But, underneath all of them, there is another economy that studios rarely model directly: Trust.

Players continuously decide whether they trust the game, its systems, other players, and the people operating it. They decide e.g., whether an offer is real, whether a probability is fair, whether their progress is safe, whether rules will remain understandable, whether a purchase will keep its value, whether another player can exploit them, and whether a failure will be handled properly.

Most studios treat these things as separate UX, community, customer-support, economy, or communication problems. I think that is too narrow.

Trust behaves much more like an economy:

• It can be accumulated.

• It can be spent.

• It can be transferred.

• It can be protected.

• It can be concentrated around certain systems, features, people, and brands.

• It can also collapse much faster than it was built.

And, when trust collapses, the damage doesn’t remain inside one feature. It spreads into progression, retention, regularity, social behavior, monetization, community sentiment, and the players’ willingness to invest more time into the game.

That’s why trust shouldn’t only be understood as a soft brand concept. It should be understood as economic infrastructure.

Trust Is Economic Infrastructure

I would define trust in games as:

The player’s confidence that the game, its systems, its operators, and its participants will behave within understandable and reasonably fair expectations over time.

This doesn’t mean that everything needs to be generous. It doesn’t mean that players must always win, receive the best reward, avoid losses, or agree with every decision. A difficult game can be trusted. A highly monetized game can be trusted. A game with harsh loss systems can be trusted. Even a game built around deception between players can be trusted.

What matters is whether the player understands the contract.

An extraction shooter can say:

If you enter the raid, you may lose everything you carry.

That can be trusted if the rules are consistent.

A gacha system can say:

This reward is rare, these are the probabilities, and this protection guarantees an outcome within a defined number of attempts.

That can also be trusted if it works exactly as communicated.

A subscription can say:

You receive these benefits while active, renewal works like this, and cancellation changes these things.

Again, that can be trusted.

Trust is not the absence of friction, uncertainty, loss, scarcity, or monetization. Trust is confidence in the rules surrounding them.

And, once this confidence exists, players are more willing to make investments:

• Time investments

• Emotional investments

• Social investments

• Progression investments

• Creative investments

• Financial investments

• Identity investments

This is why trust is kind of like an infrastructure. It supports almost every other form of value creation inside the game.

Trust Has Sources and Sinks

Traditional game economies have sources and sinks. Currency enters through rewards and exits through spending. Resources enter through production and exit through e.g., crafting, upgrades, losses, and maintenance.

Trust behaves similarly.

Trust sources can include:

• Consistent rules

• Clear probabilities

• Stable pricing

• Honest communication

• Predictable progression

• Fair compensation

• Protection systems

• Reliable customer support

• Transparent changes

• Secure player-to-player interactions

• Delivery on promises

• Respect for earlier player investment

• etc.

Trust sinks can include:

• Hidden changes

• Misleading offers

• Fake discounts

• Unclear probabilities

• Unexplained nerfs

• Broken purchases

• Unstable progression rules

• Unaddressed exploits

• Inconsistent moderation

• Poor compensation

• Sudden value destruction

• Systems that punish players for believing what the game previously taught them

• etc.

The difficult part is that these sources and sinks do not have equal weight.

A game may build trust through months of stable operation, then spend a large amount of it through one badly handled economy change. A studio may communicate honestly for years, then create doubt through e.g., one misleading monetization surface. A social system may work well for thousands of trades, then become distrusted because visible scams are left unresolved.

Trust accumulation is slow. Trust destruction can be immediate. This asymmetry is important because it means trust can’t be treated like a resource that is always easy to regenerate.

Some trust losses are recoverable. Others permanently change how players interpret the game.

Predictability Is More Important Than Generosity

Studios sometimes try to repair low trust with generosity. More rewards, better events, free currency, compensation gifts, larger bundles, and temporary discounts. These can help, but generosity isn’t the same thing as trust.

A game can be generous and still feel untrustworthy. If rewards change without explanation, offers use artificial urgency, progression is constantly rebalanced, and player investments are repeatedly devalued, generosity may only make the system feel temporarily less painful.

Predictability is usually more foundational.

Players want to understand:

• What their actions produce

• What an item is worth

• How progression changes over time

• What can be lost

• What is protected

• What a purchase includes

• What happens after a mistake or failure

• Whether the same rules apply tomorrow

This doesn’t require complete certainty. Games need surprise, tension, mystery, discovery, and changing conditions. But uncertainty should be designed. It shouldn’t feel like the rules themselves are unstable. A player can enjoy uncertain outcomes when they trust the outcome system. They struggle to enjoy outcomes when they are uncertain whether the system itself is honest.

Transparent Value in Monetization

Mobile strategy example: a premium offer showing its contents, quantities, purchase limit, duration, and value structure directly inside the game.

Monetization is one of the clearest places where trust becomes economic. Every offer asks the player to believe something.

The player may need to believe that:

• The price represents real value

• The discount is genuine

• The bundle contents are useful

• The timer means what it says

• The item will retain some relevance

• The purchase will be delivered correctly

• The offer is appropriate for their progression state

• A better offer will not immediately make the purchase feel foolish

• etc.

If these beliefs repeatedly prove correct, monetization becomes easier to understand. Players don’t need to re-evaluate the entire commercial relationship every time a store surface appears.

If these beliefs repeatedly prove wrong, every offer gains friction.

The player starts asking:

• Is this actually discounted?

• Will this be cheaper tomorrow?

• Is the item about to be nerfed?

• Does this bundle contain filler?

• Am I being shown a different price because the game thinks I will pay more?

• Will this purchase become obsolete next season?

That hesitation is trust friction. It may not appear directly e.g., in an economy dashboard, but it affects conversion, purchase frequency, long-term value perception, and willingness to consider new monetization formats.

Transparent monetization doesn’t mean removing commercial design. It means making commercial design legible.

This can include:

• Exact bundle contents

• Comparable quantities

• Clear purchase limits

• Honest discount references

• Visible duration

• Upgrade or duplicate handling

• Refund and delivery expectations

• Relevance to the player’s current progression

The strongest offer isn’t always the cheapest offer. Sometimes, it’s the offer the player can evaluate without suspicion.

Note: This connects directly with what I covered in article 73 about earning monetized value through gameplay, progression, regularity, mastery, and social engagement. An earned offer only feels valuable if the player trusts the conditions through which it was earned.

Probabilities, Protection, and Perceived Fairness

Mobile RPG example: visible rarity rates, guaranteed reward progression, pity protection, and duplicate conversion before spending.

Random reward systems aren’t automatically untrustworthy. Players often enjoy randomness. Randomness creates anticipation, stories, surprise, collection tension, and different progression paths.

The trust problem begins when randomness feels unreadable, selectively communicated, or structurally unfair.

There is a major difference between:

I didn’t receive the reward I wanted.

And:

I don’t trust how the game decided what I received.

The first can be part of the entertainment. The second damages the system itself.

Protection systems help because they make negative outcomes bounded.

Examples include:

• Pity progression

• Guaranteed rarity thresholds

• Duplicate conversion

• Bad-luck protection

• Choice after repeated failures

• Visible probability changes

• Reward history

• Previewed outcome pools

• Confirmation before spending

• etc.

These systems do more than improve expected value. They create trust boundaries.

The player may still experience disappointment, but they understand that disappointment can’t continue indefinitely or outside the communicated rules.

This is important because perceived fairness is not produced only by mathematical fairness. A mathematically correct system can still feel unfair if players cannot see, understand, or verify its logic. Visibility matters, memory matters, and protection matter. And, in many cases, actually the interface communicating probability is part of the economy itself.

Player-to-Player Trust Needs Systems

PC MMORPG example: seller reputation, trade history, escrow, item inspection, delivery guarantees, and dispute protection supporting a player marketplace.

Trust doesn’t exist only between the player and the studio. It also exists between players.

This becomes especially important in games with:

• Trading

• Auction houses

• Guild treasuries

• Crafting contracts

• Player services

• Carry systems

• Resource lending

• Shared progression

• Creator marketplaces

• User-generated content economies

Many games want rich player economies, but they underestimate how much economic activity depends on trust infrastructure. If players fear scams, manipulated prices, fake items, unreliable delivery, account theft, or unresolvable disputes, the economy becomes smaller than its theoretical design.

Players trade only with friends. They avoid high-value exchanges. They move activity into external communities. They create manual reputation systems outside the game. Or, they simply stop participating.

Games can support player trust through systems such as:

• Escrow

• Verified delivery

• Item inspection

• Trade history

• Reputation signals

• Role permissions

• Transaction logs

• Price histories

• Limits for new accounts

• Dispute handling

• Reversible confirmation stages

The goal isn’t to remove every possibility of deception. In some games, deception is part of the fantasy.

The goal is to make the boundary clear.

If betrayal is intended gameplay, players should understand where betrayal is possible. If a marketplace is presented as secure infrastructure, security shouldn’t depend on the player detecting every trick manually.

That distinction protects both the fantasy and the economy.

Compensation Is Economy Design

PC extraction shooter example: restored loadout, returned insurance, rollback protection, an incident timeline, and compensation after a service failure.

Games fail. Servers go down, items disappear, purchases are delayed events break, exploits damage economies, match results are lost, and/or progression is rolled back. Players lose resources through circumstances that weren’t part of the intended game.

The question isn’t whether every failure can be prevented. The question is what the game teaches players after failure happens.

Poorly handled failures teach:

Your investment isn’t safe, and the game may not protect it.

Well-handled failures teach:

The system failed, but the relationship still works.

This is why compensation is economy design, not only customer support. Compensation determines how much trust is returned after the game has consumed it through failure.

Good recovery can include:

• Restoring the actual lost value

• Returning insured or protected items

• Explaining what happened

• Showing the recovery timeline

• Applying compensation consistently

• Differentiating affected and unaffected players where appropriate

• Protecting players from having to prove obvious system failures individually

• Giving additional value when the disruption created meaningful opportunity cost

The amount matters, but the logic matters more. An arbitrary gift can feel disconnected from the loss. A recovery that clearly maps to what happened feels like the system understands the damage. Speed also matters.

Silence creates speculation. Speculation spreads distrust beyond the players directly affected. Once players believe that losses may not be recognized, they begin reducing future investment before another failure even happens.

The economy then suffers twice:

• First from the incident.

• Then from players protecting themselves against the next one.

Social Trust and Shared Ownership

PC strategy example: visible contributions, treasury history, withdrawal permissions, proposals, voting, and safeguarded group purchases.

Social systems often ask players to share value before giving them enough tools to trust how that value is controlled. Guild members contribute currency, items, time, event progress, territory, crafting materials, strategic information, and social labor.

Yet, in many games, visibility and accountability remain surprisingly limited:

• Who contributed?

• Who withdrew?

• Who changed permissions?

• Who proposed the purchase?

• Who benefits from the result?

• Who can reverse a mistake?

When these questions are difficult to answer, social trust depends too heavily on personal relationships and external tools. That can work for small groups, but it scales poorly.

Social trust systems can include:

• Contribution histories

• Treasury ledgers

• Role-based permissions

• Withdrawal limits

• Voting thresholds

• Proposal systems

• Audit trails

• Shared purchase safeguards

• Leadership succession rules

• Recovery from inactive or abusive leadership

These systems may look administrative, but they create gameplay. They allow groups to take larger risks, pool more resources, plan further ahead, and build more meaningful shared ownership. Trust expands the scale of cooperation.

Without trust, players optimize around individual safety. With trust, they can create institutions. That is a major difference for e.g., guilds, alliances, clans, creator groups, and persistent social worlds.

Trust Across Progression and Live Operations

Players also build expectations through progression. Every system teaches them what investment means.

If upgrading a character is consistently valuable, players trust upgrades. If collecting a category repeatedly leads to devaluation, players become cautious. If battle pass rewards retain relevance, players trust future passes more. If seasonal resets respect long-term investment, players are more willing to begin the next season. This means progression design has a trust memory.

Players remember:

• What happened to earlier investments

• Whether previous promises were kept

• How often systems were replaced

• Whether catch-up invalidated effort

• Whether balance changes respected sunk resources

• Whether endgame goals remained meaningful

• Whether paid progression retained relevance

• etc.

This is one reason why technically reasonable changes can still create negative reactions. The studio may evaluate the new system by its future performance. Players evaluate it through the history of what they already invested. Both views matter.

A progression change isn’t only a new mathematical model. It’s also a renegotiation of the relationship between the game and existing players. Live operations should treat it that way.

Trust Can Be Spent, But It Cannot Be Sold

Strong games sometimes have enough accumulated trust to make difficult decisions. They can rebalance economies, remove exploits, change progression, increase prices, retire content, reduce overpowered rewards, delay features, reset systems, and ask players to accept temporary inconvenience for long-term health. This is trust being spent.

Players may not like the decision, but they are willing to believe that there’s a reasonable explanation behind it.

The danger begins when studios mistake this tolerance for unlimited permission. Trust isn’t a permanent entitlement. It can’t simply be converted into short-term revenue over and over again.

A studio may get away with one aggressive offer, one poor communication cycle, one underwhelming update, or one disruptive economy change because players still trust the broader relationship. But that doesn’t mean the decision was free. It may have consumed trust that was needed later.

This creates a hidden form of economic debt:

• The dashboard may show successful revenue.

• The community may show manageable sentiment.

• Retention may not move immediately.

Yet, the player’s threshold for the next mistake has changed. That’s why short-term performance can hide long-term trust consumption.

Measuring Trust Indirectly

Trust is difficult to reduce into one metric. That doesn’t mean it can’t be observed.

Possible trust signals include:

• Offer hesitation and delayed conversion

• Reduced willingness to pre-purchase

• Lower participation in e.g., random reward systems

• Increased refund behavior

• Lower marketplace activity

• More external price checking

• Increased support contacts before purchases

• Players holding resources instead of investing them

• Declining guild contributions

• Reduced adoption of new progression systems

• Stronger negative response to small changes

• Players waiting to see whether others are harmed first

• etc.

These behaviors can look unrelated. Together, they may indicate that players are protecting themselves.

And self-protection is often what low trust looks like inside a game economy:

• Players keep currency liquid.

• They avoid long-term commitments.

• They purchase only proven value.

• They reduce social exposure.

• They wait before adopting new systems.

• They stop believing future promises until the results are visible.

This is economically rational behavior when trust is low.

The Risks of Designing Around Trust

Trust shouldn’t become another manipulative optimization surface.

The goal isn’t to manufacture the appearance of fairness while preserving hidden systems that work against the player.

There are several risks:

• Trust theatre: showing badges, guarantees, or transparency language without meaningful protection

• Selective transparency: revealing favorable information while hiding important conditions

• Reputation abuse: allowing coordinated groups to manipulate trust signals

• Overprotection: removing uncertainty, responsibility, or meaningful risk from gameplay

• Inconsistent recovery: compensating visible groups while ignoring quieter affected players

• Trust segmentation: giving clearer or fairer treatment only to high-value players

• Communication inflation: explaining everything so often that important messages lose weight

Trust systems need to be real:

• A guarantee should guarantee something.

• A reputation signal should be difficult to manipulate.

• A compensation process should recognize actual damage.

• A transparent offer should provide information that helps the player make a decision, not only info that helps the game close the sale.

Otherwise, the trust layer becomes another trust sink.

Why Trust as a Game Economy Matters

Games ask players to invest continuously. They ask for time, attention, learning, emotion, relationships, identity, creativity, and money. The deeper the game becomes, the more of these investments begin to overlap. Trust is what allows the player to make those investments without evaluating every system as a potential threat.

When trust is high:

• Players commit further into progression

• Players participate more actively in economies

• Players experiment with new systems

• Players make longer-term purchases

• Players cooperate with more people

• Players tolerate reasonable uncertainty

• Players recover from failures more easily

• Players believe that future investment may still matter

When trust is low, the opposite happens:

• Players become defensive.

• They hoard.

• They wait.

• They avoid.

• They reduce social and financial exposure.

• They interpret ambiguity against the game because earlier experience taught them to do so.

That’s why trust should be designed, protected, monitored, and repaired like an economy. Not because trust should be monetized directly. But because almost every sustainable form of monetization depends on it.

The strongest games don’t simply convince players to spend. They create systems in which players feel safe investing more of themselves. And, in long-running games, that may be one of the most valuable economies of all.

That’s the basic version of earning.

It works. It’s familiar. It’s understandable. And, in many games, it’s still one of the cleanest ways to connect engagement and monetization without forcing every valuable moment into a direct payment moment.

But, I think, the industry often stops too early here. Because, earning through in-game economy is only one way of letting players earn monetized value. It’s not the whole design space.

There are more advanced ways of doing the same thing:

• Players can earn better offers.

• Players can earn discounts.

• Players can earn subscription access.

• Players can earn VIP eligibility.

• Players can earn premium tier openings.

• Players can earn exclusive purchase rights.

• Players can earn temporary monetized utilities.

• Players can earn monetization surfaces themselves.

This differentiation matters. How? Because, once the monetized part of the game becomes earnable through gameplay, progression, meta systems, social systems, and feature engagement, monetization stops being only a store layer sitting on top of the game. It becomes part of the game’s progression language.

Not just:

Play → earn currency → buy item.

Instead:

Play → prove intent → unlock better commercial possibilities.

That is a very different design philosophy.

The Basic Model Is Currency Earning

The most common model is simple. The player plays the game, earns currency, and eventually spends that currency on something valuable.

This can be, e.g.,:

• Soft currency

• Premium currency

• Event currency

• Crafting materials

• Battle pass XP / currency / points

• (Store) tokens

• Guild points

• Loyalty points

• Resource fragments

This model is useful because it creates a familiar bridge between engagement and value. The player understands that time, skill, attention, or consistency creates progress. The developer understands how to price the economy, tune the earning curve, and control the pacing of value creation.

But there is also a limitation. Currency earning tends to turn monetized value into an economic conversion problem. The player isn’t really earning the monetized surface. They’re earning a substitute for purchasing power, which might get you access to the monetized surface fully or lightly.

That may sound like a small difference, but it’s not.

In many cases, a currency system asks:

How much value can the player earn before they should pay?

A more advanced earning system asks:

What commercial relationship has the player earned the right to participate in?

That question opens up much more interesting design space.

Earning System

I would define this as:

A system where gameplay, progression, behavior, loyalty, social participation, or meta-system engagement unlocks monetized benefits, monetized access, monetized options, or monetized rights that would otherwise be unavailable, weaker, more expensive, or less personalized.

This isn’t just “free stuff”. That is an important note. If the system is only giving away paid value without any strategy, it’s discounting. If it’s creating a more meaningful relationship between engagement and monetization, it can become a retention, conversion, loyalty, regularity, and personalization system at the same time.

The player should not feel:

The game is begging me to buy.

The player should feel:

I have earned a better way to engage with the game.

That’s where the concept becomes more engaging, which might eventually feed the monetization’s performance as well.

Earning Discounts and Discount Tickets

Mobile puzzle example: an earned discount ticket connected to regularity and mastery.

The most obvious version is discount earning.

A player completes milestones, reaches progression thresholds, participates in events, returns regularly, helps a guild complete a goal, plays a specific mode, or engages with a new feature. As a result, they earn a discount ticket, discount token, personalized offer reduction, store coupon, bundle modifier, or limited-time price improvement.

On the surface, this sounds simple: play more, get cheaper stuff.

But the better version is more nuanced. Discounts shouldn’t only reward activity. They should reward meaningful intent.

For example:

• A player who upgrades the same hero repeatedly earns a discount on that hero’s premium skin.

• A player who participates in a new mode earns a discount for a mode-specific starter bundle.

• A player who returns for multiple days earns a limited discount on a reactivation bundle.

• A player who contributes to a guild milestone earns a group-related offer.

• A player who reaches a deep progression point earns a discount on a long-term convenience feature.

• A player who tries a feature but doesn’t convert earns a second-chance offer that is cheaper, smaller, or more relevant.

This is much more interesting than general discounting because the discount becomes contextual. It’s tied to player behavior. It’s earned through interaction. It can feel like recognition instead of random price pressure.

The danger is also obvious.

If players learn that everything becomes cheaper by waiting, you have trained them not to buy. If players learn that weak engagement produces strong discounts, you have trained the wrong behavior. If players learn that discounts are fake, inflated, or always available, the system loses trust.

So, to avoid basic mistakes, discount earning should be designed around:

• Specific behaviors

• Clear eligibility

• Real value

• Limited frequency

• Personal relevance

• Non-destructive pricing

The discount should feel like the game saying:

You have reached a moment where this offer makes more sense now.

Not:

Please buy, we are lowering the price again.

Earning Subscription or VIP Access

Mobile strategy example: a season milestone opening a VIP/subscription trial.

The second major opportunity is earning subscription and/or VIP access.

Most subscription systems are still built around a very static idea. Subscribe, get benefits. Pay monthly, receive the package. Upgrade tier, receive better package. Cancel, lose the benefits. That’s understandable. It’s clean commercially.

But, games can do something more dynamic because games already have progression systems, behavior data, social structures, and long-term engagement patterns.

Players could earn:

• Temporary VIP access

• Subscription trial days

• Subscription tier openings

• Reduced subscription entry prices

• Upgrade eligibility

• VIP streak protection

• Partial subscription benefits

• Group subscription rewards

• Seasonal subscription boosts

• Premium feature unlock periods

The important idea is that subscription doesn’t need to be only a purchase decision. It can also be a progression destination.

For example, a player could earn three days of VIP by completing a difficult event chain. Another player could unlock eligibility for a higher subscription tier only after reaching a certain account level. A guild could collectively earn a one-week VIP trial for members who contributed meaningfully during a season. A highly regular player could unlock a discounted monthly subscription offer because their behavior already indicates that the benefits would be relevant.

This changes the psychology of subscription. Instead of asking the player to imagine the value of VIP from outside the system, the game lets the player experience it from inside the system. This is effective because subscription value is often abstract before the player has lived with it. Daily rewards, faster progression, exclusive cosmetics, queue priority, extra slots, expanded storage, bonus missions, ad removal, premium event access, convenience features, and enhanced social tools can all look small when listed in a store. But, when those benefits touch the player’s actual routine, they become easier to understand.

This is especially powerful for regular players who have not yet monetized. They may not be unwilling to pay. They may simply not have had a reason that felt concrete enough.

Note: Interested about what I’ve covered about Regularity when it comes to finding more about regular players and their behavior? Check out my article here (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/71-regularity):

Earned VIP access can create that reason without forcing the conversion too early.

Note: Interested to read what else I’ve covered relating to subscriptions? Check out these articles for starters:

Earning the Right to Buy

PC MMORPG example: mastery-based purchase rights for a prestige vendor.

Another underused model is earning purchase rights.

This can sound strange at first because most monetization design tries to reduce friction. If the player wants to buy, why make them earn the right to buy? But in some systems, earned purchase rights can increase perceived value, reduce store noise, and make monetized items feel more integrated into progression.

Examples:

• A cosmetic becomes purchasable only after mastering the related character.

• A prestige bundle unlocks only after reaching a season rank.

• A founder-style offer opens only after participating in a new feature’s early period.

• A high-value convenience item becomes available only after the player has reached the point where it actually solves a real problem.

• A premium upgrade path opens only after a player has proven commitment to a mode.

• A subscription tier becomes visible only when the player has outgrown the lower tier.

This isn’t about hiding monetization to be clever. It’s about sequencing monetization according to readiness.

Many games show players too much, too early. The store becomes a wall of unrelated commercial surfaces. The player sees offers for systems they don’t yet understand, cosmetics for characters they don’t care about, bundles for modes they haven’t adopted, and subscriptions for routines they haven’t built.

Earned purchase rights can make monetization feel less like a supermarket and more like an achievement path.

You played this. You mastered this. You joined this. You committed to this. Now this premium option is relevant.

That can be more elegant than constantly pushing the same offers to everyone.

Earning Better Store Logic

Mobile simulation example: earned store flexibility, offer reservation, rerolling, and loyalty boost logic.

Another way to think about this is that players can earn better store logic. Not just better prices. Better relevance.

For example, a player who has engaged deeply with one archetype shouldn’t see the same store as a player who rotates between many archetypes. A player who plays socially shouldn’t see the same offers as a solo optimizer. A player who values cosmetics shouldn’t be treated exactly like a player who values progression convenience. A player who comes back during events shouldn’t be treated exactly like a player with daily regularity.

The earning layer could unlock:

• More relevant offer slots

• More personalized bundles

• Choice-based offers

• Build-your-own bundles

• Delayed payment windows

• Loyalty multipliers

• Store rerolls

• Offer reservations

• Upgrade paths

• Trade-in systems

This is good because the player isn’t only earning an item. They’re earning a better commercial interface. For example, a player could earn the ability to reserve an offer for 48 hours. Another player could earn one monthly bundle reroll. Another could earn the right to convert an unused discount into a different category. Another could earn a loyalty multiplier on direct-to-consumer web store purchases, if the ecosystem supports it. This can make monetization feel more player-centric without simply lowering prices.

In many cases, flexibility may be more valuable than discounting. A player may not need a 20% cheaper bundle. They may need the bundle to contain the right character, the right currency, the right upgrade material, or the right timing.

Earned store logic can solve that.

Earning Monetized Features Temporarily

PC extraction shooter example: squad engagement unlocking insurance, gear discounts, and premium stash access.

Games can also let players earn temporary access to monetized features.

This is different from earning currency and different from earning a discount. The player earns the use of a feature that normally belongs to a paid layer.

Examples:

• Temporary Ad removal

• Extra inventory slots for a weekend

• Premium queue access for an event

• One-time auto-claim

• One-week advanced analytics for strategy games

• Temporary crafting acceleration

• Extra loadout slots

• Premium matchmaking filters

• Additional social slots

• Expanded guild tools

This can work well when the feature is hard to understand before use.

Some convenience features aren’t emotionally powerful in a store description. They become powerful only after the player experiences how they reduce friction. A temporary earned unlock can act as a playable demonstration.

But again, there is a design risk. Like, for example, if the temporary access is too generous, it may replace purchase. If it’s too weak, it may fail to teach value. If it’s given at the wrong moment, the player may not notice it.

