How to Create Your First Playable Ad in 10 Minutes

You don't need a game developer. You don't need a creative agency. You don't need to write a single line of code. This is a step-by-step walkthrough of creating a fully functional, campaign-ready playable ad using Hookin, from opening the site to exporting for your ad network. The whole thing takes about 10 minutes.

If you've been curious about playable ads but assumed they required weeks of development or a specialized studio, this tutorial will change that assumption. (If you're still weighing whether to build playable ads yourself with raw AI or use a platform, read our comparison first.)

Let's walk through it.

Step 1: Sign Up on Hookin

Go to hookin.io and click through to app.hookin.io. Sign up for a free account using your email or Google login. No credit card required. You'll land on your dashboard immediately. No onboarding wizard, no waiting for account activation.

Step 2: Create a New Project

Click "Create New Project" on your dashboard. You'll see two options:

• AI Playable. Describe a game concept in plain text, and AI generates a fully playable game for you.
• Video-to-Playable. Convert an existing video ad into a playable experience. (We'll cover this workflow in a separate guide.)

For this tutorial, select AI Playable. This is the fastest path to a working playable ad.

Step 3: Describe Your Game

You'll see a text prompt field. This is where you describe the game you want. The AI will interpret your description and generate a complete 2D Canvas game from it. Write in plain English. No technical jargon needed.

The key is to be specific about three things: the core mechanic (what the player does), the visual theme (what it looks like), and the feedback loop (what happens when the player succeeds). Here are three examples across different industries:

Gaming

"A match-3 puzzle game with colorful gems, tap to swap adjacent gems, match 3 or more to score points"

This works because it specifies the mechanic (tap to swap), the visual (colorful gems), and the goal (match 3 to score). The AI knows exactly what kind of game to build.

E-commerce

"A scratch-card game where users scratch to reveal discount percentages, exciting animations on big discounts"

Scratch cards are effective for e-commerce because they tie into the reveal/reward psychology that drives engagement. Specifying "exciting animations on big discounts" tells the AI to add visual feedback that reinforces the user's desire to tap through to your store.

Fintech

"A coin-catching game where coins fall from the top, tap to collect them into a piggy bank, show savings growing"

The savings metaphor maps directly to what a fintech app offers. The "show savings growing" detail gives the AI a visual goal state to build toward.

Step 4: Wait for AI Generation

After you submit your prompt, the AI starts generating your game. This takes roughly 2 minutes. What's happening behind the scenes: the AI is writing a complete 2D Canvas game, including the game loop, rendering, input handling, scoring, and animations, all from your text description.

When generation finishes, you'll see your playable ad loaded in the editor with a live preview. The game is already functional. You can tap, play, and interact with it immediately.

Step 5: Refine with Chat Editing

Your first generation will be close, but rarely perfect. This is where Hookin's chat-based editing shines. Instead of re-prompting from scratch or editing code manually, you type natural language commands and the AI updates the game in place.

Here are five examples of the kind of edits you can make:

1. "Make the background darker" adjusts the game's color palette without touching game logic or mechanics.
2. "Speed up the falling objects" modifies the velocity parameters so the game feels faster and more challenging.
3. "Add a countdown timer" introduces a visible timer that counts down, adding urgency to the gameplay.
4. "Make the gems bigger and add a sparkle effect when they match" changes the visual scale and adds particle feedback on successful actions.
5. "Change the score display to show in the top-right corner" repositions UI elements within the game canvas.

Each edit preserves everything else about the game: mechanics, scoring, existing visuals. You're iterating, not rebuilding. Most edits apply in seconds. Stack as many rounds of editing as you need until the game feels right.

Step 6: Configure with the Inspector Panel

The Inspector panel sits alongside your game preview and has three tabs: Game Layout, Sound, and Endcard. This is where you turn a game into an ad.

