How Drama and Fake Ads Convert To Real Profits
Dylan Tredrea is a product & publishing consultant with over 12 years of experience in mobile free to play games at studios such as Disney, Rovio, Zeptolab, & CrazyLabs.
Dark War: Survival’s (DW:S) bold bet—and its emerging success—on ‘more drama’ is an early indication even core audiences are increasingly acquired, retained, and monetized with highly dramatic narratives. With the clear trend of increasing ‘dramatic’ in casual games: it’s time for developers across the industry to ask themselves: is our audience more interested in new gameplay, or new stories?
Introduction
I remember as a young product manager, working on major releases at Disney and Rovio how excited I was for the ‘cutscenes.’ We got to work with professional writers and craft stories featuring iconic characters. The team poured their hearts into the work.
After release I was responsible for analyzing churn and sharing the results with the team: the cutscenes were driving users out of the game. The only reliable fix was ensuring they were easily, quickly skippable.
I concluded from this experience: that narrative in mobile free-to-play games was often an immense waste of resources. Players sought progression and accomplishment through compelling gameplay and systems. My crux example was Hearthstone: a Blizzard title which had succeeded completely bereft of narrative.
For years I confidently advised time and time spending any resources on narrative was a terrible idea with only a few exceptions (e.g., smaller subgenres like Hidden Object).
Increasingly, it seems that is no longer the case!
Executive Summary
Post-ATT (Apple’s App Tracking Transparency) an increasingly successful product and positioning strategy has emerged for mobile free-to-play games across genres & audiences: highly dramatic narratives.
‘Fake Ads’ as Real Marketing: Fake ads may be distasteful to us as creators, but they solve a real problem for players. A significant, and growing, audience isn’t interested in new gameplay. They want new drama & tension.
Dramatic Narratives Drive Growth: Across genres from casual to core, narrative which delivers on this demand for drama is increasingly central to acquiring, retaining, and monetizing players.
Beyond ‘Cutscenes’: Today’s dramatic content isn’t yesteryear’s skippable cutscenes. It’s the driving force behind players' motivation to install, retain, and convert.
Narrative Inherently More ‘UA-able’: UA creatives only have a few seconds to capture the attention of a potential player. Creating gameplay which achieves this- as well as retains and monetizes- is incredibly and increasingly difficult. Narrative content, on the other hand, is virtually unconstrained.
Not an ‘AI’ Story: While AI dramatically reduces content creation costs, it’s merely a tool which is well suited to untapped audience demand.
Case Study - DW:S : Deconstructing the product positioning, and top grossing heritage, of this title demonstrates how a/the best team in 4x has been increasingly betting- and succeeding- with dramatic narratives.
Casual Narrative Trend: The trend is even more evident in Casual gaming. Year over year results for gameplay vs narrative titles shows narrative product/positioning is capturing an increasing share of downloads & revenue.
Additional Case Studies: Narrative ‘incumbent’ June Journey has seen increased success since post ATT, Family Farm Adventured turned around their fortunes with a pivot from gameplay->narrative, and even in the app space similar highly dramatic, short form stories are finding success.
Industry’s Dramatic Turn
Perhaps an early sign of the potential for narrative product positioning is the sustained success, at scale of fake ads. Large, valuable audiences are not interested in finding new games by seeing gameplay. First, they want to know what’s at stake!
Marketing, fundamentally, is a promise. Fake ads promise tension & drama. The game has to then deliver on that promise. Increasingly successful or growing games are delivering on that promise with character driven, typically short ‘scenario’ form writing eerily similar to a Desperate Housewive’s episode.
Of course there is room in the market for innovation, but the opportunities for gameplay innovation are waning. Hexasort with its ‘new’ matching mechanic executed so well, is an industry ‘darling.’ And for good reason- it’s a great game with incredible design, product, ad monetization, & more execution. But it’s also not even close to the top of the top grossing charts- even with an (appropriate) generous assumption of ad revenue.
DW:S 4X’s Turn to Drama
Dark War: Survival’s focus on dramatic narrative, within the context of its predecessors Last War: Survival & Top War, show a clear trend even in 4x-.the core of core genres- highly dramatic narratives are increasingly the key to success.
Key Dramatic Drivers in DW:S:
AI-Generated ‘Fake Ads’: DW:S’s ads promise high-stakes drama with AI generated highly dramatic, narrative ads while showing little to no gameplay.
Expanded Narrative Conversion Events in FTUE: In addition to throwing players into 4x gameplay much faster than Last War, the other significant change was a large expansion- in scope and drama- of early conversion events in the FTUE.