The best timing is usually when the feature solves an active problem:

• Don’t give extra storage before the player cares about storage.

• Don’t give faster crafting before crafting has become a bottleneck.

• Don’t give advanced guild tools before the player has a guild role.

• Don’t give premium matchmaking filters before matchmaking quality matters.

Earned feature access should arrive when the player can feel the contrast.

Earning Social Monetized Value

PC strategy/social example: guild engagement opening optional group offers without forcing social pressure.

There is also a social version of this, in which players can earn monetized value together.

This can include:

• Guild discount tickets

• Team store unlocks

• Group subscription trials

• Shared VIP weekends

• Clan bundle eligibility

• Co-op challenge coupons

• Referral-based offer upgrades

• Community milestone rewards

• Spectator-driven boosts

• Creator-linked store benefits

This has a different emotional texture than individual earning. When a group earns monetized value together, the offer can become part of the social story. The guild didn’t just earn resources. The guild earned access. The team didn’t just complete a task. The team opened a better commercial opportunity. The community didn’t just generate activity. The community changed the reward surface.

This is especially relevant for games with clans, guilds, alliances, parties, creator communities, and spectator ecosystems.

The key is to avoid turning social pressure into monetization pressure.

If one player’s payment is required for everyone else to benefit, the system can become socially uncomfortable. If the group earns the opening together and each player can choose privately whether to act on it, the system is cleaner.

The social layer should create relevance, pride, and timing. It should not create shame.

Note: Interested about social monetization itself? Check out what I’ve written about the topic in these articles:

Earning Payment Flexibility

One of the more interesting future directions isn’t earning cheaper value, but earning more flexible payment structures.

This can include:

• Installment-style access

• Prepaid subscription extensions

• Delayed purchase windows

• Trial-to-paid (upgrade) paths

• Earned renewal protection

• Tier upgrade credits

• Pause-and-resume rights

• Loyalty-based grace periods

• Commitment discounts

• Regional price-sensitive offer formats

This isn’t equally available on every platform, and developers need to work within e.g., platform, legal, tax, and consumer protection constraints. But, conceptually, the design space could be important.

Some players aren’t blocked by value. They’re blocked by timing, commitment, trust, liquidity, or uncertainty. An earned monetization system can respond to that.

A highly regular player might earn a better long-term subscription offer. A returning player might earn a prepaid VIP extension instead of an auto-renewing offer. A seasonal player might earn a one-season commitment price. A player who has already purchased several related items might earn a clean upgrade credit into a larger bundle.

This isn’t just pricing design. It’s relationship design.

The game is saying:

Because of how you engage, we can offer you a better structure.

That can be very powerful if done transparently.

Earning Through Meta Systems

The most natural home for this design isn’t always the store. It’s the meta.

Progression systems, achievement systems, mastery systems, collection systems, event systems, guild systems, battle pass systems, regularity systems, and long-term account systems are all better places to originate earned monetized value than the store itself.

Why? Because, the store is where the player evaluates the offer. The meta is where the player earns the meaning of the offer.

A discount earned through a mastery path feels different from a discount randomly shown in a pop-up. A VIP trial earned through a season milestone feels different from a generic free trial. A premium tier opening earned through long-term progression feels different from a store tab asking the player to upgrade on day one.

The same commercial value can feel completely different depending on where it comes from. This is why I think earned monetized value should be designed as a systems layer, not only a monetization tactic.

The earning source matters:

• Gameplay mastery creates one meaning.

• Progression depth creates another.

• Regularity creates another.

• Social contribution creates another.

• Feature adoption creates another.

• Seasonal participation creates another.

• Comeback behavior creates another.

Each source can unlock a different kind of monetized value.

The Design Principle: Earned Relevance

The best version of this isn’t “earn discounts”. The best version is earned relevance.

A player should earn monetized value that makes sense because of who they’re becoming inside the game.

• If they’re becoming a collector, they earn better collection offers.

• If they’re becoming a competitor, they earn e.g., competitive cosmetic prestige and event access.

• If they’re becoming a guild contributor, they earn group-related value.

• If they’re becoming highly regular, they earn subscription opportunities.

• If they’re becoming a mode specialist, they earn mode-specific premium openings.

• If they’re becoming a returning player, they earn recovery paths.

• If they’re becoming a creator, they earn e.g., creator-linked commercial tools.

This is more respectful than generic monetization because it listens to behavior. It also has likely better business logic because the offer is attached to demonstrated interest.

The player doesn’t receive value because the game wants to push revenue today. The player receives value because the game has observed a meaningful moment. That’s a much healthier foundation.

The Risks

There are real risks.

• The first risk is discount dependency. If players learn that engagement always produces discounts, pricing discipline breaks.

• The second risk is entitlement inflation. If every system gives monetized benefits, players may start seeing paid value as something that should always be earned for free.

• The third risk is complexity. Too many tickets, coupons, trials, store modifiers, and unlock rights can make the economy harder to understand than it needs to be.

• The fourth risk is unfairness. If some players receive better commercial opportunities without clear logic, others may feel punished.

• The fifth risk is regulatory and platform friction. Subscription offers, discounting, auto-renewal, prepaid access, tiering, regional pricing, and external store ecosystems all have constraints. The design has to respect those constraints from the beginning.

• The sixth risk is bad personalization. A personalized offer that feels relevant is good. A personalized offer that feels manipulative isn’t.

So, this means, that the system needs rules.

Earning systems should be:

• Transparent enough to trust

• Limited enough to protect price integrity

• Contextual enough to feel relevant

• Useful enough to teach value

• Rare enough to feel earned

• Simple enough to understand

• Optional enough to avoid pressure

This isn’t a place for messy dark-pattern design. If anything, earned monetized value requires more care than normal store design because it sits closer to the player’s emotional relationship with the game.

Why Earning Monetized Value Matters

The future of game monetization isn’t only about inventing new things to sell. It’s also about inventing better ways for players to arrive at monetized value.

Many games still treat monetization as a separate destination. The player plays the game, then eventually gets sent to the store. The store tries to convert them. The game continues.

Stronger systems can make monetization part of the journey. Not in an aggressive way. In a more integrated way.

The game can say:

• You played enough to understand this.

• You progressed enough to need this.

• You contributed enough to unlock this.

• You returned enough to deserve this.

• You specialized enough to want this.

• You became regular enough for this to make sense.

That’s more interesting for a player than a static store. It’s also more human. Because, players don’t all reach monetization readiness at the same time, through the same motivations, or with the same needs. Some players need trust. Some need context. Some need proof. Some need social meaning. Some need timing. Some need flexibility. Some need to feel that the game recognizes their behavior. Earning monetized value can serve all of those needs.

The basic way is still valid. Let players earn currency. Let them spend it. Let the economy create clear paths between engagement and value. But don’t stop there.

There is a larger opportunity in letting players earn the monetized parts of the game more directly:

• Discount tickets

• VIP openings

• Subscription trials

• Premium tier eligibility

• Store flexibility

• Purchase rights

• Temporary paid-feature access

• Group offers

• Upgrade credits

• Offer reservations

• Payment flexibility

• Personalized commercial surfaces

These aren’t just monetization tricks. Designed well, they can become retention systems, regularity systems, loyalty systems, progression systems, social systems, and personalization systems.

The strongest version isn’t about making paid value cheaper. It’s about making paid value earned, contextual, and better timed.

And, if games are already systems for shaping behavior, progress, identity, and belonging, then monetization should probably learn to participate in those systems more smartly.

When most people hear the term “UGC”, they think about:

• Cosmetics

• Mods

• Sandboxes

• Level editors

• Creator tools

• Player-made maps

• Games inside games / platforms

And honestly, that’s fair. That’s what UGC has largely meant for the past two decades.

We’ve seen massive successes built around that model:

• Roblox

• Fortnite Creative

• Minecraft

• Skyrim modding

• Garry’s Mod

• Counter-Strike

• Halo Forge

• Dreams

• VRChat

But those ecosystems are incredibly difficult to build. You’re not just building a game anymore.

You’re building:

• Creator tools

• Moderation systems

• Marketplace infra

• Discovery algorithms

• Social platforms

• Distribution ecosystems

• Monetization frameworks

• Live-service operations at platform scale

And the reality is simple. Most studios are never going to become Roblox. Most studios are never going to become Epic Games. Most studios are never going to build the next Minecraft. And for every legendary Skyrim-style modding ecosystem, there are lots of of abandoned editors, unsupported mod kits, and creator systems that never generated meaningful retention or long-term value.

The industry has started treating UGC as if the only future is players becoming developers, or developers needing to mitigate their strategies inside current UGC ecosystems. I don’t think that’s true. The future isn’t just Roblox.

I think the future of UGC is systemic, collective, persistent and deeply integrated into “the living simulation of the game world” itself. That’s where Collective Reality Systems come in.

Collective Reality Systems

Collective Reality Systems are systemic game architectures where players continuously shape e.g., the world, narrative, ecosystems, AI behavior, encounters, economies, social systems, and progression together synchronously and/or asynchronously.

Instead of players explicitly creating content through editors, they influence systems that generate emergent experiences. That’s a very different philosophy from traditional UGC.

Traditional UGC says:

Players create content.

Collective Reality Systems say:

Players influence systemic reality.

And that distinction changes everything.

Because now:

• The world itself becomes the content surface

• Multiplayer becomes part of the simulation

• Persistence becomes memory

• Community behavior becomes gameplay

• AI becomes adaptive ecosystem design

• Emergence replaces static authored repetition

Players don’t just play the world anymore. They deform it. Collectively.

The Shift From Content Creation To Systemic Influence

Most traditional UGC focuses on explicit creation. Build a map, make a skin, script a game mode, and/or upload a mod.

Collective Reality Systems focus on indirect authorship.

Players influence things such as:

• World states

• Ecosystems

• AI behavior

• Narrative progression

• Environmental transformation

• Encounter evolution

• Event escalation

• Economy systems

• Social systems and structures

Players aren’t necessarily “making content” (unless scoped to that inside to a system, which is part of the collective reality approach). They’re shaping a living system. And that’s a much more scalable fantasy for e.g., many modern AAA games. Especially immersive ones.

The Different Layers Of Collective Reality Systems

So, what are these systems? Based on my research, there’s plenty of examples to give, which I’ve listed below. And, when you’re looking into this list, keep in mind that these systems can exist individually or combine together into larger ecosystems.

Collective World States

• Players collectively shape the world state over time.

• Things such as regions, factions and anomalies evolve based on player actions.

• The world can unlock, collapse or transform globally.

• Shared progression creates persistent community impact.

Environment Manipulation / UGC

• World / environment layouts evolve through player interaction; AND/OR players modify existing spaces, routes and mission areas.

• Environmental changes that affect gameplay and exploration.

• Controlled UGC systems maintain curated world quality.

Collective Environment & World States

• Players / communities shape both environments and global progression.

• Things such as world corruption, weather and territories evolve dynamically.

• Local actions contribute to larger systemic world changes.

• Persistent world states create shared live experiences.

AI-As-Ecosystem

• AI evolves as part of a living world ecosystem.

• The world state influences enemy behavior and adaptation.

• Collective player actions shape the ecosystem over time.

• AI becomes part of the “narrative” and “progression” loop.

Collective Narrative Systems

• Story progression reacts to collective player behavior.

• Narrative paths evolve through global player / community actions.

• Players indirectly influence future story developments.

• Shared narratives creates evolving world (and its history).

Mission / Encounter UGC

• Players influence how encounters and missions emerge.

• Systems generate evolving challenges from player activity.

• Encounters can e.g., spread, mutate and persist globally.

• Community behavior shapes future mission ecosystems.

Events UGC

• World events emerge dynamically from player actions.

• Events evolve based on participation, outcomes and interplay with other systems.

• Global systems react to victories, failures and activity.

• Players collectively influence live world / events pacing.

Sync Echo Systems

• Players experience real-time synchronized world reactions, and/or take part in them synchronously or asynchronously.

• Actions instantly affect nearby players and environments.

• Echo systems spread events, signals and disturbances live.

• Multiplayer actions create shared emergent moments.

Ghosts / Residue UGC

• Players leave persistent traces within the world.

• Things such as ghosts, loot and memories travel between players.

• Residues create asynchronous shared experiences.

• Player actions become discoverable world content.

Faction / Social UGC

• Communities shape factions, influence and e.g., territory control.

• Social structures evolve through player collaboration.

• Group actions affect e.g., world politics and progression.

• Collective identity becomes part of the world state.

Market / Economy UGC

• Players drive economy, trade and resource ecosystems.

• Open, focused or mixed ecosystems.

• Supply, demand and e.g., scarcity evolve dynamically.

• Economic activity impacts world systems and progression.

• Markets become player-created systemic content.

Settlement / Hub UGC

• Shared hubs evolve through player progression and activity.

• Communities shape social spaces and functionality.

• Hubs visually and systemically reflect player behavior.

• Persistent settlements create shared long-term identity.

AI Design / Manipulation UGC

• Players create, mutate or influence AI entities.

• AI behaviors evolve through systemic experimentation.

• Created entities can spread into shared gameplay spaces.

• Enemy ecosystems emerge from player-driven manipulation.

Companion / AI Partner UGC

• Players spahe evolving AI companions over time.

• Companion behavior adapts to player choices and actions.

• AI partners can develop unique identities and roles.

• Companions become persistent and player-generated content.

Character UGC

• Players create unique identities through systemic customization.

• Characters can evolve procedurally through player-made choices.

• Visuals, traits and e.g., behaviors adapt dynamically.

• Character creation becomes part of the shared ecosystem.

Crafting UGC

• Players generate weapons, gear and artifacts systemically.

• Crafting combines procedural and player-driven creation.

• Generated items influence gameplay and e.g., world economies.

• Crafted content can spread between players globally.

Ritual UGC

• Players perform rituals that alter the world state.

• Rituals can unlock e.g., events, anomalies or transformations.

• Collective participation amplifies systemic outcomes.

• Ritual systems create emergent shared experiences.

Skill / Talent UGC

• Players shape unique builds through open progression systems.

• Skill combinations generate emergent playstyles and identities.

• Build diversity evolves through community experimentation.

• Talent systems indirectly create player-generated archetypes.

Why This Matters

Everyone knows (or should, at least, by now) modern AAA development is hitting a wall. Budgets are exploding. Development cycles are getting longer. Content pipelines are collapsing under the weight of infinite engagement expectations. Studios are trying to solve retention through more handcrafted content.

That doesn’t scale forever.

Especially if your game relies heavily on e.g.,:

• Cinematics

• Voice acting

• Narrative production

• Custom animation

• High-end environments

• Scripted sequences

You can’t outproduce player appetite infinitely. Or, well, with Gen AI you could to some / far extend probably serve players through expensive content, but the use of it can backfire in multiple ways, if executed poorly.

In terms of providing smarter solutions, for everyone’s consideration, systemic reality systems change the equation.

Because now, through it things happen:

• Players generate e.g., pressure

• Communities generate the variance

• AI generates adaptation

• Persistence generates memory

• Systems generate evolution

The game creates long-term engagement through interaction itself, and not only through content drops.

The Difference

This approach doesn’t try to turn every player into a developer. That’s important. Most players don’t actually want to become level designers.

They want to:

• Leave a mark

• Affect the world

• Discover stories

• Influence outcomes

• Build identity

• Create consequences

• Feel part of something larger

Collective Reality Systems let players do exactly that, without forcing them into e.g., creator tools.

Why This Direction Can Be More Interesting For AAA

Trying to compete directly against Roblox or Fortnite Creative is brutally difficult.

Those ecosystems already have:

• Network effects

• Creator communities

• Discovery systems

• Monetization ecosystems

• Social infrastructure

• Infinite content throughput

But Collective Reality Systems open a very different strategic direction.

The value no longer comes from:

• Massive creator platforms

• User-made game quantity

• Asset marketplaces

• Endless editor tooling

It comes from:

• Emergence

• Persistence

• Shared simulation

• Ecosystem evolution

• Community pressure

• Dynamic world states

• Living multiplayer realities

That’s a much less saturated space. And honestly, a much more exciting one.

Especially for studios focused on:

• Immersion

• Atmosphere

• Narrative worlds

• Systemic gameplay

• Psychological experiences

• Persistent multiplayer ecosystems

The Future Of UGC

I don’t think traditional UGC disappears. Mods, creator tools, cosmetics, sandbox systems, and player-made experiences will continue to thrive.

But I do think the next major evolution moves away from:

Players making content.

Toward:

Players collectively shaping systemic realities.

That’s where games start feeling alive. Not because developers endlessly push handcrafted updates. But because millions of players continuously shape the same evolving simulation together.

The players become:

• The instability

• The memory

• The ecosystem pressure

• The narrative catalyst

• The evolutionary force

And that creates something far more scalable than traditional UGC. It creates collective authorship. And honestly... that might be one the most interesting future games have right now.

The games industry talks endlessly about retention. D1, D7, D14, D30, D90, D180, D360, and so on. Retention curves. Funnels. And, as the list goes on… session counts, and session times. Sometimes, in some cases, even things such as re-engagement.

Yet, strangely, one of the most important long-term engagement concepts is rarely discussed directly: Regularity.

Not retention as an event. Regularity as a behavioral state and pattern.

Why it should be discussed more? In short, because there is a major difference between a player returning to a game and a game becoming part of a player’s life and habits.

Retention and regularity are not the same thing.

A player can technically be retained while having an unstable relationship with the game. They might binge heavily during updates, disappear for days, return through obligation, or only engage when e.g., event tension spikes. From a retention dashboard perspective, things may look acceptable. From a systems perspective, the ecosystem may still be unstable.

Regularity is different. Regularity is about consistency of emotional and behavioral connection over time. It is about how naturally a game embeds itself into routines, habits, rituals, social structures, and cognitive space.

The strongest live-service games rarely survive purely because they have good retention. They survive because they build regularity.

A game that quietly becomes part of somebody’s morning coffee, lunch break, evening unwind session, weekly social gathering, or persistent mental landscape is operating at a very different level than a game that simply manages to pull players back occasionally for e.g., entertainment purposes.

This distinction matters far more than many studios realize. Because regularity creates stability. And stability creates scalability.

Retention Measures Return, Whilst Regularity Measures Life Integration

One of the more interesting things about regularity is that the industry often measures fragments of it without explicitly treating it as the central objective.

Retention partially reflects regularity. Session counts partially reflect regularity. Session times partially reflect regularity. And even things like community activity partially reflects regularity.

But these metrics are usually analyzed separately, as disconnected KPI surfaces, instead of being understood as parts of a larger behavioral system. The result of this is that many games accidentally optimize for spikes instead of rhythms.

This becomes especially visible in modern live-service ecosystems. Large updates temporarily inflate engagement. Events create bursts of activity. Reward structures attract players back into the game. Some monetization moments artificially create urgency. And the list goes on.

But underneath those spikes, the underlying behavioral regularity may actually be weak. This is why some games feel constantly alive while others feel temporarily activated.

The difference is not always retention. Often, it is cadence stability.

Session Interval Variance (SIV)

One useful way to conceptualize regularity is through something I would call Session Interval Variance, or SIV.

At a high level, SIV measures how consistent player engagement rhythms are over time. Think about two players:

Player A

• Plays eight hours on Saturday

• Disappears for four days, and returns after an update or event

Engagement for Play A is highly volatile.

Player B

• Plays twenty to thirty minutes almost every evening

• Maintains stable engagement timing

Player B naturally integrates the game into routine behavior.

Traditional metrics may value Player A heavily because total playtime is high. But, from a systems perspective, Player B represents far stronger regularity. The game has successfully synchronized itself with that player’s life rhythm.

Lower variance between play intervals often signals stronger behavioral embedding. The game no longer relies entirely on stimulation spikes or external reactivation pressure. It becomes naturally integrated into routine behavior.

This matters because routine-based engagement tends to be more resilient, emotionally sustainable, predictable, and healthier for long-term ecosystems.

Habit Persistence Score (HPS)

Retention asks whether players returned.

Habit persistence asks whether behavioral rituals survived.

There is a meaningful difference.

A player logging in every day does not necessarily mean a stable habit exists. They may simply be responding to e.g., missing rewards.

But, if players consistently participate in the same social activities, progression loops, market behaviors, guild interactions, co-op sessions, crafting routines, and such, then the game has created recurring behavioral anchors. This is where games become sticky.

Easy examples of habit persistence:

• Weekly MMO guild raid nights

• Nightly extraction runs with friends

• Morning auction house checking

• Seasonal reset / prestige preparation

• Daily community interaction during e.g., work breaks

These are not merely engagement loops anymore. Instead, they are recurring structures inside players’ lives. The strongest ecosystems often succeed because they maintain these rituals for years. Not because they maximize short-term engagement spikes.

Baseline Engagement Stability (BES)

One of the major blind spots in modern live-service design is that many ecosystems optimize around peaks instead of stability. Big events, big updates, big collaborations, and other big “beats”.

But regularity-oriented ecosystems often optimize around cadence consistency instead. This is where Baseline Engagement Stability, or BES, becomes useful.

At a high level, BES measures how stable player engagement remains without major external stimulation. In other words, it asks: "How healthy is the ecosystem when nothing extraordinary is happening?”

This matters enormously because many games unknowingly rely on continuous stimulation injections to maintain engagement. Once event cadence slows down, engagement collapses because underlying regularity was never truly established.

Healthy ecosystems tend to maintain:

• Stable concurrency

• Stable social activity

• Stable progression engagement

• Stable return behavior

• Stable community participation

Even between major updates.

Cadence Amplification Ratio (CAR)

Obviously, baseline stability alone is not enough for live-service ecosystems.

There is another important layer: How effectively do updates and events amplify existing regularity instead of artificially replacing it?

This is where something I call as Cadence Amplification Ratio, or CAR, becomes useful conceptually. CAR measures how much engagement rises during updates and events relative to the baseline regularity, or BES, of the ecosystem.

A healthy ecosystem usually has:

• A stable baseline

• Controlled amplification during updates

• Smooth stabilization afterward

An unhealthy ecosystem often has:

• Weak baseline activity

• Massive event spikes

• Rapid collapse after content consumption

The difference matters enormously. One creates long-term ecosystem health. The other creates dependency on perpetual stimulation.

This becomes especially visible in games where players are highly active during launches but psychologically disconnected between updates. The game starts feeling less like a living world and more like temporary content consumption.

The strongest ecosystems avoid this trap because updates amplify habits instead of replacing them.

Cognitive Occupancy

There is also a more abstract layer to regularity that is harder to measure directly but incredibly important: Cognitive occupancy.

This refers to how much mental and emotional space a game occupies even when players are not actively playing. Some games remain alive inside players’ minds continuously. Others disappear immediately after logout.

This often becomes visible through e.g.,:

• Discord participation

• Theorycrafting

• Community activity

• Fan culture

• Content creation

• Social discussions

• Market speculation

• Identity attachment

This layer is difficult to universally quantify because every ecosystem expresses it differently.

What matters is recognizing that these signals often move in parallel with long-term ecosystem health. In some cases, community weakening even appears before major engagement decline becomes visible inside the game itself.

Communities frequently detect ecosystem fatigue earlier than dashboards do. Because regularity is not merely mechanical. It is also emotional.

Regularity, Immersion, and Proximity Design

This is also why regularity connects deeply to immersion.

Immersion is often discussed aesthetically:

• Graphics

• Audio

• Worldbuilding

• Narrative fidelity

But behavioral immersion may actually matter more for long-term ecosystem health.

A truly immersive game maintains continuity inside the player’s cognitive world. The player never fully disconnects from it emotionally. Their relationship with the game persists between sessions.

This is also why regularity often strengthens monetization willingness in healthier ways than aggressive extraction systems do. Players who maintain stable emotional continuity with a game tend to spend more naturally over time because the ecosystem feels persistent and personally meaningful.

The relationship becomes less transactional and more infrastructural. The game starts functioning more like a long-term environment than a temporary product. This also strongly connects to proximity design.

Note: Interested about what I’ve wrote about Proximity Design? See more from below article (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/59-the-power-of-proximity):

The closer a game positions itself to e.g.,:

• Emotional rhythms

• Social identity

• Cognitive habits

• Lifestyle structures

• Recurring behavioral patterns

The stronger regularity tends to become. Games stop competing purely through stimulation. They begin competing through relevance to lived experience.

Regularity Creates Predictability

This eventually leads toward one of the most important business implications of all: Predictability.

Regularity creates predictability across the ecosystem, including:

• Predictable concurrency

• Predictable economy behavior

• Predictable matchmaking quality

• Predictable social activity

• Predictable monetization

• Predictable content demand

And, predictability is one of the foundations of scalability.

A game with stable behavioral rhythms is significantly easier to:

• Operate

• Expand

• Balance

• Monetize

• Sustain long-term

Than a game built entirely around volatility spikes.

Ironically, many studios become obsessed with highly granular KPIs while overlooking the larger systemic question: Is the game actually becoming part of players’ lives?

Because ultimately, that is what many of the greatest long-term games achieved. Not merely retention, but behavioral permanence.

Ethical Regularity

There is an important ethical dimension to regularity that designers should think about more carefully. Because there is a meaningful difference between building healthy behavioral permanence and building unhealthy dependency.

Regularity itself is not inherently good.

Games can absolutely create regularity through:

• anxiety

• obligation pressure

• aggressive FOMO

• social punishment

• compulsive reward structures

• excessive scarcity pressure

• behavioral exhaustion loops

And many modern systems unfortunately do exactly that.

This is especially important to realize because regularity is psychologically powerful. Once a game successfully integrates itself into somebody’s daily rhythms, emotional structures, and routines, it begins influencing real behavioral patterns at scale.

That creates responsibility.

The healthiest forms of regularity usually emerge when players genuinely want to return because the ecosystem provides:

• comfort

• meaning

• social belonging

• emotional continuity

• self-expression

• relaxation

• mastery

• curiosity

• creative or social fulfillment

Not because players feel psychologically trapped. This distinction matters enormously.

There is a major difference between a game becoming part of somebody’s life in a healthy, enriching way vs. becoming behaviorally compulsive through pressure-driven design.

As designers, it is important to think carefully about where that line exists for each ecosystem. Because ultimately, the strongest long-term ecosystems are usually not the ones that maximize extraction.

