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A closer look at Analytics and Player Engagement

February 23, 2022 in Games | 10 min. read
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Unity’s mission is to provide the tools you need to make your game successful, and Unity Gaming Services (UGS) plays a crucial role in that. In October, we announced UGS as a suite of tools and services with the hope of simplifying every developer’s ability to create and manage their games.

In this blog series, we take a deeper dive into each of the main categories our services cover – analytics and player engagement, backend, and multiplayer – and how you can leverage these tools for your games.

This first piece will focus on our Analytics and Player Engagement category, which provides you with the tools to improve your game with data-driven decisions and perfect player experience with dynamic content updates. 

Chart showing which tools fall under Analytics and Player Engagement

Analytics

What is it? Analytics allows studios to better understand game performance and player behaviors using prebuilt dashboards and visualizations powered by reliable, real-time data. You can customize the data based on your studios’ goals with custom audiences, events, and flexible reporting. 

It also has our newly built advanced analytics tools which provides you with more flexibility and deeper insights into your data. SQL Data Explorer allows you to run queries, visualize results, and Funnels provides a way to analyze player progression, drop offs, and advancements towards any of your goals.

Analytics is currently in beta. 

What problems does it solve? 

  • Better understand (and improve) how your game is performing
  • Use data to inform your engagement and monetization strategies
  • Use Audiences to target customers with a dynamic experience and personalized content 
  • Run A/B tests using both Remote Config and Analytics to optimize specific parts of your game

How does it work? Standard Events will automatically begin firing after the SDK is set up and Custom Events can be implemented to start tracking any action in your game. Once the events are implemented, Analytics tracks core metrics to monitor the health of your game, such as new installs, DAU and MAU, total sessions, and more. 

The information is then shown in pre-built dashboards and can be further analyzed in Data Explorer, and, coming soon, our Funnels and SQL Data Explorer tools. 

Learn more about using analytics to track how your users interact with your game here.

How do I get started? Join the beta or visit our documentation site.

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Cloud Content Delivery

What is it? Unity’s Cloud Content Delivery is an engine-agnostic end-to-end service for live game updates: A content delivery network (CDN) and back-end-as-a-service (BAAS) built for game development.

What problems does it solve? 

  • Streamlines your production process with the badging and bucketing system, allowing devs to test the content they want players to receive 
  • Reduces the download size of your app by using cloud storage to alleviate the weight of new content updates for players 
  • Engages your player base by delivering the right content at the right time – like seasonal events, new cosmetics, and bonuses

How does it work? CCD combines cloud storage, a content management system, and a reliable content delivery network for studios managing live games. 

Using CCD’s online dashboard or command-line interface (CLI), you can upload asset bundles to buckets, then badge and distribute them to designated players. You can create custom buckets and badges based on your needs. For example, a content release can be promoted from a “Development” bucket to a “Production” bucket in order to be deployed to players. 

Whether you’re using Unity’s Addressable Asset System or AssetBundles, you can upload content to the buckets you’ve created. From there, you can start deploying content releases for your project.

Even if your game is not made with Unity, you can still upload and manage content using our CLI or API and connect CCD to your game using our runtime APIs. All you need is to have an Org ID and Project ID on the Unity Dashboard, 

How do I get started? Your first 50 GB are free every month so you can try the tool with no worries. Visit the documentation site to learn more. 

If you’d like a more in-depth look, check out our latest workshop that will walk you through the Addressable Asset System and how to get started with Cloud Content Delivery.

Cloud Diagnostics

What is it? Cloud Diagnostics provides real-time error monitoring to help you identify, investigate, and resolve the crashes and exceptions impacting the stability of your Made with Unity mobile and PC games. 

What problems does it solve? 

  • Mitigates the impact crashes have on your user experience and revenue goals 
  • Helps you identify bugs in your game code

How does it work? Cloud Diagnostics connects to your project in the Unity Editor to collect and report data about errors (known as crashes or exceptions) in your game. You can view information about possible issues in your app, such as how many users are affected or what platforms and devices an issue occurs on. 

From there, you can also investigate log messages, stack traces, and view metadata about individual crashes or exceptions. This detailed information about the cause and effect of issues in your app helps you to identify, prioritize, and fix any problems which may arise.

Cloud Diagnostics can also be used to collect player feedback, such as bug reports. You can either use the built-in reporting functionality, build your own customized reports, or use a combination of both. The built-in functionality provides a simple form that your users can fill out, whereas customized reports allow you to design the form to collect any specific data you need. 

How do I get started? Get started by visiting our documentation site.

Remote Config

What is it? Remote Config allows you to update live game content remotely and in real-time with no code changes or app updates. 

What problems does it solve? 

  • Test iterative improvements post-launch without code changes or app updates 
  • Derisk new feature launches with percentage roll outs 
  • Segment and tailor settings for specific player types, audiences, or behaviors
  • Safely test game changes in custom environments 

How does it work? Remote Config allows you to create and manage Environments to group config value settings together in ways that support your development and deployment workflow. 

Environments can also be structured to fit your application so that specific settings are retrieved and updated only when needed, allowing for config value keys to be reused. You can also define settings that control which players receive specific config value updates, and when. 

When a player launches your game, Remote Config detects conditional criteria, based on Unity, the application, the user, or custom criteria that you define. The service then returns customized settings for each player according to the conditions that apply to them.

Remote Config also allows you to target specific audiences to deploy changes or A/B test those changes. For example, you can test a new enemy type with only players that have played in the last two weeks of your game. 

How do I get started? Visit our Remote Config page or our documentation site.

If you’d like a more in-depth look, check out our latest workshop that will walk you through the Addressable Asset System and how to get started with Cloud Content Delivery.

Build your analytics and engagement stack

We hope this answered any questions you might have had on some of the new offerings with UGS – particularly the tools and services you can leverage to better understand your players and improve their experiences. 

To stay in the loop with the rest of the series, follow our new UGS channels on Twitter and Facebook or visit our new Unity Gaming Services Forums.

Ready to get started building your tech stack? Pick and choose what you need from the Unity Dashboard, or check out our pricing for more information.

February 23, 2022 in Games | 10 min. read

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