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Anurag Garg, Director, RummyCulture Talks Role Of Data Science in RMG Industry

Anurag Garg is the Director of Data Science at RummyCulture. With over 3.2 crore rummy players, it is one of the most popular Indian rummy game apps in India. RummyCulture also holds the Guinness World Record for hosting the world’s largest online rummy tournament.

He joined the company more than two years ago and has diverse experience from his work stints in different businesses and sectors, including one at Microsoft. Gutshot Magazine interviewed him about topics like his interest in the game and what RummyCulture is doing to change the industry. Here is a transcript of that conversation.

• Can you tell us about your journey in data science and what led you to join the real money gaming industry?

My journey in Data Science started during my master’s program at Texas A&M University, College Station, where I developed a strong interest in Statistics and Machine Learning. I began my career in the SaaS industry, where I focused on product optimization and customer experience. The move to the real money gaming (RMG) industry was driven by my desire to tackle the unique and complex challenges inherent in this field. With the enormity and granularity of the data that is available—players’ in-game and in-app actions—there’s immense potential to develop models that not only unearth the underlying player’s behavioural pattern but also answer the ‘why’ behind those actions. Given the meaningful impact that can be created by enhancing players’ overall gaming experience, RMG is a highly exciting space for any data science enthusiast.

• You have experience working in diverse companies, from SaaS to now a real-money gaming portal. What’s the one unique aspect of working in both?

In SaaS, the primary focus is on optimizing product features and improving customer satisfaction based on usage patterns and feedback. It’s about leveraging data to enhance the software experience. On the other hand, working on an app such as RummyCulture, which offers skill-based real-money games, involves a much deeper analysis to understand the player’s gameplay and in-app behaviour. The data must be analyzed in real-time to provide personalized experiences and maintain an engaging and secure gaming environment.

• How does data science influence strategic decision-making in a real-money gaming company?

Data science is integral to strategic decision-making in a company (or industry) engaged in operating platforms that offer skill-based real-money games. It helps gain valuable insights into complex player behaviour, optimizing game mechanics and marketing and business strategies. Additionally, predictive analytics can be leveraged to deeply understand player preferences and forecast future behaviours, helping businesses and products design and tailor personalized promotions and product journeys, respectively.

 

 

 

 

 

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• What are some strategies RummyCulture has implemented using data science?

At RummyCulture, data science is the backbone of decision-making and the shaping of our strategies. We use advanced machine learning models to assist our players in their learning and skill development journeys in Rummy. Notably, our fairplay-violation (FPV) detection and prevention algorithms monitor players’ in-game actions in real-time to proactively identify and prevent any anomalous player behaviour, enabling timely and appropriate actions. All these initiatives are geared towards building trust, ensuring player protection, and creating a safe and secure gameplay environment for our players.

•  How do you use data to understand and predict user behaviour in gaming?

We analyze various data points, including players’ in-game actions and engagement levels, to build comprehensive player profiles. Our machine-learning algorithms help us identify patterns and predict future behaviours, such as the likelihood of a player exhibiting signs of irresponsible gaming. By identifying early signs of potential issues, we can implement responsible gaming measures, such as sending alerts, offering self-exclusion options, or providing access to support resources. These proactive measures are designed to protect our players’ well-being and ensure a healthy balance between gaming and personal life. Furthermore, the insights gained enable our product teams to tailor our offerings in such a way that helps maintain a safe and engaging gaming environment for all our players.

• How do you personalize the gaming experience and enhance player engagement and retention?

From our experience, we observed that our players are always seeking more challenging Rummy formats. In response, we recently launched a new tournament format called the Powerplay Tournament. This innovative format requires players to leverage their existing skills while also developing new strategies, offering a fresh and stimulating challenge. We observed that players participating in the Powerplay Tournament demonstrated higher engagement and better retention.

• Can you provide an example of a significant decision or strategy driven by data insights at RummyCulture?

Rummy is a game of skill and strategy, and our data indicates that players who upskill naturally also show higher levels of engagement. As one of the leading Rummy platforms, it is imperative for us to understand our players’ skill levels and make necessary interventions to assist them in their upskilling journey.