They are the ones players genuinely want to keep living inside.

Regularity Index (RI)

This is where a larger framework like a Regularity Index, or RI, becomes useful conceptually.

Not as a single perfect KPI, but as a systems-level perspective combining:

• Cadence consistency

• Ritual persistence

• Baseline stability

• Update amplification health

• Cognitive occupancy

• Social continuity

• Behavioral predictability

The goal is not to reduce regularity into one number. The goal is to stop viewing engagement as fragmented surfaces and start understanding it as ecosystem behavior.

Because games are not only content systems. They are also behavioral systems. And the strongest behavioral systems do not merely retain attention, they become rhythms people live inside.

Even modern multiplayer games still fundamentally operate this way. Battle royales, MOBAs, extraction shooters, competitive sports games, co-op games, and even many MMOs still rely on relatively static match boundaries. The player enters a predefined social container, the system stabilizes that container for a certain amount of time, and then the container dissolves.

Procedural (fully procedural, or semi-procedural / mixed) worlds can fundamentally challenge this structure. And, well, whilst the article focuses on procedural design directions, if you think really about some of e.g., MMOs’ worlds’ scales and/or systemic directions, what I’m writing here could be very well applicable to them, with the ability to sustain persistence in the world design. Applications isn’t, this said, just in the procedural side of things, given the world scale, size, and design is proper enough.

As worlds become more larger, dynamic, procedural, adaptive, and/or systemic while possibly (not needed in all cases) having fully, or mixing, persistent handcrafted areas with evolving procedural spaces, static matchmaking starts feeling increasingly artificial. The moment players hit a loading screen or a hard lobby transition, the illusion of a living world can collapse. The multiplayer layer stops feeling like reality and starts revealing itself as infrastructure.

This is where the future of multiplayer design becomes interesting. Not because matchmaking disappears, but, because matchmaking stops behaving like “a menu system” or as “traditional system”. Instead, players move through persistent and/or procedural worlds where multiplayer groupings dynamically emerge, merge, split, and dissolve based on geography, tension, objectives, and (social) proximity. The match itself stops being the product, and the topology of social interaction becomes the product.

New Layer for Matchmaking

In my earlier article about matchmaking as the hidden engine of monetization and retention, I explored how matchmaking systems already should shape emotional pacing, progression curves, engagement loops, social tension, and monetization pressure, instead of just focusing on optimizing themselves symmetrically through skill-based means.

Most matchmaking systems today shouldn’t simply trying to create fairness. They should be aiming to support proper economy design approaches, and create e.g., emotional states. Basically, modern matchmaking should act as a hidden orchestration layer beneath the game itself.

But, even current and these “modern” systems still largely operate within “static” boundaries. They optimize players inside “predefined molds” instead of dynamically shaping the structure of multiplayer reality itself.

The next evolution goes much further.

Instead of asking: “Which players should enter this lobby?” The system should begin asking: “Which social structures should emerge inside this world right now?” This shift is what is needed for some future games, changing everything, exploring experiences and game worlds in new ways, instead of traditional ways.

The player no longer consciously enters lobbies. Instead, the world continuously orchestrates all things required, while the system behaves less like traditional matchmaking and more like an ecological simulation engine. Or, perhaps more accurately, like “an invisible multiplayer director”. Continuously shaping probabilities. Building (social) emergence instead of enforcing structure.

Note: Some of this technology could benefit from AI Game Master concept, which I’ve wrote more about here:

The World Becomes Matchmaking

Traditional multiplayer games separate the world and the matchmaking system into two different layers. The matchmaking system assembles players first, and the world is loaded afterward.

But, procedural and/or systemic multiplayer worlds invert this relationship: the world itself can become the matchmaking system. Geography and its underlying systems can start shaping things like social behavior. As this goes by, the player “density” becomes fluid. And, in many cases, specifically considering how to tie-in procedural and/or systemic world-driven experiences together in a multiplayer setting, objectives become (social) “gravity”.

In terms of the gravity pulling things together, players naturally drift toward e.g., resources, danger, “in and out” points, conflicts, trading, hubs / (social) hotspots, events, threats, rare opportunities, safe heavens, and such, as the design for a game goes.

Instead of static lobbies creating encounters around these things players are pulled towards to, the environment itself begins generating these encounters organically. The world (and procedural) layer simply stabilizes, amplifies, and orchestrates these convergences. This is in where multiplayer topology generation emerges.

Multiplayer Topology Generation

Most multiplayer games think in terms of servers, instances, and matches. Future multiplayer systems, build around procedural and/or systemic means, incl. new types of world-building methods, need to be thought as living ecosystems.

The important thing is no longer: “Who joined the server?” The important thing becomes e.g.,: “How social density flows through space and time?” This creates a very different design challenge.

Instead of just designing maps, developers begin designing e.g., social flows, migration routes, compression points, isolation corridors, density spikes, emotional pacing through geography, and more, as the needs come. The topology becomes dynamic. Like, for example, some areas become overcrowded “warzones”, others become lonely “wastelands”, trade hubs become (temporary) social centers, resource scarcity creates migration waves, environmental changes redirect “populations” naturally, and/or so on.

The multiplayer experience stops being statically authored and starts behaving more like “procedural civilization flow”.

Dynamic Social Instancing

This is where the discussed methods become truly powerful, and here’s one of this article’s selling point.

In traditional multiplayer games, lobbies are fixed objects. You enter with a predefined group → you stay with that group → you leave with that group.

In procedural, and/or, in just new types of multiplayer worlds, social groupings can become fluid. Players dynamically pack and unpack from multiplayer clusters as they move through the world.

A player entering a dense area may gradually merge into a larger social instance without ever noticing a transition. Another player moving into “remote wilderness” may slowly separate into a lower-density simulation layer. Groups moving toward common objectives may naturally converge into temporary large-scale encounters before dispersing again afterward.

The important part is that the player doesn’t feel “static” matchmade. The player feels like they’re moving through a continuous world and a living experience.

This creates something fundamentally different from traditional instancing. In some designs, as I foresee it, by right design choices, the whole experience can actually start feeling persistent, even though its social topology is constantly shifting underneath the surface. And, that’s a game-changer and a big selling-point (like, here, before this, I’m sure you’ve thought this is just simple design and dynamic framework, but I’m pretty sure you didn’t get this far thinking what’s the real unique selling point a new tech. like this could provide for your game).

(Social) Anchor Spaces

In some designs, one of the most important aspects of this “structure” is the relationship between procedural space and/or fixed environments. Like, you can have all probably just procedural in some designs, but in many cases, not everything should be procedural. And, when this comes into question, we can use these fixed spaces as (social) anchor spaces for social and other actions.

This means that fixed areas serve as stabilizing anchors for multiplayer flow, incl. cities, hubs, zones, guild zones, raid entrances, social gathering points, economic centers, narrative landmarks, and such, as the design goes.

These locations act as multiplayer “compression points”. As players move through procedural space, the world naturally funnels populations toward these anchors. This creates recurring (social) encounters without requiring static servers or predefined matches. Players repeatedly cross paths, recognize others, encounter social guilds, witness things, observe economic shifts, form temporary alliances, and such.

The world starts generating social memory naturally. Not because the game forces interactions, but, because topology itself creates recurring convergence.

Population Density Control

One of the biggest immersion problems in procedural games, in terms of risks generated by poor design, is population inconsistency. Like, a giant world can actually be and/or feel empty. Or artificial, or disconnected.

Dynamic social instancing solves this in a fascinating way. Instead of statically assigning player counts to servers, the world controls social density procedurally. Some regions intentionally become e.g., crowded, chaotic, safe, unsafe, and such. Others become e.g., isolated, quiet, survival-focused, resource-rich, and so on.

This creates emotional pacing through population flow itself. The player isn’t just traversing terrain, the player is traversing (social) states.

The Death of “the Lobby”

Ironically, the future of lobbies, in games requiring new strategies, may be about “the disappearance of lobbies” altogether. Or, more accurately, lobbies just stop being isolated waiting rooms and become embedded social states inside the world itself.

A crowded city may effectively function as a lobby. A migration route may function as a temporary matchmaking corridor. A faction warzone may organically generate large-scale PvP clustering. A remote wilderness area may intentionally dissolve players into smaller survival-focused groupings.

The lobby becomes spatial. And once that happens, indeed, multiplayer games begin feeling less like matches and more like living worlds (and in some cases even more persistent).

The future multiplayer games that truly evolve the medium may not even be the ones with the biggest maps, the most realistic graphics, or the most advanced AI NPCs. They may be the games capable of generating living social topology at scale. Worlds where players don’t simply join matches, and instead of that, they continuously flow through dynamically orchestrated reality.

Not lazy in production values, content pipelines, monetization systems, or live operations. We’ve become incredibly efficient at building retention loops, scalable economies, progression systems, optimized engagement structures, and high-frequency live ops.

But, when it comes to understanding actual human social behavior and translating that into meaningful game and systems design, we’re still operating at a surface level. Most social game design isn’t actually social. Underestimating or not prioritizing social design, among many other things, is at least partially one of the reasons why we’re seeing some of the current events taking in place in our industry.

What We Consider as Social Design?

We often “confuse” interaction with social depth.

A clan donation feature is considered social. Sending lives or decorations to another player in a puzzle game is considered social.

Snapshots from Toon Blast and June’s Journey.

Continuing, lightweight co-op events are considered social. Leaderboards are considered social. Even many so-called “community events” in games ultimately come down to players individually contributing points into a shared meter, without having players truly interacting with one another in meaningful ways.

These systems are not bad. But, they are lazy design solutions when it comes to what social truly could be in games.

Some of these systems are elegant and well-designed for what they are trying to achieve. But, when we compare them against how humans actually behave socially in the real world, the gap becomes obvious very quickly.

What We Miss?

Humans attend events to be entertained, to meet friends, to meet new people, to observe others, to gain social status, to feel part of something larger, and sometimes simply to exist around other humans. Social behavior is emotional, expressive, spontaneous, messy, and in some cases e.g., identity driven.

Most games still barely scratch the surface of this.

Ironically, some of the deepest social experiences in games still come from genres that accidentally allow human behavior to breathe naturally. MMORPGs, sandbox games, roleplay servers, and social deduction games often create stronger social memories not because their systems are more advanced, but because they create environments where players can socially live and move.

That distinction matters enormously.

Social Presence Is Underestimated Design Layer

One of the most underestimated concepts in game design is social presence. The feeling that other humans exist around you. Not just as teammates, or opponents, but as part of “a living social environment” (multiple formats of such can exist).

You can already see this desire emerging in communities around games like ARC Raiders. Many players are not only talking about extraction mechanics or combat systems. Some simply want social hubs where they can see other players existing together. They want downtime spaces, identity spaces, and ambient social environments where the world feels socially alive. This is one of the reasons, on top of deeper meaningful mid to end-game systems missing from meta side, why the game has seen ongoing “churn” in its engagement. Like literally, if you put in let’s say 100 to 150 hours, at least, past that there’s not much meaningful things to do.

Current engagement data from ARC Raiders, from SteamDB.

Humans naturally seek social presence. Social media companies understood this years ago (although, now, I don’t think some of them anymore does, like when you look into Facebook, it’s full of Ads and “recommended” content instead of any social interaction, on top of which if they add (or added already) AI agents to supplement the circulation of content, they’re going to dig a grave for themselves at some point, when people finds out how unmeaningful as a platform it becomes when they’re on a hunt for more revenue by any means; which shows a lack of understanding, well, social design). Games, surprisingly, largely did not understood it to even this level.

Note: Something I’ve wrote here that relates to presence, if you’re curious to explore more this topic:

Apps Have Discovered Social

This is where the comparison with other industries becomes extremely interesting, if you have “certain lenses” on, when you look into things creatively.

While games were becoming masters of progression systems and retention mechanics, the app ecosystem was mastering human interaction systems. Social platforms optimized for e.g., identity expression, visibility, proximity, discoverability, reputation, conversation, parasocial behavior, and creator ecosystems. They became somewhat sophisticated at understanding why humans socially engage with one another.

Then, on top of this, apps started learning from games.

Gamification is raising its head everywhere. Systems, progression, engagement structures, rewards, retention mechanics, and live servicing is spreading across the app economy.

As an example, Duolingo has been exploring gamification deeply as part of its experience.

At the same time, games barely have evolved toward becoming more socially native, or even taking inspiration from app-like experiences (or, to say, going for “applifying” themselves).

The crossover mostly happened in one direction. Apps became more game like while games largely have been lazy to become more socially sophisticated, among other things they could have expanded towards to.

This becomes especially obvious when you look at the mobile market. Many mobile games still rely on social systems that feel detached from how people actually behave socially in digital environments today. Meanwhile social apps, creator platforms, and even productivity apps continuously evolve around human interaction, self expression, and community dynamics. I’ve literally attended some events where developers talk about social side of things, but it’s just talk without execution (probably partly because there’s not much capital flowing for innovation as well, when instead of that it’s flowing towards e.g., the ecosystem in Turkey, and probably next to just another ecosystem, e.g., Southeast Asia; though, considering Deconstructor of Fun’s latest article (Why Apps Are Beating Games for Investments: https://www.deconstructoroffun.com/blog/why-apps-are-beating-games-for-investments), app-like games could be possibly cracking doors for becoming “a thing” for investors, if you creatively approach the pitch and premise).

Games Still Treat Social As An Additional Feature

Games still often treat social systems as additional features instead of foundational design philosophy.

You build the game first. Then you attach clans. Then gifting. Then chat. Then a leaderboard. Then co-op. Then social events.

But humans do not separate social behavior from experiences the way games often do. Social behavior is embedded into how we experience environments themselves.

This is why I believe the future of social game design needs to move far beyond the traditional thinking we currently operate with.

Games should increasingly learn from real world social behavior and from platforms outside the games industry itself.

Games Could Become True Social Platforms

Take something as simple as decoration systems in puzzle games. Right now many decoration focused games already lightly touch social identity by allowing players to customize spaces. But, what if those systems would evolve much further?

Like, as an example, literally, you could have e.g., a Puzzle game with a decoration meta game, on top of which it could have social media feed integrated into the whole experience beyond what we’re seeing now in e.g., decoration games and their metas. This type of approach would be already, at least, one step towards more social compared to what we’ve seen, even when it takes just small inspiration from social media apps.

A quick concept for a Puzzle meets Social App game.

As a part of this experience, think about players being able to follow each other based on aesthetic taste. See in your mind discoverable feeds where players showcase decorated spaces. Think about commenting systems, trends, seasonal social movements, creator identities, and/or community driven design cultures emerging around those environments. Suddenly the decoration layer is no longer just a monetization mechanic or progression sink. It becomes a socially expressive ecosystem. On top of that, you could add a simple or deep puzzle core to it, taking benefits also from segments such as Match-3 or Merge.

And honestly, this should not even sound “radical” anymore.

Social media platforms already proved how powerful e.g., identity, expression, and discoverability are. Games simply have not deeply integrated those learnings into core game structures yet, and, when looked to meta game, same kind of applies in most cases.

What makes this especially interesting is that games already contain infinitely richer interaction possibilities than traditional social platforms. Games contain progression, economies, identity systems, cooperative structures, competition, spatial environments, achievements, emotional experiences, and much more all inside the same ecosystem.

Yet despite all of this potential, even some multiplayer games still feel socially less alive than social media applications (though, as mentioned earlier, some of these social apps definitely try to self-bury them underground).

We’re, as I started with, lazy on this front, or don’t just understand the underlying potential.

The Future Of Social Live Ops

The opportunity here goes far beyond engagement metrics.

Proper social design can fundamentally transform distribution, retention, monetization, live operations, and long term ecosystem resilience.

One of the biggest opportunities sits inside live servicing itself.

Right now many live ops systems are still primarily content scheduling systems. New event. New pass. New shop refresh. New leaderboard. New limited time activity. When it comes to social systems, they are more artificially social than actually social, which of course on some extent works for e.g., F2P mobile games industry, but definitely leaves even cash on the table.

Genuinely social systems create something much more powerful than scheduled engagement. They at their best create self-propagating engagement, which amplifies everything from distribution to engagement, and to monetization as well when done right.

Humans generating experiences for other humans. Humans generating emotional momentum. Humans generating aspiration, identity, culture, and participation loops organically. Or, just simply, humans meeting each other and, just, communicating as a starting point, vs. what we’re seeing on the “artificial social front” currently.

This is where the real scalability of social systems lies.

Traditional content pipelines scale through production resources. Social ecosystems partially scale through community / human behavior itself. One could say, with proper social design, a human starts becoming part of the operating system instead of being just a player using it.

Social Status Design Is Still Primitive

As we’re driving this route further, and when we look into e.g., social status, it can be stated that social status systems remain massively underexplored in games.

Status is one of the strongest motivational forces in human civilization, yet games still often reduce status into rankings, cosmetics, spending visibility, or skill ratings.

But humans socially signal through far more dimensions than this.

People gain social value through taste, influence, leadership, contribution, social connectivity, creativity, reliability, humor, storytelling, mentorship, and countless other forms of social capital.

Games barely explore these layers. Although, some upcoming games aim to explore these fronts, like one from Northern Lights Entertainment startup studio, called Nebulae, which aims to combine political systems with MMO design.

Snapshots from Nebulae, from the game’s website and its Kickstarter page.

On the social front with social status, there are lots of things open to be explored. Like think about ecosystems where community organizers become socially influential. Where tastemakers become discoverable. Where players gain reputation for helping others. Where event organizers become important social figures inside the ecosystem. Where players develop actual social careers inside games.

At these example points, the experience stops feeling like isolated entertainment software. It starts feeling more like a living society.

Web Games and Browser Platforms Are Missing Huge Opportunities

This is also where web gaming feels strangely underdeveloped.

The web as a medium offers enormous flexibility for social UI and UX experimentation, yet many web games and browser portals still behave like isolated game containers from an earlier internet era.

You could easily build e.g., social sidebars, integrated creator feeds, live community windows, discoverability systems, contextual discussions, spectator systems, and/or social overlays directly beside gameplay itself.

Quick mockup about how screens space could be used with modern web games (which we probably will need to wait for years for, given we haven’t seen in past e.g., 20 years anything innovative here in my opinion).

Even more social games such as MMORPGs could benefit enormously from more experimental social interface design. Like, think about social feeds existing alongside the game world itself. See in your mind live player storytelling systems, community driven event discovery, and/or creator ecosystems integrated directly into the environment instead of existing purely outside the game on third party platforms. Maybe also interacting with “social feeds” you could progress the game and/or some of its systems?

The screen space exists. The technology exists. The behavioral demand already exists. What often doesn’t exist yet is enough design ambition around social systems themselves. Let’s see how much we need to wait for something innovative to come here. It might take a while as when I’ve talked about my opinions on this even with some of the web platforms, which resemble what we had already 20 years, or more back, they just raise their eyebrows for the idea and keep doing same things they’ve kept doing. Of course, I get why, because it brings money as old platforms have died, so there’s the opportunity just to push out content instead of innovating at the moment. Hope we’ll get past this at some point towards more creative space.

Games Should Learn From Real Human Social Spaces

One of the biggest “gaps” the industry still makes is “focusing too heavily” on social mechanics while underestimating social environments.

Humans behave differently depending on environments.

A music festival creates different behavior than a business conference. A sports arena creates different social energy than a café. A nightclub creates different emotional dynamics than a classroom.

Lots of games rarely think deeply enough about these environmental emotional dynamics. They absolutely should.

What kind of social behavior does your environment encourage? What kind of emotional tone does your space create? What kinds of spontaneous interactions naturally emerge there? What types of social friction or opportunities exist?

Social systems are not only mechanics. They are emotional architectures.

Modern Systems Often Optimize Away Human Moments

Sometimes modern games accidentally optimize too much of the humanity away.

Many systems today optimize interaction efficiency instead of emotional depth. Faster matchmaking. Faster progression. Faster rewards. Faster transactions. Less friction.

But meaningful social experiences often actually emerge from “imperfection”, downtime, unpredictability, awkwardness, observation, repeated exposure, tension, rituals, and spontaneous interaction. It’s not just positive things that cause them.

Some of the strongest memories players carry from online games were never fully scripted by designers. They emerged socially. Ever heard of emergent design?

That is the part of the industry I believe we still fundamentally underestimate and should explore more.

Friendslop And Co-Op Games Are Early Signals Of Where Things Are Going

As we’re exploring this topic, of course, all isn’t lost as I’m constructively pointing out our laziness. One of the most interesting recent developments is the rise of so called “friendslop” games and lightweight co-op experiences.

A lot of these games are still rough around the edges. Many are mechanically simple, chaotic, intentionally unserious, or built around streamer culture and friend group entertainment.

As we’re seeing more of them floating to market, they are revealing something extremely important in parallel. They are putting social interaction closer to the core experience itself.

The traction many of these games generate is not purely coming from progression systems or mechanical mastery. A huge amount of their appeal comes from shared emotional moments between players. Laughter. Chaos. Embarrassment. Coordination. Failure. Improvisation. Social storytelling. That matters more in these games than some other systems they have there.

For years, the industry has been obsessed with optimizing friction away from multiplayer experiences. Remember when every publisher or investor said co-op games won’t succeed? Yeah, it was a thing. But, as we’ve seen, many of these newer co-op games are proving that social friction itself can actually be part of the entertainment. Even when the mechanics are relatively simple, the human dynamics become the real content layer.

This is why so many of these games spread so naturally on streaming platforms, Discord groups, TikTok clips, YouTube videos, and social media in general. They generate highly shareable human moments. In many ways, these games are exposing how hungry players are for socially driven gameplay again.

At the Same Time, I Think This Entire Category Is Still Extremely Early.

Most friendslop games today are only scratching the surface of what socially native game design could eventually become. The systems are often shallow, the progression is limited, and the long term social structures are still primitive.

But the underlying direction is important. These games are rediscovering something the industry partially “lost”, or just forgot.

That players themselves can become the most important source of entertainment. And because of that, I increasingly believe the entire friendslop and social co-op market is widely open for a defining leap forward.

In many ways, it can be said feeling similar to e.g., the early battle royale era before PUBG transformed the space. There were already games and mods exploring the concept, but nobody had fully crystallized the format into a larger cultural product yet.

The same opportunity exists here. Someone will eventually take the emotional chaos, proximity dynamics, social storytelling, and improvisational interaction of modern co-op and friendslop games and evolve them into something much larger and successful.

This will be something with deeper progression. Something with stronger social ecosystems. Something with long term community structures. Something with more meaningful social identity and persistence. Something where social systems and gameplay systems become inseparable.

And, when that happens, I think the industry may could, at least a bit more, start understanding that social design is not just an extra feature category. It is one of the biggest unexplored gameplay frontiers games still have, even it is in many ways self explanatory for us (which might be also why we think we’re good on social design when we’ve not taken it as far as we could).

Socially Reactive Ecosystems

In connection to social and communities, we often talk about UGC, AI generated content, creator economies, and infinite content generation as the future. But, I increasingly think the bigger evolution is socially reactive ecosystems.

Games that understand humans socially. Games that evolve culturally. Games that allow communities to shape emotional realities together. Games where players themselves become one of the most important layers of content.

Because ultimately, which is a strange thing to say, the most powerful content humans consume has always been other humans.

The Future Of Games Could Look Closer To Societies

When you zoom out far enough, the future opportunity becomes very obvious.

The games industry has become extraordinary at designing mechanics, economies, progression systems, monetization structures, and retention frameworks. But compared to the complexity of actual human social behavior, many of our social systems still feel primitive.

The studios that truly crack this next generation of social design will not simply build better multiplayer games. They will build socially alive worlds. Worlds where identity matters. Where reputation matters. Where social proximity matters. Where culture emerges naturally. Where players emotionally invest in communities instead of only progression. Where systems self-propagate socially. Where live operations become community- / player-driven instead of purely developer-driven.

And, the studios that figure this out first could unlock entirely different levels of engagement, retention, monetization, distribution, and long term ecosystem sustainability. Not because they manipulated players better. But because they finally started designing closer to how humans actually behave socially.

This, in my opinion, is the real frontier ahead for games. Not adding more social features. Building games that are genuinely social by design. It’s that simple.

We have built systems, loops, economies, and live operations that aim to e.g., simulate living games. We add content, tune numbers, design progression, and carefully orchestrate player journeys.

But at the end of the day, most games are still something I call as “static machines”.

Instead of this, what if the game itself was not static anymore? What if the game was actively observing, interpreting, and reshaping itself around the player in real time? In the era of AI raising its head, this is where the idea of an AI Game Master raises its head more than ever.

No. This is not a narrator. Not a helper. Not a content generator. No, no, and no. This is more deeper integration of AI on the systems level, referencing e.g., what I’ve wrote already in the past:

This is a system that sits across every layer of the game and continuously reshapes it through another level of emergency, which can be achieved when imagination becomes limitless, whilst the technological layer enabling such limitlessness becomes realizable.

Note: This isn’t just another “AI slop” outcome article, focused on producing something in low quality. This is an exploration, which hopefully sets in place forces that result in us getting exciting new games, with differentiating experiences.

From Designed Systems to Directed Systems

Traditional game design is about building systems that produce outcomes. When we look into this new suggested direction; an AI Game Master flips this.

It’s not only about systems producing outcomes. It’s about a system that observes outcomes and then reshapes the system itself. This is closer to how “a human dungeon master” operates. They don’t just follow rules. They read the table, feel the tension, and adjust the experience.

Here, the difference between human and AI is scale. An AI Game Master can do this across millions of players, across every session, across every system layer at once. Human-operated systems comes with its limitations (of course, when system design hits its sweet spot, even with limitations, you can create awesome stuff, which I acknowledge still whilst I’m writing this article).

This has implications everywhere:

• Core gameplay

• Meta layers

• Economy

• Monetization

• Live operations

Everything becomes dynamic.

Core Gameplay and Core Loops

At the core loop level, most games operate on fixed patterns, e.g.,:

• Explore → Fight → Loot → Upgrade → Repeat

Even in more advanced systems, the variation is authored or parameter driven.

