The truth is many Game Studios struggle with getting even 2-3 minutes average engagement time for their games.
On our latest game Monkey King - Legend of Hereos we have an average of 23 minutes per active user. This number blew our mind.
We have been building games for the past 15 years and for us our core value is not these fast dopamine kicks (even though they are important), but it is to create a fundamental value for the player in terms of depth to the game itself.
We listen a lot to our players, especially in early stages, the way we have gone about doing that is we have contacted several hundreds of people on IG and asked for honest feedback.
Many times this has given us key insights as to how we've been blind to early bottle necks in the game that makes users fall off. And gradually we have improved on that and removed these blockers for users to stay.
In conclusion, listen a LOT to early players, and ask them especially how you can improve on the first 1-2 minutes of the game. This is where many players drop off if the game is not understandable or interesting enough.