Indie Game’s 180% ROAS Win in Asia 2026

It’s tough for indie brands to get noticed when they’re up against huge competitors with massive budgets. We recently ran a campaign for an indie mobile game developer that shows how you can win by being smarter, not just richer. By focusing on emerging markets in Southeast Asia, we used sharp targeting and constant creative testing to drive real EPS growth for them, and this is the breakdown of how we did it.

Campaign Overview: “Pixel Pilots: Skybound Saga” in Southeast Asia

The goal was simple: get high-quality installs for “Pixel Pilots: Skybound Saga,” a retro arcade shooter. We went after key Southeast Asian markets, specifically Indonesia, Vietnam, and the Philippines, because mobile usage there’s huge, gaming communities are booming, and ad costs are way lower than in the West. The game’s pixel art style and easy-to-learn gameplay felt like a perfect fit for growing the user base quickly in those regions. We had eight weeks and a $25,000 budget, running from mid-February to mid-April 2026.

Strategy: Hyper-Localization and Performance Marketing

Our whole plan was built on two things: hyper-local creative and hardcore performance tracking. A generic, one-size-fits-all ad was never going to work. For Indonesia, we created visuals with nods to local folklore, like pixel art characters in scenes that looked like traditional shadow puppet theater. For Vietnam, we knew the esports culture is big, so we pushed the game’s competitive leaderboards and community aspects. We ran everything on Meta Ads (Meta Business Help Center) and Google Ads (Google Ads documentation), mostly using in-app placements and rewarded videos.

Right out of the gate, we put 60% of the budget on Meta for its super-detailed targeting and 40% on Google to get into its massive network of gaming apps. Our first pass at targeting included obvious interests like “mobile gaming” and “arcade games,” but also local gaming influencers. To give ourselves a head start, we also built lookalike audiences from a list of high-spenders from a small test we’d run in Malaysia.

Creative Approach: Beyond Translation

Getting the creative right was everything. We knew just translating the English copy would be a disaster. We had to completely adapt it. The English copy “Relive classic arcade action” became “Nostalgia game retro, terbang tinggi!” (Retro game nostalgia, fly high!) in Indonesia, which is much more informal and how young people actually talk. The visuals got a major overhaul, too. We ditched generic gameplay clips for short, 15-second videos where our pixel art characters flew over local landmarks, like Borobudur Temple in the Indonesian ads. That kind of detail paid off immediately in our engagement metrics.

We ended up running 15 different ad creatives on Meta and Google, testing everything from video length to button text. Every single localized ad was A/B tested against a generic, global version, and the data was night and day. The localized video ads smashed the static images, delivering a 45% higher Click-Through Rate (CTR) on average.

Targeting and Audience Segmentation

Our initial targeting segments included:

• Demographics: Age 18-34, Male and Female (gender split was largely even for this game genre).
• Interests (Meta Ads): Mobile gaming, arcade games, specific game titles popular in the region, esports, anime.
• Behaviors (Meta Ads): Engaged shoppers, users who have purchased in-app items.
• Placement (Google Ads): Gaming apps, particularly those in the arcade or casual categories, YouTube placements targeting gaming content.
• Lookalike Audiences: Top 5% of existing users by in-app purchase value.

We let these segments run with broad budgets at first to see what would happen, collecting data on CPI and how many people were actually completing the tutorial or making a purchase. That early data was exactly what we needed to tighten our targeting in the following weeks.

Performance Metrics and Analysis

The numbers from the first couple of weeks told a clear story about what was working and what wasn’t.

Initial Data (Weeks 1-2)

• Budget Spent: $6,250
• Impressions: 15,000,000
• Clicks: 250,000
• CTR: 1.67%
• Installs: 25,000
• Average CPI: $0.25
• CPL (Cost Per Lead – in this case, install): $0.25
• ROAS: 90% (initial purchases were slow to materialize)

Install volume was fine, but we saw a problem right away: the rate of first in-app purchases was too low. We figured there was a disconnect between what the ads promised and the first few minutes of the game, or maybe the tutorial was just confusing people and causing them to drop off.