With an AI Game Master, the loop itself becomes fluid. It can stretch tension, compress pacing, and redirect player intent.

Instead of designing encounters, you design possibility spaces. The AI Game Master decides when to introduce friction, when to create relief, and when to break expectations.

In e.g., an extraction context, this can become extremely powerful. A run is no longer just a sequence of encounters.

It becomes a guided emotional arc:

• The system can detect that the player has had e.g., three safe runs in a row and inject risk.

• It can notice hesitation and push opportunity.

• It can turn a routine run into a story.

The real potential is when regular steps are no longer predictable.

Meta Game Layers Become Alive

Meta systems are usually where games can lose their illusion of life.

They most often are also e.g., spreadsheets with UI:

• Progression trees

• Upgrades

• Collections

• Currencies

An AI Game Master changes this by turning meta into a responsive system:

• Instead of static progression, the system can reshape available paths based on player behavior.

• Instead of fixed rewards, it can create contextual rewards that align with player intent.

And much more. This connects closely to the idea of progression vectors I have written about before:

Different players move through the game with different motivations and directions. The challenge has always been serving these vectors without fragmenting the system.

The AI Game Master doesn’t choose one path. It adapts the system, so multiple vectors can exist at the same time, without breaking coherence. It observes how a player engages and bends the meta around that behavior.

One player might experience a progression that leans into risk and high stakes. Another might see a system that emphasizes collection, completion, and stability. Same game. Different reality. At their best, these systems doesn’t just offer hyper-personalization but also honor multi-archetype systems design, which I’ve also covered in the past:

From Static Economy Design to Situational Systems

This is where things get interesting (and, possibly, also dangerous).

Game economies have traditionally been designed as controlled systems:

• Sources

• Sinks

• Inflation control

• Conversion loops

Monetization sits on top of this as a set of entry points:

• Offers

• Bundles

• Time pressure

With an AI Game Master, the economy is no longer static. It becomes situational.

The system understands context:

• What the player is trying to do

• What they value

• Where they struggle

• Where they succeed

Instead of offering the same bundle to everyone, the system can create opportunities that align with the player’s current state. This is not just about personalization, it’s structural adaptation.

In its best format, it ties back to vector based thinking (mentioned above). Instead of pushing players into predefined funnels, the system supports multiple archetypes at once and allows them to coexist inside the same economy (also referred above).

A risk driven player might see systems that amplify high stakes loops. A builder might see systems that deepen crafting and base growth. A collector might see systems that expand rarity and completion. The economy becomes multi layered but still unified.

The risk? I think it’s obvious. If done poorly, this becomes manipulation. If done well, it becomes “alignment”.

The difference is whether the system is extracting value from the player or creating value for the player. One comes with a proper engagement profile, another comes with a churning point.

Designing for “Intervention”

If you introduce an AI Game Master, you are no longer designing “closed” systems. You’re designing systems that expect “intervention”.

This changes how you build everything:

• Systems need to be interpretable

• Systems need to expose levers

• Systems need to be modular

The AI Game Master needs to understand what is happening and what it can safely change. Let’s think about a layer above that.

A system that can:

• Shift risk reward calculations

• Introduce new objectives mid run

• Change e.g., extraction conditions

• Trigger social conflict

This is not about adding content. It is about creating systems that can be recombined and redirected. Design becomes less about authoring outcomes and more about defining boundaries. Boundaries, and rules; yes, they should exist in your designs.

The End of Static Live Events

Live ops today is scheduled design.

• Events

• Seasonal content

• Limited time modes

Even the most advanced systems still rely heavily on planning and manual tuning.

An AI Game Master turns live ops into a continuous process:

• Events don’t need to be scheduled → they can emerge.

• Difficulty doesn’t need to be globally tuned → it can be locally adapted.

• Content doesn’t need to be pushed → it can be generated or recombined.

The game becomes a live service in the literal sense:

• Always reacting

• Always adjusting

• Always evolving

This also changes how teams operate. For example, by this, designers are no longer only creating content → they are shaping the behavior of the system that creates content.

Extraction RPG Simulation Case Example

Let’s explore this topic through a practical Extraction RPG Simulation concept, which I’ve produced here to showcase what I mean by AI being the Game Master.

In this concept, the core loop is structured around sending squads into dangerous realms; whilst AI Game Master would be observing their behavior, and, eventually, resolving outcomes.

The experience here isn’t just single player / campaign experience, it can be easily stretched to a real multiplayer experience with synchronous multiplayer for matches between players’ squads.

The system includes:

• A hybrid extraction RPG structure with risk and reward loop

• Autonomous characters with needs, traits, and memory

• A base layer with social simulation and multiplayer interaction

This is a “game premise” / “foundation” that fits properly for an AI Game Master.

During a raid, the AI Game Master observes:

• Squad composition

• Health and morale

• Loot value

• Recent player history

…and also runs the whole social and multiplayer “simulation”. Of course, if wanted, player-led controls or intervention controls can be added to the core gameplay.

Instead of fixed encounters, which would be the traditional “design”, the AI Game Master directs the experience completely:

• A squad that is overloaded with loot might want to extract quickly, whilst they could trigger increased enemy attention.

• A high tension run might introduce a rare opportunity that forces a player-made intervention, if such control is designed being part of the core gameplay. Do you risk everything for a potential breakthrough, or secure what you have?

Back at the base, the system continues.

• Raiders remember what happened.

• They form relationships.

• They demand better equipment.

Raiders have needs, personalities, and memory that affect their decisions and behavior.

The AI Game Master connects these layers. It creates continuity between runs. It turns isolated sessions into an ongoing story, with depth on meta layers that the player can interact with.

The result isn’t just a game loop. It’s a living system that produces stories as a byproduct on top of which the player interaction layer stays living and focused on what is wanted to be left for players to explore.

The Opportunity

The biggest mistake would be to treat AI Game Master as an add on. A narrator on top of a static game. A content generator for quests. This misses the point.

The actual opportunity is to let it reshape the entire game:

• Core loop

• Meta

• Economy

• Live ops

Everything becomes part of “a directed” system. The game stops being a product and starts behaving more like “a real simulation”. Not a simulation of e.g., physics or systems; instead, a simulation of experience.

We have spent years building systems that try to feel alive, and have spent lots of cash to achieve this. AI Game Master could be a step toward systems that can be affordable and sustain some form of “healthier” studio economies.

Side Note: No, I don’t want AI to replace people. Instead, I want AI to amplify them and studios to sustain a better future for our industry. This article could be, in this sense, very inspirational for e.g., an upcoming studio, who is bold enough to try out something different, which could theoretically result to a proper outcome, enabling them to scale and grow at all sides, incl. headcount considerations.

As I see it, the challenge is not technical even anymore. It’s more philosophical. Are we willing to leverage AI? Are we willing to give up control? And so on.

The moment we open our mind for a new shift in game-making, we are no longer designing games. Instead, in best scenarios, we are designing worlds that “design” themselves, resulting to new exciting experiences.

From Watching to Participating

For years, and years past those years, spectatorship in games has been passive.

You’ve watched eSports. You’ve watched streamers. You might have chatted. Maybe even donated.

What you might not have done, whilst some may have already, in a format of “baby steps”, influenced someone’s gameplay through a stream, through stream’s “direct” engagement and/or monetization systems.

With the latter in mind, the question raises up: “What happens when spectators are no longer just observers, but actors inside the system?”

We’re already seeing fragments of this future.

Gone deeper, I think the question is not just if spectatorship becomes a core design pillar for some games, but when and who executes it properly to the end as a foundational pillar for their game, incl. all sides of game economies tied to it.

Twitch, Bits, and the First Layer of Spectator Monetization

For spectatorship to exist; platforms like Twitch have already laid the foundation.

Twitch Bits, donations, and subscriptions are not just monetization tools; they are already existing interaction systems:

• Viewers spend to signal support or effect gameplay through emergent events

• Streamers react (shoutouts, gameplay choices, emotional responses)

• Feedback loop, at its best, potentially reinforces some spending

But fundamentally, this is still external to gameplay, or added layer; instead of a layer built to foundational layers of games with first integrations.

Even in cases where Bits trigger effects (alerts, sounds, overlays, etc.), the interaction is:

• Surface-level

• Non-systemic

• Detached from the game’s core economy

So, the leap we haven’t fully made yet is:

• Spectator acting, and also spending, through spectating a stream, in a way that these actions directly impact gameplay, systems, outcomes, and economies as core part of a proper-scale game and its business model.

From Overlay to System: CrowdControl and Beyond

Platforms like CrowdControl.live are early “signals” of where things can be going.

They allow viewers to e.g.,:

• Spawn enemies

• Give items

• Modify difficulty

• Influence moment-to-moment gameplay

This is important, but still largely “tactical” and reactive to its nature.

Despite what we’re seeing already, I see the in-depth opportunity goes beyond the surface level:

• From event-based triggers → to systemic influence

• From chaotic fun → to structured economies

• From stream gimmicks → to core game loops

And… having this all as a core part of a game and its experience, on a proper scale. Crucially, this doesn’t even need to rely on third-party platforms.

Developers can, if seen fit for their business cases, e.g.,:

• Integrate through Twitch’s API directly

• Build web-based control layers

• Create cross-platform participation systems (browser, mobile, second-screen)

Technically, and if wanted to be pushed this far, this opens the door to something much bigger:

• Parallel spectator economies running alongside, or integrated deeply to, with e.g., the player and/or game economy.

Why Hasn’t It Fully Broken Through?

Despite all the developments, as I see it, spectatorship is still underdeveloped as a primary business model (side note: at least based on my research, but there could be some movements already in motion; at least I know couple indie projects who look into it, at least on a paper).

Yes, some games have integrations:

• Voting systems

• Minor Twitch interactions

• Occasional event triggers

However, these are lightweight features, not foundational systems (and interconnections).

We don’t yet have:

• Games designed from the ground up for spectatorship economies

• Monetization loops where spectators are “first-class” participants

• Long-term progression systems for viewers

This is “surprising”, because the demand and early services exists to a certain extent; which could be taken further by some bold takes definitely.

Not to forget this, there are, of course, mentions in blogs, and some direct conversations that I’ve had around the topic, about couple companies that have been trying to crack this space with new multiplayer concepts built around spectatorship and spectatorship monetization.

Whilst these projects have been exciting to be read, and heard about, some of these projects have been paused; not because the idea failed, but because e.g., the market conditions did (e.g., due to tightened funding landscape, or other reasons).

Given these, it’s important to note that spectatorship systems are:

• Complex

• Cross-disciplinary

• Difficult to crack right way economically

…which makes them seen potentially as “a high-risk” in the current macro environment by people who don’t really get the whole funnel and/or economies’ potential behind the model. But this doesn’t reduce the model’s potential; as all advantages still exists, from first actual movers (on a healthy game and longevity basis) to followers on it.

How Spectatorship Fits with Different Business Models?

In F2P

Spectatorship fits naturally into F2P models:

• Viewers can, potentially, even spend without installing the game

• Acquisition funnel expands dramatically

• Social virality compounds monetization

Spectators become:

• Soft-converted users

• Pre-players

• Economic participants without onboarding friction

This can be incredibly powerful model, if executed properly, within F2P.

In Premium Games

More interestingly, spectatorship can unlock new value layers in premium games:

• Extend engagement beyond purchase

• Create post-purchase monetization without breaking the premium promise

• Turn players into performers and spectators into co-creators

When done right, hybrid models emerge, e.g.,:

• Premium entry + spectator-driven live economies

Platforms; Not Just Twitch

This isn’t limited to Twitch.

We’ve already seen early forms of participatory monetization across platforms, e.g.,:

• Live gifting influencing creator or simplistic game behavior

• Interactive streams where audience actions shape outcomes

• Real-time voting systems affecting content direction

This works from Twitch to TikTok to YouTube, and further.

While not always even gameplay-driven, the pattern is clear:

• Audiences (are willing to) pay influence outcomes.

And, yet, gaming is underutilized frontier for this behavior, even despite what we’ve seen already, like simple streamed games based on this model.

What This Can Become

In my own work and explorations, I’ve been thinking about spectatorship not as a feature, but as a core design axis.

The idea is not just interaction, but with “live control” over the game state, by spectators, the model can e.g.,:

• Trigger dynamic events by viewers

• Create environmental shifts influenced by the audience

• Have monetization loops tied directly to these actions

• Form into full-scale progression and economy systems, tied to both ends: the game’s end, and spectating’s end

Games’ can very much blend e.g., AI-driven systems with live audience interaction, introducing player-driven and audience-influenced multiplayer and monetization systems at scale.

This is the direction that I believe matters most. Not gimmicks. Not overlays. A real systemic integration.

Potential Depth of Spectatorship

Spectatorship can exists on a spectrum; from effects to economies. Below is a list of “depth” on high-level, including notes on where we are standing.

Level 1; Cosmetic / Reactive

• Alerts

• Sound triggers

• Visual effects

Level 2; Gameplay Influence

• Events, such as spawning enemies

• Giving buffs/debuffs

• Modifying difficulty

Level 3; Systemic Integration

• Influencing game economies

• Affecting progression systems

• Altering matchmaking dynamics

Level 4; Parallel Meta Systems

• Spectator progression

• Viewer-owned assets

• Cross-session influence

Level 5; Emergent Ecosystems

• Social, e.g., spectators form factions

• Compete or cooperate at scale

• “Influence entire worlds” over time

We are currently hovering between Level 1 and Level 2, whilst the real (monetary / large-scale) opportunity is I’d say within Levels 3–5.

Social Monetization Evolves

This is a much larger topic to discuss, which I’ll go through, maybe, as a topic of its own. So, instead of a too deep dive, let’s just focus on the core message.

Spectatorship is not just a feature, and it might be part of a broader shift toward:

• Social monetization

• Systemic participation

• Emergent economies

Players are no longer the only “users”. Viewers are “no longer passive”. Communities definitely aren’t passive. Players, as well as viewers (and viewer-players), want to be very closely part of the experience and a game more deeper. This got “more validation”, I’d say, through a recent event I attended personally, where both presenters and the audience (audience of game developers) discussed a lot about how players want to be involved more and how e.g., UGC, mods, and multiple other fronts are raising their heads more as part of the experience, on top of having communities being deeply involvement in everything.

Considering these, and many other factors, eventually, the distinction between different business models as well as ways how people get involved with games they play may integrate more deeply together.

Note: Some hints of what I’m discussing shortly about can be found from my previous article about Proximity Design in Game Design:

Why This Can Break Through

Despite where we are, I believe someone will crack this model.

Why and how? Because it has layers that aligns with:

• Human behavior (e.g., influence, participation, social signaling)

• Platform evolution (streaming + interactivity)

• Monetization “expansion” (beyond players) / entrepreneurial monetization exploration

And when it happens, it won’t look like a Twitch plugin, a donation overlay, or a gimmick feature. It will look like a game where the audience is part of the system, and the system is designed around them.

Spectatorship today is where free-to-play was many years ago; understood in fragments, misapplied in execution, and massive in potential.

The question is no longer if spectatorship becomes a core pillar. I’d say the question is:

Who builds the first truly scalable spectator-native game (economy)?

And more importantly, what does it feel like when you’re not just watching… but shaping the game itself?

This is not just a monetization or game experience shift, it also, when done right, shifts engagement as well as distribution and live ops to far into the future.

• Kill → Loot → Upgrade → Repeat.

• Match → Win → Rank → Repeat.

• Build → Expand → Dominate → Repeat.

We’ve optimized it → we’ve monetized it → we’ve scaled it. And yet, engaged players are burning content fast, and developing fatigue over the core.

This happens usually not because loops are bad, but because loops alone are not enough for building longevity. Same could be told for applying for the basic meta systems.

From Loops to Living Systems and Worlds

Players today don’t just play games. They optimize them, break them, and exhaust them. They pretty much go that far that they consume loops like content. And once the loop is “solved”, big parts of most games collapse in players’ eyes.

With this in mind, one part of building longevity is not about better loops or meta systems. It’s more often about what shapes and scales the loop’s experience.

In the eyes of this, most games already have the building blocks they could use for shaping and scaling their loops’ experiences, such as quests, events, social systems (e.g., guilds, factions), contracts / missions, and environment states.

However, most often, even the pieces are the, the real interlink between them and the core loop is broken, as these systems are most often treated as content delivery systems. That gives you results indeed, but that is also most often something that results in having a gap in your longevity.

So, how can we do better? At their full potential, these systems should be used as something I call as “game-shaping systems”. This means they don’t just add gameplay. Instead, they reconfigure the gameplay itself, resulting in deeper dynamics and emergency, which players are looking for.

When a Quest Stops Being a Task

Let’s give this a simple example.

Traditional quest design:

“Go here → kill this → get reward”.

Systemic quest design:

A quest becomes a parameter that modifies the entire session.

Game Scenario Example

We have an Extraction Shooter game with social faction systems, which puts players into active factions core part of the game. As a part of those factions, you activate faction contracts to proceed in the game.

Traditionally, by traditional design, you would have gotten a simple contract to do X to get Y as reward. By systemic design approach, not just your objective changes, but also dynamics change.

This can be designed to affect everything, such as:

• Matchmaking: Higher chance of same-faction players, and increased probability of enemy faction encounters.

• Environment: Specific locations become hotspots, and AI density increases in contract zones.

• AI behavior: More aggressive patrol patterns, and possible boss spawns tied to activity.

• Rewards: Higher-tier loot concentrated in risk zones, and dynamic reward scaling based on participation.

This is not a quest anymore. This is a session modifier. You didn’t pick content, and instead of that you entered a different version of the game. And this is already visible in your system design: contracts increase faction clustering → increased enemy faction encounters → boosted AI presence → extra loot in specific areas.

This isn’t just content anymore, this is systemic orchestration, which in well-executed format adds distribution, engagement, and monetization potential to your game.

What makes this interesting, in this scenario example, is not just the systems and their world-shaping capabilities themselves, but also the fact that player behavior and behavioral dynamics and economies change dynamically from match to match and lobby to lobby. Like tied to an Extraction Shooter experience, players wouldn’t know exactly what dynamics they are matched against, e.g., how many factions, how many non-faction players, how many “boosted” areas, etc. take in shape, which itself makes the whole match very exciting from e.g., core economics perspective.

These types of emergent interconnections would have probably even helped games such as ARC Raiders to sustain its active user counts much longer, if they would have gone for having more dynamism between their systems. Time will tell how they aim to deepen their systems’ approach.

Match-based Ecosystems

Most teams treat matchmaking like plumbing: skill, latency, and queue time. Sounds familiar?

The best matchmaking is actually the most powerful invisible “designer” in your game; because it decides basically who you meet, who you fight, and who/what shapes your experience.

Note: See what I’ve wrote about matchmaking as own separate topic here:

Now, as we understand what matchmakers should be at their best, let’s think about a matchmaking that considers e.g.,:

• Active quests/contracts

• Faction alignment

• Risk level (loot carried into session)

• Player intent (PvP vs farming vs exploration)

• Behavioral patterns (aggressive vs passive players)

With traditional means, matchmakers give “balanced matches” through above parameters.

With systemic approach, instead of “balanced matches”, you can create e.g.,:

• Faction-heavy wars

• Predator vs scavenger ecosystems

• High-risk lobbies full of stacked players

• Mixed-intent chaos sessions

Now each match is not just a match. They actually become ecosystems of their own. Pretty exciting, right?

Events as “Mutations”

Most events use pretty basic formats:

• “+20% XP weekend”

• “Limited-time mission”

• “Holiday skin”

Most often they don’t even change the game. They just “decorate it”.

Of course, above said, I know lots of games do change their content within events and experiment with systems, e.g., Hunt: Showdown, which is currently running their Devil’s Trail event with things as Inferno’s shaping the game world by having big areas under fire, along with many other things there for players to experience.

This is itself very exciting and big investment over building distribution, engagement, and monetization over a live service title. But, even so, they usually over longer time start repeating themselves and/or forget the systems-level interconnectivity potential they could have in their game; regarding specifically what I’m writing here in my article.

Systemic events do something else:

• They add emergency to the world.

Instead of “more rewards”, you can have:

• AI density that spikes dramatically

• Patrol logic that collapses into chaotic aggression

• A roaming boss hunting players dynamically

• Resource value skyrocketing in localized zones

• Extraction becoming contested and volatile

You can also do more than this, e.g., layer these with night-time visibility changes, have faction contracts active along with event systems, and have e.g., a high player density.

By this, you don’t have anymore just a traditional event as “a feature” or experience. You have an emergent system / ecosystem players experience over and over with a big smile on their faces, as these interconnections create experiences that players will remember for ages.

Indirect Participation

Indirect participation can make things more interesting, if wanted to be used. By this design approach, players wouldn’t need to opt into systems to be affected by them.

In a systemic game with indirect participation:

• Some players queue into faction events intentionally

• Others land in those same lobbies randomly

With this, you create new dynamics e.g.,:

• Prepared vs unprepared players

• Opportunistic ambushes

• Avoidance and stealth strategies

• Temporary alliances

Creating Second-order Gameplay

Not anymore about:

• “What is the objective?”

Instead:

“What is happening, and how do I survive it?”

That’s where some further depths of emergence lives.

Social Systems as Behavioral Gravity

Social systems such as factions are still one of the most under-designed systems in modern games.

Usually they add things such as:

• Cosmetics

• Narratives

• Progression tracks

But systemically? They could have more in them.

With the direction I’m pointing through my article, they can become:

• Behavioral gravity wells

Social systems can influence:

• Matchmaking clustering

• Conflict probability

• Map movement patterns

• Resource competition

• Social grouping

When systems such as factions affect who you meet, where you fight, and what enemies and rewards exist; then players are no longer just progressing. They are participating in a “living conflict”.

Interconnectivity as a Key

Individually, these systems are very interesting and can move a needle a lot. However, together, they can become genre-moving designs.

Think about a single session:

• You activate a faction contract

• A global breach event triggers

• Night-time reduces visibility

• Matchmaking clusters high-risk players

That’s not a traditional session anymore over your core loop. That’s a beast of an experience to go through.

Through proper interconnectivity, you get:

• Unpredictable encounters

• Unique session narratives / experiences

• Player-driven outcomes

Key insight:

You don’t scale content
You scale interactions between systems

Why This Changes Everything

This isn’t just design philosophy. It directly impacts to your whole funnel.

1. Distribution

Emergent systems create:

• Shareable stories

• “You won’t believe what happened” moments

• Organic virality through community videos, social media reels, etc.

No marketing beats unpredictable gameplay stories.

2. Engagement

Instead of more content, more levels, and more missions, you create dynamic and emergent variation.

Same loop, but different reality.

3. Monetization

Instead of selling power, skips, and content, you could theoretically sell, as an example:

• Access to high-risk systems

• Influence within factions

• Event participation advantages

• Risk mitigation (insurance, protection, scouting tools)

• And other things tied to your game

You can focus on intrinsic monetization strategies on this side, which don’t feel like monetization, because it’s tied to system participation, not pressure.

Game Genre Examples

Extraction Shooters

The perfect foundation.

• PvPvE

• Risk layers

• Shared spaces

Systemic design turns them into living ecosystems-

Multiplayer Roguelites

Still massively underexplored.

• Runs influenced by player activity

• Events affecting procedural generation

• Shared world states across sessions

Randomness becomes systemically influenced “fun-chaos”.

Note: Interested what I’ve wrote about Extraction Shooters and Roguelites in general? Find more from these articles:

Possibilities with AI

Now, take everything above. And, remove static control.

Add an AI layer that:

• Observes player behavior

• Tracks faction dominance

• Detects stagnation or imbalance

• Understands player intent

And, then, make it actively reshaping your system.

This is not anymore content generation (e.g., infinite quests, procedural noise, narrative spam). This is, again, system orchestration; amplified with AI. Not a slop.

What AI can enable:

1. Adaptive Matchmaking

2. Persistent NPC Memory

3. Dynamic Worlds

4. Social Dynamics

5. Reactive Events

…and much more.

When systems + matchmaking + AI interact, you can bypass endless content, constant updates, and artificial retention loops. Games can become more reactive, adaptive, and unpredictable, in which players don’t return for rewards but rather for possibilities.

Living Systems

Best games are living systems.

The industry has spent decades perfecting core loops, progression systems, and content pipelines. Beyond that, the next generation of games will not be just defined by those. They will be defined by:

How alive they and their systems feel

The real question is no longer: “What I do next?” It’s more about: “What kind of world am I stepping into this time?”

Budgets have inflated. Production cycles have slowed. Content pipelines have become heavier and less predictable. Science-based optimization has been optimized for squeeze that churn users. Players are spreading time among multiple medias more, and many claim “AI is going to kill our jobs”, and such. While this all is cumulating, at the same time, player expectations have shifted toward something entirely different, e.g., living, evolving, and social experiences that persist over time, or just towards wanting, well, better games and experiences.

Growth is no longer driven by acquisition alone. It is driven by retention, depth, and long-tail engagement. Similarly, the industry is no longer rewarded for producing just more content and squeeze over it. It is rewarded for producing better games, and, as I get to discuss this topic here more, better systems around them.

This creates a fundamental shift in how games should be designed, built, and scaled.

The old model:

• Build a game

• Ship content

• Maintain via live ops

• Move to the next project

The better model:

• Build systems, and launch “an experience engine” platform

• Experiment rapidly for optimizing performance in smart way, even when building just the first game

• Through one game (or more games), scale across multiple games, genres, and audiences

• Expand through modular extensions

This is where experience systemization becomes critical for the better model. Not only as an optimization mean, but as the core strategy and mindset model.

When you are as a reader exploring this topic, please note that lots of the examples lie around games and genres I like to blog about, e.g., Shooters. This doesn’t say, though, that Shooters are best benefitting from experience systemization alone. As I see it, there are multitude of genres and experiences these same principles and models can be used for, e.g., even for simulation / tycoon games / idle games, puzzle games, 4X / strategy, MMORPGs, and such.

The key lies in understanding a market, and its near-by markets deeply, and using experience systemization as the main anchoring method for pulling things together the way this article discusses about experience systemization.

Note: This is a topic I’ve developed with a lot of care and passion. It’s something I return to often, because I believe it sits at the core of building a more sustainable future for our industry.

