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CSR Racing App Generates $12 Million Per Month!

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I’m addicted to CSR Racing, and have been playing it for the past month or so. The game itself is free for your iPhone or iPad, but it utilizes a freemium model – The game monetizes through in-app purchases where players can spend currency they buy in the game.

It’s an interesting business model, and based on the $12 Million a month they’re generating from CSR Racing, it’s obviously working! But MAN is it frustrating as the end-user..

For those of you who haven’t played CSR Racing, here’s a description of the game:

Race your dream car in the ultimate test: a drag race along deserted city streets. CSR Racing combines stunning, high-fidelity graphics with addictive gameplay to create a new type of racing experience.

Upgrade your Audi R8, BMW M3 or Chevy Corvette with turbos, nitrous injection and aerodynamic tweaks to beat tougher and tougher opponents. And when you’re ready, it’s time to challenge the crews that rule the city.

So basically, you buy a car, races against competitors to earn more money, which you then use to upgrade your car, so you can beat the next wave of competitors. After you complete each stage, you have to buy a faster car, and start the whole process over again.

It doesn’t sound very exciting, but it’s REALLY addicting. It’s like living out the Fast and the Furious movie. The game itself is very similar to Drag Racing, but with stunning graphics and more of a “storyline”.

Where the money comes in is this – Some people might not want to grind out a number of race wins in order to trick out their car, so they’ll pony up real cash to upgrade their virtual cars. In addition, you can buy coins to speed up the game. Rather than wait for 60 minutes for your car to get refueled, you can buy 2 coins and fill up immediately.

I’m a cheap bastard, so I’ve never spent a dime on the game. But I can understand how people can get caught up in the game and make an impulse purchase, as it’s incredibly frustrating when you run out of gas and have to wait FOREVER to refuel.

Russian hacker Alexey V. Borodin built an in-app purchase hack because he was getting fed up with CSR Racing! “I was very angry to see that CSR Racing developer taking money from me every single breath.”

NaturalMotion chief executive Torsten Reil disagrees. “We tried to monetize many parts of the game, but not too aggressively. We think this is a more sustainable and defensible approach that’s ended up working.”

What do you think of the freemium model? Is it the wave of the future? Are paid apps dead?

Zander Chance is a technology nut who is always first in line to try out the latest tech gadgets. He also has been an active affiliate marketer for the past 15 years, and he writes about his adventures in that on his blog.

2 Comments

2 Comments

  1. Sujeet

    August 27, 2012 at 4:38 pm

    Have you updated to their latest version? They’re now junking up the game with a slew of annoying ads. Guess $12Mil/month isn’t enough for them!

  2. Sunny

    March 21, 2016 at 6:09 pm

    I have played CSR for just one weekend and already lost €10 on it. Being a former race gamer addict, which almost blew my marriage, I recognize an enslaving addicting money spending game anywhere….yet it took me 10€ and a whole weekend to discover this in CSR. It is sneaky and profits from the weaker impulsive gamers. There is no other way to describe this game than an impulsive spending trigger to reach the games goals in a realistic time period that otherwise would last forever in the gready mind of the gamer. The low barrier to spend your PayPal earnings on this hooking race game is a dangerous threat for your bank account and can easily seduce one into grand spending for quick beneficial goodies that are necessary in ginormous amounts to complete the game. Don’t let it get to you and protect yourselves by writing all your PayPal money back to your bank account and deleting this sneaky money pushing addictive immoral game from your harddrive.

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