Mastering Retention

On today's episode of the Mastering Retention podcast, our host Tom Hammond talks to hyper-casual guru Michal Tomcany! He is the Chief Gameplay Scientist at Studio Slovack and has a lot of experience with hyper-casual games. Episode highlights: What is hyper-casual? Types of hyper-casual games What can mobile free-to-play games learn from hyper-casual? The role onboarding tutorials play in retenti...

On today's episode of the Mastering Retention podcast, Riley Andersen, Co-Founder and CEO of Umami Games, joins Tom to talk all about hyper-casual games! Umami Games is a hyper-casual games startup in Copenhagen, Denmark. Riley always been a passionate gamer but found her light with hyper-casual games. Topics from today: How being a social media manager shaped her way of thinking now How she start...

In today's episode of the Mastering Retention podcast, Tom talks to Francisco Andrada, the lead World Game Economy Designer at Gameloft. Francisco has always been very passionate about games and about helping other game economy designers in their career paths. During today’s episode, he discusses with Tom what makes a great economy, the GED school and the top 5 mistakes to avoid while designing yo...

On today’s episode of Mastering Retention, Kaitlyn Kincaid, lead economic and monetization designer at Rovio Entertainment Corporation joins today’s episode to talk all about game economy design. From what is a game economy, how to build it correctly to how to better use your data to improve your game. Key topics from today’s episode: What is the game economy? The importance of understanding the p...

Adam Zelenay is an avid listener of the Mastering Retention show so we are happy to have him on as a guest! Adam is the Live Ops manager at ZeptoLab and today he goes in-depth about crucial aspects that game teams should take into account about LiveOps Today's highlights: How he went from being a lawyer to a game developer The balance between copying and creating new features in the game Recommend...

Jamar Graham, publisher operations partner at Unity technologies joins today's Mastering Retention episode to talk about ad monetization in games. He tells us how he got to his current role at Unity, some of the common mistakes on ad monetization strategies and the right balance between in-app purchases and ads. Episode highlights: Common mistakes on ad monetization strategies The balance between...

For today’s episode, we bring you two experts on what there is to know about gaming product teams: Patrik Wilkens & Chris Balazs. Listen to everything there is to know about gaming product teams, from how do you build it to what should it look like on different stages of your game and company sizes. Guests: Patrik Wilkens – VP of Mobile at Azerion and Founder of Game industry Networking Chris...

On today's episode of Mastering Retention, Oscar Clark the Chief Strategy Officer at Fundamentally Games and one of the pioneers of games services since 1998, joins us to talk about the core principles of LiveOps. He goes in-depth about the three core aspects of games as services: capturing data, configurations and selling. Today's episode key talking points: What games as a service mean to him Th...

On today's episode of Mastering Retention, Harshal Karvande , Game Design Lead at Rovio , joins us to talk about how he started in India and ended up in Finland, what it means to create a LiveOps strategy based on player behavior and how to align yourself to the flow of your audience. During the episode, he provides several real-life examples that make his concepts and logic very fun and easy to u...

Today's guest for another episode of the Mastering Retention podcast is Rachel Ansell—senior producer & product owner at PerBlue. After getting her degree in arts, she got an internship that showed her what she wanted to do with her career: be a producer! She joins today's episode to talk to Tom about the different roles and responsibilities that fall under a game producer, some of the life le...

In today’s episode of the Mastering Retention podcast, we are joined by Creative Game Lead Sophie Vo. She’s French- Vietnamese but currently resides in Berlin where she helps run Voodoo . In today’s episode, she talks to Tom about some hiring practices, her definition and implementation of cognitive diversity, and how she nourishes work culture—especially during Covid-times! Highlights of today's...

On today’s episode of the Mastering Retention podcast, Tom talks to Renee Gittins, ED of the International Game Developers Association and CEO of Stumbling Cat. Renee is a leader in the field and she is passionate about advocating and connecting game developers in the industry. In today’s episode, she talks about her role at the IGDA, the future of Stumbling Cat and gives some tips to those who wa...