This is also an area where deep, cross-disciplinary experience matters. Systemizing experiences at this level requires a rare combination of systems design, game economy thinking, product leadership, and business understanding. It’s a space I’ve been operating in, and one I feel strongly positioned to help push forward.

Very few people in the industry are currently equipped to operate at this level when it comes to experience systemization. My hope is that through this post and effort of others, more can switch their world perception to right tune for achieving same.

Also, I’m open for opportunities as they come, if someone wants to arm me for building sustainability for their studio(s) through experience systemization.

From Games to Experience Engines

Experience systemization in a nutshell means that you are no longer designing a single game. You are designing an experience engine, which builds sustainability and scalability for your business in smart way.

This engine consists of reusable, interconnected systems, such as:

• progression

• matchmaking

• game mode(s)

• economy / monetization

• social structures / systems

• world / environment simulation

• live ops systems

When it comes to experience systemization, these are not just features. They are primitives / foundations as well as base systems that carry over not just one game but multitude of games, on top of which even for one game they allow adjustments between science bases, modes, genres, and, well, experiences combined.

When designed correctly, they allow you to e.g.,:

• create multiple game modes smarter

• mix and switch between game modes

• experiment with monetization models

• adapt games to player behavior without rebuilding the product

• shift between genres for one or more games

• scale from one foundational game base to new experiences faster

The result is a system that produces experiences and new games instead of building content and games again, and again, and again in an infinite loop. Simultaneously, I would say your genre-mastery accumulates on a much greater scale than previously, as it comes from a foundational layer that allows you to experiment between sciences and experience bases. Instead of just deepening one vector knowledge, you deepen your knowledge in parallel around a multitude of vectors.

Systemizing Experience

Traditional design is often content-first. It focuses on e.g., levels, missions, and handcrafted sequences.

Systemic design is rule-first, and it focuses on:

• mechanics

• interactions

• emergent outcomes

Instead of asking:

“What content do we build next?”

You can ask:

“What system(s) produce(s) the next thousand experiences?”

This is where e.g., mechanics → dynamics → aesthetics become “operational”. You build mechanics that scale and shift dynamically through configurations. In a simple way, you enable dynamics that vary, and you allow aesthetics to emerge.

The outcome:

• higher replayability

• lower content cost

• stronger player agency

Multi-Science Systems

One of the most important principles in experience systemization is this:

• Every system should be built on multiple scientific bases.

Let’s look, for example, into matchmaking. A traditional implementation optimizes for one variable, for skill-based matchmaking.

A systemic implementation optimizes for multiple sciences, e.g.,:

• geo-based matchmaking

• skill-based matchmaking

• engagement-based matchmaking

• symmetric matchmaking

• asymmetric matchmaking

• social cohesion

• core gameplay data

• server data

This transforms matchmaking from a static system into a configurable layer. You can switch between logics, combine models, run experiments, and adapt to player data and feedback.

With this, even something like matchmaking becomes a control system for experience design, and not just a backend utility. And, through this approach, you would have a revolutionary matchmaking system ready for not just one game but multitude of games.

Note: Interested about matchmaking systems? Read what I’ve wrote about them here:

Genre as Configuration

When systems are modular, genre is no longer fixed. It becomes a configuration.

A well-designed experience system allows transitions such as:

• PvPvE → PvE-only → PvP-only

• Extraction → Roguelite → RPG/MMO

• Solo → Co-op → PvP

This is not about making everything flexible. It is about designing systems that support controlled transformation.

Thesis: PvPvE to Co-op PvE in a Shooter Game

If AI systems, rewards, environments, and matchmaking are modular:

• PvP pressure can be reduced or removed

• AI presence, behavior, and difficulty can be scaled

• rewards can be redistributed, and repositioned

The result is a fully different experience built on the same foundation. Of course, the foundation might require some finer tweaks, like for level design, but there are also ways how you could do all this within larger open maps and/or evolving biome-based maps.

Thesis: Extraction to Roguelite in a Shooter Game

Both, Extraction and Roguelite, share core primitives:

• run-based loops

• risk vs reward

• progression layers

The difference lies in e.g., persistence and reset structures. With this in mind, you can build and experience, in a smart systemized way, how you can even go that far that you switch between genres.

If foundations in your systems for both genre directions are supported:

• you can pivot or mix based on data

• you can test player preferences

• you can evolve the product post-launch

This allows you in one systemic shot to not just test and iterate a game to market wisely, but also over time spin new products out from same base, e.g., you could have an Extraction game acting as a spin-off base for your Roguelite game.

Switches between PvP, Co-op, and PvPvE can be also included in this mix, if you build things just the right way.

Note: Interested about what I’ve wrote about Extraction Shooters and Roguelites? Find more from these articles:

Designing the Bet: Constraints That Enable Flexibility

System design for experience systemization is not about unlimited flexibility. It is about choosing the right constraints early.

Meaning, which I acknowledge well here, that there are certain limits for the flexibility and switches between experiences. Like for those Shooter examples, you cannot make them to something extreme like to puzzle games without spending money expensively.

Key decisions for this matter include e.g.,:

• environment / map / level scale and its emergency

• world density and emergency

• session structure

• social depth

• progression systems

Map Example

Large-scale maps:

• long-term tension

• slower pacing

• high-stakes extraction

Biome-based maps:

• faster iteration

• controlled variability

• high replayability

Both support Extraction and Roguelite systems when it comes to Shooters. But they shape the experience differently.

With this in mind, system design for experience systemization is about selecting constraints that maximize future optionality rather than aiming for building a base for unlimited choices.

Systemic Shooter Game Concept Example

This game concept example, I’ve made myself withing couple evenings, can be understood, from experience systemization’s point of view, not as a single game but as a system configuration.

Core layers:

1. Extraction Loop

Deploy → Engage:

Loot:

Extract:

Upgrade / Maintain:

2. Roguelite Character & Trait System

With adding e.g., Class and Roguelite systems, you get e.g.,:

• temporary power growth, lost at character dead

• combinatorial builds and fantasy explorations

• deep economy, which allows also later DLC / microtransactions-based monetization opportunities, if wanted

3. Environment system

Well planned environments bring lots of dept, which suit for Extraction Shooters, Roguelites, and/or their mixes.

For example:

• multiple environments / biomes

• dynamic events (e.g., night, breach)

4. Social structures

Smart design enables:

• All solo, co-op, and group play allowed, AND/OR

• one of these allowed / focused into, as/if wanted

These systems already enable multiple configurations:

• PvPvE extraction

• Co-op PvE roguelite

• PvE-only

• Social raid structures

The important insight:

The game is not the product, the system is.

New Games & Experiences:

From futuristic setting to e.g., modern techy setting, using same “experience” / game (systems) base:

Systems can also enable multi-platform explorations:

Potentially, if your tech. choices allow, multi-platform exploration becomes a possibility to some extent, e.g., same systems but for mobile:

Tech Modularity: The Enabler That Changed

Historically, this level of systemization was extremely difficult. Like when we talk about modularity, I believe it’s something that has been tried to crack properly since 80s. It’s slow, costly, and time-consuming.

Building modular systems has so far required:

• large engineering teams

• long development cycles

• heavy upfront investment

• complex maintenance overhead

As a result, most studios defaulted to building one-off solutions tied to a single game.

This is now very likely changing. AI could be fundamentally shifting the cost structure of modularity under the hood. I’m not talking vibe coding your whole stack but rather than putting AI under the hood of these components, while you would be in control of the architecture. Also, just to put it out here as well, I’m not talking about replacing people by AI on this, as instead you can just amplify them and sustain proper dynamics culturally.

What AI Potentially Enables

As someone pointed for me, the belief is that AI allows you to:

• generate and maintain system variations

• support multiple configurations simultaneously

• reduce engineering overhead for system updates

• automate balancing and tuning processes

Instead of building rigid systems, you can build adaptive ones faster. Instead of maintaining one game, you can maintain a system layer across multiple experiences more efficiently.

The Outcome

Tech modularity becomes:

• faster to build

• cheaper to maintain

• scalable across multiple games

This might be the first time in the industry where true experience systemization is not only possible, but somewhat practical.

Beyond this, AI Can be Considered for e.g.,:

• balancing economies

• tuning matchmaking

• generating events

• adapting difficulty

• supporting live ops experimentation

This allows the system to evolve / be maintained continuously without requiring full manual intervention.

Compounding Systems as The Real Advantage

The biggest impact of experience systemization is economic.

Traditional model:

• each game is a new investment

• each feature is rebuilt

Systemized model:

• each system is reused

• each improvement compounds

• each game becomes cheaper to build

This creates:

• faster production

• lower risk

• scalable portfolios

A studio becomes a system that produces great games, instead of a team that builds them one by one with high risk-profile through traditional optimization means and methods. This way, again, genre-mastery compounds in a way no-one probably haven’t experienced it “the smart way”.

Designing for the Unknown

The most powerful aspect of experience systemization is not efficiency. It is adaptability. You are not designing for a fixed outcome.

You are designing for:

• unknown player behavior

• unknown genre evolution

• unknown monetization shifts

Instead of reacting to change, you are prepared for it.

Experience systemization is the bridge between:

• creativity and scalability

• design and economics

• games and platforms

It is how you:

• reduce cost

• increase speed

• unlock innovation

And most importantly:

It is how you build games that do not just succeed. You evolve along with that.

For many years, my day-to-day work has relied on using market intelligence tools. Over time, I had the chance to try a lot of well-known platforms that promised a high-level view of the mobile games market, e.g., revenue estimates, downloads, KPIs, category leaders, trend identification, and many more.

They were powerful, but also expensive, rigid, and sometimes too abstract for the kind of work I actually needed to do. My core challenge wasn’t access to data. It was a resolution. As a product leader, systems designer, and hobbyist angel investor, I rarely ask simple questions like, “Is this genre growing?” Instead, my questions tend to be more surgical:

• Is this specific subsegment within a genre growing or decaying?

• What monetization structures and strategies are actually working for those competitors on the inside and not just on the surface?

• Are live events being used as a core economic driver, or just as surface-level engagement boosts?

• Does a product’s observed KPI profile support a sustainable business case, or does it break at scale?

With previous tools, answering those questions required a lot of manual triangulation: exporting rough estimates, building parallel sheets over granular parts of the industry, and cross-checking assumptions with anecdotal industry knowledge… And still feeling that some questions were left unanswered.

The challenges in using them peaked at some point, when I realized that many were paying very premium prices for tools that were excellent at telling what was happening—on a certain level—but not on any level why, and definitely not how.

Note for readers: This article has been originally published on AppMagic’s site here.

Finding the Right Tool to Use

I first came across AppMagic through industry circles and peer recommendations. The positioning was interesting: more affordable, but also more focused on practical, granular category analysis, monetization, and live service insights rather than just dashboards after dashboards.

“I didn’t expect it to replace my existing tools at first. I expected it to be complementary. Instead, it quickly became central, as it had some comfying ‘magic’ to it.”

What made AppMagic stand out was how it allowed me to deconstruct markets and products faster and more effectively, rather than forcing me to dive deeper into higher-level perspectives. The level of categorization, down to genres, subgenres, monetization placements, and event structures, matched how I actually wanted to take quick yet insightful looks to support decision-making or time investments across different research topics.

Instead of, say, abstract “puzzle” labels, I could start slicing reality closer to subcategories, how they behave, and how products perform within them, on top of which I was given complementary information about monetization and events.

Monopoly GO! In AppMagic

Getting started with AppMagic was straightforward. There was no heavy onboarding process or mandatory training period. The UI and data structure were intuitive enough that I could jump directly into exploration.

Within days, AppMagic got integrated into multiple workflows:

• Early-stage opportunity evaluation

• Competitor deconstruction

• LiveOps and monetization benchmarking

• Benchmarking for validating new concepts

• KPI benchmarking for monitoring game progress and investments

• Personal investment research

• And much more

There is depth to the platform, and it is the kind you discover naturally as your questions become more detailed. Eventually, it became a multi-purpose lens I now use to analyze both products and markets, and I’m happy to share a nine-step framework that helps turn market research into real results.

Using AppMagic: Example Scenarios

1. Evaluating Opportunities Within a Genre

By drilling into very specific subsegments, I can assess whether an opportunity is genuinely underserved, growing, mature, or declining. Let’s see how this works with the example of one of the genres that showed a tremendous growth in 2025: Screw Puzzles.

I’ve looked at the Screw Puzzle segment before, and back in 2024, it was already clear that pure 2D Screw Puzzle games were declining. The Market Segment dashboard showed that the subgenre leader, Screw Jam, was losing momentum, with no other title poised to take its place. The reasons were fairly typical: copycat games failing to provide fresh takes, overly aggressive monetization pressure, and a general lack of new ideas.

Screw Puzzles on the Market Segment dashboard

Then, the introduction of 3D Screw Puzzle games gave the segment’s growth another push. However, that growth was concentrated only around one title: Screwdom. That’s why the segment still didn’t invite a straightforward business case consideration. Further still, if you dove deeper into Screwdom, you would notice that its downloads had been going down, whilst cumulative RpD had been on the rise.

This is clearly something one needs to monitor in order to understand how their UA strategy may have reprioritized LTV optimization with lower user numbers over sheer traffic volume—to sustain the current business case. But in order to do it right, you need to start with the bigger picture, and that’s what you can do just by looking at the market composition. Starting from here, you can go further into product analysis—as far as you like.

2. Monetization Strategy & Placement Benchmarking

Instead of guessing where monetization pressure sits, I can actually explore all the essential economy aspects of my game of choice:

• What type of monetization strategies and placements it uses

• Which IAP placements drive the most value

• What upcoming monetization methods and psychological tricks are connected to them

• How aggressively the competitors push their monetization and economy

For example, Monopoly GO! is the fastest-grossing game to surpass $6B in revenue, and it serves as a great learning platform for anyone working with monetization. Using AppMagic’s Monetization Intelligence, I can actually take a look at the game’s vast library of offers. Going into a more granular level, tracking their placements and types, I can learn a lot about the game’s success in IAP monetization.

Monopoly GO! offers in Monetization Intelligence

But most importantly, I can see how these offers are interconnected with other aspects of the game, including any ongoing LiveOps events, and with each other.

3. LiveOps Calendar: Types, Cadence, and Strategic Weight

One of the most interesting things for me has been tracking:

• How frequently events run

• What types of events dominate certain segments

• Whether events are used as core economic engines or secondary engagement tools

This feeds directly into designing LiveOps systems that aim for top-percentile performance, not just table stakes, because having a clear view of how others do things also reveals what it actually takes to reach certain percentile targets with your games.

Take, for example, the Merge games segment with its $1.6B IAP revenue and constant year-over-year growth. Despite how promising it might look, it is important to consider what it really takes to get to the top. And such requirements are big ones, especially for live events.

Gossip Harbor in the LiveOps & Updates Calendar

Even a quick glance at the LiveOps & Updates Calendar of Gossip Harbor, an undeniable leader in the genre, is enough to understand the scale of its LiveOps efforts. It’s packed with various simultaneous interconnected events telling a story of the resources you need to put into motion if you hope to sustain the possibility of getting closer to their level.

4. Investment Analysis (as an Angel Investor)

As a hobbyist angel investor in games, AppMagic helps me do the sanity check:

• Whether teams are targeting the right markets

• Whether their ambitions align with observable market realities

• Whether their differentiation claims hold up against existing competitors

In addition to the tools described above, it also helps to see a list of competitors in specific regions. Using the Top Publishers chart, I can review the list of competitors operating in the same country to better understand the company’s background, its professional environment, and the overall state of the games industry in the region.

Top gaming publishers in Türkiye

5. Tracking Emerging Games & New Phenomena

To stay up to date and track major trends earlier than others, I can, as wanted, set up a custom early opportunity/warning system that allows me to:

• Spot emerging games and trends

• Follow them over time to assess sustainability

• Identify genuinely new systems or segment shifts, not just reskins

For that, I rely on several tools: Advanced Search and Notifications. The first helps me track every new release in the niche, even if it hasn’t built a revenue or downloads track record yet, while the second helps set up custom alerts delivered directly to my email. For example, I can track when the game in a certain niche reaches particular revenue or downloads figures; thus, the alert could be set for “Hypercasual Puzzles with daily IAP Revenue of $10K or more” to track new Hybrid Puzzles.

Screw Puzzles in Advanced Search

6. Creative Tracking & Benchmarking

A proper analysis shouldn’t end with the product overview only. Sometimes, it can be even more important to take a look at the UA side of things:

• Spotting the highest-spending creatives by competitors

• Monitoring creative trends

• Network and regional data

Screwdom creatives in Ad Intelligence

If we look at Screwdom as an example, it’s clear that introducing 3D into the Screw Puzzle was not only about gameplay, but a UA decision, too. Its creatives are built around 3D puzzles, highlighting the game’s unique proposition and underscoring the importance of a marketable core gameplay for new Hybridcasual games. This allows the publisher to showcase actual or semi-actual gameplay for UA creatives and to cheaply scale the required volume of creatives.

“The biggest change after adopting AppMagic wasn’t a single “big win”. It was something more valuable: confidence.”

From these Ad Intelligence views, you can also build confidence in what works and what the segment-wide sentiment is. Like, if you’re not seeing fake ads, maybe you can somewhat confidently assume that you should not lean on them fully in your strategy.

Step-by-Step: How AppMagic Fits Into My Rhythm

With AppMagic, I reach conclusions faster, and they are supported by much stronger evidence. It helps me make confident decisions: from killing weak ideas early to doubling down on opportunities backed by real market signals.

That’s why I most often use the tool during the active concept or investment analysis phases. My typical flow would look like this:

1. Identify a question or hypothesis (product, market, monetization, system, etc.)

2. Slice the market down to the right level of granularity

3. AppMagic-deconstruct relevant competitors

   1. KPI ranges, monetization strategies, and live system patterns

4. Granular self-deconstruction, as required, including macro/product layers, and cross-checking against what the tool shows

5. As needed, validate marketability layers:

   1. Channels

   2. Creatives, including possible volume requirements

   3. Trends, risks, and opportunities

6. Feed those insights into validation models, design decisions, or investment theses.

Yes, this might take time and is always about creative thinking with data informing the work and interlinking. But it always translates into meaningful time savings, fewer blind spots at early validation stages, and better alignment between product strategy and actual market reality.

It also changes the quality of internal discussions: conversations become grounded in data rather than opinions, which makes decision-making clearer and more constructive. But most importantly, it helps overcome the biggest friction point in market analysis: the gap between macro-level data and actionable insight.

• We see talks about dynamically segmented events.

• We see talks about tailoring offers to specific cohorts.

• We see talks about AI-driven playstyle detection and behavioral clustering.

• We talk about live-ops engines that mutate the game experience per user.

And yes, in many ways, this direction makes sense. But the means to reach this direction properly? Many times not so much.

For example, mobile F2P, in particular, has reached a maturity point where improving retention and financial performance increasingly requires understanding playstyles at a granular level. AI and data-driven product management are pushing us toward systems that detect intent patterns and serve personalized content accordingly.

In many ways, this is progress. But here’s the uncomfortable truth: Hyper-personalization is often a lazy solution to a deeper design problem.

Hyper-Personalization Alone Is Dangerous

Heavy segmentation can:

• Increase production cost.

• Fragment the player base.

• Reduce cross-archetype exposure.

• Create event fatigue.

• Inflate live-ops complexity.

• Shrink systemic depth.

• Leave engagement and money on the table.

And worst of all:

It can mask weak core system architecture.

If your game requires hyper-personalized event design to keep archetypes engaged, that’s often a signal that your systems aren’t intrinsically elastic enough.

So, instead, before building systems that split players into increasingly narrow silos, you should always ask:

Have we designed systems and/or interconnectivity that naturally serve multiple archetypes at once?

Because if you haven’t, you’re patching over shallow design with algorithmic band-aids. This is something where multi-archetype systems design approach and mindset grows importance over single-purpose design approaches.

The Multi-Archetype Design Mindset

Multi-archetype systems design means:

• One system serving multiple player archetypes through different engagement modes.

• Interconnected systems that progress the overall game even if players don’t deeply engage with all of them.

• Features designed with layered motivations instead of single-purpose funnels.

• Etc.

This is fundamentally different from some takes I’ve seen e.g., being talked on LinkedIn, like:

“Let’s create separate events for each playstyle and segment players by that.”

That path can be beneficial. But, many times with poor systems approach it still can lead to fragmentation, production overhead, event fatigue, and eventually operational complexity that in worst cases eats margin.

Instead, multi-archetype systems create structural elasticity inside the game, which is something many should have in place before going too deep, if not needed even past this point at all.

Multi-archetype systems allow e.g.,:

• Competitive players to compete.

• Social players to cooperate.

• Optimizers to min-max.

• Casual collectors to accumulate.

• Explorers to discover.

• And much more.

The best part, this all can be achieved within the same “macro-system”.

When done correctly, hyper-personalization could even become:

1. A minor optimization layer.

2. Or completely unnecessary.

Because… the system already adapts through player agency!

Light Examples

Monopoly GO’s Archetype Biasing

You can see early, lighter versions of this thinking in Monopoly GO!.

Take a team-based event, as an example. Despite fully leaning to team-based activities, players can technically also choose to play solo, even the solo option is visually secondary (placed below the team-building flow).

This placement order most likely matters for Monopoly GO!, as the default nudges players toward social participation, which is very likely seen through experiments improving engagement and monetization in solid manner. But, beyond that, solo exists, even in de-emphasized format, as there’s also meaningful results probably gained from that as well.

The system serves multiple archetypes / playstyles, and it does so without fully splitting the feature into isolated archetype-targeted variants. One reason Monopoly GO reached such massive scale is precisely because its overall design serves multiple archetypes simultaneously.

It’s not just a board game. It’s e.g.,:

• A collection meta.

• A competitive race.

• A cooperative event engine.

• A long-term progression economy.

There’s still, of course, room for deeper multi-archetype layering, but the structural direction is slightly better than many others directions are pushing developers and publishers to go.

ARC Raiders: Archetype Layering as a Pillar

On the PC/console side, I discussed in The Future of Extraction Shooters article how ARC Raiders builds one of its core success pillars around serving multiple archetypes.

Unlike many extraction shooters that heavily lean into hardcore PvP tension, ARC Raiders layers:

• PvE cooperation.

• Environmental scavenging.

• Long-term progression.

• Competitive PvP risk.

• Social squad play.

• Narrative / quests.

• Etc.

The result is a broader archetype surface area. Instead of segmenting these audiences into different single-purpose modes or events, the core loop itself supports them.

They show on some level quite well the difference between multi-archetype system architecture instead of leaning to reactive personalization. Beyond this and their success on this approach, I do think they could do a bit more still on this front, which will be seen through future updates if they go more on this direction or do something else based on strategies of their choosing (as they pretty much can choose and experiment past their success).

Multi-Archetype Design Across Genres

Past given examples, let’s go deeper on this through some (hypothetical) examples.

Modern Puzzle Games

Instead of:

• One competitive leaderboard event.

• One collection album event.

• One narrative mini-campaign event.

Let’s think about a new single meta-layer where:

• Competitive players push time-based leaderboards, whilst benefits flow to below points.

• Collectors climb same boards for cosmetics and seasonal artifacts, whilst benefits flow to other presented points.

• Social players contribute to guild / team-based puzzle-solving goals, which on same system may advance different reward routes / boards on top of their single contributions advancing above points.

• “Optimizers” theorycraft resource economies to maximize event multipliers, and take part as they want beyond that in single or social activities.

The same core play fuels multiple motivations and still progresses things further through interconnectivity.

Interconnectivity here ensures e.g.,:

• Playing casually still contributes to guild progression, if you’re part of one.

• Competitive engagement boosts other milestones and progression / reward paths.

• Collection unlocks modify gameplay expression in casual and social play.

No segmentation needed. Just multi-archetype targeting for system design. Same thinking can be applied to actual core and meta, and/or for events / live events as takes go.

Action-RPGs / MMORPGs

Let’s think about a dynamic world boss system approach.

Instead of:

• Separate PvP tournaments.

• Separate co-op raid events.

• Separate solo challenge ladders.

One integrated system could allow:

• Solo players to weaken world bosses over time.

• Guilds to coordinate final kills.

• PvP factions to fight over spawn control.

• Crafters to profit from drop-based resource cycles.

• Explorers to discover spawn patterns.

Interconnectivity in this rough example ensures that e.g.,:

• Even non-combat players influence outcomes / economy.

• Social and competitive layers collide organically.

• The system progresses globally without mandatory participation.

Extraction Shooters

Beyond ARC Raiders’ styled take, think about a seasonal “frontline” meta-layer where:

• PvP-focused players push territory control.

• PvE scavengers collect rare components.

• Social players coordinate and collaborate over PvP / PvE / PvPvE.

• Risk-averse players contribute via e.g., “logistics” and crafting.

• Hardcore players escalate on high-risk zones.

Everyone contributes to the same “macro”. But, no-one is intentionally “forcedF into every sub-loop, even though the typical risk-reward layer for extraction might stay same.

Strategy / 4X

One alliance war system can serve:

• Diplomats (negotiation mechanics).

• Economists (resource optimization).

• Military tacticians (battle planning).

• Saboteurs (covert mechanics).

• Social leaders (community coordination).

Interconnectivity > Isolation

Multi-archetype design rests on high-level on two pillars.

1) One System Serving Many Archetypes

Including e.g.,:

• Multiple interaction modes.

• Different reward surfaces.

• “Choice” architecture.

2. Interconnectivity Without Mandatory Participation

Players:

• Progress the macro layer even if they ignore or de-emphasize certain systems.

• Are exposed to adjacent loops passively.

• Drift between archetypes over time.

Full Ignorance Eats Engagement

If your strategy is heavy data- or AI-driven segmentation with archetype-targeted events, something dangerous can happen:

Players stop seeing adjacent motivations.

This means that by your strategy you reduce cross-pollination, and most likely extra engagement and monetization opportunities.

You train achievers to only play achiever events. Collectors to only show up for album events. Competitors to only care about ranked ladders.

Exposure disappears… and with it, business potential.