On our platforms, we have developed models that analyze players’ game moves in real-time and determine their Skill levels. This allows us to create tailored learning and skill development journeys for each player, resulting in increased engagement and an enhanced playing experience.

• What are some of the biggest challenges you face when analyzing data in the context of real money gaming, and how do you overcome them?

We have over a million rummy games that are played on all our platforms daily. One of the biggest challenges is to process, analyze, curate relevant features, and then generate predictions in real-time over that vast amount of game data. We have developed robust, scalable, and state-of-the-art data science models that meticulously look into each and every player’s in-game move in real time and generate the respective optimal actions. The output from these models is used to power our pipelines that are used to design learning and skill development journeys for our Rummy players.

• Can you list specific tools or technologies effective in overcoming these challenges?

We heavily use open-source frameworks and Cloud infrastructure to process the raw data at scale and generate predictions. We utilize ‘Apache Kafka’ for real-time data processing and ‘Spark’ for managing large datasets. Machine learning libraries like ‘TensorFlow’ and ‘Keras’ are essential for building our predictive models. We use ‘Amazon Sagemaker’ for end-to-end management of our deep learning models, including development, training, deployment, monitoring, and continuous integration/continuous deployment (CI/CD). For observability, we rely on monitoring and logging solutions like ‘Amazon CloudWatch’, which allow us to track model performance and system health in real-time. This comprehensive tech stack running on a scalable cloud infrastructure enables us to process large volumes of data effectively and generate actionable insights swiftly and in real-time.

• What emerging trends or technologies in data science do you believe will have the biggest impact on the real money gaming industry, and is RummyCulture ready for them?

I believe that advancements in Generative AI (GenAI) will significantly impact the real money gaming (RMG) industry in the coming years. Using GenAI, game studios can dynamically create engaging and story-driven game-specific campaigns where players progress through a narrative that evolves based on their decisions and outcomes in the campaigns. In the game of Rummy, picking a card could represent gathering information or resources within the story; making a Pure Sequence could represent forming the right alliances; and dropping a game might represent retreating or strategically withdrawing from a situation. This adds a layer of storytelling to the game-specific experience, making it more engaging and giving players a sense of progression beyond just winning hands. This can help RMG companies also appeal to a very different set of gaming audiences.

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Also Read: RummyCulture’s ‘SPADENet’ Paper Recognized At IEEE AI 2024 Conference

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GenAI can also be harnessed to automatically generate tailored content, such as promotional materials, emails, or social media posts, based on individual player profiles, preferences, and in-game achievements. Another exciting use case is generating personalized game summaries and commentary in post-game reviews, where GenAI discusses the player’s and opponents’ decisions and offers insights customized to their current strategy and skill level, making the game more interactive and educational.

As a market leader, RummyCulture is actively investing in understanding how leveraging GenAI can further enhance our players’ overall gaming experience.

• What is RummyCulture’s 5-year plan in the industry? How do you plan to achieve it?

RummyCulture’s 5-year plan focuses on building a larger player ecosystem for the game of Rummy. We plan to expand our user base, enhance the gaming experience, and continue to promote responsible gaming. We aim to reach every nook and corner of India, making Rummy a game of the masses.

To achieve this, we will continue to innovate and leverage advanced data science techniques for hyper-personalized experiences. Creating learning and skill development journeys for new and existing players is a huge step in that direction. To further boost Trust with our players, we will continue to invest in our Fair Play initiatives. Strategic partnerships and investments in new game formats that attract different player personas will also be explored as growth levers.

Our vision includes providing thrills and entertainment to our players and investing in initiatives that help players belonging to different strata of society develop real-life skills through this game.

We recently published our work, SPADENet, at IEEE CAI 2024 in Singapore. SPADENet proposes a generic architecture to profile and benchmark players’ skills in any skill-based card game. Additionally, we are publishing our findings and insights as a series of Medium blogs here.

For more such news and updates on RummyCulture and the rummy industry, stay tuned to Gutshot Magazine and follow us on our social media handles. 

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