Dramatic Narrative as Core: The overarching story unfolds in cinematic chapters, with key moments driving player progression and monetization.
Results: DW:S is climbing the charts and off to a strong, if early start (considering it’s still scaling, long payback periods of 4X, etc.).
Source: Appmagic
DW:S (Probable) Top Grossing Heritage
The game officially released by Florere Game out of Hong Kong appears to be the work of the same team behind Last War: Survival and Top War. While Florere Gam isn’t directly linked there are clear indications that the team, technology, and resources behind their titles are shared. This is similar to how Last War: Survival and Top War were released under different companies but most likely came from the same creators.
Last War has been incredibly successful in Western AND Eastern markets, even surpassing Whiteout Survival. However, Whiteout Survival reportedly remains the top-performing game in China. Top War enjoyed significant success and remains in the top 10 grossing 4X titles long after release in 2019. However, its peak on the iPhone/Games Top Grossing chart was around position #20 and it has been trending downward since mid-2023.
Top War, their first success, leaned on generic character designs—arguably inspired by Boom Beach—and minimal storytelling.
Last War: Survival growth is solidly centered on hypercasual gameplay- players are oh so carefully introduced to full 4x systems. The FTUE, however, features a highly dramatic ‘mini narrative’ driving a key conversion event. (At least, reasonable to assume the team believed the narrative driven conversion event was successful because they expanded it ‘dramatically’ in Dark War: Survival.)
Deconstruction of DW:S’s Drama
As 2 & ½ gamers podcast aptly called it: DW:S is almost ‘just Last War with a revamped FTUE. The underlying 4X gameplay shares almost, well everything- though to be fair there are a number of notable product changes ‘under the hood.’If the game continues to scale, these elements are worth deeper analysis. The initial results are sufficient to deconstruct the game’s product positioning and how the top 4x studio has decided to bet big on drama.
AI Generated Marketing
Even without paid access to advanced tools like sensortower for analyzing ad campaigns the saturation of AI generated content is clear in Facebook Ads Library. It’s likely precisely what you’d expect. The ads deliver a clear promise: high-tension drama. The actual gameplay experience isn’t represented at all until players install the game (unless actual screenshots are required by app store policy, i.e., iOS).
Example UA creatives from FB ads library
ASO/App store creatives for Google continue the AI/fake trend, while Apple, presumably due to stricter store policies, features screenshots from the actual game.
Gameplay
Visually, DW:S’s presentation of 4X systems looks entirely different, but the core gameplay remains highly similar to its predecessors. Fans of the genre will recognize this immediately. However, from a player perspective, DW:S stands on its own due to its distinct theme, narrative, and FTUE.
Revamped FTUE & Dramatic Key Conversion Events
Unlike Last War, DW:S throws players straight into the 4x gameplay. Most likely, this decision stems from the vastly different audiences coming into the games. The players ‘showing up’ from the AI generated hyperdramatic videos of Dark War: Survival are certainly different than those installing Last War for hypercasual gameplay.
Last War featured dramatic characters and narratives to drive key conversion events, but lacked an overall story for the game. In contrast, DW:S opens with cinematics and characters meeting tragic fates. A thin but coherent narrative unfolds across chapters, keeping players engaged throughout the game.
Opening ‘narrative’ in FTUE from Last War
Example chapter ‘narrative’ from DW:S
FTUE Drama Driving Conversion
The only real drama ‘front & center’ in Last War is a conversion mini-narrative/quest: rescuing a “damsel in distress.” Players were motivated to progress through the map, collect wire cutters, and free the woman. The reward for doing so was a new, powerful squad member which you were then- constantly- offered an IAP to make them even more powerful.
DW:S expands this product strategy to drive early conversion significantly. Of course, there’s still an attractive woman- now with even less clothing. More than that: you’re saving her beloved puppy!
Once you rescue the animal by progressing on the saga map (spoiler, turns out to be some giant battle beast now) the animal ends up injured and permanently lays in need of help in the center of your home base until purchased.
Who once saved, becomes injured, and the only way to save him is an IAP!
Driving Conversion and Scaling
In the current UA environment, early conversion isn’t just good practice—it’s essential. Increasingly scaling UA requires event-optimized campaigns which send in-game events, indicative of which players will be highly engaged and monetizing over the long term, back to UA networks for the algorithms to find more, similar players.
Event-optimized campaigns are especially vital for high IAP genres like 4x. The team behind DW:S almost certainly only prioritized such an expansion of the ‘mini narrative’ conversion event if they believed it increased conversion in particular of high value players.