Optimization and Iteration (Weeks 3-5)

So, based on that initial data, we made some key changes:

1. Ad Creative Refinement: We went all-in on the hyper-localized videos that were getting the best CTR. We also made new videos that focused on the game’s early rewards to try and get people hooked faster. One ad showing a “first 10 minutes” gameplay with a local voiceover actually boosted tutorial completion rates by 20%.
2. Targeting Adjustment: On Meta, we got more specific, focusing on users who had clicked on game ads before or were in regional gaming groups. We also bid more aggressively on our lookalike audiences, since they were sticking around longer.
3. Bid Strategy Adjustment: We switched Google Ads from “Maximize Conversions” to a “Target CPI” strategy to give us more direct control over how much we were paying per install.

These changes immediately made the campaign more efficient:

• Budget Spent: $9,375
• Impressions: 18,000,000
• Clicks: 360,000
• CTR: 2.0% (a 19.8% increase from initial phase)
• Installs: 45,000
• Average CPI: $0.21
• ROAS: 130%

Final Push and Results (Weeks 6-8)

For the home stretch, we pushed 70% of our remaining budget into the absolute best-performing ad sets, which were the localized videos on Meta. We also created a limited-time offer inside the game and promoted it in the ads to get people to buy something right away.

Here’s what the full eight-week campaign looked like when all was said and done:

The final tally showed a 180% ROAS, which was a direct injection of profit that boosted the developer’s EPS. And getting a final CPI of $0.20 is fantastic for these markets, where costs can easily be much higher. It proved the hyper-targeted strategy worked.

What Worked Well

• Hyper-localization: This was the single biggest factor in our success. Putting in the work to make culturally relevant creative paid off massively in engagement and conversions. It’s about more than just the words. It’s the cultural context.
• Iterative A/B Testing: Our continuous A/B tests (we had at least 10 running at all times) meant we were always improving efficiency by cutting losers and scaling winners.
• Clear Conversion Tracking: Proper SDK integration was non-negotiable. Tracking in-app events like tutorial completion and first purchase gave us the data to make smart moves. Without it, we’d have just been guessing.

What Didn’t Work (or could have been better)

• Initial Broad Targeting: We went too broad with targeting at first. While it gave us data, it also meant our CPI was higher than it needed to be for the first two weeks. We could have saved some budget by being more granular from day one.
• Reliance on a Single Offer: We relied on a single “starter pack” offer. It worked, but we missed an opportunity to test more personalized offers for different types of players.
• Platform Diversification: We should have tested niche gaming ad networks earlier. Sticking only to Meta and Google at the start might have meant we missed out on other cheap user sources.

Lessons Learned for Future Campaigns

This campaign really drove home a few key lessons for any indie developers looking to expand into emerging markets:

1. Don’t Underestimate Cultural Nuance: Your money is best spent on local expertise for creative. Don’t even bother with generic global campaigns in culturally diverse regions, because they just won’t land.
2. Data-Driven Decisions are Paramount: We learned again that our initial assumptions are almost always wrong. You have to set up solid tracking from the very beginning because the data is what will actually guide your campaign.
3. Budget for Experimentation: Always budget for experimentation. That money isn’t waste. It’s an investment in figuring out what works so you can scale it.
4. Focus on Lifetime Value (LTV), Not Just CPI: Don’t get obsessed with just CPI. The real goal is LTV. Monitor what users do after they install to make sure you’re buying profitable users, not just cheap installs that churn.

In the end, the “Pixel Pilots” campaign shows that with a smart, localized strategy, indie developers can effectively compete and grow in emerging economies. It comes down to doing the work to speak your audience’s language, both literally and culturally. If you’re looking for more ways to optimize, checking out common indie remarketing myths is a good next step.