Game Layout Tab

The Game Layout tab controls how your CTA (call-to-action) button appears during gameplay. You have 8 layout templates to choose from:

• Classic. CTA centered at the bottom of the screen. The standard placement most users expect.
• Left-side. CTA positioned on the left edge, useful when your game's action happens on the right.
• Minimal. Small, unobtrusive CTA that stays out of the way during active gameplay.
• Top-center. CTA at the top center, good for games with bottom-heavy interaction.
• Bottom-left. Anchored to the bottom-left corner.
• Bottom-right. Anchored to the bottom-right corner.
• Top-bar. Full-width bar at the top of the screen with the CTA integrated.
• Bottom-bar. Full-width bar at the bottom of the screen with the CTA integrated.

For each template, you can customize the CTA button text (e.g., "Download Now," "Play Free," "Shop Now"), button color, and text color. Pick the template that works best with your game's visual layout. You want the CTA visible but not covering the core gameplay area.

Sound Tab

The Sound tab lets you add background music to your playable ad. You can browse and select from available background music tracks, adjust the volume level, and toggle mute on or off. Audio in playable ads can meaningfully change the experience. A well-matched track adds polish. But keep in mind that many ad environments start muted, so your ad should work without sound too.

Endcard Tab

The Endcard is the screen users see after the game ends. It's your conversion moment, the screen that drives installs, clicks, or sign-ups. You have 8 endcard templates:

• Centered. Logo, title, and CTA stacked in the center. Clean and direct.
• Minimal. Stripped-down design with just the essentials.
• Banner. Wide banner-style layout.
• Top-banner. Banner positioned at the top with content below.
• Compact. Space-efficient layout for when you want the game visible behind the endcard.
• Hero. Large, bold design that dominates the screen.
• Bottom-stack. Content stacked at the bottom, leaving the top for visual impact.
• Cinematic. Full-screen, immersive endcard design.

For each template, you can configure: your app logo (upload an image), the title text, the CTA button (text, color, link), and the background (color or image). Spend time on this screen. It's the last thing users see before deciding whether to tap through.

Step 7: Set Up the Loading Screen

The loading screen is what users see while your playable ad loads in the ad network's environment. It's a small detail that matters more than you'd think. A branded loading screen looks professional, while a blank white screen or generic spinner looks cheap.

Open the Loading Screen modal and configure:

• Logo. Upload your brand or app logo.
• Background color. Match your brand colors.
• Animation type. Choose how the loading indicator behaves.
• Duration. Set how long the loading screen displays.

Keep it simple. The loading screen should feel like a natural lead-in to the game, not a separate experience.

Step 8: Preview on Different Devices

Before exporting, preview your playable ad in the embedded phone mockup in the editor. You can switch between different device sizes to see how your game, CTA placement, and endcard look across screen dimensions.

Things to check during preview:

• Does the CTA button overlap with gameplay elements?
• Is the endcard readable on smaller screens?
• Does the game's tap target area feel right?
• Does the loading screen transition smoothly into the game?

If anything looks off, go back and adjust. Chat-edit the game, switch layout templates, or resize elements in the Inspector. Iteration is fast, so don't settle on the first version.

Step 9: Export for Your Ad Network

This is the final step. Click Export and select the ad networks you want to target. Hookin supports:

• Google Ads
• Meta (Facebook/Instagram)
• TikTok & Pangle
• AppLovin
• Unity
• IronSource
• Mintegral
• Vungle
• AdMob
• Moloco

You can select one or multiple platforms. When you hit export, Hookin's pipeline runs through four stages: it validates your ad against the target network's requirements, optimizes assets and code for performance, adapts the output to each platform's specific format (single HTML, ZIP bundle, MRAID version, CTA callback pattern), and bundles everything into ready-to-upload files.

Each network has different technical requirements: different file formats, different APIs, different compliance rules. (For the specifics on each network, see our detailed guides for Google Ads, Meta, Unity & ironSource, and AppLovin.) Hookin handles all of it. You don't need to know MRAID versions, ZIP structure requirements, or CTA callback patterns. You select the networks, and the pipeline delivers compliant exports.

