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Amazon Luna: We’re not trying to replace consoles (but maybe we could) · The Game Business Show

0:00
SPEAKER_01: This week,
0:01
SPEAKER_01: Amazon adds Luna into the Prime Video app,
0:03
SPEAKER_01: and we are joined by Amazon games boss Jeffrey Gattiff to discuss whether
0:07
SPEAKER_01: the company can be a viable alternative to consoles.
0:14
SPEAKER_01: Hello and welcome to The Game Business Show.
0:16
SPEAKER_01: This week's edition is sponsored by Keyword Studios.
0:19
SPEAKER_01: If you're in the industry,
0:20
SPEAKER_01: you'll likely know about Keywords,
0:22
SPEAKER_01: but you might not know all the things that they do.
0:25
SPEAKER_01: In their words, they work with game studios to build, launch, and support games at a globe.
0:29
SPEAKER_01: And that covers game development, art, audio, localisation, QA, player support and marketing.
0:35
SPEAKER_01: So whatever studio needs,
0:37
SPEAKER_01: whenever they need it,
0:38
SPEAKER_01: Keywords connects them with the right specialist expertise in their business.
0:42
SPEAKER_01: And that's at every stage of the game lifecycle.
0:44
SPEAKER_01: From early stages all the way to release and beyond.
0:47
SPEAKER_01: So Keywords is a services provider, but they go a bit beyond that.
0:51
SPEAKER_01: They're more like a long term strategic partner.
0:54
SPEAKER_01: They can help a developer scale their production,
0:55
SPEAKER_01: ensure the quality levels are high,
0:57
SPEAKER_01: reach new markets and build a strong relationship with the players.
1:01
SPEAKER_01: They've got all the technology and the people who just understand games,
1:04
SPEAKER_01: how they're made, played and what players are expecting.
1:08
SPEAKER_01: To find out more about all the number of things that they do,
1:11
SPEAKER_01: you can find that on the Keyword Studios website and via the link in
1:14
SPEAKER_01: The Game Business Newsletter.
1:17
SPEAKER_01: Now, back to our show.
1:19
SPEAKER_01: And it's a bit of a sequel show to the one we did last week, sort of.
1:23
SPEAKER_01: So last week we had a lovely chat with Netflix's Sean Crankle.
1:26
SPEAKER_01: It was all about their new horror streaming game, Unhinged.
1:30
SPEAKER_01: And that game was built for an audience that may or may not exist.
1:33
SPEAKER_01: It's this idea that there are people out there that might be interested in
1:36
SPEAKER_01: a narrative video game.
1:38
SPEAKER_01: But aren't necessarily interested in buying a gaming console or PC.
1:42
SPEAKER_01: Netflix is looking to reach these players directly through its Netflix app via
1:46
SPEAKER_01: a games tab at the top.
1:48
SPEAKER_01: And now Amazon is doing the same thing with its Prime Video app and
1:53
SPEAKER_01: of course its streaming service Luna.
1:55
SPEAKER_01: That's their big news they're announcing today.
1:57
SPEAKER_01: Prime members with a Fire TV in the US and the UK can play Luna games from inside
2:01
SPEAKER_01: the app alongside movies and sports and TV and all sorts.
2:04
SPEAKER_01: The idea is to make Luna games more accessible and easy to find to the widest possible audience.
2:09
SPEAKER_01: Now Luna...
2:10
SPEAKER_01: It's a slightly different proposition to Netflix as it features AAA games such
2:14
SPEAKER_01: as Indiana Jones and Fallout and Hogwarts Legacy and EA Sports FC.
2:17
SPEAKER_01: They've got Tomb Raider of course coming out next year.
2:20
SPEAKER_01: But the goal is similar,
2:22
SPEAKER_01: win over people who perhaps used to play consoles but don't anymore
2:25
SPEAKER_01: or people There are people who have been interested in a game here or there,
2:27
SPEAKER_01: but haven't been able to justify the cost or the friction associated with console
2:31
SPEAKER_01: or PC gaming.
2:33
SPEAKER_01: I find this really interesting because it's potentially unlocking a new audience
2:37
SPEAKER_01: for these sort of experiences, potentially widens the industry
2:43
SPEAKER_01: Now, Amazon has of course undergone some significant changes.
2:46
SPEAKER_01: It closed a bunch of game developers,
2:48
SPEAKER_01: it's cancelled some games including its MMOs,
2:51
SPEAKER_01: it ended publishing relationships with third party teams,
2:54
SPEAKER_01: but it insists it's not going to be.
2:55
SPEAKER_01: It's not backing out of games.
2:57
SPEAKER_01: In fact, it's merged Amazon Game Studios and Amazon Luna together.
3:01
SPEAKER_01: They're not separate teams anymore doing separate things.
3:03
SPEAKER_01: They're still publishing the new Tomb Raider games and developing a bunch
3:07
SPEAKER_01: of these sort of game night party games as well.
3:09
SPEAKER_01: It's also looking to sign products and plans to be involved in whatever
3:12
SPEAKER_01: the next James Bond game will be.
