Welcome to The Business of Games Podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In this Extended Cut, host Lia Ballentine talks with Mark Long, veteran producer, investor, and CEO of Villain Studios, about how indie developers can thrive in an increasingly crowded market and why the future of Web3 depends on making it invisible. With experience at HBO, Microsoft, and as former CEO of Shrapnel, Mark shares a modern indie playbook built around ownership, community, and smart planning. He explains why devel...
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Welcome to The Business of Games Podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In this Extended Cut, host Lia Ballentine talks with Mark Long, veteran producer, investor, and CEO of Villain Studios, about how indie developers can thrive in an increasingly crowded market and why the future of Web3 depends on making it invisible. With experience at HBO, Microsoft, and as former CEO of Shrapnel, Mark shares a modern indie playbook built around ownership, community, and smart planning. He explains why devel...
Welcome to The Business of Games Podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In this Extended Cut, host Lia Ballentine talks with Mark Long, veteran producer, investor, and CEO of Villain Studios, about how indie developers can thrive in an increasingly crowded market and why the future of Web3 depends on making it invisible. With experience at HBO, Microsoft, and as former CEO of Shrapnel, Mark shares a modern indie playbook built around ownership, community, and smart planning. He explains why devel...
Welcome to The Business of Games Podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In this episode, hosts Chris Hewish and Lia Ballentine move from definitions to deployment. Part 1 explained what Web3 is. Part 2 asks how it’s actually being used in games today and explores what’s working, what’s failing, and why. Joining us are two returning guests on the front lines. David Kim, a publishing and marketing leader who’s advised studios on blockchain and Web3 strategy, and Mark Long, CEO of Villain Studios ...
Welcome to The Business of Games Podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In this Extended Cut episode, host Lia Ballentine sits down with David Kim, a publishing and marketing leader and advisor in the Web3 space, for a deep-dive conversation about the realities of blockchain, digital ownership, and the economics shaping the next phase of gaming. Web3 has been called everything from the future of player ownership to a passing fad. But beneath the hype is a real question: how can this technology ...
Welcome to The Business of Games Podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In today’s episode, Xsolla’s Chris Hewish and Lia Ballentine kick off a three-part series on Web3 and gaming, cutting through hype and backlash to explain what the tech actually does for players and studios. For decades, digital items lived inside walled gardens. Players acted like owners anyway by trading, reselling, and modding in gray markets that created value but invited fraud and frustration. Web3 introduces tools tha...
Welcome to The Business of Games Podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In this extended cut, host Chris Hewish sits down with Olivier Perbet, Chief Marketing and Revenue Officer at IO Interactive (IOI), to explore how LiveOps transformed Hitman from a boxed release into a living platform and what that means for the future of AAA publishing. From his early career at Disney and Warner Bros. to guiding IOI through independence, Olivier shares how storytelling, player connection, and rapid iterati...
Welcome to The Business of Games Podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In this extended cut, host Lia Ballentine sits down with Jenny Xu, founder and CEO of Talofa Games, for a wide-ranging conversation about designing for Gen Z, turning fitness into fun, and why building in public matters more than chasing polish. Jenny’s story is one of creativity, resilience, and rethinking the rules. From drawing Neopets fan art on DeviantArt as a kid, to pitching VCs after teaching a virtual fitness class...
Welcome to The Business of Games Podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In today’s episode, Xsolla’s Chris Hewish and Lia Ballentine take a closer look at the generation reshaping how games are made, marketed, and monetized: Gen Z. For decades, the industry operated on a one-way model: studios built games, players bought them, and marketing ran through TV spots and conventions. But Gen Z grew up in a different reality. For them, games are living social platforms, and the line between player and...
LiveOps is no longer a backstage scramble. It’s a growth strategy. In this episode of The Business of Games: Extended Cut, host Chris Hewish sits down with Tim Kravchenko, veteran LiveOps producer and product manager at Xsolla, to explore how LiveOps has transformed into the heartbeat of modern games. From Guinness World Record concurrency attempts to AI-driven campaign orchestration, Tim shares lessons from more than a decade of running global LiveOps, highlighting what works, what doesn’t, ...
Welcome to The Business of Games podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In this special episode, host Lia Ballentine sits down with Chris Hewish, President of Xsolla, who has just returned from the world’s biggest gaming event: Gamescom. This time, Chris takes the guest chair to share his firsthand takeaways from the show floor, giving us a unique insider’s perspective on the industry’s most important trends. From direct-to-player monetization and AI breakthroughs, to the balancing act between in...
Welcome to The Business of Games podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In today’s episode, Xsolla’s Chris Hewish and Lia Ballentine take a closer look at the engine that keeps modern games alive long after launch: LiveOps. Once dismissed as duct-taped events and last-minute patches, LiveOps has become one of the most powerful growth drivers in the industry, fueling player retention, personalization, and revenue. As acquisition costs climb and competition intensifies, studios are realizing that...
