From hypercasual success to hybrid growth: The evolution of State Connect

• Azur Games focused on evolving existing hits instead of launching from scratch.
• State Connect is returning to peak performance after its highs in 2021 to 2022.
• A few changes helped double the share of in-app purchases up to 15%.

Yuriy Tsoy is product manager at Azur Games.

These days, especially in mobile game development, and even more so in hypercasual, it’s incredibly hard to launch a game from scratch and break into the top charts. 

It’s usually smarter to develop existing projects long-term, especially if you already have titles that perform well and have a loyal audience. We’ve got hypercasual projects that've been performing steadily for over five years and still get regular updates.

When State Connect, a hypercasual strategy whose popularity peaked around 2021 to 2022, first launched, it didn’t include any hybrid mechanics. But its solid, retention-driven core gameplay made us confident enough to experiment - we wanted to add a second gameplay layer, refresh the visuals, and introduce new systems to support hybrid monetisation.

Spoiler: There were several failed iterations and hypotheses that didn’t pan out. At some point, we even considered shutting the project down, but we couldn’t shake the feeling that the core still had untapped potential.

So we decided to test a few more hypotheses, and it paid off. The project is now steadily evolving in a hybrid direction, and according to the metrics, State Connect is gradually returning to its 2022 peak. At the same time, the share of in-app purchases has reached the highest level in the game’s history.

State Connect is a calm, pleasant road-building manager. You have a map of a country or a state, and your task is to connect cities with roads, creating a transport network. Cars drive along these routes, generating in-game currency. The gameplay feels relaxed, there’s no rush or sense of running out of time.

A few years ago, that perfectly matched the hypercasual formula: meditative pacing mixed with a light challenge. Add some appealing visuals, and we got solid metrics for that time.

Our first test showed a CPI of $0.30 in the U.S. (and only $0.03 globally), an average playtime of about 18 minutes (which is great for a hypercasual), and R1 around 36–37%.

The main issue at launch was content shortage. To keep players engaged longer, we adjusted the balance and progression. Monetisation came through interstitials and a simple in-app system for upgrading car parameters with in-game currency.

In that form, the project performed well both in user acquisition and revenue. In January, February, and March 2022, it generated over $1 million per month.

Updating the game for 2025

Over three years after launch, the market had changed significantly, and it became clear that State Connect no longer fully matched current expectations, even though it still had a loyal audience.

We identified several key bottlenecks to build a roadmap for hypotheses and updates:

• The game lacked depth. Long-time players had completed the entire map and didn’t know what to do next.
• The visuals felt outdated.
• In-app monetisation was underdeveloped, with no mechanics to expand it.

We started working in all these directions at once. But in terms of visuals, we quickly realised most feedback was subjective. We consulted artists who shared professional recommendations on improving contrast, shading, and other small details.

We spent resources polishing these elements, but testing showed little to no effect on metrics. In simple games like this, even primitive visuals can perform better than something overpolished. We realised that running separate visual tests for State Connect simply wasn’t worth it. 

So we revised our workflow: instead of spending time on standalone visual experiments, we focused on adding new gameplay features and monetisation improvements, and updated visuals came packaged within those bigger updates. That way, players got fresh content and a refreshed look all at once, and we used our resources more effectively.

Updates that boosted the metrics

The first update that truly moved the metrics was the car upgrade merge mechanic.

Originally, the game had three buttons at the bottom of the screen - upgrade speed, experience, and profit. We replaced that with a small merge-based progression system: players could buy cars and combine them. 

For example, merging three level-1 cars produced a stronger level-2 model. This created a fun “mini-merge game inside the game,” and players loved it. 

All key metrics improved noticeably, and rewarded ads performed much better since players could get missing cars for merges through ads.

The next success came from monetisation. As we moved toward a hybrid monetisation model, we introduced a starter offer - a one-time in-app purchase shown early in the game.

It’s a low-priced offer, just one dollar, but with relatively great value for the player. It’s available for 24 hours and performed extremely well. Players saw a cheap but worthwhile deal and thought, “Why not?” After that first purchase, their loyalty and conversion into second and later purchases increased noticeably.

We also added tickets, which players can buy and use instead of watching rewarded ads. They didn’t perform as well on Android, but iOS purchases grew by about 5%. Not huge, but still a good sign.

Another important addition was inventory - passive items that provide stat bonuses. Essentially, it’s a mini-gacha: players open chests, get items of different rarities, and upgrade them. Chests can be bought with hard currency or earned through ads.

We also introduced several good tweaks to slow down progression, since content consumption is always too fast. Previously, when a new region was unlocked, players could immediately start building roads there. 

Now, an excavator icon appears with a countdown timer, which can be skipped by watching an ad. This simple mechanic effectively slowed progression, reduced content burnout, and even boosted monetisation.

Just these few changes helped double the share of in-app purchases compared to 2022, up to 15%. 

Rewarded ad views also increased: from an average of one per user on day one to three or four. It might not sound like much, but that difference allowed us to kick off user acquisition and scale traffic.

Another strong update that impacted both retention and monetisation was a big gold reward ad. Players often ran out of coins for building roads or upgrading houses, so they eagerly watched these ads to instantly get several thousand coins.

In summary, the best strategic decision was to focus on strengthening the existing core instead of drifting too far with additional gameplay layers.

At one point, we tried to build “a game within the game,” even though our core mechanic wasn’t all that developed yet. We added a city-building feature, where players could switch to a separate isometric view and construct houses for bonuses. It seemed interesting on paper, but in practice, it didn’t deliver much value.

Listening - and actually hearing - the players

Later, we decided to develop new features around the core mechanics, just like with the car merge system. We also expanded the number of city upgrade levels, from three to six, and each increase showed a positive effect on metrics.

By studying our audience, we realised that the best direction forward is to improve the main gameplay loop without overcomplicating it with extra systems.

There was even a funny case: players kept asking for an option to remove already built roads. We added it, and immediately saw a 5% to 10% drop across almost all key metrics. Turns out, despite the feedback, most players actually enjoy connecting cities in every possible way and creating intricate road networks.

So now, when we tweak the game’s logic, we do it gradually. For example, we might introduce colour-coded roads, where red cars only travel to red houses, green cars to green ones, and so on.

Step by step, by improving the core without straying from the original concept, and without scattering resources, we managed to reignite player interest and secured the room to add several successful monetisation updates.