PickFu's game concept validation playbook helps you validate a mobile game's mechanics, art direction, features, and overall concept with real players before you commit development resources. This article covers how to start it, additional pre-development questions worth testing, and answers to common questions.

Example result: an art-direction test ranks visual styles by player preference and summarizes the mood each one conveys.

The step-by-step concept-validation playbook — competitive research, core mechanics, art direction, feature priorities, and overall concept validation — now lives in our docs:

👉 Run the step-by-step game concept validation playbook →

Starting it in the app: log into PickFu, find the Playbooks section on your dashboard, and click the concept-validation playbook. You'll get a pre-built project with a link to run each test, plus an AI-powered report across all of them. (More on using playbooks →)

Beyond the core five steps, these tests answer other pre-production questions. Run any of them as standalone tests.

Willingness-to-pay research — understand what players will spend on before committing to a monetization model.
​"What are you most willing to spend money on in a mobile [GENRE] game?"
Poll type: Multi-Select, Ranked, or Open-Ended

IP / license audience validation — for games based on licensed IP, confirm the audience cares about it.
​"Are you a fan of [IP/FRANCHISE]?" followed by "What would you expect in a mobile game based on [IP]?"
Poll type: Survey (Q1 Single Select Yes/No, Q2 Open-Ended)

World / theme selection — test which setting creates the most excitement before world-building begins.
​"If you could start an adventure in one of the following worlds, which would you be MOST excited to explore?"
Poll type: Ranked

Character design preference — identify which character archetypes resonate.
​"Which of these characters would you most want to play as in a mobile [GENRE] game? What appeals to you about them?"
Poll type: Ranked

Read the qualitative feedback before deciding. Low scores usually trace to one of three things: the concept description didn't communicate clearly, the art style mismatched genre expectations, or the core concept isn't resonating. Identify the culprit, revise, and re-test the final validation step before moving forward.

Keep it to 2–3 sentences covering the essentials: genre (what type of game?), core mechanic (how does it play?), and setting (where does it take place?). Avoid jargon and feature lists — describe it the way you'd describe it to a friend who doesn't work in games.

Target the genre your game is entering, then layer in demographic traits (age, gender, spending habits) as needed. For broad casual games, general mobile-gamer targeting works well; for niche genres, be as specific as possible.

100 per step gives solid directional data for pre-development decisions. Use 50 for early-stage tests to save budget, then re-test with 100+ before locking major decisions.

Step 1 (competitive research) works best first since it informs everything after. Steps 2–4 are flexible once you have that foundation. Step 5 (overall concept validation) works best last — it's the final pre-production gate.