One common 'mistake' I see with clients? Rejecting ad monetization (Interstitial & RV) without fully considering the tradeoffs.

Some common framings, and my devil's advocate 2c

"Our plan is just IAP monetization. If that doesn't work, we'll consider ads." - Game Team

Me: From a business and first-principles perspective, deliberately choosing $0 revenue from 95%+ of users seems suboptimal. You CAN do better than that.

"We're worried about ads driving away spenders." - Game Team

Me: Segment the audience. Delay interstitials in T1 Geos until D3-D7 by driving self-selection with a juicy starter offer. 'No ads for anyone' seems unlikely to be the optimal tuning.

"Our top-grossing competitor doesn't have ads." - Game Team

Me: Even if your top-grossing competitor is ROAS-positive with $0 revenue from 95% of users, I wouldn't conclude that this is the best strategy for YOU, in the current UA environment.

"We'll probably need ads, but we want to really dial-in our IAP monetization first." - Game Team

Are you sure it makes sense to prioritize a 5% ARPU lift over a 15-40% ARPU lift? If you take an ROI-first approach to feature selection, you will likely find that first-pass ad monetization tops your list, since it generates revenue from 95% of your users (non-spenders).

It's worth drawing a distinction between RV and Interstitials since the latter is what tends to push developers' comfort zones.

I find that teams often resist Interstitials for personal / philosophical, rather than business reasons, e.g. "As a player, I hate forced ads."

While not without merit, these feelings (which, FWIW, I share) don't necessarily reflect 100% of your target audience. With a little segmentation, you may be surprised how little retention and IAP revenue are affected by Interstitials.

If I could leave skeptical studios with one recommendation it's to test and let the data inform the decision: a small-scale test will bring light to the tradeoffs involved.

NOTE: I have no financial incentive (other than monetization growth for my clients) to push ad monetization, so, of course, you should make the best decision for your product and lifecycle stage.