Download your exports and upload them to your ad network dashboard. You're live.

Tips for Writing Better Prompts

The quality of your playable ad starts with your prompt. What makes a prompt effective, and what doesn't:

What works

• Specific mechanics: "Tap to swap adjacent gems" is better than "a puzzle game." The AI needs to know what the player physically does.
• Visual descriptions: "Colorful gems on a dark background" gives the AI a clear art direction. Without it, you get defaults.
• Success feedback: "Matched gems explode with sparkle effects" tells the AI what happens when the player does the right thing. This is what makes a game feel satisfying.
• A clear goal state: "Score points by matching" or "collect coins into a piggy bank." The AI needs a win condition to build toward.

What doesn't work

• Vague descriptions: "A fun game" or "something engaging" gives the AI nothing concrete to build. You'll get a generic result.
• Too many mechanics at once: "A game with matching, shooting, building, racing, and collecting" will produce a confused output. Pick one core mechanic and describe it well.
• Platform-specific instructions: "Make it work on Unity" or "add MRAID support." The AI generates the game; the export pipeline handles platform compliance. Don't mix the two.
• Performance requests: "Make it load in under 1 second." Optimization happens in the export pipeline, not at the game design level.

Think of your prompt as a creative brief, not a technical spec. Describe the experience you want the player to have, and let the AI handle implementation.

What to Do After Your First Playable Ad

You've created and exported your first playable ad. Now what?

Run A/B Tests with Variations

Your first version is a starting point, not a final product. Create variations by changing the game mechanic, the visual theme, or the endcard design. Upload multiple versions to your ad network and let performance data tell you what works. Some things you can vary quickly:

• Swap endcard templates (try hero vs. cinematic vs. minimal)
• Change CTA text ("Download Now" vs. "Play Free" vs. "Try It")
• Adjust game difficulty via chat editing ("make the game easier" or "slow down the timer")
• Try different color schemes ("change the color palette to blue and gold")

Go Multi-Platform

If you started with one ad network, expand. Export the same playable ad for additional platforms: Google Ads, Meta, TikTok, AppLovin, Unity, and others. Each network reaches different audiences and has different cost structures. A game mechanic that underperforms on one network might be a winner on another. Hookin handles the per-network export requirements, so going multi-platform takes seconds, not days.

Iterate Based on Data

Once your ads are running, look at engagement metrics from your ad network dashboards. Are users completing the game? Are they tapping the endcard CTA? Where are they dropping off? Use those signals to guide your next round of chat edits. If users drop off early, the game might be too hard or too slow. Try "make the first 5 seconds easier" or "add more visual feedback on the first tap." If they play but don't convert, the endcard might need work. Try a different template or a more compelling CTA.

Traditional Process vs. Hookin

To put all of this in perspective, here's what creating a playable ad looks like with the traditional approach versus what you just did:

Step	Traditional Process	With Hookin
Game concept	Brief to creative team, rounds of review	Write a text prompt
Game development	Developer builds from scratch (1-3 weeks)	AI generates in ~2 minutes
Iteration	Code changes, QA, rebuild (days per round)	Chat-edit in seconds
CTA & endcard	Custom implementation per network	Select from templates in Inspector
Loading screen	Build custom loading UI	Configure in modal
Sound	Implement audio with unlock handling	Pick a track, set volume
Ad network compliance	Manual per-network adaptation (weeks)	Select platforms, one-click export
Multi-platform export	Separate builds per network	Select multiple networks, single export
Total time	3-8 weeks	~10 minutes

The traditional process involves multiple specialists, multiple tools, and multiple rounds of back-and-forth. With Hookin, one person with no coding experience can go from idea to campaign-ready export in 10 minutes.

Start Building

You've seen the full workflow. Nine steps, one tool, 10 minutes. The best way to understand it is to do it. Sign up for free on app.hookin.io, describe a game, and have your first playable ad ready before your coffee gets cold.