Improving Gamer Retention by Exploring Key Drivers in a Gaming Subscription
Client A, a video gaming company, launched “System A,” a subscription service offering access to a base catalog of games with new monthly games. Despite competitive pricing and special offerings, the service faced decline in subscribers and lukewarm engagement, especially among new and returning subscribers.
Goal
The research goal was to understand what drives adoption, satisfaction, and cancellation across different user segments to enhance the subscription model, shape retention strategies, and improve future product offerings.
Key research questions:
How are users discovering System A?
What motivated or deterred users from subscribing to System A?
What offerings and features were valuable to users?
Why did users cancel/continue their subscription?
How could System A become more compelling to new and existing users?
Research Design
The study unfolded across four phases over three months. The case study presented focuses specifically on Phase 4.
Phase 1: Into User Interviews (1 hour)
Phase 2: Survey Check-in (10 questions)
Phase 3: Survey Check-in (10 questions)
Phase 4: Outro User Interviews & Card Sorting (75 minutes)
Participants
N=66
50/50 mix of males and females
Mix of age ranging from 18 to 65 years old
Mix of industries for education, income, and race background
3 segments:
New User - Purchased the gaming console within 3 months & first-time subscriber to System A.
Monthly Active User - Purchased the gaming console more than 3 months ago & first-time subscriber to System A.
Churned User- Previously subscribed to System A within the past 12 months.
Project Overview & Contributions
Duration: September 2024 to December 2024
Role: Senior User Experience Researcher
Responsibilities:
Partnered with clients to define research goals, align on scope, and translate business needs into actionable study objectives
Designed and executed a four-phase mixed-methods research plan, including detailed moderator guides and survey questionnaires
Led participant recruitment strategy, coordinating with external vendors to ensure representative sampling across demographics
Directed a cross-functional research team (ux researchers, ux designers, project manager, and software engineer) delegating tasks for interview moderation, note-taking, and data collection for completed surveys
Conducted in-depth analysis of qualitative and quantitative data to uncover actionable insights
Moderated 1-hour remote user interviews via Zoom across all segments
Delivered a comprehensive, two-part report with strategic recommendations, and presented key findings to client stakeholders
Deliverable: Produced an in-depth report comprised as a comprehensive document in two parts:
Phase 4 : Detailed analysis of final interviews and card sorting activity
Phases 1–3: Overview of insights from interviews and surveys to track evolving user sentiment and engagement trends
Phase 4: In-Depth-Interviews
All interviews were 75 minutes, conducted remotely via Zoom. Sessions included open-ended questions followed by a card sorting activity.
Participants reflected on their experience using System A, video gaming subscription service, over a 3 month period. Interviews focused on how users discovered and redeemed titles, how they perceived the catalog’s quality and variety, and which features they found most or least valuable.
I spoke with users across 3 key segments: New Users, Monthly Active Users, and Churned Users. This captures a wide range of perspectives shaped by usage patterns, platform familiarity, and satisfaction over time.
Sample Interview Questions:
Can you walk me through how you typically browse games?
How do you determine whether you want to redeem a game?
Which subscription benefits stood out to you?
What, if anything, felt confusing or frustrating about your experience?
Which device do you typically use to redeem games?
Would buy-back offers (e.g. , 1 month free) entice you to continue your subscription to System A? Why? Why not?
These interviews provided rich context around how users interacted with System A beyond surface-level engagement. They revealed pain points, expectation gaps, and clear opportunities to improve discoverability and overall satisfaction.
Card Sorting Activity
As part of the final interview sessions, participants completed a card sorting exercise to evaluate the perceived importance of various potential benefits of System A.
All participant were asked to categorize 10 potential benefits into one of three categories: Essential, Nice to Have, or Not Important. This activity helped quantify user preferences and clarify which potential benefits drove perceived value across different user segments.
Features evaluated included:
2 Monthly game titles
Exclusive discounts
Access to exclusive games
Earn tokens to buy content (3x more than regular users)
Cloud storage
Free play weekends
Video pass for movies and sporting events
Play PC games through System A
AI-powered avatar customization
Access to Client A’s exclusive content
The card sorting activity helped prioritize feature development and highlighted which benefits
to emphasize in onboarding, marketing, and future product tiers.
Key Findings
1. "Free" Games Were the Hook, Not the Discounts
While the subscription included discounts and exclusive content, users valued the two new monthly games most. These were perceived as “free” games, even though they were part of the paid subscription.
However, many were unaware of additional benefits such as purchase discounts, signaling poor benefit communication.
2. Game Catalog Quality & Variety Were Pain Points
Most participants appreciated access to new games but felt the base catalog was:
Overloaded with FPS (first-person shooter) games
Lacked in genres such as sports, adventure, or casual “cozy” games
Inconsistent in game quality
This lack of variety directly impacted perceived value, especially for churned users, who expected premium experiences similar to Client A competitors (Competitor A and Competitor B).
3. Discovery & Redemption Were Frustrating
Accessing the subscription and redeeming games were inconsistent across devices.
Device 1 was preferred for browsing games
Device 2 was considered challenging to navigate
Some users never redeemed any games due to friction
4. Redemption Motivators Were Simple and Emotional
Users based redemption decisions on:
Game theme or genre
Visuals (screenshots, video clips)
Star ratings and review count
Estimated time commitment to play the game in one session
Shorter games with polished visuals won out over complex, time-consuming ones—especially for users with limited play time.
5. Users Wanted Choice & Customization
Participants expressed a desire for tiered memberships tailored to genres (e.g., puzzle tier, family games).
Through a card sorting activity, users were asked to categorize 10 potential benefits as essential, nice to have, or not important.
Essential potential benefits included:
Access to exclusive games
2 Monthly titles
Exclusive discounts to games
Earning tokens
Nice to have potential benefits included:
Free play weekends
Video Pass
Play PC games
Not important potential benefits included:
AI-powered avatar customization
Mixed responses to potential benefits:
Access to exclusive Client A’s content
Cloud storage (unless linked to game performance gains)
“I subscribed because I knew I’d get two new games every month. It keeps things fresh.”
“I gave up trying to find the titles. The subscription’s not even visible in the store.”
Recommendations
I delivered actionable insights based on Phase 4 findings:
Increased perceived value: Expand monthly offerings beyond 2 titles to diversify genres
Clarify benefits: Simplify the messaging on what is included in the subscription (discounts, tokens, exclusive content)
Improve discoverability: Make System A accessible from the main interface of Device 1 and Device 2 with a dedicated tab or homepage presence
Support casual play: Highlight lighter, time-flexible games during onboarding and monthly promotions
Introduce subscription tiers: Test segmented plans (e.g., Family Tier, FPS tier) with targeted benefits
Additional recommendations can be viewed in the redacted deliverable. Due to NDA restrictions, identifying details have been removed from the original report. The version below has been redacted to protect the confidentiality of the client and product. This deliverable reflects the structure, depth, and clarity I bring to research reporting from synthesis to recommendations. It includes:
A detailed breakdown of findings from final user interviews (Phase 4)
A synthesized overview of user sentiment and engagement across Phases 1–3
View Redacted Report : Here