Naavik Gaming Podcast

Guild of Guardians, Immutable’s second major game after Gods Unchained, is one of the most anticipated web3 games of 2024. The game recently pivoted from a real-time RPG to an auto-battler, and is set for a May 15th global release. Guild of Guardians is one of the first games on Immutable’s new ZK-EVM blockchain, which Naavik covered in the January 24, 2024 episode of the podcast with Immutable fo...

In this week's Roundtable, the squad takes a deep dive into the unique atmosphere of this year's Game Developers Conference (GDC), marked by a spirit of camaraderie and innovation amidst widespread industry layoffs. We then pivot to discuss the monumental acquisition of data.ai by Sensor Tower, setting the stage for what could become the definitive source of mobile app data. The conversation heats...

Finding success on Roblox can be very challenging. There are over 20 million experiences created every year, and the play patterns are quite different from their more traditional mobile and console counterparts. That’s why UGC games analyst, David Taylor , sat down with Xiang Shen , the CTO of Century Games, a top 20 mobile publisher and the creators for the recent breakout hit Whiteout Survival,...

After the meteoric rise - and equally meteoric fall - of Axie Infinity, the term “Play-to-Earn” lost much of its cachet, and web3 developers avoided the term throughout the 2022-23 crypto winter. Adjacent concepts such as “Play-and-Earn” or “Play-to-Own” proliferated instead while developers and investors largely ignored the genre, and P2E was effectively declared dead. But not all developers felt...

In this week's Roundtable, the squad dives into the exciting news of a greenlit sequel to the Super Mario Brothers movie, with production once again helmed by Illumination. We speculate on the potential for spinoffs and the broader implications for video game adaptations. The conversation then shifts to Microsoft's landmark recognition of Activision Blizzard's 600-person union, which focuses on qu...

RallyHere builds on the back of years of experience in Live Service, before the term was even coined, as Hi-Rez Studios under the leadership of CEO Stewart Chisam . RallyHere bottles this expertise into a toolset that can provide a huge edge for teams that want to leverage the power of live services in games. Hi-Rez Studios is behind many popular and long running live service games like Smite, Pal...

GRID has seen the value of data in esports since 2018 thanks to Founder and CEO Moritz Maurer 's direct experience in the scene. Working directly with game developers, GRID is able to surface unmatched competitive game data from some of the biggest games like League of Legends, DotA 2, Valorant, PUBG, and Rainbow 6: Siege. GRID is leveling up the understanding of competitive player and match data...

Neopets has always been a metaverse, says Dominic Law, CEO of The World of Neopia . If you were born prior to the 2000s, you’ll remember how much Neopets took the internet world by storm. By 2011, Neopets had 35M unique users, amassed 1 trillion page views, and was responsible for compelling an entire generation of children to internet proficiency and adoption. Not only that, but Neopets was free...

In this week's Roundtable, the squad unpacks the seismic impact of Nintendo's legal victory, securing a $2.4M settlement against the Switch emulator Yuzu, a move that has dramatically reshaped the emulation landscape. We then pivot to Netflix's strategic foray into gaming, spotlighting its latest coup in bringing the critically acclaimed indie darling Hades to mobile platforms, signaling a deeper...

Studio369 is preparing to launch MetalCore, an open world player-versus-player mech combat game that combines the engagement of high-quality traditional gaming with true asset ownership via web3. It has been in the works for about three years, with the game expected to hit a closed beta by the end of March and an open beta test by May 2024. It’s being built by a team of experienced developers fami...

The games industry can no longer ignore the MENA region, encompassing markets like Israel, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt, and more. With approximately 800 million people, a young and growing audience of gamers, expanding wealth, rising ARPUs, and emerging talent, it’s abundantly clear that MENA will be much more important to the games industry’s future than it was in the past. To tell us more about wha...

In this week's Roundtable, the squad dives into the recent announcement of Age of Empires Mobile, sparking debates on whether it will meet the high expectations of its loyal fanbase or simply blend into the crowded market of 4x strategy games. We then shift gears to discuss the surprising success of Balatro, a poker roguelike game from a solo developer that turned profitable within just an hour of...

Do you believe that XR is the future of modern entertainment? Composed of a blend of AR, MR, VR, and spatial computing, XR is a major frontier for big tech. Meta has spent $40B on Reality Labs, and Apple has launched the world’s first “spatial computer” this past month. But is it a fit for entertainment and games? Join your host, Alexandra Takei , Director at Ruckus Games , Taylor Hurst , Principa...