The Live Ops Implication

Live ops becomes dramatically more efficient under multi-archetype design.

Instead of:

• Producing multiple segmented event tracks.

• Designing bespoke mechanics per cluster.

• Managing complex targeting logic.

You simply can:

• Build few deeply layered seasonal systems.

• Tune reward routes, interconnectivity and weighting per vector.

• Plan economy multipliers and modifiers per route.

• Etc.

If the core design is strong, personalization becomes refinement and not repair.

The UA & Marketing Layer

There’s another overlooked benefit for user acquisition.

In Unlocking the Power of Intrinsic Motivation article, I discussed how intrinsic loops should shape our marketing narratives.

With multi-archetype systems, you can create truthful creatives for different archetypes, without building separate experiences.

From the same system:

• A competitive-focused creative shows leaderboard tension.

• A social creative highlights guild collaboration.

• A collector-focused creative showcases e.g., cosmetic progression.

• An optimizer creative emphasizes economy mastery.

You “hypertarget” through systems-born messaging. This aligns product and marketing, in which your unique selling points become archetype-specific value propositions drawn from the same core. No need to lean (at least that fast) to “fabricated” hooks for CPI optimization.

The Strategic Decision

What I’m writing and discussing here doesn’t mean hyper-personalization is wrong.

AI-driven playstyle detection.
Behavioral clustering.
Offer / event optimization.

These can be powerful.

But, honestly, they should come after:

1. Strong multi-archetype system architecture.

2. Deep interconnectivity.

3. Intrinsic motivational layering.

And I get it. For some games, especially smaller teams or tightly scoped designs, full multi-archetype layering may be too heavy. In those cases, segmentation experiments may be the right short-term lever. In some cases, maybe it’s too late to change the direction of a live product, if you have inherited one that isn’t designed or easy to adapt to that way. Sometimes there’s just lots of debt over tech., etc.

But strategically:

Multi-archetype systems create compounding structural advantage.

They:

• Scale better.

• Reduce content overhead.

• Improve organic retention.

• Support truthful UA.

• Enable light-touch personalization.

• Protect against archetype stagnation.

And… even if resources would be tight, I’d always argue that good systems are better investment for your money from scratch instead of realizing this past your first lever or failure.

So, all in all, the future of games is not just hyper-personalized. It is architecturally more multi-dimensional.

When you design systems that:

• Serve multiple archetypes.

• Interconnect without coercion.

• And expose players to adjacent motivations.

You don’t need to chase personalization with poor means. You’ve already built everything into the fabric of the game. And that is far more powerful than any algorithm.

What began as e.g., tightly scripted, replayable team experiences is steadily evolving into something more systemic, more persistent, and more unpredictable as we’re seeing and predicting fresh takes on the genre.

One soon realizing future sits at the intersection of two forces:

• Roguelike / roguelite systemic design.

• Co-op-first social play.

However, I believe this is just the beginning.

If things continue with this approach, I think we’re actually seeing at some point future games based on the intersection of three forces:

• Roguelike / roguelite systemic design.

• Co-op-first social play.

• Extraction-inspired DNA / PvPvE structures.

Individually, each of these has proven successful. Combined, they point toward new genre phases, one likely to define the next 3 to 5 years of multiplayer shooters, followed by a deeper evolution that could shape the direction of the genre for at least the next decade.

Let’s dive deeper.

AA / AAA Momentum: Roguelite Systems Enter the Shooter Core

One of the clearest signals of these directions comes from the AA / AAA space, where systemic replayability is no longer a niche experiment but a central design pillar for some studios.

A strong example is Housemarque, the Finland-based studio now owned by Sony. Their work has helped “normalize” roguelite mechanics in high-fidelity shooter experiences, starting from Returnal.

Returnal proved that:

• Roguelite loops can coexist with premium production values.

• Procedural and systemic progression can carry emotional narrative arcs.

• Failure can be reframed as forward momentum rather than punishment.

Returnal features trailer. (Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKZV00Esu54)

Returnal’s Formula

Core Roguelite Loop

• Death resets most items, weapons, and run-specific currencies, but key upgrades and narrative progress persist.

• Procedural structure reshapes each run through shifting rooms / biomes, item placement, and encounters.

• Fast third-person combat built around mobility and bullet-hell experience with encounters and avoidance.

Systemic Build Variety

• Weapons with randomized stats, traits, alternate fire modes.

• Weapon Proficiency enabling stronger drops deeper into a run.

• Strategic decision layers:

  • Malignant items that offer power with risk.

  • Parasites that introduce trade-offs.

  • Adrenaline stacks rewarding skillful, damage-free play.

“Dual-layer” Economy

• Run currency for immediate decisions.

• Persistent resources that carry meta-progression across deaths.

Narrative through Repetition

• Story fragments, environmental storytelling, and progression unlocked over multiple cycles.

The Blend

This blend, permanent growth, temporary power, and systemic risk / reward, became the studio’s defining design identity.

Now, they’re escalating that identity.

Saros: Formula Escalation

Housemarque’s upcoming project, Saros, appears to deepen and intensify the same philosophy and formula they’ve invested once already in.

While the game isn’t released yet, the direction communicated so far suggests a stronger and deeper emphasis over the existing formula:

• Newly thought Roguelite comeback (“Death → return stronger” loops) mechanics.

• Shapeshifting biomes and level states., with a world-state escalation system (“eclipse”) that:

  • Corrupts the environment, escalates enemy systems, and raises audiovisual intensity and difficulty.

  • Improves rewards in exchange for higher risk.

  • Interacts differently with armor and weapon builds, in connection with the enemy system escalation.

• Permanent progression via armor, perks, and talent-like systems, with skill / talent tree styled approach.

• Modifier systems balancing protection vs. offensive power as well as world / enemy conditions.

  • Note: Manipulators are something as systems that I’ve predicted gaining popularity in one of my previous articles here (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/41-manipulator-mechanics-new-frontiers):

• Continuation mechanics.

• And much more.

Compared to Returnal, these systems appear more depthful, layered and tension-driven, and less about a single run loop and more about shaping the world itself across repeated engagements. And, I think this is a great direction, and I hope they’ll do well with this game release, as from that they can get where I’m expecting roguelites and co-op direction going.

Saros Gameplay Overview Trailer going through its base systems. (Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcLGdMG0L8Q)

As Returnal established the formula, Saros looks a step to evolve it into a bit more persistent and reactive ecosystem, focusing in building excitement and engagement through clearer power progression.

Note: As we’re covering Extraction DNA in the article a bit as well, power progression and systems depth is something I’m predicting coming for future Extraction Shooters as well. See article about this topic here (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/57-the-future-of-extraction-shooters):

What Housemarque should / could build next? Well, if they do well, and my article ages properly, I’d say they should end up building a proper co-op and/or PvPvE game in this space, to continue multiplying their success.

Co-op Momentum

As AA / AAA side is building momentum over the roguelite side, at the same time, the market has shown a powerful trend: co-op and “friends-first” / friendslop games are surging more than the industry predicted many years back.

Remember when as a developer it was almost impossible to argue for co-op games’ success? Well, that has changed with there being lots of momentum over games like Peak, Repo, Phasmophobia, Schedule I, and such.

It seems we’ve inevitable ended up players increasingly wanting e.g.,:

• Shared fun.

• Shared tension.

• Shared risk.

• Shared reward.

• Shared win / recovery conditions.

• Social storytelling emerging from emergent and/or systemic play.

• …and much more.

Even ARC Raiders and many games have proven co-op really stands out in a shooter setting, even it includes PvPvE in its core. And, not to forget, Helldivers 2 is of course standing there leaning on co-op as well as if you look more into extraction space, Hunt: Showdown has also duo and trip setups.

Note: Interested to read more about the phenomena behind ARC Raiders, Helldivers 2 and Hunt: Showdown? Check my article here (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/57-the-future-of-extraction-shooters):

How we ended here? There are lots of e.g., macro and micro economics as well as economics behavior conditions behind this all. On top of that, there are even, which you might not think much, lots of psychology and physiology behind these phenomena as well, on both on macro and micro levels. These are totally different article and discussion point themselves. For now, let’s just say that seeing overall where some part of the industry has puts its money, this side has “naturally” being craved by the other side, incl. players’ side, and from that overall I think we’ve ended seeing these games popping up and building success. Naturally we’ve also seen more curiosity and encouragement for going here and being bold about bringing our co-op visions to life.

Momentum Combination

The combination of currently growing co-op and roguelite momentum looks like a no-brainer, if you look both sides’ ends with simplistic lenses on; and, therefore, this makes it one predictable direction where co-op shooters can go.

When we look into some similarities, roguelite shooters already generate e.g., emotional spikes from e.g., failure, survival, unexpected builds, near-death moments. When those experiences become shared, they supposedly multiply in intensity and memorability.

This is why the next logical step is not just co-op or roguelite shooters alone, but co-op roguelite shooters. And, actually, momentum is building already to this direction.

The return of creators behind co-op shooter classics like Left 4 Dead, signals renewed interest in pushing cooperative shooter design forward again: https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/4-loop/.

4:LOOP trailer. (Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-5ieEtmgTc)

From PlayStation Official Site:

“Created by Mike Booth (Left 4 Dead) and the interactive storytellers at Bad Robot Games, 4:LOOP is a tactical, four-player co-op shooter crafted for endless replayability and infinite ways to build the ultimate team. Together, if you can learn from your mistakes, you might just fail to save the world.

Experiment. Improvise. See if you can beat the odds.”

4:LOOP in-game captured image. (Source: https://www.playstation.com/en-us/games/4-loop/)

In terms of us seeing really soon what’s coming on this side, I think the momentum will just continue building up.

Co-op Roguelite Shooter DNA

In one format, over how a co-op roguelite shooter could look, you can look into a multiplayer-first design built on systemic progression instead of scripted missions. Let’s dive deeper on this.

World Progression

• Teams unlock new regions and biomes over time.

• Global progression shifts the structure of future runs.

• Narrative emerges through world changes rather than linear storytelling.

Loop Tightening

• Each cycle increases stakes, difficulty and strategic demands.

• Systems react to player success / failure patterns.

Layered Progression

• Temporary run-based builds.

• Permanent meta upgrades.

• Potentially even team-level progression (shared unlocks, structures, tech.); permanent and temporary.

Risk vs. Reward

• ”Corrupted” zones offering higher payouts.

• Trade-off decisions impacting entire squad survival.

• Build synergy across teammates.

Adaptive world conditions

• Weather, “corruption”, faction activity, and AI evolution.

• Difficulty scaling tied to player performance.

• Combined manipulators.

Note: Read more about manipulators here (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/41-manipulator-mechanics-new-frontiers):

Emergent gameplay

• Unexpected team roles.

• Improvised strategies.

• Player-driven “stories” instead of authored missions.

This is where co-op becomes more than a mode. It becomes the core operating system of the experience.

The Matchmaking Challenge: Roguelite Meets Multiplayer

A multiplayer roguelite introduces a critical design challenge: matchmaking.

Traditional lobbies assume many times parity, incl. similar skill, similar power, and/or similar progression. Roguelite systems, considering the systemic direction they’re going on AA / AAA side, will break this.

A successful system would need to consider e.g.,:

• Meta progressions and levels as well as build types.

• Run history and playstyle / progression compatibility.

• Social preference (friends vs. solo fill).

• World conditions’ adaptability.

• AI conditions’ adaptability.

• And much more, even considerations not around symmetric directions but also asymmetric directions.

The complexity raises up by this, incl. the importance of designing the matchmaker properly. Matchmakers can make or break your social game, see more about how you should approach them here (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/42-matchmaking-the-hidden-engine):

However, despite the complexity on matchmakers, I believe early in a game’s lifecycle, concessions must be considered:

• Wider matchmaking tolerances.

• Assisted onboarding runs.

• Scaled enemy difficulty based on team composition.

…because overall if you’re wanting to onboard players and build proper DAUs / MAUs for the game, you’ll need to consider how you can sustain that past the whole journey. Having a successful game helps of course, but it’s something you cannot lean as even those games needs to be grown over time properly. And, good systems will help you on that.

Over time, matchmaking would evolve into a core design system:

• Pairing complementary builds.

• Balancing risk profiles.

• Creating intentional friction and synergy.

This becomes more about creating engaging tension to sustain a proper design, on top of fairness.

PvPvE: Where Extraction Design Enters the Picture as 3rd Pillar

Once roguelite and co-op systems stabilize over the co-op and current state roguelite pillars, PvPvE becomes the next frontier, and for that I believe we’re needing a 3rd, Extraction DNA, pillar.

Extraction shooters already introduced:

• Enter → raid → survive → extract loops.

• Persistent economies.

• High-stakes risk.

Combining that with roguelite progression and co-op / PvPvE unlocks powerful possibilities. This can formulate multiple scenarios, over which I’ll give two examples below.

Scenario 1: Jump-In World Spaces

• Multiple squads enter a shifting map.

• Areas open dynamically as well as by based on players’ in-game activities.

• Teams race to raid corrupted zones.

• High-tier resources require confronting elite enemies.

• Extraction becomes the climax.

Scenario 2: MOBA-like Persistent Worlds

• AAA-scale environments.

• Long-term territory control.

• PvE threats shaping PvP opportunities.

• Extraction loops feeding macro-progression.

This hybrid model keeps PvP from dominating the experience while ensuring constant unpredictability. The PvE world becomes the “third player.”

Single-Player Can Still Matter

Despite the multiplayer focus, these systems can on some games benefit from solo compatibility.

Different design pillars could coexist:

• Solo roguelite runs for mastery and experimentation.

• Co-op for shared and separated / combined progression.

• PvPvE for high-tension stakes.

Note: I’ve discussed about blending single / campaign vectors in the past with multiplayer vectors, which heavily lean on what I’m writing here. See more from my article here (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/45-blending-vectors-designing-games):

Players could fluidly shift between “modes”, with shared progression tying the ecosystem together. This avoids fragmenting the audience and reinforces the idea of a single living world rather than separate modes.

The Real Opportunity: Systems, Not Modes

Whilst this article and discussion focuses heavily on specific directions, I believe beyond that the future of co-op shooters isn’t all about adding roguelite elements or PvPvE modes.

It’s about building:

• “Persistent” and/or “adaptive” worlds in combination.

• Systemic progression.

• Shared environments and conditions.

• Emergent game and team dynamics.

• Risk economies that feel meaningful.

Note: I cover some things like emergent and systemic mechanics in my past articles, which relate heavily to where I think games are going. Whilst the article what I’ve written focuses on F2P games, these games can be also premium or premium + microtransactions based. Read more here (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/28-systematic-and-emergent-gameplay):

Studios like Housemarque are already showing how high-production shooters can adopt roguelite DNA without losing emotional or cinematic impact. The next leap is socializing those systems (which and Bad Robot Games is looking to showcase) making progression shared, tension communal, and outcomes unpredictable because other players exist inside the same systemic web.

That’s where co-op shooters stop being content-driven experiences and become living ecosystems.

Not just mechanical power (e.g., DPS, levels, gear, rank), but social power. Who gets to shine within your social systems. Who gets listened to. Who sets the tone. Who influences the economy. Who defines what “meta” even means. Who overall has power and equity on social side.

As more and more games can evolve (if designed right) into persistent ecosystems rather than isolated products, social equity has quietly become one of the most important (/and sometimes least intentionally designed) progression layers in modern game development.

It exists in its simplest form around three overlapping spaces:

1. Inside the game

2. Around the game (systems & meta layers)

3. Outside the game (community, creators, and culture)

And, within each of these, there are both tangible and intangible forms of power.

With great social power and equity comes great responsibility.

Understanding this is no longer optional for developers. It is a core part of how games grow, stabilize, fracture, or even in some circumstances collapse.

What is Social Equity?

Social equity is a player’s accumulated power through systems as well as influence, trust, recognition, and authority within a game ecosystem.

It is by some form of definition a combination of:

• Systemic power

• Reputation

• Authority

• Credibility

• Access

• Network position

• Cultural relevance

It compounds over time, much like wealth or skill. And like any economy, it has visible (tangible) and invisible (intangible) forms.

Social Equity Inside the Game

This is where design can intentionally shape power.

Tangible Social Equity in the Game

These are system-recognized markers of influence, such as:

• Guild leadership roles

• Raid leaders and strategists

• High-ranked PvP players

• Economy controllers (traders, crafters, auction manipulators)

• Territory owners

• Clan founders

• World-first achievers

Some genres where this thrives:

• MMOs / MMORPGs

• Extraction shooters

• Sandbox RPGs

• Strategy and survival games

System-driven Examples

Guild ecosystems:

• Guild owner controls access, direction, and social hierarchy.

• “Officers” gain trust-based power.

• Recruitment decisions shape player pipelines.

Raid leadership:

• Knowledge = power.

• Strategy creators become “institutional memory”.

• Social equity accumulates through success repetition.

Economy dominance:

• Players controlling crafting chains become indispensable.

• Auction house experts dictate supply flows.

• Resource “cartel” behavior emerges.

Extraction shooters:

• Shot-callers determine team survival.

• Route planners hold tactical authority.

• Trust networks determine squad inclusion.

Designers can actively enable this:

• Visible leadership ladders

• Reputation scoring

• Guild (legacy) systems

• Economy influence tools

• Social progression tracks

These mechanics transform players from consumers into actors in a social power structure.

Intangible Social Equity in the Game

This is harder to measure, but often very powerful.

• “That player who always helps newbies”

• “A friend with whom I always like to play”

• The strategist everyone trusts

• The calm voice during raids

• The person who never tilts

• The lore / theorycraft expert

• The culture-setter

These players in some games:

• Hold no formal rank

• Own no territory

• Have no mechanical dominance

Yet they anchor communities. They are social infrastructure. Design sometimes acknowledges them, sometimes not.

Possible system supports:

• Endorsement systems

• Mentorship rewards

• Social commendations

• Community contribution metrics

Social Equity Around the Game

This is where power starts to escape pure gameplay.

It exists in e.g.,:

• Discord leadership within superfans

• Strategy creators

• Build theorycrafters

• Modders

• Tool creators

• Data miners

These actors shape:

• The meta

• The narrative

• The perceived “truth” about the game

And their power can rival developers’ power.

Example Drivers

MMOs

• Theorycraft communities dictate builds

• Guild recruitment channels gate progression access

Extraction shooters

• Route maps spread across communities

• Risk/loot strategies normalize through social sharing

RPGs

• Optimal build creators define “correct play”

These systems produce social power and quity, as well as sometimes things like knowledge power. And, if you get knowledge power, it often translates to social equity. Designers can either, ignore it, fight it, or build for it. Building is the future.

Examples of design support for building it with the ones owning social equity and power:

• Official theorycrafting tools

• Public API data access

• Creator sandbox environments

• Community guide integrations

• Player knowledge hubs inside the game

• Involvement campaigns / events

• Etc.

Social Equity Outside the Game

This is where the phenomenon becomes explosive, in a good (or bad) way. Creators, influencers, and community leaders operate in an entirely separate power layer.

This is one layer that can:

• Uplift a game

• Redirect audience

• Expose its weaknesses

• Break its economy

• Define its public perception

And crucially:

Developers do not often control it.

Of course, not controlling it is not always the pure fact as you can build e.g., social and community proximity systems to support the overall systems design approach of the game; however, even with this approach, there’s a strong emergent nature of things into which developers cannot still affect in full.

Note: Interested about social and community proximity systems approach? Read more about it here (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/59-the-power-of-proximity):

Creator-Driven Power

Influencers today act as:

• Sentiment engines

• Watchdogs

• Amplifiers

• Meta-setters

• Cultural translators

They accumulate massive social equity.

Examples

Investigative Creators

Creators like TheBurntPeanut builds authority within ARC Raiders by:

• Exposing bugs

• Revealing exploits

• Demonstrating macro abuse

• Showing duplication or system manipulation

This generates:

• Trust from players

• Pressure on developers

• Authority over the game’s “truth”

They become part of the governance layer. Not officially, but functionally if there are no means to control it even partially.

Growth Catalysts

Some creators hold so much social equity they can directly affect a game’s trajectory.

Large creators can:

• Reignite dormant titles

• Shift sentiment overnight

• Legitimize returning to a game

• Normalize new metas or updates

When a creator invests emotionally into a game, their audience often follows. This is what for example Jynxzi has done for Clash Royale (more about this below in an example of where things have gone from lucrative growth “collab.”).

This can:

• Drive organic growth

• Increase retention

• Revive cultural relevance

But it also creates a dependency risk.

The Dangerous Side of Social Equity

Here’s where developers often underestimate the phenomenon. Social equity is fragile, and relational.

If players feel:

• Ignored

• Unrecognized

• Used

• Disrespected

The backlash is amplified by those who hold social power. A single high-equity creator feeling dismissed can trigger e.g., community fragmentation, negative narrative loops, distrust in developers, and/or sentiment collapse

And once social equity flips from positive → adversarial, recovery is slow.

Recent Example

As a recent example, over how things can escalate, Supercell did just publish its CEO’s yearly review, which acknowledged both the multi-billion dollar growth and enormous profit, incl. Clash Royale’s (CR) growth in 2025.

The yearly review included highlights of e.g., how CR achieve big growth last year, with big thanks to its team, and such. But, what was missing was the players’ and creators’ side totally; especially, the side where one of the creators / influencers, Jynxzi, had played part of reigniting the title’s growth.

There’s a great analysis by Matthew Emery on LinkedIn (Analysis / post here on his LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/matthewemery_1-activity-7402024878297747456-Ppsk) around how Clash Royale’s growth can be tracked being partly thanks to Jynxzi’s efforts. I recommend you all reading and checking it through to understand the phenomena better.

A snapshot of Matthew’s deep dive and analysis on how Jynxzi played part in reviving Clash Royale in 2025. (Source: https://www.linkedin.com/posts/matthewemery_1-activity-7402024878297747456-Ppsk | Credit: Matthew Emery, Turbine Games Consulting)

So, a creator / influencer can drive enormous growth through social power and equity. And, it can be both, very lucrative, and/or dangerous.

What followed Supercell CEO’s announcement, was “a spit on Jynxzi’s” face, as he put it himself via X:

Jynxzi’s post on X about Supercell’s latest yearly review. (Source: https://x.com/jynxzi/status/2021283304649970153)

I’m not sure where this leads. This post has received quite a lot of attention, incl. other influencers such as MrBeast:

Mr Beast’s comment on X to Jynxzi’s post. (Source: https://x.com/MrBeast/status/2021308068856754612)

Overall, despite not knowing how this escalates, if not at all, I’m sure, anyhow, that this is something that could have been completely avoided, especially if the player / community layer would have been kept fully in mind. Of course, life is sometimes a lot about learning, so I’m hoping the learnings from this will be taken properly into account for future statements.

What happened here is of course anything new. Even bigger publishers in the market tend to ignore many times the players’ and creators’ side, which has caused similar things to happen.

We can plan and do better definitely, as the growth of certain individuals’ social equity and power is not going away any time soon, and it should be treated well.

Recognition Matters

There have been moments in the industry where:

• A game’s resurgence is driven by community energy

• Influencers re-legitimize a title

• Players rebuild cultural momentum

But official narratives sometimes credit only:

• UA campaigns

• Updates

• Internal teams

…Leaving out community drivers.

Even if growth is multi-factorial, which it always is, omission matters. Because to high-equity contributors: recognition = respect. And respect sustains alignment.

Ignoring social equity doesn’t neutralize it. It weaponizes it. And, usually, it would be best to weaponize yourself with it instead having your players turning against you.

Designing for Social Equity

The key point for developers: stop treating social power as accidental. Instead, start treating it as a designable progression layer.

Systems Growing Social Equity Intentionally

Player-level Examples

• Reputation ladders

• Mentorship paths

• Knowledge contribution rewards

• Social achievements

Guild-level Examples

• Legacy systems

• Inter-guild diplomacy

• Governance mechanics

• Cultural identity building

Community-level Examples

• Creator programs

• Transparent recognition loops

• Player voice

• Shared roadmap input

• Collaborations, incl. event collabs.

Meta-level Examples

• Social systems

• Player-driven economies

• Strategic knowledge networks

• Territory and influence layers

Note: Related articles:

The Core Truth

Players don’t just grind power.

They grind:

• Influence

• Recognition

• Authority

• Identity

Social equity becomes in many cases:

• The real endgame

• The real retention driver

• The real emotional glue

In MMOs, RPGs, extraction shooters, and social strategy games, players stay not because of content, but because of their position in a social structure. You’ll shine when that structure is enabling and honoring them, and they leave when that structure disappears.

The next generation of successful games will not just design:

• Progression systems

• Economies

• Combat loops

They will design social hierarchies, influence pathways, and recognition systems. Because the true persistent resource in live games isn’t gold, loot, or gear. It’s a lot about social equity.

And the studios who understand how to nurture it, inside the game, around it, and outside it, won’t just build games. They’ll build living games with long tails.

Snapshot from Merge’s continuous growth (Source: AppMagic).

They proved that players are not just willing to optimize systems; they actively enjoy doing so when the interaction layer is tactile, readable, and emotionally framed.

At the same time, simulation games, from farming and factory builders to tycoon-style experiences, have remained as durable and scalable products in e.g., mobile and PC. These games are built on production chains, expansion, optimization, and infrastructure growth. Their strength has always been systemic depth. Of course, they might lack things like emergent gameplay, which I’ve covered here previously (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/58-emergent-gameplay-and-social-depth):

Yet, despite both genres’ parallel business case feasibility, the industry has largely treated merge and simulation as separate genres.

At a systems level, merge games and simulation games are strikingly similar; arguably more similar than most designers have explicitly acknowledged. And when viewed through that lens, a new subgenre begins to take shape: Simulation Merge.

Not a merge game with simulation features, and not a simulator with a merge mechanic. Simulation Merge is a unified design philosophy where e.g., merging becomes a production interface, and simulation becomes the macro-layer that gives that production meaning (there can be other points of views to approaching this as well).

Structural Similarity

The surface differences between merge and simulation are obvious.