On today’s episode of the Mastering Retention podcast, narrative game designer, Isaac Phoenix, joins us to discuss everything NARRATIVE related! Games are nothing without an appealing storyline. If you are starting a game or are having questions about what are key aspects in your game to craft a good storyline you don’t want to miss today’s episode. Highlights of today’s episode: Why games should...

On today's episode of the Mastering Retention podcast, we have a special visit from the Mobile Game Doctor! Dave Rohrl has 25 years of experience in design, production, and studio leadership that has allowed him to lead several groups of people to grow his business and help others with their design challenges. Because of Dave's incredible journey, today's episode is one you'll want to listen to th...

On today's episode of the Mastering Retention podcast, Tom talks to the first woman to join the podcast, Antanina Livingston! She's an accomplished product manager originally from Belarus, that is currently working at Activision. Some key topics for today's episode: How living in different places and speaking different languages has helped her approach live ops and content that is tailored to peop...

In today’s episode of the Mastering Retention Podcast, Tom has a conversation with Karan Khairajani, cofounder of independent studio Firescore on all there is to know about hyper-casual games. From starting a gaming company to what KPIs are important. Some of the highlights of today's episode are: How he got into gaming and his entrepreneurial spirit What it takes to start up a gaming company CPI,...

In today's episode of the Mastering Retention podcast, Tom interviews MURKA's COO Barak David, who went from a technological background to leading a company's business strategy.  Some of the key topics from today's episode:  Why he decided to open an accelerator division within MURKA How some of the Social Casino features can transfer to other genres Pushing MURKA to be a more data-drive...

In today's episode of the Mastering Retention podcast, Tom talks with Fawzi Mesmar, Head Designer at DICE, and winner of the Game Dev Heroes award in 2020 for the category of Game Design!  Key takeaways from today's episode:  Thoughts on Genshin Impact How his computer science undergrad impacted his career in games Why he is getting and MBA  The balance between business and developm...

On today’s episode of Mastering Retention, Tom is joined by Ethan Levy, Executive Producer on Tetris Mobile! Ethan is an experienced game designer and producer that has worked on several cool projects from several different angles. Ethan is also the founder and lead consultant at Famous Aspect in regards to free-to-play monetization.  Some of the key takeaways of today's episode are:  Ho...

On today's episode of Mastering Retention, we get a gaming history lesson from Alex Ronald from Clanet.io! Alex has been in the gaming industry for a long time and is very knowledgeable about how human behavior has been impacted by the gaming industry and vice-versa.  Some of the topics touched on today's episode: How he got into gaming  His experience in China and building his own compa...

In today's episode of Mastering Retention, Tom talks with Nick Murray! Nick is a freelance consultant, the head of Games for Carry1st, and a publisher looking to promote gaming in the African continent and worldwide.  Some of the topics discussed during this episode include:  Nick's favorite subject: Game balancing and why it's so important!  Working on a game that is not your go-to...

In today's episode, Hadrian Semroud, an experienced product manager with experience at companies like GSN and Ubisoft, joins us to discuss his experience with free to play games, how to be data-driven in these types of games, and more!  Some of the topics Tom and Hadrian discuss:  What it means to be data-driven in free to play games  Market analysis and research  The process t...

On today's episode of Mastering Retention, Michael Tapley joins Tom to discuss what he has learned during his career in the gaming industry and his thoughts on how to take gamer intuition into account when designing games.  Some of the key topics discussed during this episode:  What the role of a game designer entails  Designing games with live-ops in mind  Balancing out gamer...

In this episode of Mastering Retention Podcast, Tom is joined by Hinrik Asgeirsson from FunPlus to talk about measuring retention by quantifying fun in the gaming industry and how to maintain an efficient yet caring work culture.  Amongst many other things, here are some aspects Tom and Hinrik discuss:  Quantifying FUN  Blending the data side and the art side of gaming when developi...

In this episode of Mastering Retention, we are joined by Dennis Heizman, product manager at Tilting Point, to speak about some (secret) projects they are working on, the importance of data analytics, and more!  Some of the key takeaways of today's episode:  Read Dennis' article about tips for maximizing ARPDAU  The importance of data analytics on all aspects of gaming  The bene...