In this episode of The Business of Games: EU Sessions, Nathan, Director of BD EMEA, interviews Timo Verschueren, co-founder of BlackSoup marketing agency and Mostly Games development studio. The conversation delves into community building for games, how influencer marketing has evolved over the past decade, and advice for self-publishing developers, including the importance of community feedback, strategic platform engagement, and creativity in campaigns. Verschueren shares examples of succes...
Loyalty is no longer a nice-to-have. It’s a business strategy. In this episode of The Business of Games: Extended Cut, Lia Ballentine sits down with Sarah Chafer, Xsolla’s Global Head of Ad Sales, and Travis Anderson, Head of Developer Partnerships, to explore how loyalty and rewards are evolving into a core growth engine for the games industry. From early experiments with Farmville and K-pop voting apps to modern systems that blend gamification, personalization, and brand integration, Sarah ...
Welcome to The Business of Games podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In today’s episode, Xsolla’s Chris Hewish and Lia Ballentine take a closer look at one of the most important and often misunderstood growth levers in modern gaming: loyalty. For years, loyalty programs were treated as add-ons. Cosmetic perks. Daily log-in bonuses. However, in a world where acquisition costs are high, players are fragmented across platforms, and the competition for engagement is constant, loyalty and rewards...
Discovery isn’t just a marketing challenge. It’s the foundation of the entire business of games. In our most expansive Xsolla Conversations episode yet, Brian Murphy, Head of Gaming and Go-To-Market at AppsFlyer, joins host Lia Ballentine to unpack how discovery has evolved in a post-IDFA, privacy-first world and why the smartest studios are treating it as a full-lifecycle strategy, not just a launch tactic. Brian shares: What broke with iOS 14 and how developers are adaptingHow creative te...
Discovery used to be about visibility. Now it’s about architecture. In this episode of Xsolla Conversations, Chris Hewish talks with Ryan Goeden, Gaming Sales Director of RTB House, to break down what it takes to drive game discovery in today’s fragmented, post-platform world. Drawing on more than a decade in mobile advertising, Ryan shares a clear-eyed view of how developers can build scalable, full-funnel systems that drive re-engagement, extend player lifetime, and recapture revenue. The...
Discovery isn’t just about being seen anymore — it’s about building systems that scale. In this episode of State of Play, hosts Chris Hewish and Lia Ballentine pull together insights from two leaders at the forefront of performance and post-platform marketing: Nic Ingham, VP of Performance Marketing at Xsolla, and Ryan Goeden, Gaming Sales Director at RTB House. Together, their perspectives paint a sharp, essential picture of how discovery strategies are evolving and what developers must do t...
Welcome to Xsolla Conversations. In this episode, Xsolla’s Chris Hewish sits down with Nic Ingham to discuss one of the biggest shifts in the game business: discovery. For years, developers relied on platform-controlled visibility App Store placements, algorithm boosts, and pay-to-win UA to get noticed. But the rules have changed. With seismic shifts like the Digital Markets Act and the Epic v. Apple ruling, developers now face both a challenge and an opportunity: building discove...
In today’s episode, Xsolla’s Chris Hewish talks with Artem Liubutov, VP of Monetization Products & Solutions at Xsolla. With over 15 years in the space, Artem shares how web shops evolved from a simple idea into a transformative model for mobile game monetization. They discuss what held developers back, what finally pushed adoption forward, and the real results games are seeing now, from revenue lift to retention insights unlocked by owning player data. If you’re a developer, product lead...
In this premiere episode, hosts Chris Hewish and Lia Ballentine explore one of the biggest shifts in the mobile gaming industry: the rise of web shops. Through cinematic storytelling, real-world examples, and conversations with Niantic CFO Jeff Shouger and Xsolla’s Artem Liubutov, we unpack how developers are reclaiming control over margins, data, and their connection to players. You’ll hear how studios are moving beyond the 30% platform tax, why conversion rates on web shops are exceeding ex...
In today’s episode, Xsolla’s Chris Hewish sits down with Jeff Shouger, CFO at Niantic, the studio behind Pokémon GO, Peridot, and Monster Hunter Now. Jeff shares how Niantic approached the shift to web shops from a financial perspective, what convinced them to go direct-to-player, and the measurable impact they’ve seen since. If you're in the game industry and curious about how top studios navigate monetization, platform relationships, and the future of AR-driven commerce, this one’s for you....
Welcome to The Business of Games Podcast, brought to you by Xsolla. In this Extended Cut, host Lia Ballentine talks with Mark Long, veteran producer, investor, and CEO of Villain Studios, about how indie developers can thrive in an increasingly crowded market and why the future of Web3 depends on making it invisible. With experience at HBO, Microsoft, and as former CEO of Shrapnel, Mark shares a modern indie playbook built around ownership, community, and smart planning. He explains why devel...
