What Subscription Apps Can Learn About Monetization From Gaming — Mathias Gredal Nørvig, Subway Surfers

The 'world tour': every three weeks the game's setting moves to a new part of the world, so players see their own hometown, a nearby town or a place they haven't traveled to. The core run stays the same; each city is a season. Partners sometimes contribute (e.g. a Foo Fighters keyboard player produced one city's soundtrack with the in-house audio designer).

Founders' rule: a truly free-to-play game where players can do the core run as much as they want, are never 'pinched' or blocked from content, and everything is achievable by playing. Monetization is mainly ads, with IAP for those who want to progress faster. Because the game has been live since 2012, they avoid heavier monetization that would alienate older players and test new mechanics only in time-limited events, keeping the core run clean. Guest argues heavy extraction would hurt word of mouth and the content engine.

A core content team of under 10 people produces 5-10 assets a day, brainstorming freely and riffing on whatever goes global (Squid Game honey cake as the Subway Surfers logo, The Last of Us with game characters, a guard post about Justin Bieber's new album, rivalry posts with Duolingo, a new hire dancing in the guard mascot costume). They balance gameplay-relevant clips (so people know it's the game) with pure-fun viral content. The team is autonomous: brand checks by the head of play experience and head of brand rarely say no; the CEO has vetoed only twice in 12 years; trends judged off-brand (e.g. Skibidi Toilet, too many fart sounds) are skipped. All creative is in-house, not agencies.

Produce content designed to be reusable for UGC, allow users to use the IP in videos without takedowns, and amplify (reshare) user-made content the team finds cool. Creators such as a K-pop band member post videos reacting to the game's sounds without being paid; the game became a known backdrop format for TikTok ('sludge content').

No standing paid UA budget. When a piece of organic content starts picking up, spend a few hundred dollars boosting it, especially to carry it to other platforms (e.g. from TikTok to Instagram). Total boosting spend is in the tens of thousands of dollars, not hundreds of thousands or millions.

Revenue mix of interstitial ads and rewarded videos (players choose to watch an ad in exchange for a reward), plus IAP for characters and unlocks aimed at paying players in the US, Europe and other tier-1 markets. Ads let the game serve tier-2/tier-3 markets where people rarely subscribe or buy IAP. Ongoing questions: where on screen to place banners or rewarded prompts, and whether payers should have interstitials removed permanently or for a period. Guest notes a fairness gap: skilled players who rarely die see few ads.

Players state their age at install. Anyone under the legal age in their country (13 or 16) goes into a COPPA segment served only by ad networks with COPPA-compliant inventory. For adults, blocklist gambling, guns, pornography and anything R-rated. When a player reports a bad ad, flag it to the network to remove. In-game SDKs record which ads were shown and engaged with. COPPA and GDPR compliance handled by a small team.

Two-way crossovers with other popular games: Crossy Road, 8 Ball Pool (Miniclip), and Brawl Stars (Supercell), where each game visits the other. The CEO sources them through conferences and industry relationships; concepting starts at least a year ahead, then engineering and legal. Deals are traffic exchanges with no commitments beyond delivering quality assets; each side keeps what it monetizes. Chosen where there is large player overlap. The Brawl Stars mode is a time-limited event that also tests a PvP mechanic and whether it scares players off the core run.

Slopes (ski tracking) sells a season pass and day passes so people can buy as little or as much as they want, while keeping a subscription for avid skiers who go out many times a year.