

GameMakers
Joseph Kim
The GameMakers podcast publishes current, entertaining, and in-depth discussions on F2P game development. Topics that we cover include the business of games, F2P monetization, liveops, game design, game development processes, team structure, and more.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Sep 30, 2021 • 28min
Key Challenges for Blockchain Gaming ft. Lars Doucet
In this deep conversation with Lars, we were able to speak to the key challenges that remain behind blockchain and crypto in gaming.
Key problems discussed: 1. Degraded Blockchain Problem, 2. Some Problems with Play to Earn, and 3. The Problem with Land Sales.
Links:
- Lars Blog- The Fortress of Doors
- Degraded Blockchain Article (Lars post from Fortress of Doors)
- Land Speculators Will Kill Your Game's Growth (Game Developer)
Also check out the original, full interview with Lars that has a wider ranged discussion on Bitcoin and cryptocurrency on Super Stonk Bros here
Read about it in the GameMakers newsletter: https://gamemakers.substack.com/

Sep 29, 2021 • 40min
Key Technology Challenges in Mobile F2P Games | Epic Tech Evangelist Arvind Neelakantan
LILA Games CTO Avinash Pandey discusses key tech challenges in scaling mobile F2P games with Epic Games' Technology Evangelist Arvind Neelakantan.
Read about it in the GameMakers newsletter: https://gamemakers.substack.com/
Watch it on the GameMakers YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/GameMakersStudio

Sep 28, 2021 • 1h 9min
IndiaF2P: What Global Strategics Are Looking for From Indian Game Companies
Deep discussion on what global strategic game publishers like Stillfront, SEGA, and Scopely look for when expanding into India from a development or market perspective.
Moderator:
- Justin Keeling, General Partner, Lumikai Fund
Speakers:
- Alexis Bonte, Group COO, Stillfront Group
- Saito Go, Executive Officer & Head of Japan Asia Publishing, SEGA Corporation
- Justin Scarpone, SVP & GM Asia, Scopely
Read about it in the GameMakers newsletter: https://gamemakers.substack.com/

Sep 28, 2021 • 47min
IndiaF2P: How To Build A Successful Career in F2P Games
Panelists discuss:
1. How did you break into this industry?
2. Gaming career choice versus traditional options?
3. Different Roles?
4. Sustained interest?
Moderator:
- Vik Agarwal, Lead PM, Zynga
Speakers: -
Poornima Seetharaman, Dir of Design, Zynga
- Karan Gaikwad, Lead PM, Nukebox
- Shilpa Gaur, Lead Marketing & Strategy, Cympl
Read about it in the GameMakers newsletter: https://gamemakers.substack.com/

Sep 24, 2021 • 51min
Doing the Work For a Top Grossing Game | Game Design by Paul Leydon
Paul Leydon LILA Games Chief Creative Officer and former lead game designer on multiple #1 top grossing titles like King of Avalon (FunPlus) and Game of War (MZ), discusses his design and research methodology. He discusses the importance of doing the work and depth in making a hit game.
Read about it in the GameMakers newsletter: https://gamemakers.substack.com/
Watch it on the GameMakers YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/GameMakersStudio

Sep 9, 2021 • 48min
IndiaF2P: How India Becomes A World Leader in Games
In this conversation, we have some of India’s top game industry leaders.
Speakers:
#1. Manish Agarwal, CEO of Nazara
#2. Amit Hardi, CEO of Nukebox
#3. Salone Sehgal, Genera. Partner at Lumikai
#4. Anuj Tandon, Head of Corp Dev India & MENA at Krafton
The focus of the conversation is oriented around India as a game development ecosystem. We talk about What’s keeping India from becoming the next China or Turkey, what are the strengths of the Indian game dev scene, and how do we accelerate the local Indian gaming market. This was the first of 5 sessions from the India F2P gaming conference. Be sure to check this out as well as some of the other sessions.
Moderator:
- Joseph Kim, CEO of LILA Games
And you can always read about it in the GameMakers newsletter and get alerted to new events in the future: https://gamemakers.substack.com/

Sep 1, 2021 • 1h 22min
Is the future of games Instant? (Lars Doucet, Emily Greer)
We talk about the history and future opportunities for Instant Games. Joining us is Lars Doucet who wrote about this in his blog post (linked below) and Emily Greer, who as the former founder and CEO of Kongregate, has a strong perspective on this.
LINKS:
- Jon Lai, a16z partner, tweet on Instant Games: https://twitter.com/Tocelot/status/1404914355670437889
- Lars Blog Post "The Future of Games is an Instant Flash to the past": https://www.fortressofdoors.com/the-future-of-games-is-an-instant-flash-to-the-past/
- Read about it in the GameMakers newsletter: https://gamemakers.substack.com/
Speakers:
- Lars Doucet, President of Level Up Labs: https://twitter.com/larsiusprime
- Emily Greer, CEO of Double Loop Games: https://www.linkedin.com/in/emilygreer/
Moderator:
- Joseph Kim, CEO of LILA Games: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jokim/

Aug 15, 2021 • 1h 3min
IDFA Loss: Real Data & Real Talk
We talk about real-world data and the implications of IDFA deprecation.
Now there has been a lot of VERY BAD information being published on this topic. So today we have with us 3 real-world practitioners and some real data about what’s actually happening.
More specifically we will discuss:
#1. Real world data and impact of IDFA Deprecation
#2. Specific changes to how we do UA and Marketing based on the effects of IDFA Deprecation
#3. Implications to product and monetization design
#4. Who are likely winners & losers from these changes?
SPEAKERS:
1. Brian Bowman, CEO of Consumer Acquisition:
2. Matej Lancaric, Independent UA & Marketing Consultant:
3. Warren Woodward, Co-founder and Chief Growth Officer at Upptic
Overview:
0:00 Intro
2:15 Games Impact: Real Data
12:02 Winners, Models, Supercell
16:47 Algo Instability, Lookalikes
20:43 Google Performance
23:35 Unity Perf Explained
26:20 ROAS Loss
30:05 Specific Marketing Changes
36:43 SKAdnetwork Conversion Value
43:17 Creative Testing on iOS
44:43 Reactivation Campaigns
46:13 Strategic Maneuvering
48:56 CPG Marketing
53:20 Product Implications
56:42 Winners & Losers

Aug 12, 2021 • 12min
Social Casino Outlook with SciPlay's Joe Byrne
Read about it in the GameMakers newsletter!
Conversation with Joe Byrne Director of Business Development and Strategy at SciPlay one of the world’s biggest and most successful social casino game companies.
Topics:
#1. How do the most sophisticated game companies use market intelligence data to inform their product strategy?
#2. How given new changes because of IDFA deprecation for example would create new requirements for the kinds of insights from the data that we look for?
#3. Strategic insights on how the social casino genre is evolving and new trends for that genre.
This conversation was facilitated in partnership with AppAnnie who is currently rolling out an update to their gaming taxonomy. Thanks App Annie!
Speaker:
- Joe Byrne, Director of Business Development and Strategy at SciPlay

Jul 28, 2021 • 56min
Tech Infrastructure for Competitive PVP Games
Read about it in the GameMakers newsletter: https://gamemakers.substack.com/
How do competitive PVP games manage and scale up their tech infrastructure? What did Riot do for Valorant? We spoke to arguably the best two people in the entire world to address this question Riot's Head of Infra & Live Ops Zach Blitz and Network Next CEO Glenn Fiedler.
SPEAKERS:
- Zach Blitz, Head of Infra and Live Ops, Riot Games
- Glenn Fiedler, Founder & CEO, Network Next


