Rewarded user acquisition and offer walls are suddenly becoming a major part of mobile game UA strategy.

In this episode of Two and a Half Gamers, Matej and Felix talk with Max from MAF about how rewarded UA evolved from a questionable growth hack into a legitimate acquisition channel.

Studios are now allocating 30–40% of their UA budgets to rewarded channels, and some games are scaling them even more aggressively.

The conversation covers ROI timelines, retention dynamics, monetization setups, genre fit, and how rewarded playtime models are changing the economics of offer walls.

If you’re running UA in 2026, ignoring rewarded UA might be a very expensive mistake.

🧠 Key Takeaways

• Rewarded UA budgets now reach 30–40% of total spend

• Playtime rewards outperform install rewards

• Rewarded channels can reach break-even 2–3x faster than traditional UA

• Strategy, merge and social casino games scale best

• Offer walls can add 5–15% monetization uplift inside games

• Playtime rewards help build player habits over 60–90 days

• Offer walls are shifting from monetization tools to loyalty and engagement systems

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This is no BS gaming podcast 2.5 gamers session. Sharing actionable insights, dropping knowledge from our day-to-day User Acquisition, Game Design, and Ad monetization jobs. We are definitely not discussing the latest industry news, but having so much fun! Let’s not forget this is a 4 a.m. conference discussion vibe, so let's not take it too seriously.

Panelists: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Felix Braberg, Matej Lancaric⁠

Special guest: Massimo Caroli

https://www.linkedin.com/in/massimocaroli/

https://maf.ad/

Join our slack channel here: https://join.slack.com/t/two-and-half-gamers/shared_invite/zt-2um8eguhf-c~H9idcxM271mnPzdWbipg

Chapters

00:00 Rewarded UA Strategy Question

01:18 Podcast Intro

01:50 Max From MAF Introduction

03:20 What Rewarded UA Actually Is

04:00 Why Studios Are Investing In It

05:20 Privacy Changes And UA Diversification

06:40 Economic Trends In Rewarded Apps

07:46 Why Offer Walls Had A Bad Reputation

09:05 The Shift To Playtime Rewards

10:00 Monetization And Game Economy Challenges

11:00 Airline Loyalty Case Study

13:00 Rewarded Playtime On iOS

15:00 Why Playtime Rewards Work Better

16:00 ROI Comparison vs Traditional UA

18:00 Building Player Habits

19:30 Monetization Setup For Rewarded UA

21:00 Best Genres For Offer Walls

23:00 Games That Should Avoid Offer Walls

24:30 Offer Wall Monetization Benchmarks

26:00 When Studios Should Implement Offer Walls

28:00 Case Study: TapNation ROI Results

30:00 How To Launch Rewarded UA

32:00 Scaling Across Multiple Offer Wall Networks

34:00 LiveOps Events & Super Bowl Tournament

36:30 Future Of Offer Walls & Loyalty Systems

39:30 DSPs And Offer Wall Aggregation

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Matej Lancaric

User Acquisition & Creatives Consultant

⁠https://lancaric.me

Felix Braberg

Ad monetization consultant

⁠https://www.felixbraberg.com

Jakub Remiar

Game design consultant

⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/jakubremiar

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Hit the Subscribe button on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple!

Please share feedback and comments - matej@lancaric.me

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If you are interested in getting UA tips every week on Monday, visit ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠lancaric.substack.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ & sign up for the Brutally Honest newsletter by Matej Lancaric

Do you have UA questions nobody can answer? Ask ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Matej AI⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ - the First UA AI in the gaming industry! https://lancaric.me/matej-ai

📈​🤌 Why studios now spend 40% on Rewarded UA?

two &amp; a half gamers

📈​🤌 Why studios now spend 40% on Rewarded UA?

📈🤌 Why studios now spend 40% on Rewarded UA?

two & a half gamers

📈🤌 Why studios now spend 40% on Rewarded UA?