Merge games present:

• Boards

• Generators

• Item tiers

• Delivery orders

Simulation games present:

• Factories

• Supply chains

• Infrastructure

• Expansion

When you step away from the interface and look e.g., at the economy sheet, the actual systemic logic, the similarities are almost one-to-one.

Both genres rely on:

• Inputs → outputs

• Recipe discovery

• Tier escalation

• Unlock progression

• Resource gating

• Demand loops

• Optimization

In simulation:

• Resources go into a factory.

• Factories output components.

• Components feed upgrades, construction, and/or deliveries.

In merge:

• Generators output items.

• Items combine into higher tiers.

• Outputs fulfill e.g., customer demands.

The interaction model differs. The system underneath is fundamentally the same. This is where merging and simulation can interconnect naturally, as they are already variations of the same economic grammar.

Unified Genre

Simulation Merge emerges when we stop treating merge as a content mechanic and start treating it as a production interface (again, there can be other points of views to this); AND, similarly, when we stop treating simulation as a background economy and start making it playable through merging.

The hybridization opens up a new design space that extends beyond:

• Classic grid merge

• Isometric merge

…and infuses them with:

• Production chains

• Infrastructure

• Workforce systems

• Expansion

• Automation

• Logistics

The result is not simply “more features.” It is a shift in how the player interacts with economies. Merge becomes the tactile layer, and simulation becomes the systemic layer. Together, they can be structured to form a continuous loop.

The Core Simulation Merge Loop

A foundational loop for the genre could look like this:

1. Generate:

   1. Generate e.g., items or resources through fields, factories, workers, and/or generators.

2. Merge:

   1. Merge outputs like items or resources into higher-tier materials and products.

3. Deliver:

   1. Deliver to customers, contracts, macro objectives, etc.

4. Expand:

   1. Expand land / areas / fields, factories, infrastructure, industrial capacity, tycoon, etc.

5. Unlock:

   1. Unlock new recipes, tiers, factories, tools, areas, and production logic.

6. Combine systems:

   1. Combine merge outputs with simulation systems, e.g., mechanics from above to later expansion, automating, etc.

With this core loop, merging is no longer a contained board activity. It becomes part of a living production ecosystem.

Theme Expansion from Casual to Midcore

One of the most powerful aspects of Simulation Merge is how naturally it scales. Heck, it could go even that far that you can formalize new sub-genres of these as well, when you think about the possibilities.

Farming

Grow crops → merge produce → process in factories → sell → expand farmland → manage workforce.

Luxury production

Merge components → craft jewelry / fashion → manage storefronts → unlock brands → scale distribution.

Industrial factories

Extract resources → merge components → build machines → optimize supply chains.

Fantasy / Strategy

Produce weapons and armor → supply armies → conquer territory → manage logistics.

Push this further, and Simulation Merge begins to approach e.g.,:

• 4X-lite systems

• Guild economies

• Territory control

• MMO-like experience with 4X and/or supply networks

  • Or, maybe, this could be one of the new marketing-friendly onboardings to a 4X experience. No limits, what you do with this info, it is up to you.

Merge evolves from a casual mechanic into a systemic production interface, with possibilities to formalize new sub-genres beyond Simulation Merge.

Generators, Factories, and Hybrid Production

The most interesting design space lies in combining merge-native and simulation-native production. Generators produce merge-ready items. Factories require merge outputs. Hybrid nodes convert between both systems.

Progression unlocks:

• New generator types

• Specialized factories

• Infrastructure multipliers

• Production synergies

The player begins orchestrating systems rather than operating isolated mechanics; achieving entertaining systems extravaganza.

Automation and the Question of Control

Simulation Merge can also lean toward automation.

Workforces, managers, and idle systems allow:

• Production without constant input

• Strategic prioritization

• Tycoon-level decision making

But this introduces a key tension: How much should the player do manually? How much should the system do for them? Too much automation removes tactile satisfaction. Too little prevents scale.

The strongest progression likely evolves across phases:

• Early:

  • Hands-on merging.

• Mid:

  • Hybrid play.

• Late:

  • Orchestration and optimization.

The player moves from mechanic to tycoon manager.

Monetization: Two Economies, One Strategy

Simulation Merge inherits monetization vectors from both genres.

Merge brings:

• Energy

• Board expansion

• Generator upgrades

• Event boards

Simulation brings:

• Production acceleration

• Infrastructure upgrades

• Workforce optimization

• Expansion gating

Usually both also have similarities, from timers to other economic means. Combined (all above incl. similarities), this could be used to create a monetization surface that can be deeper than either genre alone.

The opportunity is not simply to stack monetization. It is to align it with progression orchestration where players invest not to skip actions, but to shape systems.

Marketability: Multiple Entry Points

Hybridization unlocks marketing advantages.

A Simulation Merge game can communicate through:

• Merge gameplay

• Simulation fantasy

• Production systems

This provides multiple creative vectors from day one. Instead of relying on e.g., misleading creatives to reach broader audiences, the product itself contains multiple truthful entry points. Proper marketing extravaganza!

UA can test:

• Tactile interaction

• Tycoon fantasy

• System optimization

• Etc.

The genre starts with breadth.

Live Ops as a System, Not a Layer

Live operations in Simulation Merge can interconnect systems rather than decorate them.

Examples:

• Temporary factories

• Event production chains

• Merge boards feeding global goals

• Economic disruptions

• Seasonal industries

• Etc.

Events affect production, production affects merge, and merge affects expansion. The game becomes a living economy rather than a rotating content schedule, if you systematically approach this the right way, which feeds your core loop as well as economy (and, furthermore, monetization).

Scale: From Simple to Tycoon to New Sub-Genres

Simulation Merge supports dramatic scaling.

A farm evolves into:

• Multiple regions

• Logistics networks

• Equipment systems

• Workforce layers

• Industrial processing

And, from this, eventually, the experience resembles a tycoon game. As also stated above, you can go even more far from this, e.g., if you bring 4X / Strategy / MMO-like elements to the combination, you can formalize actual sub-genres.

Themes Beyond Renovation

The genre is not limited to cozy or narrative-driven themes.

It can support:

• Candy and pastry empires

• Racing team production ecosystems

• Theme park operations

• Train, ship, and airline logistics

• Industrial megafactories

• Retail ecosystems

• Sci-fi colonies

• Fantasy themes

• Etc.

Each theme reshapes the economy while preserving the loop, on top of which you could systematically, as stated multiple times, approach new sub-genre possibilities from this.

Why the Subgenre Hasn’t Fully Formed Yet?

The pieces exist. Merge mastered content pipelines and emotional framing. Simulation mastered systemic depth and scale.

But they evolved in parallel. It makes sense, in terms of business cases. However, with raising competition and evolving consumer tastes, I’d say strategies need to evolve with more bolder takes.

Simulation Merge requires designing both layers as one system from day one. Not feature stacking. Not surface hybridization. Systemic integration. Proper game and systems designers with economy and monetization understanding to build it right.

This is blue ocean with many fish and whales to go for, when you combine marketability / UA, product engagement, monetization, live ops, and growth right.

Simulation Merge as Its Own Category

If executed fully, Simulation Merge can easily become its own category (I believe one or another way, it’s inevitable. And, actually, as this is economically and from systems point of view very straight-forward, I would be surprised if we wouldn’t already have games leaning on this side).

Simulation Merge can be defined by:

• Tactile production

• Systemic economies

• Casual entry

• Midcore scalability

• Multi-layer monetization

• Multi-vector marketing

• (Multi-vector) Live economies

And most importantly: A structure that grows with the player. From merging to managing to orchestrating. A genre where interaction and systems are not separate layers, but the same language expressed at different scales.

That is the promise of Simulation Merge.

In modern game and systems design, proximity shouldn’t be thought about being just about distance. When you dive deeper into it as a topic, it’s actually more of a driver of e.g., tension, sociality, economy, and emergent play.

Whether players virtually close in a gunfight in an extraction shooter or physically meet for an event (e.g., in Pokémon GO), the relative closeness between agents, human and/or AI, can be designed to e.g., trigger mechanics, influence decisions, and shape event entire economic systems. Unlike many flat mechanics, proximity can be designed to bridge core gameplay, meta gameplay, social interaction, and monetization into a spatially anchored experience.

In the context of what I’ve explored in my blog, from social and systemic design to hybrid emergent economies, understanding proximity isn’t just an incremental tweak; it should be thought actually as a paradigm shift in how we architect compelling interactive worlds.

Note: Some of the mentioned explorations can be found from here:

Proximity’s Dimensions in Game Design

At its simplest, proximity refers to spatial relationships between elements, e.g., characters, objects, events, players, etc. in a game world and how those relationships matter to experience and outcomes.

Designers use proximity to e.g.,:

• Trigger interactions (e.g., alert AI, engage combat).

• Influence detection and stealth (e.g., whether an enemy sees the player).

• Shape tactical decision-making and risk/reward trade-offs.

But, I don’t think proximity is just about geometric distance.

It’s perceived closeness / presence, social relevance, and (temporal) anticipation of action. In social design patterns, proximity can be set being one of the fundamental catalysts that turn strangers into acquaintances by regularly bringing them into shared spatial contexts.

In a shooters, proximity increases tension, e.g., enemies heard around a corner boost excitement. In strategy, proximity to contested objectives shapes e.g., alliance behavior. In narrative puzzles, proximity of story threads draws players deeper into world logic and narrative through spaces you can decorate and co-work (usually very light (puzzles, you can do better!), but proximity-based design can be still be seen used).

These are design levers that intersect core loops, meta systems, and economic incentives.

Proximity Across Genres: Core Gameplay and Meta Economics

Extraction Shooters

In extraction shooters like Hunt: Showdown or ARC Raiders, proximity determines risk and reward.

Approaching a contested space isn’t just spatial, it’s an economic decision related to core gameplay and experience: stay back, avoid conflict but risk extraction delay, or move close and engage for e.g., loot but risk loss. These dynamics tie proximity directly into the core loop and core and meta economic sides.

Here, proximity isn’t just conceptually abstract as well. For example, audio layers such as proximity mic / chat increase social dynamics by letting you hear and react to players based on distance and direction, creating tension-filled friend / enemy encounters and deeper decision systems.

4X Strategy

In 4X and MMO strategy, proximity isn’t literal on the map; it connects behaviors.

Being near an enemy faction’s territory prods diplomatic choices, joint guild action, and/or opportunistic raids. These are spatially influenced economic and political decisions. In hybrid systems proximity can trigger emergent conflict, alliance multiverse outcomes, and resource scarcity shocks.

In my work on social systems, I’ve explored how e.g., group monetization and collective decision-making evolve directly from gameplay mechanics, with proximity sometimes acting as the connective tissue that turns individual actions into shared economic pressure. More of this can be found e.g., below links.

Puzzle & Narrative

Even in very casual and non-spatial genres like match-3 or merge puzzles, proximity can be abstracted into narrative co-location, meta events, and world-composition systems.

Players might unlock story arcs when their progression paths align through a form of narrative proximity that fuels progression economies one or another way. Puzzles are still, though, pretty light on this, and they could do much better.

This ties to some of the concepts I’ve wrote about (again, what I’ve wrote, you can start exploring from previous section’s links), extending proximity beyond tactical spatial pressure into e.g., emergent narrative loops.

Faces of Proximity

Virtual Proximity

Virtual proximity encompasses e.g., perceived, relational, and emergent closeness in digital universes: whether visually (e.g., NPCs approaching players), tactically (e.g., objectives converging), or socially (e.g., shared zones). In multiplayer spaces, a sense of co-presence and social proximity significantly affects engagement and retention, especially when playing cooperatively over competitive play.

This has direct implications for emergent economies: spatial bottlenecks become trade hubs, contested zones become market arbitrage opportunities, and proximity-induced tension can create organic demand cycles (e.g., evacuation missions, limited-time safe zone, etc.)

Physical Proximity

Whilst it’s a very small probability to have this being successful addition to a game, physical proximity mechanics have in some unicorn cases (unicorn cases means also they’re very rare to happen, incl. facts that many have failed on this) proven themselves commercially viable in games like Pokémon GO (of course, they could do much more here given the success of the game), where e.g., GPS / location/map-based proximity drives gameplay interaction.

These systems, when done properly, usually blur into daily routines along with play, tapping into psychological proxemics, the inherent distance humans maintain in social settings, and translating it into persistent play motivation. Real physical space can become a game experience, transforming everyday movement into emergent economic systems.

Mixed Proximity: Bridging Physical & Virtual

Whilst physical proximity alone is interesting as a concept, in my opinion mixed proximity as a concept retains much more business potential than many thinks about.

Mixed proximity blends physical presence and virtual dynamics into seamless experiences. This is all about, for example, hybrid systems where proximity unlocks virtual guild missions when players are near each other, or where strategic military maps update based on real world proximity of squad devices. Some of these solutions exists or have been tested already, whilst some are waiting for someone to implement them (e.g., in some strategy/4X titles lots of mechanics could be tied to a mix of all of this).

Mobile platforms and cross-platform interactivity can further enable this fusion, through tying real physical presence to virtual system states, emergent events, and collective monetization opportunities that aren’t purely pay-to-progress but pay-to-cohere, reinforcing belonging and shared agency.

These mechanisms don’t need to be also fully location-dependent as well. I think it is good to have optionality and/or systems-based approach to this, which allows for participation from the main place where you’re playing normally, instead of moving around. Mechanics supporting this can be as simple as e.g., convoy mechanisms being based on a mix of virtual and physical presence, where e.g., on a pseudo 4X game setting you could have physical location being setting time-based durations for your convoys towards other players.

(Abstract) Systems Proximity

Beyond those straight-forward proximity examples, there’s more. One of the most underexplored aspects of proximity in game design is (abstract) systems proximity, which isn’t measured in meters, tiles, or coordinates, but e.g., in systems state or systems “nearness”.

Systems proximity exists when players, groups, or entities become “close” to each other through:

• Progression state / phase.

• Shared objectives or dependencies.

• Economic exposure.

• Narrative alignment.

• Systemic interdependence.

In these cases, proximity is not about where you are, but about how entangled you are.

Two players in a merge game unlocking the same world chapter are not spatially close, but systemically, they are. Players positioned in a leaderboards can be close to each other. Two guilds competing for influence in a 4X map might be geographically distant, yet economically and politically adjacent because their actions directly affect each other’s outcomes. Proximity here can be defined by e.g., impact radius, not physical distance.

This kind of proximity is especially powerful because it can scale across genres that lack strong spatial gameplay, and on the other side feeds into meta systems, economies, and social structures through systems state point of view.

Systems proximity allows designers to create pressure without forcing confrontation, connection without forced co-play, and tension without constant conflict. It is proximity as latent potential, not constant action.

Social Proximity

Closely related, but usually left unexplored as well, is social proximity.

Most games treat social systems as binary:

• You’re in a guild or you’re not.

• You’re friends or you’re strangers.

• You’re matched together or separated.

But proximity allows social systems to be more of something I’d call “gradient-based”, not binary.

Social proximity can be designed around:

• (Frequency of) direct/indirect interaction.

• Shared exposure to events or risks.

• Partial economic dependencies.

• Overlapping goals without full alignment.

• Etc.

This is where strangers become familiar, familiar players become rivals, and rivals sometimes become allies. Not because the game told them to, but because systems repeatedly brought them near each other in meaningful ways.

Importantly, social proximity doesn’t require constant communication. In fact, some of the strongest social bonds in games emerge through:

• Seeing the same names repeatedly in contested spaces.

• Competing over the same resources across cycles.

• Contributing asymmetrically to shared outcomes.

• Existing in each other’s “economic shadow”.

This kind of proximity is especially potent for future social systems, where community formation, group monetization, and collective decision-making emerge from gameplay rather than being layered on top of it.

Here, proximity becomes the mechanism that:

• Converts individual play into collective pressure.

• Turns communities into economic actors.

• Allows monetization to operate at the group level without explicit coercion.

In other words, social proximity is what allows games to monetize belonging, influence, and shared fate, and not just time or power.

Systems & Social Proximity: New Mindset for Economies

When proximity becomes abstract / systems initiated, and social, economies can turn a page.

Instead of asking “How close are players to content?”, games begin asking: “How exposed are players to each other’s decisions?”

This enables e.g.,:

• Soft competition instead of zero-sum conflict.

• Emergent cooperation driven by system incentives.

• Scarcity created by overlapping demand, not fixed limits.

• Monetization that reinforces social cohesion instead of breaking it.

Systems proximity is something that can allow certain economies to feel alive; responsive to (social) player behavior rather than scripted progression paths. It is also what makes emergent systems legible: players understand who they are close to and why, even if they never share the same physical space.

Systemic Relationship Matters

Most games already use proximity, but mostly at the surface level:

• Combat ranges.

• Trigger volumes.

• Matchmaking pools.

The real opportunity lies deeper: designing proximity as a systemic relationship, not a coordinate. As games continue to move toward with this mindset, we can see:

• Persistent worlds.

• Social-first economies.

• Emergent live operations.

• Group-based monetization.

Abstract and social proximity can, at right hands, become one of the most important design tools we have, even if players never see it labeled as such.

Community Proximity

Beyond social proximity between players inside the game, there’s a another and increasingly powerful layer: community proximity.

Community proximity is about how close the game itself feels to the player’s everyday life through social and community based point of view, even when they are not actively playing. It describes the perceived distance between the player and the wider game community: how visible it is, how present it feels, how easily the player can “step back in.”, and how easily you can engage / play with the community around your game. This isn’t proximity between individual players. It’s proximity between the player and the living ecosystem around the game.

A game with strong community proximity doesn’t disappear when you close the app.

Community Proximity as Engagement Engine

One of the most underestimated drivers of long-term engagement is not content cadence or progression depth, but how often the game comes back to the player in meaningful ways. Community proximity can be used to achieve exactly this.

When players:

• See clips, memes, or strategy discussions in their feeds.

• Get pulled into Discord conversations about ongoing events.

• Watch Twitch streams or YouTube breakdowns.

• Read Reddit threads reacting to balance changes or emergent moments.

They are re-entering the game mentally and socially, even if not mechanically.

This lowers the friction of returning / increases the overall engagement. Logging back in no longer feels like “starting again”; it feels like continuing something already in motion. The community keeps the game warm.

From a systems perspective, this acts as a meta retention loop:

• Play → Engage with community → Stay contextually close → Return to play.

Importantly, this loop is often stronger than direct notifications or live-ops prompts, because it’s socially mediated rather than system-pushed. However, even said it’s mediated socially, it actually can be tailored from systems point of view to be a phenomena, that initiates from it and self-feeds itself.

Community Proximity as Marketing Vector

Community proximity also reshapes marketing. When a player engages with game-related content on platforms like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, or YouTube, algorithms begin to move the community closer.

The game’s ecosystem starts appearing:

• In e.g., Facebook reels.

• In short-form clips.

• In recommended videos.

• In comment threads.

• As recommended content on your feed.

At that point, the community doesn’t just exist “somewhere else”, it literally shows up on e.g., the player’s phone. This is a different form of proximity than traditional UA:

• It’s persistent, not campaign-based.

• Contextual, not interruptive.

• Social, not transactional.

From a design lens, this means community proximity can function as a soft acquisition and reactivation system, driven by relevance rather than spend.

This is at least how it usually goes as a soft acquisition and reactivation system. But, thinking beyond that, can it be tailored to happen as a phenomena? I’d say yes, if you systematically approach it and can get your community to engage in content creation for this purpose and sharing it the right ways with proper frequency and volume. With the era of agentic AI as well, I’m pretty sure, even this is clearly on the grey zone, you could drive this pretty effectively around various networks through AI agents.

Discord and the Shrinking Distance Between Community and Play

Discord gets a bit more mentions here. It’s no longer just a chat / community tool, it’s becoming a proto-platform for games themselves.

Discord allows:

• Game sessions to be initiated directly from servers.

• Players to move from conversation to play with almost no friction.

• Communities to organize around events, modes, and social roles.

In some cases, the boundary between “being in the community” and “playing the game” becomes almost invisible. This is still surprisingly underexplored still as far as I know. Of course, many do it, but it’s still unleveraged front.

Most games treat Discord as:

• A support channel.

• A broadcast tool.

• A moderation channel.

Very few treat it as a systemic extension of the game layer, where proximity to the community directly affects when, how, and with whom you play.

Yet the potential is obvious:

• Community-driven session formation.

• Proximity-based invites (“people active right now”).

• Event triggers originating from community activity, not just in-game states.

There’s of course many implementations of aiming to do this same for games initiated from other platforms than it, like Hunt: Showdown and many games do community contests and things like that, that aim to bridge the community proximity.

Community Proximity Beyond the West

Game and community initiation / engagement topic around community proximity becomes even more interesting when looking at Asian markets.

Platforms like:

• LINE.

• WeChat.

• KakaoTalk.

Already function as hybrid social–platform ecosystems, where games, payments, identity, and community overlap far more tightly than in most Western stacks.

In these environments, community proximity is often:

• Default, not optional.

• Embedded into daily communication / life.

• Closer to the player than the game client itself.

Games launched or integrated into these ecosystems benefit from an always-on sense of closeness: the game lives where players already are.

This points to the systems side that community proximity isn’t just a content or marketing challenge, it’s a platform strategy question related to systems thinking.

From Underdesigned to a Norm

Despite its impact, community proximity is rarely treated as a designed system.

Most games:

• Measure community size, not community distance.

• Optimize engagement inside the client, and light layers around it.

• Separate “marketing” from “systems design”.

But, if you think about it the right way: community proximity sits exactly at that intersection. When designed intentionally, it can:

• Reduce churn without adding content.

• Increase return frequency without notifications.

• Turn communities into retention and discovery engines.

• Make the game feel alive even during downtime.

In other words, community proximity doesn’t just support the game; it extends its playable and perceivable surface.

Proximity as a Lever for Emergence, Systems Design & Monetization

As emergent and systemic design gains traction (at least when designers realize its potential and start to pick it up more), proximity can be a core agent of progression and economy, not just a mechanic.

Intrinsic & Systemic Economies

When proximity triggers meaningful social interaction, like collaboratively capturing a stronghold or pooling resources, it becomes economic (at least in games involving actual social gameplay with interdependencies).

Players invest time, skills, and sometimes currency into shared proximity states / systems that e.g., unlock group rewards. These taps into intrinsic motivations (competence, autonomy, relatedness); a theme I’ve explored deeply in my articles covering intrinsic strategies and monetization.

Note: Some of the related articles can be found from here:

Monetization Futures

Proximity isn’t just about core or meta sides. Proximity-activated mechanics can spawn new monetization vectors such as:

• Proximity passes; unlock benefits when co-near guildmates.

• Emergent event boosts; triggered when players cluster near objectives.

• Location-linked cosmetic unlocks; exclusive to real world or virtual zones.

These tie into broader Social Group Monetization frameworks championed in my recent systems design explorations.

Note: Some sources to start with:

The Next Frontier of Interactive Proximity

Proximity isn’t simply about distance as we’re moving forward with our designs. It’s a design substrate for e.g., tension, social systems, emergent economies, and monetization.

By integrating proximity into the fabric of game systems much deeper (and/or just by understanding it more deeply), designers can craft experiences that feel dynamic, socially rich, and economically meaningful.

As platforms, devices, and player expectations go, proximity should already be a central pillar of systemic design, supporting everything from core loops to e.g., as far as cross-platform emergent ecosystems go. This is how games become living worlds, and where more of the next generation of monetization, engagement, and community depth can emerge.

In my earlier writing, I have returned many times to the idea that great games are not content machines but system engines. Places where meaning emerges from interaction rather than from scripted outcomes. Builder, tycoon, and simulation games historically understood this intuitively, like with environmental hazards and events. Somewhere along the road to scale and F2P monetization, much of that confidence was lost. As my industry connection wrote (when we discussed about this together, which also sparked idea to write this article): “It was to a degree a deliberate choice as not to endanger value of IAPs made by players.” We both agreed to this that this has been a very simplistic way of seeing things, and lots of depth lies within the emergent side.

This article is about reclaiming what was once lost, and expanding the conversation beyond economies into emergent gameplay as a whole. Knowing what emergent design and gameplay means nowadays, there lies lots of opportunities for many to take. These opportunities are actually that big that there is even a possibility to form new types of emergent sub-genres inside builder, tycoon and simulation genres.

The Roots of Emergence in the Genre

Early builder and simulation games trusted the world to push back. Environmental hazards were not special events or opt in challenges. They were constants. Floods, fires, disease, worker strikes, supply shortages, collapsing trade routes, and pollution spirals were not punishments. They were consequences.

In early city builders, transport simulations, and colony management games, players were never fully in control. Systems overlapped and interfered with one another. A decision made for efficiency in one layer often created fragility in another. The joy came from observing the system, forming mental models, and adapting under pressure.

Tycoon games taught players that optimization always carries risk. A perfectly tuned factory was efficient but brittle. A diversified and slightly messy operation was often more resilient. Simulation games taught lessons about economics, ecology, logistics, and social systems not through tutorials, but by letting players fail in believable ways.

This acceptance of loss and instability was not niche. It was foundational. Audiences embraced it because failure felt earned and recovery felt meaningful. Emergent gameplay was not an added feature. It was part of the core experience.

When F2P Arrived, Emergence Went Quiet

When F2P became dominant, especially on mobile, a design fear crept in. Loss became dangerous. If players could lose progress, efficiency, or systemic advantage, then IAPs would feel unsafe. The response was to sand down volatility and constrain emergence.

Environmental hazards became cosmetic, scripted, or optional (or, well, in some games, they went to total zero). Social friction was minimized or removed in some cases as well. Systems were isolated from one another to prevent cascading failure states. Gameplay became more deterministic, more reversible, and less expressive. Economies became linear and inflationary rather than cyclical and self correcting.

This was not incompetence. It was a deliberate choice. Protect the perceived value of IAPs. Avoid states where a spender could feel regret or loss connected to money.

There’s a but: this framing is simplistic. It assumes that value is only stored in persistent accumulation. It assumes that players only tolerate positive progression. It ignores decades of evidence from strategy, simulation, and competitive genres where players, including spenders, routinely accept loss if the rules are clear and the systems are transparent on this. In some games, players can invest heavily and still lose territory, units, or advantages through poor decisions or social conflict. The spending is not invalidated. It is contextualized. Mastery, decision making, and adaptation still matter.