3:14
SPEAKER_01: And to take me through this news,
3:16
SPEAKER_01: the vision for Amazon Games and the opportunity around streaming in an era
3:20
SPEAKER_01: of $1000 video game machines,
3:22
SPEAKER_01: I had the chance to chat with General Manager for Games at Amazon, Jeffrey Gattis.
3:26
SPEAKER_01: And he oversees both Luna and Amazon Game Studios.
3:29
SPEAKER_01: He was really candid in our conversation.
3:32
SPEAKER_01: And here it is.
3:33
SPEAKER_01: Enjoy.
3:34
SPEAKER_01: Hello, Jeff.
3:34
SPEAKER_01: Welcome to the show.
3:35
SPEAKER_01: Good to see you, Chris.
3:36
SPEAKER_01: Thank you.
3:37
SPEAKER_01: This news, it sounds exciting.
3:38
SPEAKER_01: How significant is it?
3:39
SPEAKER_01: How many devices are we looking at here?
3:41
SPEAKER_00: It's a pretty big deal for us.
3:43
SPEAKER_00: You know,
3:43
SPEAKER_00: in particular,
3:44
SPEAKER_00: I'm excited,
3:44
SPEAKER_00: number one,
3:45
SPEAKER_00: just for more people to be able to discover the benefit that we've put into Prime.
3:49
SPEAKER_00: So as you may know,
3:50
SPEAKER_00: we relaunched Luna last October,
3:52
SPEAKER_00: really just pushing close to like 80 to 90 games into the Prime membership.
3:57
SPEAKER_00: And those are things that range all the way from AAA games like Hogwarts Legacy,
4:01
SPEAKER_00: all the way down to more casual phone as a controller game.
4:04
SPEAKER_00: We had our Snoop Dogg courtroom chaos game and other things.
4:08
SPEAKER_00: And we got great reception from the audience.
4:10
SPEAKER_00: We've 5X'd our player base,
4:11
SPEAKER_00: albeit on a modest base,
4:13
SPEAKER_00: but I think anytime you 5X anything,
4:15
SPEAKER_00: that signal that we've found some product market fit with customers.
4:19
SPEAKER_00: But our bigger problem is that not enough people know about the benefit.
4:22
SPEAKER_00: And that's just because it's been fairly difficult to discover Luna.
4:25
SPEAKER_00: You often have to intentionally go download an app or go directly to a website.
4:29
SPEAKER_00: So being integrated with Prime Video and literally having a games tab at the top
4:33
SPEAKER_00: of Prime Video is just going to give us access to so many more potential players
4:38
SPEAKER_00: and I think allows so many more people to discover this great benefit.
4:41
SPEAKER_00: So I'm excited about that.
4:43
SPEAKER_00: And then I think secondly, I just get excited.
4:45
SPEAKER_00: I've seen for a long time,
4:46
SPEAKER_00: I really felt that we've seen this continued convergence between video games
4:51
SPEAKER_00: and television and movies.
4:53
SPEAKER_00: And it started where you make a game off of a movie or make a A movie off of a game.
4:58
SPEAKER_00: And a couple of years ago,
4:58
SPEAKER_00: we had the Fallout television show on Prime Video,
5:01
SPEAKER_00: and we saw this major spike in Fallout players of the video game through Luna.
5:05
SPEAKER_00: And I happened to be at Xbox at the time.
5:07
SPEAKER_00: We saw a major uptick there.
5:08
SPEAKER_00: And that was a relatively dated franchise that sort of had a rebirth,
5:12
SPEAKER_00: if you will, kind of all in the backs of this television show.
5:15
SPEAKER_00: So I do think increasingly we're going to see more and more TV show,
5:18
SPEAKER_00: movie, and video game kind of feel like all one entertainment experience.
5:22
SPEAKER_00: And just having it all in one place for customers, I think, is good for the industry.
5:25
SPEAKER_01: Do you think Luna can be a legitimate replacement for console gaming in this era
5:30
SPEAKER_01: of very high pricing?
5:31
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I do, but our business isn't predicated on replacing consoles.
5:35
SPEAKER_00: I think that's part of the clarity we've gotten is,
5:37
SPEAKER_00: you know,
5:38
SPEAKER_00: I think as you think about cloud gaming,
5:39
SPEAKER_00: which we all know has been around for,
5:41
SPEAKER_00: gosh, I think 20 some odd years if you go all the way back.
5:45
SPEAKER_00: But in some ways,
5:45
SPEAKER_00: I think historically, it's been a little bit of a solution in search of a problem.
5:50
SPEAKER_00: Consoles, for the most part, have been relatively inexpensive until now.
5:54
SPEAKER_00: So our business is more about reaching more players and expanding the market,
5:58
SPEAKER_00: not trying to get people to give up their consoles or their gaming PCs.
6:01
SPEAKER_00: Having said all that,
6:03
SPEAKER_00: we've seen the news,
6:04
SPEAKER_00: you know, we saw the Steam Machine pricing opening at $1,000 US.
