The order of operations flipped while I wasn’t looking. We used to build the game, then work out how to sell it. Now the selling decides the building: micro-moments instead of marathon sessions, because long sessions quietly cost you retention; creative proven with a few AI stills and a tiny test budget before a line of feature code; everything measured against what a player is worth on day thirty, not day one. The ad network learns on your creative — so design things it can learn on.