Welcome back to the In-App Purchase Inspector, where we examine free-to-play games from the perspective of the player.

We examine the incentives or pressure used to encourage in-app purchases, their perceived worth, the expansion provided by IAPs, and the overall value of the experience in each installment.

The ultimate objective is to determine if the game convinces us to part with our money, or if gamers are satisfied – or engaged enough – to ‘freeload.’

Summoning Up a Storm:

Summoners War, which was first released in 2014, is still going strong. The game was one of the first gacha-focused mobile RPGs to gain traction outside of Asia, and it is currently one of only a few mobile games to reach $1 billion in lifetime revenue. Summoners War’s overall takings have recently topped $890 million, according to earlier figures from July, implying rapid growth.

One reason for this might be Com2uS’ growing attempts to promote the game as an eSport, with its first-ever US-based tournament providing a $25,000 prize pool and ranking among Twitch’s top five most-watched daily broadcasts.

Summoners War has definitely found a larger following than one might anticipate for a squad-based fantasy RPG, with the majority of its income coming from outside of South Korea.

War Never Changes:

Summoners War wasn’t the first game to combine a deep gacha-fusion metagame with ultra-quick, autoplay-enabled battles, but it was the most influential in the West. Indeed, titles like Rumble Entertainment’s Alliance: Heroes of the Spire may be classified as Summoners War-like.

With a core loop of playing battles, earning scrolls to summon new monsters, and fusing unwanted monsters to strengthen active squad members, playing Summoners War in 2017 is a fairly familiar experience.

Monsters gain experience by completing battles, and Runes can be used to buff them in specific areas.

Summoners War is so easy to lose hours to because of the way these mechanics interlock, as well as a difficulty curve that ensures there are always attainable targets within reach.

More than that, while most players will stay in the shallow end, the game’s upgrade system is complex, and the tactical potential of optimizing your squad is vast.

Shiny:

Mana and Crystals are the two main currencies in Summoners War.

Mana is a soft currency that feeds into the metagame’s base-building strategy. It’s similar to Gold in Clash of Clans in that it’s generated at your base and can be used to buy buildings and defences.

300 Mana can also be combined with an Unknown Scroll to summon a Monster of one to three stars – mostly fusion fodder, but the low-level characters that will propel most players forward. A Magic Shop with a regularly rotating stock of Runes, Scrolls, and Monsters to buy provides, even more, uses for Mana.

The selection changes every hour, but you can do it right now for three Crystals. Bundles of crystals are available in quantities ranging from 72 for $2.99 to 2,400 for $99.99.

They’re utilized for a variety of things, like reviving Monsters in combat (10 Crystals, or $0.36), summoning a three-to-five star Monster without the need for a Scroll (75 Crystals, or somewhat more than the standard IAP of $2.99), and timed benefits like EXP Boosters.

Holding Out for a Hero:

Although crystals aren’t given out in large quantities, they don’t seem to play such a large part that their absence is limiting, and Mana never seems to run out.

However, scarcity is used as a design tool in the Summoners War, notably with the drip-feeding of Unknown Scrolls.

This is in sharp contrast to Hero Cores in Alliance: Heroes of the Spire, where the loop was heavily dependent on regular summoning and fusing, but Summoners War places a greater emphasis on polishing existing Monsters via repeated play. The game also has an energy system that may be used to limit the length of a session, however, it isn’t so restricted that it seems restricting in a typical session.

Buy Now, Get Later:

So the principles at the heart of the Summoners War are by now somewhat recognizable, but it also plays host to other monetization strategies that are less so.

Annuities are a good example of this since they provide greater value rewards if they are split up into daily payments over a specified time rather than being given all at once.

These so-called Daily Packs, which range in price from $4.99 to $29.99 and provide rewards for 15 days, are aimed towards the lower end of the IAP spectrum. They may be purchased and activated regularly, but they cannot be stacked.

The beginning packs, which arrive at just the right moment to give the player enough time to figure out what’s going on, are essentially one-time enhancements of these deals, with the same price but additional cash and a few scrolls thrown in for good measure.

The Road to Billions:

Offering that much variation in a game like this can only be a positive thing. Those who seek immediate gratification are catered to, but those who are prepared to wait for better value are also catered to.

And, as always, include annuities in a beginning pack appears to be a wise decision, encouraging first-time spenders to return every day to collect their benefits.

It wasn’t the first and won’t be the last gacha RPG, but it’s such a well-oiled machine now that it’s simple to see why so many people have invested time and money on it since 2014. It’s a game that recognizes what players want and provides it through in-app purchases (IAPs) whose worth is clearly expressed.