Egg, Inc. is getting a Subscription. But let me start by saying that Egg, Inc. is not becoming a ‘subscription game’.
We have been toying with ideas for a subscription for years. However, because Egg, Inc’s monetization strategy has been around for 7 years now, there is little room with which to work.
There are two main areas where Egg, Inc. can provide more value over time to serious players without disturbing the game’s balance:
1. Ad Removal
2. Leggacy ContractsThe subscription was originally going to be called “Contracts Club” — as it was (and is) geared towards Contracts players, but the more we sat with it, the more we think many dedicated players will find it valuable — even if they don’t play Contracts often. Ten different names later, we went ULTRA.
Here’s what subscribers can expect:
Tiers
Egg, Inc. ULTRA Standard — $3.99/mo USD
One extra Leggacy Egg of Prophecy Contract per week PLUS: +25% Golden Eggs from Piggy Breaks, Host ‘Any Grade’ Co-ops, Occasional exclusive events.
Egg, Inc. ULTRA Pro — $7.99/mo USD
Everything in Standard WITH NO Ads. Also Piggy break bonus changes to +40%
Details
For newly addicted players, the Egg of Prophecy deficit is substantial and can be demotivating — but now — players can earn EOP twice as fast even in the lowest tier. Reducing catch up time from 3 years to 18 months.
Players love our ad implementation, but I personally still prefer a zero-ad experience and pay for it with virtually every service I use. With the PRO tier, the video-ad doubler becomes the ULTRA doubler and is permanent. Video ads are automatically converted into ULTRA gifts and delivered via truck. Zero change to timing and contents. (Note: like a video offer you must ‘collect’ one before another will appear).
Many players find Egg, Inc ‘relaxing’ — and PRO takes it to another level.
Finally, ULTRA adds the ability to host ‘all grades’ coops. These are coops where any player can join explicitly regardless of their Grade (if set to public, only same-grade players can auto-join). The Contract rewards will use the host’s Grade’s rewards. The evaluation will use the host’s grade as well, and will count on the leaderboards, but will not affect a participants Grade progress unless they are in the same grade as the host. This will allow friends at different stages to play together with only the host needing ULTRA. Likewise it allows advanced ULTRA players to accelerate new players with big Contract rewards— perhaps at the cost of lower points to advanced players (until they do a replay with peers).
The financial minded of you have probably already realized that these subscriptions can effectively be ‘free’ if you buy 3 or 4 Piggy Breaks a month — or at least have a lower effective cost if you buy 1 or 2.
We aren’t pretending to be generous, but rather highlighting the potential win-win. If players are ready to commit to take their farm to the top, we want to meet them half way. We believe ULTRA will reduce the cost of this commitment, but increase the number of players willing to make it. This is why we ultimately decided to launch it.
Rollout
Ultra will become available to some players over the next few weeks. Only players with some history buying IAP will even see the option to subscribe. Over time we will reduce the requirements, but this will always be a subscription for a minority of Egg, Inc players.
This is our first subscription implementation, and the code is surprisingly complex to fully support all server side features the app stores recommend — so we expect some bumps — but will always do right by our Players and will happily extend subscriptions if any glitches occur.