Top Events of August 2024: Umbrella Events in RAID, MARVEL SF, and CoD Mobile
Today, we’re diving into the world of “umbrella events”—special in-game affairs that reward players for completing other ongoing events. We’ll explore what sets these umbrella events apart and examine how they have been implemented in five top-performing games.
— by Alexandra Doroshenko and Andrei Zubov
In the fourth edition of our monthly column, we reveal top-performing LiveOps trends and dissect the latest events across top-grossing mobile games. Trendy mechanics, profit-boosting events, and innovative update strategies: everything you need to enhance your LiveOps.
Today, we’re diving into the world of “umbrella events”—special in-game affairs that reward players for completing other ongoing events. We’ll explore what sets these umbrella events apart and examine how they have been implemented in five top-performing games: RAID: Shadow Legends, MARVEL Strike Force, CoD: Mobile, Frozen City, and Slotomania.
As always, we got all the insights for this piece using one magic tool: the LiveOps & Updates Calendar!
What Umbrella Events Are and Why They Work
An umbrella event is a larger event, in which players advance by participating in multiple other concurrent events. Umbrella progress is typically fueled by earning points, resources, or rewards from these linked events, creating a cohesive experience that ties multiple activities together under a single overarching goal.
By structuring the gameplay routine, these events encourage engagement across different activities, extending play sessions and deepening involvement. Additionally, umbrella events provide consistent positive reinforcement through valuable rewards, which is essential for maintaining player engagement and improving retention.
Let’s move on to the first game from our list to explore how this concept is implemented in practice!
CoD: Mobile: Pass of Duty
On August 1, 2024, CoD: Mobile rolled out the Challenge Pass: a month-long event aligned with the in-game season, offering additional motivation for players to engage with all pass-related activities.
Despite its name, Challenge Pass isn’t your typical pass. Instead, it functions more as a milestone event, where players earn points and advance by participating in other ongoing events, engaging with login calendars, and completing milestones and tasks. Basically, it’s the epitome umbrella event out there!
As players progress, they earn currency for the Exchange Store, where they can buy season-specific rewards. This adds an extra layer of motivation throughout the season and makes the daily routine more rewarding. At the same time, it drives FOMO, since season-tied rewards will not be available forever!
There are a lot of progression parallels in CoD: Mobile, like player and weapon levels, competitive ranking, or pass levels. In this case, it is important not to overwhelm the players, and Challenge Pass accomplishes this goal in style. Its minimalistic umbrella events offer nothing but rewards and can be a great fit for almost any event grid.
RAID: Shadow Legends: Titanic Rewards for Titanic Efforts
Earlier this spring, the team battler RPG RAID: Shadow Legends celebrated its 5th anniversary. To mark the occasion, on March 18, 2024, Plarium launched its first Festival Titan, a two-week-long anniversary extravaganza.
Festival Titan is a prime example of an umbrella event, as it ties together several related “Titan” events running at the same time. By participating in these smaller activities, players earn points that contribute to their progress in the overarching Festival Titan event. This setup encourages players to engage with all the linked events, amplifying the overall value and rewards they receive.
Additionally, the event is designed to motivate players to spend more resources to get valuable rewards for achieving milestones, which can indirectly boost monetization. There are five major milestones, each with ten intermediate goals associated with a specific number of points. The final milestone offers rare resources, permanent avatars, and 5-star hero fragments.
Whenever they run, these events’ time-limited nature further drives players to return frequently, maximizing their rewards and progress across both the individual “Titan” events and the main Festival Titan event.
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MARVEL Strike Force: Events Assemble!
MARVEL Strike Force frequently incorporates umbrella events into its event schedule: Nature/Nurture, M is for Mercs, Dawn of Time, and We Stand Together are just a few of the umbrella events we’ve tracked in our LiveOps & Updates Calendar. Let’s take one of them and use it as an example.
First introduced on April 3, 2024, Nature/Nurture runs for one month in perfect sync with the game’s cycles, nurturing player engagement from the very start of the season. True to its umbrella nature, the event lets players earn points for the main event by participating in related activities, with rewards ranging from hero characters to high-level equipment.
Some of its features make this event especially effective for mid- and long-term retention. First, its extended duration allows developers to introduce 40 milestones, making the experience rewarding every single day of the season. Second, there is a leaderboard with extra rewards—and a competitive social element is always great for motivating players.
From the development standpoint, Nature/Nurture is a straightforward event with a replicable format and predictable schedule, which makes it easy to reuse. Its simplicity and effectiveness likely explain why inspired reskins are so common in MARVEL Strike Force to this day!
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Frozen City: Weekly Competition Under the Umbrella
The Weekly Contest in Frozen City is a regular, week-long event linked to other ongoing events similar to other umbrella events we are discussing today.
However, unlike more complex events, this one is relatively straightforward, focusing solely on leaderboard competition without any milestone rewards.
Players earn event points by reaching milestones and securing the top 10 spots on those location-specific leaderboards. These points then determine their position in the Weekly Contest leaderboard, making the competition fierce and highly rewarding for those who excel.
Minimalistic as it is, the event fits perfectly into the elaborate LiveOps grid of Frozen City. If you want to learn more, check out our extensive deconstruction dedicated to the game and its event strategy.
Bonus! Slotomania: Lock, Stock, and One Closing Album
Originally introduced on April 24, 2024, in a month-long format, the Album Closing Benefits event in Slotomania stands out from other events since it doesn’t have its own progression. Instead, it serves a different purpose, adding a layer of strategy and urgency to the player experience.
This event is timed to coincide with the end of a longer ongoing Album event (typically lasting 2+ months), and it offers bonus collectible cards as rewards. This strategic timing effectively triggers FOMO and greatly complements the Album event, motivating players to maximize their effort and earn additional value.
Since Album events are usually very lucrative for the developers towards their end, this one not only enhances player engagement but also significantly boosts monetization throughout its run!
Key Takeaways
- Umbrella events drive engagement: They strengthen overall goal-setting and player focus in LiveOps by consolidating objectives and encouraging players to work towards one major goal instead of multiple smaller ones.
- Umbrella events are a perfect fit for seasonality: Launching these events at the beginning of a season can significantly boost player engagement and goal-setting throughout the month.
- Simple yet effective design: Umbrella events typically use straightforward mechanics like milestones or leaderboards, making them easy to reskin and reuse multiple times.
- Potential for non-progression events: An umbrella event without progression could constitute a unique experiment, offering highly appealing bonuses for other events on a limited-time basis and thus driving player participation.
- Indirect monetization influence: Umbrella events can subtly push monetization by encouraging players to engage in other in-game events, increasing their investment and spending over time.
- Umbrella events can fit almost any LiveOps schedule: These events can be easily adapted to complement existing event structures, making them flexible tools for boosting both engagement and monetization.
Check out our previous Top Events of the Month editions, where we explore events in games like Monopoly GO!, Royal Match, Brawl Stars, and more. We have one piece of research into Album events and another for Complementary events.