Yes, it's not visible immediately, thanks to a different publisher name, but as you play, you get it right away. This time, the key iteration is that the Last War team took their game, added a Whiteout Survival (Century Games) onboarding funnel, and slapped a zombie/survival theme on top of it. 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗶𝘂𝘀!But the biggest genius move is in UA and creatives. Currently, 90% of creatives are made by AI. Think cost efficiency and speed of production (check this AI creative guide as […]

Matej Lancaric December 2

Highlights

Brutally Honest #140

Hey, FAM! What’s up? 🥃 Drink talk Alright, the San Francisco trip is happening on December 3! One day before (December 2), Supersonic is organizing a hybrid casual competition. If you have a hybrid casual game, check this out. 🦩Tip of the week Creatives should be about emotions because emotions are a powerful way to connect with an audience, inspire action, and create a lasting impact. Emotions make the videos/images more meaningful and relatable, as people often engage deeply with content that evokes strong feelings. Whether it's joy, sadness, excitement, or even anger, tapping into emotions can be a key driver of creative success. Key points about emotions in creatives: Connection with the audience: When a creative piece evokes an emotion, it creates a deeper connection with the viewer or listener, making them feel personally invested in the content. Inspiration […]

Matej Lancaric November 28

Journal

Playable ads Ultimate guide: kick a$$ creatives in UA

Actions speak louder than words, and doing is always better than showing. Don’t talk about buying your wife flowers; buy them. It’s the same with playable ads. Why show your game when you can get people to play it? Video ads get boring too, and playable ads can add some spice to your UA campaigns. For the unfamiliar, playable ads are minigames that give users a brief glimpse of what your game looks like. Here’s everything you need to know about them: Where did playable ads come from? Playable ads used to be developed by ad networks for advertisers. However, advertisers didn’t have the control to test or experiment with different creatives. Now, there are a lot of drag-and-drop tools that make it easy to develop. Alternatively, you can also easily produce them with a little bit of coding and […]

Matej Lancaric November 27

Journal

A lot of hype around AppLovin in eCommerce!

𝗧𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲’𝘀 𝗮 𝗹𝗼𝘁 𝗼𝗳 𝗵𝘆𝗽𝗲 𝗮𝗿𝗼𝘂𝗻𝗱 𝗔𝗽𝗽𝗟𝗼𝘃𝗶𝗻 𝗶𝗻 𝗲𝗖𝗼𝗺𝗺𝗲𝗿𝗰𝗲. If you think Applovin cracking e-commerce is the end game, you don't understand where the puck is going 🏒👇 While Meta continues to dominate budgets with at least 60%+ of spend, for top-spending brands AppLovin has equaled or overtaken heavyweights like Google (~10%), Amazon Ads (~5%), and TikTok (<3%) for a spot in the marketing mix. Some brands have achieved that level of spending scale in a short 2-8 weeks from onboarding, which is impressive, especially as they are already leapfrogging channels with multibillion-dollar ad businesses like TikTok, Amazon, and even Google.E-commerce brands are allegedly achieving higher spend and higher ROAS on Applovin than Meta right now. Since AppLovin’s eCommerce ads network is still in closed beta, it will be interesting to monitor if there’s a consistent ability to maintain this. […]

Matej Lancaric November 25

Journal

Major Trend: Celebrity Effect in Creatives

🎥 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐂𝐞𝐥𝐞𝐛𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐲 𝐄𝐟𝐟𝐞𝐜𝐭 𝐭𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐧 𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐬. Major UA trend that shines👇 💥 Arnold Schwarzenegger in Mobile StrikeHis involvement wasn’t just about lending his face—it tied directly into the game’s theme of power and strategy. These were the times when Arnold was everywhere. You opened your fridge, BAM! Arnold. Toilet? Arnold. TV? Arnold. Good old MZ days… 🎰 Jennifer Lopez in Coin MasterCoin Master (MoonActive Ltd) brought J.Lo on board, and her star power and the game’s mechanics created a campaign that resonated with a diverse audience. She also shared a few of these ads on her social media, getting 5+ million views. You have probably seen a Kardashian playing Coin Master. Those ads started rolling back in 2019. It was June 2020 when they introduced new celebrities into the mix. It was J.Lo that accelerated the number of downloads […]

Matej Lancaric November 22

Journal

Burny Games: Making a few $M a month from Ads

Making a few million $$$ a month from ads revenue! 🤑 Anatolii Henis going from Social Casino to Mobile Puzzle Games. The live review of Burny Games! 👇 We discuss the transition from social casino games to ad-supported mobile games, the development and mechanics of their games PlayDoku and Colorwood Sort, and the importance of player retention and monetization strategies. The conversation also touches on their games' current performance and future plans for in-app purchases and hybridization. It delves into the mechanics and features of mobile games, focusing on user engagement, monetization strategies, and comparative analysis of different game titles. Discussing the unique mechanics of their games (and how Jakub fails), the importance of ad strategies, and insights into user acquisition and retention, providing a comprehensive overview of the current mobile gaming landscape. Felix was really excited to cover Playdoku […]

Matej Lancaric November 21

Matej Lancaric

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