From Initial Investment to Creating Our Own IP

In the world of video games, competition is fierce. Every day, new titles emerge and players have more options than ever. To stand out, it’s not enough to release a good game, you have to keep your audience engaged beyond that first session. In 2021, Notbug Studios closed its first seed round of $60,000, capital that allowed us to develop our first prototypes and, at the same time, lay the foundations for a LiveOps strategy we now apply to every project.

Our plan

The $60,000 we raised gave us the oxygen we needed to:

• Hire key talent (programmers, designers, and game specialists)

• Develop our first prototypes and validate them with retention and monetization metrics

• Implement our LiveOps infrastructure (dashboards, real-time analytics, and data pipelines)

  
  

Thanks to that injection of resources, within a few months we went from a nascent studio to a team capable of launching several alpha-phase titles, gathering community feedback, and preparing a roadmap of regular updates.

What Are LiveOps Services and Why Do They Matter?

LiveOps services are the set of practices and tools that let you manage a game after its launch. Instead of a “deploy and forget” approach, we maintain an ongoing operation that includes:

• Content updates: new missions, characters, and levels

• Time-limited events: themed competitions with exclusive rewards

• Data analytics: tracking ARPDAU, DAU/MAU, and churn to inform our decisions

• Player support: agile issue resolution and direct feedback
  

These components—powered by our initial seed funding—were key to boosting our first releases from D1 retention rates of 25% to over 45% after the first three months of LiveOps.