Deconstructor of Fun

In this episode we sat down with three growth experts to discuss following questions: What companies are doing to prepare for the depreciation of IDFA How to figure out the best messaging to convince as many users as possible to give you permission to access their IDFA via AppTrackingTransparency How to optimize marketing campaigns post IDFA depreciation How to pick conversion value events going f...

Welcome to TWIG #97! This week we cover: #1. Amazon is good at so many things. Why is it bad at games? #2. Take-Two Interactive acquires mobile studio Playdots for $192 million #3. Tencent takes minority stake in French casual games maker Voodoo #4. Video Game Creators Are Burned Out and Desperate for Change SHOW LINKS: Guest Host: Dan Bailey , Actor/Voice Actor and Video Game Producer  THE G...

Host:  Joe Kim , Deconstructor of Fun Podcast Host, Managing Partner of GameMakers , and CEO of LILA Games . We are joined by the founders and CEOs of 3 recently funded game studios:   1. Antti Hattara , CEO of StarBerry  ($1.3M led by Play Ventures)     2. Emily Greer , CEO of Double Loop ($2.5M led by London Venture Partners)    3. Travis Boatman , CEO of...

Welcome to TWIG #96! This week we cover: #1. Next-Gen Gaming: State of the Industry , Unreal Engine Blog site #2. Opinion: The Apple/Epic battle has four possible outcomes, and Epic can’t lose , 9to5 mac #3. Wildlife Scores Vulcan-led $120M Series B Financing To Propel Mobile Game Platform , Crunchbase SHOW LINKS: Guest Host: Kenny Liu from ggDigest, now DOF Digest! Is the US about to split the in...

Game companies (with some exceptions like Nintendo) don't last! They are not long-term defensible. In tech, the FAANG companies are massively defensible. In fact,  Amazon today is the most valuable and most defensible company in the world.    In the video games industry, we don’t see the same level of long-term defensibility that we see in those industries.   After lots of grea...

Welcome to TWIG #95! This week we cover: #1. Apple blocking Project xCloud and Stadia because it can't review every game (gamesindustry.biz) #2. Zynga acquires hypercasual game maker Rollic for $168M (Mobile Marketer) #3. Why Indies are struggling to be seen on the Switch eshop (MCV/Develop) SHOW LINKS: Guest Host: Kenny Liu from ggDigest, now DOF Digest! FEEDBACK?: Do you have feedback or comment...

Indie mobile game developer WildCard Games has been developing mobile card games for the past 7 years launching games like Ultimate Cribbage, Cribbage, and Backgammon.   How does this 2 person studio get to the next level in growing their mobile game products?   Let's DIVE DEEP! We review mobile marketing strategy and discuss channels, campaigns, creative types.  Deep discussio...

Welcome to TWIG #94! This week we cover: #1. Could Halo: Infinite be the last ever Halo title, as 343 calls it a “platform for the future” #2. EA Just had its best june quarter for Sales in 38 year history #3. Blizzard shows off new Diablo Immortal gameplay SHOW LINKS: Guest Host: Kenny Liu from ggDigest, now DOF Digest! FEEDBACK?: Do you have feedback or comments for us? You can reach us on Twitt...

In today’s episode, we ask a very important question - how to build a studio that can make genre-defining hit games. Even though game mechanics are powerful forces, what can truly drive massive and sustainable growth are culture, processes and teams that comprise high-performing studios - a perspective that I’m excited to dig into today. I’m truly thrilled to get Mishka’s insights distilled from h...

Welcome to TWIG #93! This week we cover: #1. The 7 RPG player personas #2. Over half of US kids are playing Roblox, and it’s about to host Fortnite-esque virtual parties too #3. Microsoft Showcase #4. The Imminent Ragnarok of M&A in Mobile Gaming Space SHOW LINKS: Guest Host: Brett Nowak , CEO of Liquid & Grit FEEDBACK?: Do you have feedback or comments for us? You can reach us on Twitter...

If the Metaverse is the next frontier? How should the economy be designed to help support a healthy and vibrant ecosystem for all players? Today we are joined by Tim Sweeney CEO of Epic Games  The focus of the discussion is how do we build an efficient and fair economy for this new platform.

We’re here today to talk about the current state of M&A aka mergers & acquisitions in the games industry. There’s been a lot of recent activity and there seems to be an open question now of whether the current trend can continue as Zynga seems to indicate or whether we’re likely going to see a major slowdown.   Specifically we’ll speak to:      - #1. What has drive...

