Hello everyone!
Faster Than You was the first game I self-published. It was made with Cocos2d-x (v3.6), of course 
The game was released more than a year ago, but I never posted it here. I don’t have many time lately, but I wanted to create this post anyway, answer questions and read your feedback or suggestions if you have any.
Faster Than You is a free logic game with a minimalistic style. It’s available for iOS on the App Store, for Android on the Google Play Store and for Windows Phone / Windows 10 Mobile on the Windows Store.
You can also see Faster Than You in the games showcase section.
The game basically consists of an order (match, arrange, 3+5…), a timer (the circle around the order) and four panels with answers. You have to touch those panels to give the correct answer before the timer. For example, to correctly answer the order 3+5 you just need to touch the panel with an 8. If the order is match or arrange, you have to touch the four panels in pairs or in order.
There are two game modes: Adventure and Quick Mode. The Adventure is a set of levels with increasing difficulty and different themes. Quick Mode is an endless mix of everything in the Adventure Mode, and you have to reach the higher level possible with only 3 lives. Also, there’s a mini game: The Mystery Box. It appears in both game modes if you answer correctly and quickly (there’s an horizontal bar to represent when the mini game will appear). To open the Mystery Box you just need to tap on it several times very quickly before the timer finishes. If you open it, you’ll be rewarded with some random messages or in-game currency / lives.
I used SDKBOX to integrate the AdColony SDK for iOS and Android platforms. After more than a year I decided to update SDKBOX and integrate other ad units like AdMob and Charboost, and it was far easier than before!
Monetization: The game can be played 100% for free. Each time you play a game, you pay with an “Energy”. Time recharges Energy for free (up to 5), and you can also watch rewarded video ads or buy in-game currency to get Energy. I thought it was a good monetization strategy, but didn’t work at all: Users don’t buy in-game currency, and only a few watched rewarded videos.
Downloads figures were ranging 1000-2000 per month since launch. Then, after one year, monthly downloads began rising and got surprisingly high last month (200-600 daily, 7000-8000 in August and September). It almost reached 40k total downloads.
When I noticed this unexpected rise of downloads, I updated the game to fix some crashes and to add Charboost and AdMob ad units to show an interstitial ad after each X games. Now it’s making some money, but still very low.
I can’t complain about the low revenues, because I didn’t do a lot of promotion of the game, nor updated it in all this time. I’d like to work on a big update and remove all wait-to-play and energy system, add new levels, some more fixes… But I don’t know if it would be a waste of time considering the low revenues. I also have to maintain Tappy Tiki, my new game, and start planning the development of more games.
Did you read through that wall of text? You’re awesome! Tell me what you think, ask anything you’d like to know, give the game a try and bring some feedback, suggestions, advices… everything is welcome!
Thank you for your interest! 
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