Shadowverse Worlds beyond: Creative Performance Refresh
Refreshing a fatigued ad campaign with character-driven concepts.
OVERVIEW
Shadowverse: Worlds Beyond had experienced strong advertising success, but recent campaigns hit a plateau as prolonged asset repetition led to audience fatigue. With ad performance dipping and acquisition costs rising, a total visual refresh was needed to reignite engagement and scale campaign reach.
I was appointed to audit the current advertising ecosystem, identifying technical bottlenecks and performance leaks to develop a comprehensive recovery plan.
CHALLENGE
Following a high-volume media campaign for Shadowverse: Worlds Beyond, existing ad creatives hit a performance plateau. Audience overexposure to redundant visual themes led to severe creative fatigue, driving down click-through rates (CTR) and inflating customer acquisition costs (CAC). The campaign required an immediate strategic pivot to cut through platform noise, re-engage core card-game audiences, and capture broader gaming demographics.
STRATEGY
To pivot Shadowverse: Worlds Beyond away from redundant ad concepts and reverse performance decay, I led a strategic audit to identify visual fatigue triggers and uncaptured market opportunities:
IMPACT
8% ROI
Refreshes drove traffic and converted new users.
Renewed Contract
Successful refresh led the client to extend its contract.
Modular Ads
The new design made it easy to adjust and insert new assets.
Gap Analysis & Trend Forecasting:
Analyzed high-performing gaming marketing trends, identifying that audiences responded strongly to interactive visual hooks, character contrast, and clear tactical showcases rather than generic gameplay loops.
Thematic Deconstruction:
Cataloged two years of campaign data to map asset fatigue cycles. The audit revealed that standard card frames and UI-heavy battle screens had hit severe audience saturation, driving down click-through rates (CTR) and inflating customer acquisition costs (CAC).
EXECUTION
I led the transition from tired gameplay assets to these new creative pillars, acting as the bridge between strategy and execution:
RESULTS
Initial Market Validation: Launching the pilot set featuring the Character Select and Card Strategy concepts halted the ongoing performance decline caused by creative fatigue within the first week. Immediate engagement lifts gave the strategic green light to scale production across all three new visual pillars.
Modular Design Scalability: To support rapid creative iteration without inflating production timelines, I established a flexible, modular asset template system. Separating character cutouts, UI overlays, and localized copy into reusable layers allowed our design team to quickly test new hero combinations and swap out fatigued elements in minutes.
Tripled Impression Reach: By the second week, the new creative concepts achieved a major breakthrough in campaign reach. Ad impressions surged from a 3% baseline to 9%
Measurable ROI Lift & Contract Renewal: The new creative direction generated an 8% ROI increase, proving that character-centric storytelling and tactical card showcases converted higher-quality players more efficiently than generic gameplay footage. This sustained turn-around led the client to extend and renew their campaign contract.
The "New Horizon" Showcase:
Hosted a hands-on workshop with the design team, presenting high-fidelity mood boards and motion references for game character select screens.
The "New Horizon" Showcase:
Showcasing more cool looking characters rather than the typical cute characters
The "New Horizon" Showcase:
Paring the scary hulking characters again a cute character in a faceoff screen.