Welcome to TWIG #92! This week we cover: #1. Microsoft to launch xCloud streaming free with Xbox Game Pass Ultimate in September (The Verge) #2. China removes  Supercell’s Hay Day and 2500 other games from iOS app Store (Venture Beat) #3. Glu reloads its war chest for mobile game acquisitions (Venture Beat) SHOW LINKS: Watch the M&A YouTube video FEEDBACK?: Do you have feedback or comment...

Monumental changes are changes are coming to mobile games market.  First one to bear the hit is the performance marketing ecosystem. As Play Store follows suit, attribution platforms, ad networks and Facebook are struggling to adapt to the new reality. And as the shift happens, performance marketing teams will go through a rapid bottoms up change due to all the changes in the ecosystem. ...

Welcome to TWIG #91! This week we cover: #1. Sony invests $250m in Fortnite’s Epic Games (Financial Times) #2. Why Tencent is looking to buy Warframe parent company Leyou (Venture Beat) #3. App Annie: Mobile gamers broke app store records in Q2 2020 (Venture Beat) #4. Everything we learned on Ubisoft Event (Kotaku) SHOW LINKS: As per the News updates, check out the incredibly handsome Joe Kim's bl...

Which one is better: acquiring a new user or getting a lapsed user to re-engage? Well, it depends. Most of us have been investing into getting new users while struggling at re-engaging our lapsed users. But our lack of success in re-engagement is likely more to do with how we go about it rather than the strategy of getting the lapsed players to return. In this episode we discuss re-engagment both...

Welcome to TWIG #90! This week we cover: #1. PUBG Mobile Doubles Lifetime Revenue to $3 Billion in Just Seven Months (Sensor Tower) #2. Apple Cancels Some Arcade Games in Strategy Shift To Keep Subscribers (Bloomberg) #3. Amazon and Google are in games for the wrong reasons (GamesIndustry.biz) SHOW LINKS: Game Changers is a webinar series featuring exceptional women in the gaming industry. Our goa...

We’re here today to talk about the kinds of online, live services technology that are required for multiplayer PVP games.    More specifically we will cover online services (accounts, matchmaking, player stats, and store) rather than the multiplayer networking side.  Speaking with us today is the founding team from Pragma.gg who have incredible backgrounds in online back-end service...

Welcome to TWIG #89! We are joined this episode by the legendary Emily Greer founder of Kongregate and her new game studio Double Loop. A must watch at GDC and one of the OGs of the F2P games industry. This week we cover: #1. Abuse in the industry isn't down to a few "bad apples" | Opinion #2. iOS 14: IDFA is not dead yet, but it’s definitely on life support #3. Former PlayStation Boss Says AAA Ga...

Today we’re going to be talking about 2 different perspectives on the future of performance marketing.    Positive View: The changes currently impacting UA will shift the role of a UA marketer but ultimately the changes will not be so dramatic and besides potentially adding some additional skills or shifting to be a bit more strategic and having leaner teams, and the changes will mean mo...

Welcome to TWIG #88! This week we cover: #1. Microsoft is shutting down Mixer and partnering with Facebook Gaming #2. EA details game slate with 'Star Wars,' Switch news #3. Epic Games and Match Group join Spotify in protesting Apple’s App Store fees #4. Apple Rejects Facebook’s Gaming App, for at Least the Fifth Time #5. Epic Offering 750M at 17B Valuation Do you have feedback or comments for us?...

Huge changes are coming to the role of user acquisition (UA) and what it means to be a performance marketer in mobile.   #1. What are the big changes coming and the trends that are driving the changes?  #2. How big will brand marketing be in the future? Will it take over performance marketing?  #3. What new skills will performance marketers need to build to prepare for the future? F...

Welcome to TWIG #87! This week we cover: #1.; Call of Duty Publisher Wins First Amendment Trademark Suit Against Humvee Manufacturer (Gamma Law) #2. Selena Gomez Sues Mobile Game Company for $10M for Stealing Likeness (Gamma Law) #3. This is the PlayStation 5 (The Verge) #4. Valorant is Performing Below Expectations According to Twitch Stats (GameLife) #5. How to Build the Amazon of Game Companies...

Despite lots of talk about the use of data science in game studios, surprisingly, there's a lot of misunderstandings about how data science is actually used and how best to utilize data scientists. Today we discuss the following with Andre Cohen who is Head of Data Science at our friends over at Tilting Point: #1. What is the role of data science within a games studio? #2. What are the primary app...

Welcome to TWIG #86!  This week we cover: #1. Why Zynga bought Peak Games #2. Glu Announces Pricing of Public Offering of Common Stock #3. Game and UA Teams That Work Together, Grow Together Hosts this Week: Today we are joined by guest host Nebo Radovic from N3twork: Nebo Radovic: @eniac (Twitter) Do you have feedback or comments for us?  You can reach us on Twitter at:  Joseph Kim...