Context
If you were to ask me right now what game to build with a fully-staffed game studio, what game would I build and why?
Chosen Sub-Genre & References
● ● ● Sub-Genre: Roguelike Survivor (a.k.a.“Bullet Heaven”) Example References: Survivor.io, Vampire Survivors, Halls of Torment Summary: Roguelike survivors are a proven sub-genre with strong monetization potential and thematic flexibility, yet it is still early in its design evolution on mobile. There are untapped opportunities in co-op, depth of equipment synergies, and live ops that make it a strong choice for a new F2P mobile game. Sub-Genre Rationale Proven Market with Growth Potential ● ● Survivor.io has been a massive success for Gorilla Studio. ○
$500M revenue, from a good mix of IAP and ads, with revenue split evenly between the U.S., China, and South Korea. 1 ○ 50M downloads Roguelike Survivor mechanics are found in many other titles like Archero and Archero 2 (also by Gorilla Studio), Funfly’s Last War: Survival, and Supercell’s Squad Busters. These games experiment with formats (time-based, wave-based, survival) and often limit enemy counts and/or movement space to control difficulty. This genre seems to still be getting optimized, as seen with the struggles Squad Busters and Archero faced at launch, but it also demonstrates that these games can be wildly successful once optimized (in the case of Last War: Survival and Archero 2.) 1 https://wnhub.io/news/finance/item-43301 ● On PC/console, the genre has had some recent hits from indie studios. Vampire Survivors is the biggest one, with $58M in revenue2 , 30k concurrent users on Steam, and a mobile port. Many of these are not F2P, and do not have much live ops integration. This seems ready to take to mobile and improve on those designs. Design & Development Advantages ● ● ● Low investment costs, high ROI potential ○ Low graphical expectations, reusable maps, and basic enemies reduce production costs. ○ Simple basic gameplay allows rapid iteration on theming, progression, and monetization. ○ If successful, the same game can sustain years of content and feature expansion (levels, characters, upgrades, events, co-op, guilds). Defensible Moat and Personal Interest: ○ his is a great proving ground for game design. Success depends on cohesive narrative and theming, well-tuned power scaling, and strategic upgrade synergies. ○ Co-op gameplay is lacking in roguelike survivor games. This company could use its resources to develop that, and that would unlock greater gameplay depth and social retention. ○ On a personal level, I love these games. I think it’s important to build games that you think are fun! I can also bring my experience playing these (and all the games I reference here) to what I’m building. I play these games with my critical product manager hat on—so I have strong opinions about what works, what doesn’t, and what should be added to the genre. Thematic Flexibility & Virality: ○ Hordes of enemies can suit many themes–allowing us to quickly test to find the best one. Good fits can be: zombies, fantasy, sci-fi, superhero, anime, shooter, or crime (think Grand Theft Auto.) ○ Survivor.io extensively uses TikTok and Instagram UGC/UGC-like ads3 . It’s easy to see how those ads grab your attention with hordes of enemies. We could test different creatives to see what works best, and see how far it can reduce CPI. Target Audience ● ● Demographics ○ Core: 18-34 years old ○ Gender: between 50-60% male, 50-40% female ○ Player Type: hybrid-casual and mid-core mobile gamers Geography ○ Primary markets: North America, South Korea, Europe Primary Player Motivations & Solutions ● Mastery: Feeling “God-like” ○ Massive waves of enemies, increasingly powerful weapons, tuned difficulty spikes that create feeling of being on the verge of death. ○ When players die, they can learn equipment synergies so they can overcome difficulty. Game can be played casually, but the ceiling is high in order to collect everything in an event. ○ Roguelike progression ensures player actually feels more powerful when they replay old levels. 2 https://steam-revenue-calculator.com/app/1794680/vampire-survivors3 https://ads.tiktok.com/business/creativecenter/topads/7155303942981074946/pc/en?period=7 ● ● Collection: Unlock everything ○ Large roster of characters, equipment evolution, achievement-based unlocks, and secrets hidden within levels. ○ Live ops to deliver new content, retain players until next release. Social Connection: prove skills & co-operate ○ Synergies between equipment could also be applied to teammates, utilizing a co-op feature (a la Diablo). While builds are created in-world in roguelike survivors, players could communicate about who should take what equipment so that they complement each other’s builds. Also, we could allow some builds to be set prior to starting a game. ○ Co-op runs could yield different types of permanent upgrades, unlock special equipment that could be used in PVE, or unlock special evolutions of equipment. ○ For future development, gameplay could easily support guilds, or (to borrow more ideas from Diablo), World Bosses (not set in a world map, but timed bosses where 10+ players ready-up and fight together) or Helltides (same PVE maps, but harder–yielding more rewards). Objectives
- Create differentiated Roguelike Survivor optimized for mobile.
- Prove that game can scale at reasonable CPI (~$2)4 . Test UA creatives at every step of production process, use it to inform art style.
- Tested and proven optimal session length and mechanics (time-based, wave-based, or survival.)
- Achieve retention goals (D1: 45%, D7: 20%, D30: 10%) and ROAS goal (D7 ROAS: 5%.)5 Assumptions ● ● ● Assumption: ~$2 CPI benchmark is achievable. True CPI for roguelike survivor sub-genre is difficult to find data on. ○ Mitigation Plan: Early UA testing with prototype (or just entirely rendered) gameplay videos. Assumption: Multiplayer is feasible without severe lag. Bullet heaven games are computationally intensive (high projectile counts and AI pathing). ○ Mitigation Plan: Optimize via reducing enemy counts, simplifying AI, but mainly, engineering solutions that we figure out in advance so that we can build around limitations. Assumption: current trends favoring this sub-genre continue. Players are playing longer sessions, more often. UA creatives are working to get players in with arcade-style gameplay, with additional depth unlocking over time. 6 ○ Mitigation Plan: Track UA creative performance. If data is showing poor performance, test new creative that highlights other player motivations and features, and adjust game onboarding to fulfill those interests. 4 https://maf.ad/en/blog/mid-core-games/ 5 b https://info.liftoff.io/en/2023-midcore-gaming-apps-report-slides?submissionGuid=05f22b9b-b6f0-4c3f-9cc8-3e8c79e5d2c 6 https://www.deconstructoroffun.com/blog/2025/6/5/the-state-of-mobile-gaming-2025