Jam & Tea Studios set out to explore a new frontier in gaming: Improvisational Play. This emerging genre required the team to invent solutions from scratch while deeply understanding what drives players to engage with open-ended, social role-playing games.

Early challenges included:

• Identifying the motivations that enable some players to thrive in social role-playing games while others struggle.

• Uncovering the traits of a “golden cohort” of players who would become advocates for the game.

• Ensuring onboarding and gameplay resonated with these players to maximize engagement and satisfaction.

By partnering with Solsten, Jam & Tea identified the motivations and behaviors of the game’s golden cohort, enabling targeted recruitment of playtesters who mirrored the ideal audience.

This detailed understanding of what drives social playfulness and improvisation allowed the team to design environments that fostered the desired behaviors.

Additionally, Solsten’s tools informed decisions across product, design, and marketing teams, ensuring a cohesive focus on core player motivations and crafting messaging that resonated with the target audience. These insights ultimately helped Jam & Tea create a deeply engaging experience tailored to the unique needs and preferences of their players.

Jam & Tea x Solsten’s collaboration proved transformative for the development of Retail Mage, aligning the game’s mechanics with player motivations to achieve remarkable results. Through targeted audience alignment, 70% of playtesters matched the valuable player personas identified by Solsten, ensuring that feedback came directly from the ideal audience. The game’s innovative design resonated strongly, with 82% of players describing Retail Mage as a fresh and unique experience, and 90% eager to continue playing and invite friends.

Solsten’s insights into player motivations guided key design decisions, enhancing social playfulness and streamlining onboarding. Additionally, tailored messaging spoke directly to the golden cohort, creating a sense of connection and understanding from the players’ very first interactions with the game.