The same logic can apply here as a reference, when we enter the new emergent era for builder, simulation and tycoon games.

Emergent Gameplay Does Not Have to Destroy All Value

The key mistake is tying all value directly to fragile and loss exposed resources. If every IAP reinforces a single economic or power node, then any systemic loss threatens monetization. But, as an example, if value is layered (of course, you need to be careful in layering systems), expressive, and partially abstracted, then emergence becomes safe.

There are many design paths to achieve more opportunities on this front:

• One approach is separation. Environmental and systemic volatility operates on layers that are not directly purchased. Weather, labor morale, supply chain instability, political pressure, or ecological collapse affect efficiency, reach, or priorities, not ownership. The player still owns what they bought, but must continuously reinterpret how to use it.

• Another approach is indirect coupling. A disaster might destroy output or force a shutdown, but unlock reconstruction opportunities, recovery arcs, prestige projects, or social leadership roles. Loss becomes a narrative and systemic transformation rather than a deletion.

• A third approach is reframing IAPs away from raw power and toward optionality, resilience, and expression. Players do not buy immunity from systems. They buy tools, lenses, and levers that allow them to respond creatively and uniquely.

• And much more.

This is where emergent gameplay and monetization can reinforce each other instead of colliding.

Note: I have wrote about systematic and emergent gameplay in the past. Interested to read more about the opportunities these design directions offer? Check my article here:

Examples of Emergent Gameplay Systems

Imagine a city builder where climate patterns slowly evolve over decades. Heat waves increase energy demand, water scarcity pressures agriculture, disease spreads differently across districts, and migration flows reshape neighborhoods. These systems interact continuously, not as scripted events. None of this deletes player purchases. Instead, it reshapes priorities, forces tradeoffs, and creates new player stories.

Monetization in this context does not sell protection from heat or disasters. It sells advanced planning tools, specialized infrastructure archetypes, long term policy frameworks, or advisory systems that help players interpret complexity. Spenders feel more capable, not more protected.

Another example. Think about a logistics tycoon where labor dynamics are fully emergent. Worker morale, unionization, skill migration, and cultural identity arise from wages, safety, commute times, and regional competition. A hyper optimized exploitative setup might be extremely profitable in the short term, but increasingly unstable.

IAPs here could unlock governance philosophies, corporate culture systems, training doctrines, or symbolic investments that influence behavior across the system. These do not guarantee success. They bias outcomes and open strategic space.

When looking further, in terms of examples, a colony simulation with emergent gameplay could lean to e.g., alien ecosystems, seasonal resource shifts, predator prey dynamics, or long term terraforming feedback loops. Players who over exploit trigger cascading consequences that reshape the world rather than simply reducing numbers.

Monetization can live in expedition doctrines, research paradigms, legacy blueprints, or cultural memory systems that persist across colonies. Even if a colony collapses, the player gains long term identity and systemic capital.

Loss is not punished. It can be transformed.

Social Systems as Emergence Multipliers

Social gameplay is still one of the most underused amplifier of emergent gameplay in this genre.

When players share a world directly or indirectly, systems gain meaning. Infrastructure decisions affect others. Environmental damage becomes a social externality. Risk becomes shared. Responsibility becomes visible. This is also something what builders, simulation and tycoon games can take from various MMOs.

Guilds, cooperatives, or factions can function as living systems themselves. One group over produces while another under invests. Trade imbalances form. Political pressure emerges. Conflicts arise not from scripted PvP but from systemic friction.

Crucially, social loss is more tolerable than solitary loss. When a shared project fails, it becomes a collective story. When a rival outmaneuvers your group, it feels earned rather than arbitrary.

Social monetization here becomes intrinsic. Players invest to support group identity, coordination capacity, reputation, and legacy. Prestige is earned through stewardship, recovery, leadership, and long term contribution, not just accumulation.

Examples include shared megastructures, regional infrastructure, disaster response systems, or cultural landmarks that require coordination, planning, and trust rather than spending shortcuts.

IAPs can enhance visibility, contribution clarity, historical recognition, and long term social memory within these systems. They do not bypass emergence. They sit inside it.

Note: Interested about social monetization and the depth it provides? See my articles about the topic here:

Intrinsic Monetization Inside Emergent Worlds

When systems are deep enough, players pay to engage, not to skip.

They pay for clarity in complexity, for expressive control, for identity persistence, and for long term narrative continuity.

In emergent builder and simulation games, this can take the form of historical records, advanced analytics, simulation lenses, scenario tools, legacy modifiers, or generational progression that survives individual failures.

Players might lose cities, factories, or colonies, but gain lineage, influence, philosophies, and reputational weight that shape future play.

This is where monetization aligns with meaning rather than fighting against it.

Note: Interested about intrinsic monetization strategies? Start here:

Why the Opportunity is Larger Now Than Before

We understand emergent and systemic design better than ever. Or, well, some proper designers do.

We have decades of examples from simulation, strategy, MMOs, and sandbox games. We know how feedback loops behave. We know how players read systems. We know how social pressure reshapes value perception.

The tools are also better. Live operations allow slow systemic evolution. Data enables tuning without flattening complexity. Communities are more willing to engage with depth when systems are legible and fair.

And, F2P no longer has to mean safe, static, and sterile.

If designers shift effort from protection to possibility, entirely new sub-genres can emerge. Social ecological city builders. Political simulation tycoons. Cooperative systemic worlds. Competitive stewardship games. Heck, even Extraction Shooter/RPG type of simulators (like imagine ARC Raiders simulator game, in which you send Raiders for looting to gather resources for your colonies). Sky’s the limit when we forget limitations and encourage innovation.

Closing Thoughts

Emergent gameplay was not a mistake of the past. It was a promise.

By avoiding it, many games, especially F2P builder and simulation games, traded depth for certainty. But certainty is not what keeps players engaged in the current state of the industry / market. Meaning does, in addition to immersive experiences.

The future of the genre lies in worlds that e.g., remember, react, and resist. In systems where loss teaches and recovery defines identity. In social spaces where value is shared, contested, and earned.

Monetization does not need to fear this. It can grow from it.

When we let worlds push back, players lean in.

Titles like Hunt: Showdown and Helldivers 2 have de(/re)fined the formula, emphasizing tension, high stakes, risk vs. reward, and emergent PvP / PvE drama. But such games have rarely dived deeply into e.g., persistent progression systems, player archetypes, or meta-systems beyond loot, basic unlocks, or gear — until now.

Enter ARC Raiders; Released in 2025 by Embark Studios, with a PvPvE extraction-shooter core, ARC Raiders brings more systemic, RPG-style progression and meta-systems into the mix. In doing so, it points to a possible future for the genre, towards one that blends extraction-shooter intensity with e.g., RPG / MMORPG / roguelite-inspired breadth and depth.

In this article, I analyze the depth of ARC Raiders’ “systems-orientation”, compare it against Hunt: Showdown and Helldivers 2; and, furthermore, explore how the genre could evolve further by more fully embracing RPG / MMO / roguelite design patterns: from e.g., classes, professions, and specialization paths to e.g., social hubs, persistent worlds, quests, professions, and emergent long-term progression.

Why ARC Raiders Already Feels Like a Hybrid Shooter-RPG

Persistent Progression & Skill Trees

In many extraction shooters, like in Hunt: Showdown, the progression is relatively light: you unlock weapons, items, and traits across play sessions, but core character growth beyond that is limited. In Helldivers 2 things go a bit further with some elements, yet remain light on some ends.

However, in contrast, ARC Raiders goes one step further:

• After raids, players earn XP which contributes to a permanent “raider level.” Even if you die and lose your raid loot, that XP isn’t lost.

• Leveling grants skill‐points to allocate into a three-way skill tree (Survival, Mobility, and Conditioning).

• These skill upgrades affect many aspects: loot detection, resource-gathering efficiency, movement / stamina / parkour, combat proficiencies, and even crafting / interaction with objects.

• Beyond that, there is a crafting and workbench system: extracted loot and schematics allow you to build and upgrade gear, weapons, tools, and even upgrade your workshop back at “base.”

• At higher meta-level, there is an “Expedition Project” mechanic — essentially a prestige / reset option: you can choose to wipe much of your progress (characters, gear, workshop upgrades), in exchange for long-term / permanent rewards.

This is an improvement for extraction shooters. Rather than treating each raid as standalone loot-runs, where death always resets everything, ARC Raiders gives players long-term sense of progression and growth. But more importantly: it gives choices. The optional prestige/reset system recognizes that different players value progression differently (some like permanence, some like clean-slate challenge).

Snapshot from SteamDB, showcasing ARC Raiders’ good start — showing player love towards the game and assumably its system-level choices and depth.

This layering of persistent RPG-style progression on top of moment-to-moment extraction tension is perhaps the most important genre-blending move ARC Raiders has made.

Player Archetypes, Playstyle Diversity, and Mixed Motivations

ARC Raiders doesn’t just layer RPG system. It opens space for different player archetypes and motivations to coexist, in ways less seen in extraction shooters.

• Whereas some extraction shooters focus predominantly on PvP + loot + fear-of-loss (for example, high-stakes duels like in Hunt: Showdown), ARC Raiders’ design allows for a range of motivations: some players might enjoy high-risk PvP raids; others might favor PvE cooperation, looting & crafting, or slow-burn progression through the skill tree. The mixture of PvPvE, crafting, and persistent progression caters to many archetypes and motivations.

• There are quests / mission-chains (through “Traders” / mission-givers) in addition to pure loot runs, giving the game more structure, narrative hooks, and meaning beyond “loot or die.”

• Crafting and base-workbench upgrades add yet another axis of engagement: players who like building, tinkering, optimizing, or experimenting with gear can enjoy that, not just shooters who like combat.

• The concurrent “battle-pass” (or reward-track) and multiple progression tracks (loot, gear, crafting, skills, quests) allow different kinds of players to prioritize what they enjoy; reducing grind fatigue and increasing agency.

In short, ARC Raiders embraces, to a considerable extent, the core design philosophy of RPGs or MMOs: that different players have different motivations, and that the “game” should support many possible ways to play, specialize, progress, and enjoy.

Comparing to Earlier Extraction Shooters

Hunt: Showdown — Minimalist & Tense

Hunt: Showdown (and earlier extraction shooters) built their tension largely around risk. In the game you find clues, hunt bosses, fight other hunters (incl. solo / duo / trio gameplay), and try to escape alive. The progression tends to be modest: weapon unlocks, items, and character traits. Additionally, there’s also a prestige progression (which just, though, grants you skins and light rewards, and nothing much more permanent — having it staying quite light vs. what prestige systems usually have in them) path you can go for. But overall the core identity stays around “gear-fear” and “moment-to-moment tension.”

This design works well for a game like Hunt: Showdown (they’ve been able to consistently maintain good active user counts through expanding content and running events) — but it also constrains the type of players who enjoy it. It’s less welcoming for people who prefer things like gradual progression, experimentation, crafting, or long-term investment.

Snapshot from SteamDB, showcasing Hunt: Showdown’s ability to keep its community engaged through years.

I have ~550 hours on Hunt: Showdown and enjoy playing it a lot. It has lots of good things on it, whilst it lacks lots of systems-orientation in terms of various possibilities it could have. Obviously I’m pretty sure Crytek knows this. However, with a game of so invested fan base (some of Hunt’s fans literally tattoo things from the game on their skin) it’s hard to make drastic changes to the equation that works; as there’s always a risk involved in changing a working equation drastically (even when the intentions would be good).

Of course, at some point some new choices might be needed to be made, as overall the competition grows in the market and games like Hunt might need to re-think their approach from onboarding to systems better, or studios running these games need to expand their IPs through introducing new things in the form of new titles.

Helldivers 2 — Co-op Shooter with Extraction Trappings

Helldivers 2 adds co-op + PvE against hordes of enemies, with stratagems and gear loadouts, but its core loop is a bit more mission-based rather than leaning that deep on loot-extraction-loop.

Given this, according to some critics and developers, Helldivers 2 doesn’t always “clearly fit under the extraction-shooter label” — on which I tend disagree; as there’s always variety within a genre.

Snapshot from SteamDB, showcasing Helldiver 2’s sustainability and how e.g., events / updates complement the game’s sutainability. Lots of players tend to enjoy of the game.

Helldivers 2’s emphasis is on tactical teamwork, equipment choices, and emergent side — not persistent loot-based progression or that deep meta systems. And, even by this, it’s enjoyable game — I’ve enjoyed playing it a lot as it has lots of fun points in it, in addition to bringing the nostalgia up from various references they use, incl. Terminator, Starship Troopers, Zombies (Left 4 Dead, etc.).

It will remain interesting to see how Helldivers 2 and ARC Raiders compete over time against each other, as they clearly have very differentiating takes on them, whilst on some levels the games look and a lot like same ones.

I would also hope ARC Raiders would put a Helldivers 2 meets ARC Raiders “lovechild” levels out there, where players would face more mass-fight type of PvE — and that we would get new enemy types to fight against instead of ARCs.

What Was Missing (for a Broader RPG/MMO-Inspired Evolution)

• No deep persistent character development beyond loadout or stratagem selection.

• Little to no “meta progression” (skill trees, persistent stats, crafting, base or hub building, long-term specializations).

• The social/structural systems tied to long-term commitment, such as clans, guilds, social hubs, economies, were rarely present.

• Few options for different playstyles or long-term investment outside “get good / extract / repeat.”

Hence, while the core extraction-shooter loop remained compelling, the “live-service / meta / RPG” dimension remains underdeveloped.

ARC Raiders as a Proof-of-Concept: Extraction + RPG/Systems Sustain Greater Potential

Given the contrast above, ARC Raiders stands out as an advanced attempt to merge extraction-shooter dynamics with RPG-inspired systems. Its strengths suggest multiple directions the genre might evolve, and hopefully goes towards to.

What Works Well in ARC Raiders

1. Persistent, Player-First Progression: The XP + skill-tree + crafting + workbench + optional prestige resets give players a sense of growth that persists beyond individual raids.

2. Multiple Motivations & Archetypes Supported: PvP-hunters, loot-scavengers, crafters, explorers, meta-progression grinders; all find something to do.

3. Accessible Entrance + Low Barrier for New Players: Despite systemic depth, the base mechanics (shooting, looting, extraction) remain familiar, and players can opt-in to deeper systems over time. This helps lower the entry barrier, whilst of course they could do a bit better on the FTUE and onboarding still, as the systems-level depth can be still overwhelming (but I don’t think Hunt: Showdown or Helldivers 2 do any better).

4. Meta Feedback Loop: The interplay between raids, crafting, base upgrades, skill-tree progression, optional resets (prestige), and rewards creates layered incentives and long-term engagement.

All this demonstrates that extraction shooters can indeed evolve beyond “shoot-loot-extract-repeat,” without losing their core tension and identity.

Potential Future Roadmap for Extraction Shooters

If developers are inspired by what ARC Raiders did, and push further, here are ways extraction shooters could evolve toward full-fledged hybrids of shooter + e.g., RPG / MMO / roguelite:

1. Class / Profession / Specialization Systems

Instead of a generic “skill tree + loot,” future games could introduce defined classes or professions (e.g. Scout / Medic / Engineer / Heavy / Hacker / Survival-Specialist / Looter), each with unique progression trees, abilities, roles, and even exclusive end-game paths.

• Professions could interplay with team composition and squad strategy.

• Specializations could lead to “crafting professions” or “base-building professions” (architect, technician, medic, etc.).

• Long-term progression could mean mastering a class — unlocking unique abilities, gear, or social roles (guild-level perks, prestige titles, leadership roles).

• Prestige systems could benefit from all things related to classes and specialization.

This is what traditional MMOs and RPGs do well, and the extraction-shooter loop of risk, loot, and tension could be enriched by the layering of class-based identity, role diversity, and social interdependence.

These classes / professions could be more pre-defined through selection of the path at the beginning — or if someone wants to go wild, all of the specializations could be coming in play through more advanced and complex systems like open skill / talent trees, etc. instead of fixed choices.

2. Persistent Social Hubs, Towns, Safe Zones, Player Bases & Economies

Rather than every session being a raid and a risk, there could be persistent “home bases,” towns, or hubs where players return between runs. In these hubs:

• Players trade, craft, customize gear, build social spaces.

• Guilds or factions could form, with shared resources, shared workshops, clan-specific progression paths.

• Players could build individual strongholds, crafting stations, or even contribute to shared structures (e.g. communal facilities).

• Economy mechanics (crafting materials, trade, supply-and-demand, markets) could emerge, making the meta-game about more than just personal loot.

This would mirror MMORPG / MMO design, but within a risk-driven, extraction-loop context. These systems also open up paths to social and intrinsic monetization strategies, whatever the business model would be (premium + microtransactions, or F2P).

Note: Interested about social and intrinsic monetization and their possibilities? Find more about the topics here:

3. Roguelite-Style Cycle + Layered Progression

Taking inspiration from roguelites, the genre could invite players to treat extraction runs as “runs” within larger campaigns:

• Temporary runs where failure has consequences, but success or partial success yields incremental meta-progress.

• Permanent unlocks across runs: skills, blueprints, base upgrades, cosmetic rewards, even reputation or faction-based rewards.

• Optional prestige and reset systems, with richer takes: e.g. unlock “hard mode raids,” “elite dungeons,” or “legacy paths” that only unlock after certain achievements — and much, much, more.

This could combine the thrill of per-run risk with long-term investment; a powerful draw for both “hardcore” and “casual but committed” players.

4. Blended Game Worlds: Open World + Instanced Raids + Risk/Reward Zones

Future games could adopt a hybrid world structure:

• A persistent “overworld” (open world or semi-open world), incl. hubs, safe zones, towns, wilderness, safe pathways, etc. where players can explore, trade, socialize, craft, plan, and so on.

• Instanced or semi-instanced “raid zones”: high-risk areas for loot, PvP, PvE — extraction shooter loops, but with progression gating (difficulty tiers, unlock requirements, recommended player levels or gear, etc.).

• Multiple difficulty layers & gating:

  • entry-level raids for newcomers;

  • mid- and endgame raids for veterans;

  • procedure-based or narrative-driven raids; and

  • dynamically scaling challenges based on party size, past performance, world state, etc.

This structure would combine the freedom and persistence of open-world RPGs / MMOs with the high-stakes risk loop of extraction shooters.

5. Deep Crafting, Professions, and Player-Driven Economy

Progression need not be limited to character + gear. Games could offer:

• Crafting professions: weaponsmiths, engineers, medics, alchemists, makers of gadgets or deployables.

• Resource gathering, base building, logistics: encouraging cooperative play, social interdependence, and long-term goals beyond individual loot.

• Player-driven economy and trading: players trade crafted goods, gear, resources, services; potentially even run shops, workshops, or guild-based production chains.

• Meta-progression anchored to economy, not just player stats: e.g. owning a workshop or facility, owning shares in a guild’s communal base, or “territorial control” zones, stable crafting buildings, etc.

Such systems would deepen the sense of “living-world,” give more non-combat activities, and allow players with varied motivations to find a niche. They would also open up more social and intrinsic monetization opportunities.

Where ARC Raiders Falls Short — and Why the Genre Has Room to Grow

All above laid out and said, even ARC Raiders doesn’t go as far as the ideas above. There are clear limitations, and some show what needs improvement if the genre is to evolve.

• According to some reviewers and players, many skill-tree upgrades feel like small stat bumps rather than meaningful, transformative specializations.

• The crafting/loot economy and “junk” resources have been criticized as underwhelming: many players report that much of the loot feels like scraps, which aren’t satisfying “epic finds.”

• While the skill tree exists, core extraction-shooter tension remains: loot and gear are still lost on death (unless carried in safe pocket, or unless you opt out via expedition reset). This means that for players prioritizing high-risk loot runs, loss remains punishing. That duality limits how “safe” and social the game can be.

• The “home base / hub / social world” dimension is mostly absent: there’s no persistent world with towns, social economy, guild/faction meta, or player-housing/workshops shared among groups. That’s a missed opportunity — but also an opening for the future.

• The narrative / lore dimension is reportedly thin: one review described story as “barely registering”; with vendor dialogue and mission snippets hardly giving world-building weight.

• The prestige system looks more punishing than rewarding, and potentially asks for very high dedication after first opt-in, which doesn’t look attractive (Extraction Shooters overall fall short on this, like in Hunt: Showdown past 10th prestige reset the rewards are quite poor — whilst overall the system grants skins and some in-game currency, which also falls light).

• Live events cadence / non-existence of live events — at least for now they don’t have much exciting going on (compared to e.g., Hunt: Showdown having some heartbeats on this side in place in okay manner; though growing a bit repetitive in terms of not introducing much new exciting gameplay and systems — on top of which Helldivers 2 has some, but the cadence and repetition is still light).

Some of the above points could be related to the swap from F2P to Premium + Microtransactions; as if it’s true that the game was first aimed to be F2P game, it would probably carry over some level of mindset debt from that first choice, which hasn’t fully gotten rid of completely by the new monetization direction. It’s possible to do a systemic game with Premium + Microtransactions take, that honor the F2P ideologies, but carry the game beyond that in more self-sustainable and self-feeding way. I’ve written about such type of systems design approach here (https://gamesalchemy.substack.com/p/46-building-a-premium-first-game), from which ARC Raiders could benefit more:

Additionally, there are tradeoffs with adding depth: adding deep systems and persistence risks increasing complexity, raising the barrier for new players, diluting the core tension of raids, or pushing the game toward grind, especially if not carefully balanced. On some terms, ARC Raiders has a casual touch on introducing its depth for players, but could do it a bit better as there are lots of learning you need to do as a player by reading everything and going through the game ongoingly. The tradeoffs around depth and mass reach are not insurmountable. They simply show that genre-blending must be approached thoughtfully. Barriers of entry matter; complexity shouldn’t be feared about, as with low barrier of entry even complex things can be taught for players.

What Extraction Shooters Could Become: A Vision for the Future

If the genre chooses to lean into the RPG / MMO / roguelite-blending path, here’s what I envision as possible next evolutionary steps:

A Full-Blown Extraction-RPG/MMO Hybrid

• Defined classes or professions, with specializations, roles, and long-term progression distinct from mere gear.

• Persistent hubs or safe zones where players socialize, trade, craft, build bases or workshops, form guilds or factions, and plan raids together.

• A player-driven economy: resource gathering, crafting, trade, supply/demand dynamics, maybe even player-run shops or markets.

  • Of course, goes without saying, one can ruin player-driven economy pretty much by design, so proper systems and economy understanding would be required to nail this down properly.

• Mixed PvE / PvP plus PvE-only zones: some zones where players cooperate against AI, others where PvP and extraction tension is high — giving players the choice of risk & rewards profile.

• Story / Quest systems + world progression: not just isolated raids, but meta-campaigns, world-states, persistent / semi-persistent changes, territory control, long-term community progress.

• Roguelite-style cyclical progression: optional resets, legacy unlocks, meta-rewards, “new game plus” style runs that keep content fresh while rewarding long-term investment.

• Better prestige systems: Yeah, these are definitely needed.

• Social structures and clan / guild systems: not just as cosmetic or social add-ons — but as meaningful progression, resource pooling, shared bases, maybe even communal crafting or territory control.

• Social and intrinsic monetization: Social and intrinsic monetization strategies would be able to raise their heads up.

• Live event rich: More systems allow much larger and in-depth live events, which the genre urgently needs in my opinion.

Why This Matters For Players & For the Genre

• Wider Appeal and Broader Audience: By supporting many motivations (loot-seekers, grinders, socializers, crafters, risk-takers, explorers, etc.), extraction shooters could appeal to a much wider audience; not only hardcore PvP/loot fans.

• Longer Lifespan & Engagement: With layered progression, social systems, and meta-economics, games can sustain player interest far beyond the “novelty period” of extraction tension.

• Greater Design Depth & Richer Player Experiences: Emergent stories; not only from raids, but from social dynamics, guild politics, player-driven economy, base building, crafting, etc. can emerge. These are the kinds of experiences traditional RPGs and MMOs do best, but rarely exist in shooters.

For persons like me, interested not only in monetization models, but in systemic design, emergent gameplay, and player motivations, this hybrid path offers a blueprint for a more sustainable, innovative, and player-first direction for live-service shooters.

Ambition & Willingness

Of course, building these kinds of hybrids is not trivial. It requires:

• significant design ambition, wisely invested resources, and long-term commitment;

• balancing complexity with proper barriers of entry (so you don’t scare away newcomers);

• building social, economic and meta-systems which are stable, robust, and resistant to exploitation or grind-fatigue; and

• ensuring that persistent progression and meta-systems don’t kill the core tension and risk-reward identity of extraction shooters.

But given what ARC Raiders shows is possible (and where it still falls short), I believe extraction shooters are on the cusp of a potential transformation: from niche high-risk shooters to deeper, broader, more systemic shooters.

The Path Ahead for Extraction Shooters

ARC Raiders may not yet be a full RPG- or MMO-styled take, as it has trade-offs and design solutions deviating still from that. But it already represents a significant step forward: to me it’s a proof-of-concept that extraction shooters can support persistent progression, meta-systems, crafting, skill-trees, variety of motivations, and long-term engagement, which resemble RPG / MMO and similar genres’ systems.

If developers and studios take inspiration, and are willing to push further, the next generation of extraction shooters could blur (or even dissolve) the boundaries between shooters, RPGs, and MMOs. We might see games where players don’t just raid — they build, craft, trade, socialize, specialize, plan meta-campaigns, form communities, and carve out long-term identities.

That kind of evolution could open the genre to far more players; not just for those who live for the adrenaline of loot-and-extract, but also for those who love systems, crafting, social dynamics, long-term progression, and potential emergent game economies. Also, there’s potential for vice versa effect as well; MMORPGs could benefit from the extraction core as well, which would be a totally different topic to be discussed and opened about.

For fans of the extraction shooter genre, and for designers who care about systemic games with depth and player agency, I believe the future direction I’m describing is worth fighting for.

Meanwhile we’re waiting these types of games, see you at the Top / Bayou / fighting for the Democracy!