How Futureplay exceeded global ROAS targets by scaling rewarded UA with Mistplay and AppsFlyer

Overview

• Futureplay, a leading mobile game studio with more than one billion cumulative downloads, set out to scale user acquisition beyond its established Tier 1 markets while maintaining strong return on ad spend (ROAS) and attribution clarity.
• As the company expanded its media mix and entered new geographies, increasing signal loss, attribution complexity, and channel fragmentation made it more difficult to identify which campaigns were driving profitable growth.
• Futureplay partnered with Mistplay to unlock new rewarded inventory while leveraging AppsFlyer’s ROI measurement and fraud protection solutions to validate performance, optimize spend, and confidently scale acquisition.
• The strategy paid off, with D7 and D30 ROAS exceeding targets in both established and new markets, while AppsFlyer’s Receipt Validation solution further improved the quality of rewarded traffic by eliminating fraudulent purchase signals.

Background

Futureplay is a Helsinki-based mobile game studio with a vision to transform the way mobile games are played around the world. Founded in 2015, the studio built its reputation on casual and merge-style titles that blend approachable mechanics with deep progression. Today, their portfolio of nine titles, including Idle Farming Empire and Merge Gardens, has surpassed one billion cumulative downloads worldwide.

Challenge

After a decade of building a strong presence in Tier 1 markets for casual and merge games, Futureplay was looking for ways to take their growth to the next level. But with new scale always comes the risk of sacrificing ROAS through weakened UA efficiency and quality.  

Additionally, as Futureplay pushed beyond their existing media mix, they ran into the pitfalls that often come with scaling, as signal loss, attribution complexity, and fragmentation across channels made it increasingly difficult to get a clear picture of what was actually working. 

As they approached this new stage of growth, priorities were clear: diversifying acquisition channels and expanding their geo mix while simultaneously protecting ROAS and having the attribution clarity to know what was actually driving results. 

Solution

Futureplay Games decided to leverage the Mistplay Audience Network due to its strong publisher network and ability to reach new inventory beyond any single rewarded platform. Through continuous optimization and fast iteration on targeting and bidding strategies, Mistplay was able to scale user acquisition globally for Futureplay while keeping their key KPIs intact. New opportunities came in regularly, and when adjustments were needed, the team moved quickly.

But that was only one piece of the puzzle, as scaling across new publishers only works if you can trust what the data is telling you. As Futureplay expanded its media mix, AppsFlyer’s Protect360 Fraud Protection solution gave them the confidence that budgets were reaching real users and that the metrics guiding their decisions were clean. 

With sharper attribution and complete, accurate ROI measurement from AppsFlyer ROI360, they unified performance data by connecting costs to revenue streams at the most granular level. This gave them the confidence to allocate budget quickly and optimize spend where it drives growth the most.

Results

In January 2026, Mistplay scaled Merge Gardens beyond Futureplay’s ROAS targets across all key markets, both new and established. In established geos, D7 ROAS came in 142% above target, while D30 ROAS was 51% above target. In newer markets, where Futureplay had less of a foothold, performance was even better. In Japan, for example, D7 ROAS exceeded the goal by 146%, while D30 ROAS exceeded it by 130%

Rolled out on both iOS and Android in March 2026, AppsFlyer’s Receipt Validation solution had an immediate impact on the quality of rewarded traffic. By eliminating fraudulent and manipulated purchase events, it delivered cleaner, fraud-safe signals, resulting in a noticeable D7 ROAS uplift across several rewarded partners in the weeks following its launch.

„AppsFlyer’s Protect360 gave us the confidence that our budgets were reaching real users. With cleaner data and reliable attribution, we could make faster, better optimization decisions, and the early results from Receipt Validation have only reinforced that.“

– Inna Sceglikova, Senior User Acquisition Manager at Futureplay