In this week's Roundtable, the squad dives into the unexpected success of Helldivers 2, PlayStation Studios' first game to launch simultaneously on PlayStation and PC. We then shift gears to Microsoft's Xbox Business Event, which, despite its brevity, sparked a flurry of speculation regarding the company's strategy for porting "exclusives" to PlayStation. The conversation takes a critical turn as...

It is no secret that web3 gaming had bit of a down year in 2023. Many studios had to shut down, and venture funding was hard to come by. But where some see a valley of despair, others see opportunity. Midnight is scooping up talented web3 studios that have run out of funding in order to go after multiple opportunities at the same time with double AA games.  To get a sense of the ambitious plans Mi...

Today’s guest is Shanti Bergel, Founding General Partner and Managing Director of Transcend Fund, which has been a top decile performer since the firm was founded in 2020. Shanti is not just on the cutting edge of where the games industry is headed, but he’s also a veteran operator across much of the industry’s decades-long dynamism. In this episode, Shanti and host, Aaron Bush, chat through Shant...

The Super Mario Brothers Movie made $1.36B at the box office, shattering records and solidifying the power of gaming IP on the big screen. Transmedia across TV and Film is an active growth strategy for many gaming companies, and a high number of works are in the pipeline as Hollywood looks towards games as a fertile ground for untold stories. Alexandra Takei , Director at Ruckus Games , hosts Roy...

In this week's Roundtable, the squad dives into Disney's $1.5 billion investment in Epic Games, aiming to create custom Fortnite-related experiences. We speculate on what Disney's persistent world might look like, especially in light of its potential connections to Fortnite and the recent Lego collaboration. Then, we shift gears to discuss Mythical Games' settlement of its lawsuit against Fenix Ga...

Trading card games (TCGs) have always been the most natural fit for web3. Their real-world analog cousins are inherently collectible, generally have a notion of rarity, and have a thriving secondary market.  So it is no surprise that some of the earliest and most hyped entrants into web3 gaming have been TCGs, and perhaps none more so than Parallel, the Toronto-based company building an ambitious...

User-generated content (UGC) in games continues to grow in scale and impact, and staying on top of this dynamic market has never been more important. In this episode, Naavik analyst and consultant David Taylor joins Aaron Bush to discuss the most important trends and developments on Roblox, UEFN, and beyond. We discuss emerging patterns that make successful UGC experiences, game-changing roadmap f...

In this week's Roundtable, the squad dives into the public reversal of China's proposed bans on game monetization tactics, plus ponders the future of these regulations and their impact on Chinese game stocks. We then shift focus to Tencent's CEO's candid reflections on the company's 2023 gaming performance and its hopeful outlook on AI for 2024. The conversation heats up with a detailed analysis o...

It is known that the gaming scene in CIS has political, legal, and regulatory challenges that make it hard to develop games or deploy investments into the region. But if you do it right, my guests, Maria Kochmola , Managing Partner at The Games Fund, and Arseny Lebedev , CEO and Co-Founder at Original Games, think it’s worth it. Today they both sit down with your host, Alexandra Takei , Director a...

In this week's Roundtable, the squad dives into the booming success of Palworld, a game that's been dubbed "Pokemon with guns," and explores why it's capturing everyone's curiosity. We then shift gears to discuss Riot's recent pullback (layoffs and game pivots) and what this could mean for other projects in the works. The conversation then heats up as we dissect Newzoo's 2024 market predictions, s...

Immutable is one of the leaders in the web3 gaming space, as well as one of Australia’s fastest-growing companies. The business has raised AUD$400 million dollars and was most recently valued at AUD$3.5 billion (about US$2.5 billion). The company was founded by brothers Robbie and James Ferguson in 2018 when it was called Fuel Games, and they developed and published the blockchain trading card gam...

Venture markets – within and beyond gaming – soared in 2020-2021 and fell back to earth over the past couple of years, but what should we expect in 2024? And what may change about gaming VC longer-term? To answer these questions and more, host Aaron Bush is joined by Moritz Baier-Lentz , Partner and Head of Gaming at Lightspeed. Moritz shares his thoughts on the state of venture capital, lessons l...