Dark War: Survival, In Summary
Dark War: Survival is still scaling and whether or not it gets even close to its predecessors remains to be seen. What’s inarguably is the laser focused strategy of more drama, tension, and narrative throughout all the key beats of the growth and product funnel.
Casual ‘Drama’
The trend of successful games with dramatic, narrative product positioning is much clearer to quantify in casual games. Perhaps due to belief in this audience's predilection for soap opera-like content. Or, perhaps- and more likely, it’s simply because the rate of new casual game releases is so much higher.
Casual games have long included visually compelling characters as part of their worlds, if not full narratives unfolding along a saga map. However, these games typically acquire players through marketing assets showcasing gameplay- though there are many using fake ads as well. What makes these titles ‘gameplay’ focused is player progress and monetization is driven by gameplay, not narrative content. (Players pay extra moves to complete challenges to see new mechanics/puzzles, not progress a story)
Narrative-driven games are fundamentally different. They start with a completely different promise. Instead of promoting “the best gameplay” or “the best levels,” these experiences are positioned as “the best drama.” This doesn’t mean the games are of lower quality or less robust—far from it. Their marketing promise and player progression are just built around the introduction and use of new characters & stories rather than gameplay content/mechanics.
Gameplay vs Narrative Analysis
Even a high-level analysis of publicly available data reveals the growing prevalence of narrative-driven games.
Number of gameplaye or narrative focused games appearing or growing >10 spots in casual, annual top grossing ranking per Appmagic
Methodology
Casual titles (as tagged by AppMagic) which have either appeared or grown >10 spots in the top 100 grossing iOS, US chart
Narrative games are defined as those which primarily acquire, retain, and monetize players primarily through characters, narrative, and drama. (Fake ads alone aren’t sufficient)
Games which don’t meet all the criteria of narrative games are tagged as “gameplay.”
Excluded: Social casino as it’s a distinct market. Similarly, niche successes: like children’s games and the New York Times Games App also omitted.
Example of data table:
Using Sensor Tower data to estimate the downloads & revenue of these titles per year shows ‘gameplay’ is still dominating, but narrative is trending upwards and onwards.
Especially if you isolate a key/single driver- Royal Match, and its declines as well.
However, even including Royal Match, the annual growth rates for downloads & revenue of narrative & gameplay tell two distinctly different stories. And only one of them looks good.
Examples from 2024 of ‘drama’ from Marketing->Product
Travel Town Merge Adventure
Gossip Harbor
Seaside Escape
Klondike Adventures
Additional Case Studies
Narrative Incumbent grew with ATT
June's Journey (launched April 2021, around the time of ATT) is the dominant title in the hidden object market. It acquires, retains, and monetizes players primarily through narrative-driven content.
Following ATT, the game managed not only to recover its downloads but also significantly grow revenue. This provides further evidence that the post-ATT ad tech ecosystem favors products positioned around strong narratives.
Family Farm’s Pivot to Narrative
Family Farm Adventures is another interesting case study. It appears on ‘growing games’ list 2x- once after release in 2021 (just ATT was being implemented) as a ‘gameplay’ focussed game. Then in 2023 it starts growing again with a decidedly more narrative product experience.
The game wasn’t able to continue scaling, but it did achieve some notable post-ATT growth with a significant pivot from gameplay to a more narrative focused product experience.
FTUE 2020 in gets players right into the simulation gameplay
Current FTUE is far more dramatic at the start and also includes more narrative ‘beats’ with story art tied tightly into the progression.
In 2020 a key new character/progression motivation in the FTUE is a kindly older guy.
That role has been recast, and this time, he’s a hottie!
The quest UI was also updated to be far more character/drama focused than gameplay.
Current Character/Drama Focused Quest UI
The quest UI in 2025, far more gameplay/mechanic progression focused.
Drama Box app success
Success for ‘soaps’ extends into apps as well: Drama Box has been steadily climbing the charts!
Conclusion
The rise of dramatic narratives as a core product pillar is, admittedly, not something I would have predicted, especially across genres & audiences. Yet, from casual to 4X, examples like DW:S and Gossip Harbor show that high-tension, character-driven storytelling can be a game-changer. Integrating high-tension, character-driven storytelling into marketing, FTUE, and key conversion events can unlock large, highly valuable audiences.
While gameplay innovation continues to produce hits, an increasing number of successful titles are wrapped in drama.
As this trend reshapes the gaming landscape, embracing this ‘soap opera’ could be the key to sustainable growth and chart-topping success across the industry.
