Deconstructor of Fun

After 16 months in soft launch, Supercell’s Clash Quest has reached the end of its run. The game has not achieved the business objectives set by Supercell and the game will shut down. Following an excellent postmortem by Laura Taranto , Javier Barnes and Anette Staloy , host Ethan Levy sits down with the writers to discuss what went right and what areas of improvement for Clash Quest. We discuss t...

Eric Kress and Laura Taranto celebrate the 200th Episode of TWIG with a special guest, Joe Kim. In this episode, we take a walk down memory lane remembering the start of TWIG, how and when the hosts joined, discuss Scopely’s acquisition of Stumble Guys, and a recap of Ubisoft’s most recent announcement on mobile games and Netflix, and complete with a rant from Eric. Our headline covers Microsoft a...

Eric Kress, Laura Taranto, and Eric Seufert discuss Apple’s growing ambitions with its advertising business, the latest wave of layoffs that hit companies like Snap and Bytedance as well as Tencent's investment into Ubisoft's parent company. Most importantly, in this episode you'll hear about Seufert's latest Uber debacle, an update on Kress' son's thriving basketball career, and find out which co...

Whether you know it for its role as a hub of the Flash game development scene or in its later incarnation as a F2P mobile publisher, you are likely familiar with Kongregate. They have been making a lot of moves in the blockchain space recently, between their extension of The Bitverse into Web3, the announcement of NFT-powered game Blood Vessels , and the announcement of their $40m Web3 developer f...

Despite the goodbyes, as both Mishka and Adam exit TWiG, this episode is filled with laughter and good times. Or maybe it is because the two fellas from the North are taking a hike? hosts: Eric Kress, Ethan Levy, Laura Taranto, Eric Seufert

Right before heading out for our party at Gamescom, our very own Eric Kress sat down with Mishka Katkoff to talk about his long career in games, his biggest regrets, where his independency stems from, and why you can't really cancel him.  Show Eric some love by sending him a DM on Linkedin.

While Kress, Laura, and Mishka were hosting a banging party at Gamescom, Ethan and Seufert carried the TWiG torch. The guys discussed 4 -day work weeks, flexible hours, and culture building for early-stage start-ups. They also talked about Embracer rolling up Lord of the Ring and The Hobbit into their vast portfolio. And they made sure to cover Diablo 4 live service plans, which were detailed in t...

This one is a treat! This week our stalwart host Ethan Levy interviews Graeme Devine , a true game design legend. From his groundbreaking work on 7th Guest and 11th Hour to Doom 3, to Age of Empires III and Halo Wars, to Magic Leap, Graeme has found success across many different platforms. Now, as a co-founder of QXR Studios , Graeme has added another notch to his belt with WAX-powered blockchain...

The crew starts off by recapping Unity's rejection of AppLovin and why it went the way it did. Adam does an update on Supercell's games in soft launch now that Clash Quest became yet another could-be-hit in the company's soft launch graveyard. Finally, the guys debate what’s the right role of market research in early game development. Hosts: Laura Taranto, Adam Telfer, Eric Seufert

It may be unthinkable for the Deconstructor of Fun audience, but people are still finding success with premium mobile games in 2022. It all depends on your aspirations and what your goals are. In this episode, Ethan Levy interviews fledgling game designer Sophie Artemigi whose freshman debut, the sex-positive Hook Up The Game found chart-topping premium game success on the App Store thanks to clev...

Seufert is back from Europe and has a couple of words regarding last week’s analysis of the Hypercasual games' economy following Google’s ad changes. We’ll deep dive into AppLovin’s gangster move. JamCity’s massive layoffs and Roblox’s bookings miss. The gang also discusses why Blizzard and NetEase scrapped Warcraft Mobile and PlayStation Mobile’s hiring spree. hosts: Eric Seufert, Ethan Levy, Ada...

Art outsourcing can become a game changer or a hopeless money sink. To discuss how to outsource art in the smartest and most effective way, the Deconstructor of Fun podcast was joined by Silver Saaremäel , co-founder and Art Director of a boutique art outsourcing studio Fantastic Vagabonds (ex-Wooga & Crytek), and Kshiraj Telang , Art Director from Moon Active (ex-King and Rovio).

Special guest star, Matej Lancaric, a household name in the user acquisition circles and a podcaster extraordinaire (Two and a Half Gamers) joins the TWiG crew to give his view on Google’s latest Play Store policies and Apple’s new ad placements for advertisers. We also discuss whether Rockstar can get their culture less toxic and whether that will impact their super violent franchises. And we dis...

