Nigerian Deluxe Creation started operations in 2014, as a one-man game development studio, by Edushola (Founder & Team lead). The first game created was a game called App rush, which was developed in 3D, using the Game Maker platform, but the studio has since gone on to develop a slew of other hyper casual titles.

Since 2014 till date, the company has gone on to develop 20+ games and has grown to around 6 people in personnel (mostly freelance).

The most popular game from the studio so far, has been the 2017 release of the game called CHIKE. However, they were quick to understand the difference between just having a popular game on social media and having a popular game that people actually download and play.

The major issue was with downloads and to remedy this issue, they decided to change their approach to the development of games by carefully leveraging trends. In 2018, the company released a game called stickman based on the general stickman trend.

They released this game in series, with the first series titled Stickman: Save your world, which was on a 2D platform. This first installation garnered over 70k+ installs.

They followed this up with another series titled Stickman: Badlandz and this title was inspired by the then popular series titled Into the badlands. This game was also on a 2D platform and featured primitive range weapons, but was also able to garner thousands of downloads.

The third series was Stickman: Magic brawls and this series had the biggest success of all three editions. This edition was able to garner over 200k downloads and was the subject of content creation by YouTubers.

On inspiration needed for games, Edu Shola says:

“If you are a gaming company focusing on casual/hyper-casual games, then trends should be top priority, as that is what people are ready to consume. The advantage of trendy inspired games is less work on the marketing side.“

Edushola

Most of their games rarely relies on trend from Nigeria and on this, Edushola also says:

“Game monetisation for casual and hyper-casual games in general is based on the freemium model and this means that gaming companies mostly make money through in-game ads. Anybody that understands how ads monetisation works, knows that the click per ads in Nigeria is lower than what is obtainable in developed countries”

Essentially, this means that most times, you have to tailor the trendy inspiration to things people from these countries can relate to. To put into perspective, 130 installs from the CHIKE game got the studio about 30 cents, but just 3 downloads in the United States of America (USA) got the company about a dollar.

The downside however is that the relevance of the game is tied to the existence of the trend and so, people in this space have to move very fast. This is something that the studio had to learn over the years.

Aside from leveraging trends, Edushola also recognized the role that content creation played in the success of the stickman Magic Brawl game. A YouTuber outside Africa just picked up the game and started playing it for fun to his subscribers, but this is not the case in Nigeria and most places in Africa.  On this, he said:

“Maybe it has something to do with the type of games made from African gaming studios, but there is no synergy between the development and content creation side. Then again, when you look at games like Fall guys and Among Us, you get to have the feeling that maybe it is not all about the quality from a gameplay standpoint, but maybe the creators are just not aware of the existence of the development community”

With evolving trends in the industry, the company is also looking to intensify their exploration of game creation in 3D, as the company is trying to put the CHIKE game in a 3D world.

On the talent side, the company has received requests from young talents looking to do their industrial training with the studio and so far, the company has been able to retain three individuals that work on different projects. Edushola also recognized the fact that gaming companies like Gamr, Zannoza, Maliyo, Kucheza, Magic carpet and Gidi creative are currently leading the charge in talent development, when it comes to game development.

In 2023, aside from the plan to explore 3D game creation, the company is also looking to finish a fighting game that they are currently working on with David Kimekwe from another game development company called Vector studios. The game was demo-ed at both the Africacomicade and creative fest event and they received positive feedback from the audience at both events.

They hope to foster a strong relationship with the fighting gaming communities in Nigeria/Africa, on the release of this game.

You can follow their works on their website and also on Apple and Google Play store respectively.