You know her from TV (That 70’s Show, Family Guy), Film (Book of Eli, Black Swan), and have probably even heard of her hit NFT collections ( Stone Cats , The Gimmicks ). But did you know that Hollywood star Mila Kunis is a closet World of Warcraft addict? And that her love of WoW has led directly to the creation of a brand new, Web3-powered gaming IP in the Armored Kingdom ? Along with her raid pa...

As you may guess from his dadtastic body, the host  Ethan Levy  is a big fan of Peloton’s bike and fitness platform. That’s why he literally jumped at the chance to speak with Jim Green of Peloton Interactive about the present and future of gamified fitness on the Peloton platform.  The two discuss Jim’s background in Facebook and mobile free-to-play, his transition to a Product rol...

Ethan Levy is back to talk about the crypto Winter giving us an update from his blockchain snow castle. In addition to the latest high-school basketball news, Eric Kress analyzes Snap’s shares plunge. Mishka Katkoff discusses the pros and cons of having a transparent salary structure in a gaming company. And we discuss Netflix Games once again after receiving some insights on what the future portf...

The crew returns back to Unity’s merger with ironSource as Eric Seufert offers his view of the deal. There’s a conversation about the latest government ruling not to regulate loot boxes. Talk about Tesla’s new gaming initiative and Netflix’s latest batch of gaming veteran hires. We also talk about E3’s return to in-person events and what we can expect from it. Hosts: Eric Kress, Eric Seufert, Laur...

UnCaged Studios is pioneering AAA-quality Web3 gaming. Co-founded by seasoned Web3 and gaming experts, the studio has over a hundred years of combined experience designing and developing high production value, immersive gaming experiences with sustainable economies. Through its own platform, Game OS, the studio’s first release is an esports franchise called MonkeyLeague. In addition, UnCaged lever...

With so many new games delayed the crew has their long-awaited debate on what is the optimal way of working for game studios. On-site, hybrid, or fully remote. Eric Kress whales on GameStop, which went full “crypto bro” in the middle of the crypto Winter. And gives his hyperbolic analysis of Unity’s merger with ironSource. Links: Questions and Feedback Sponsors: Google , ironSource , Xsolla , Recu...

In this episode, Laura talks about why games are being delayed and whether mobile games suffer from it as much as PC and console games. We also discuss what the metaverse is. Analyze the impact of Samsung Gaming Hub coming to Xbox. And Eric Kress does doom and gloom updates on the mobile market. Links: Questions and Feedback Sponsors: Google , ironSource , Xsolla , Recur Hosts: Laura Taranto, Eric...

Consolidation, IDFA, metverse, Web3 and now a recession… During just the last couple of years, we’ve seen some wild phenomena affect the games industry: First, lockdowns caused engagement spikes. Second, we saw a streak of consolidations with record-breaking deals. Third, the impact of the privacy changes started taking effect, all the while as the crypto boom turned into crypto winter... Today, t...

Hold on to your AirPods because we have more than a full house on this episode. There’s no more doom and gloom. Mishka and Seufert drop teasers for two upcoming parties. We analyze if Blizzard is “back”.  Talk Stumbel Guys, Fall Guys, Sybo and Clash Quest. And take the episode home by talking about the master plan behind creating standards for open metaverse interoperability. Links: Questions...

The team discusses Riot joining Microsoft’s GamePass. Talks about the $24M made by Diablo Immortal after the first two weeks. Reviews the abysmal number of downloads Netflix games has racked up to date. Dives deep into how to survive the mobile marketing winter. And with Ethan back on the podcast, covers your most essential crypto updates, as the wheels are coming off the first iteration of blockc...

Every successful mobile games story is different and offers something unique for the industry to learn from, and the story of SuperPlay and Dice Dreams is no different. In this episode, I had the privilege of sitting down with Noam Banon , the CMO of Superplay, to talk about how their game Dice Dreams was able to find success in the highly competitive mobile games market. I was also lucky enough t...

Against the backdrop of a crypto winter that has many a team re-evaluating their go-to-market plan, Illuvium pressed ahead with their land NFT sale, taking in over $72m in a well-organized, well run, low-gas fee land sale. In today’s episode, we go deep inside Illuvium with System and Economy Designer Khalid Alroumi . In this wide-ranging talk, we get an inside look at Illuvium and the many challe...