6:08
SPEAKER_00: We hear rumors about consoles because of the RAM crisis,
6:10
SPEAKER_00: you know, pushing up well over $1,000 in Gen 10.
6:14
SPEAKER_00: So I do think you get to a point at which a lot more people will be in
6:17
SPEAKER_00: the consideration set for a cloud gaming solution just because of the sheer cost
6:21
SPEAKER_00: of buying dedicated hardware.
6:22
SPEAKER_01: I think the thing that excites me about what you're doing and Netflix
6:25
SPEAKER_01: as well is your press release mentions it.
6:27
SPEAKER_01: You can appeal to lapsed PC and console players,
6:29
SPEAKER_01: which is great because there's lots of people in my generation
6:32
SPEAKER_01: that might be interested in a GTA or a Tomb Raid or whatever,
6:35
SPEAKER_01: but they're not necessarily willing to invest We don't stand out the time anymore
6:39
SPEAKER_01: as this sort of reduces that need to expensive hardware.
6:42
SPEAKER_01: But Press Fleet also talks about this audience of people that might be interested
6:46
SPEAKER_01: but have been put off because of the friction of consoles and PC gaming because
6:50
SPEAKER_01: of expensive hardware.
6:51
SPEAKER_01: The question I don't know, does that audience actually exist?
6:54
SPEAKER_01: Have you got anything that makes you confident that there is this audience of people
6:57
SPEAKER_01: that would be interested but have been put off by that friction?
7:01
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think we have a couple of things.
7:02
SPEAKER_00: We have Signal since our relaunch of people that have come to us who I think fit
7:05
SPEAKER_00: that exact category.
7:07
SPEAKER_00: Obviously, we want to continue to grow that.
7:09
SPEAKER_00: But I think the sheer numbers of the industry as a whole,
7:11
SPEAKER_00: when you look at three billion people in the world who play video games,
7:14
SPEAKER_00: yet there's only,
7:15
SPEAKER_00: you know,
7:15
SPEAKER_00: depending And that's a lot of people who have some sort of affinity for video games.
7:18
SPEAKER_00: Maybe they're playing on mobile,
7:20
SPEAKER_00: maybe they're playing through a browser,
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SPEAKER_00: but they're not having the highest quality of the game.
7:32
SPEAKER_00: They're not playing in front of a television screen or a bigger monitor.
7:34
SPEAKER_00: To unpack a little bit why they don't do that,
7:37
SPEAKER_00: I think we've just talked about hardware is getting increasingly expensive.
7:40
SPEAKER_00: You know,
7:41
SPEAKER_00: games can be big investments to go buy a $70 game to go through
7:45
SPEAKER_00: the download experience.
7:46
SPEAKER_00: And so there's people like me who love that.
7:47
SPEAKER_00: That's how I choose to spend my entertainment time.
7:49
SPEAKER_00: But I think most people fit into more of a...
8:01
SPEAKER_00: Like that whole curve, you know, just kind of a more normal distribution.
8:03
SPEAKER_00: They spend some time watching television,
8:05
SPEAKER_00: they spend some time watching movies and they like to play video games.
8:07
SPEAKER_00: And so I think that's where we see an opportunity to serve a group of people
8:12
SPEAKER_00: who I might argue haven't really been well-served because the console
8:15
SPEAKER_00: and PC companies are mostly focused on those hardcore players.
8:19
SPEAKER_00: And I think to your point, you know, this is where I think we share a similar vision to Netflix.
8:23
SPEAKER_00: So I love to see what they're doing in this space because I think we're both kind
8:26
SPEAKER_00: of going after the same,
8:27
SPEAKER_00: at least have the same thesis about making games more available to more people.
8:31
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
8:31
SPEAKER_01: It's interesting because I remember,
8:32
SPEAKER_01: this is years and years ago,
8:33
SPEAKER_01: I was talking to Pete Hines when Bethesda was still not part of Microsoft.
8:37
SPEAKER_01: And he was talking about how he really believes in streaming because he said,
8:39
SPEAKER_01: I'm no longer having to market to PlayStation owners or Xbox owners or PC games.
8:44
SPEAKER_01: I can market to everybody.
8:45
SPEAKER_01: I can target whoever might be interested in it irrespective of what devices they own.
8:49
SPEAKER_01: It was just the whole appeal.
8:51
SPEAKER_01: But how are you looking to promote this to reach those people?
8:54
SPEAKER_01: Obviously the big thing being it's in the tab.
8:57
SPEAKER_00: Yeah I think you know part of it obviously we'll do more of our own marketing
9:01
SPEAKER_00: but you know just distribution as a whole and making you know we're talking
9:04
SPEAKER_00: about meeting players where they are and that's why
9:06
SPEAKER_00: the prime video integration is such a big deal for us because it's just going
9:09
SPEAKER_00: to be right there in front of people when they log into the prime video app.
9:12
SPEAKER_00: But I think there's more of that we can do across Amazon.
9:14
SPEAKER_00: You look at all the other properties we have within the company,
9:17
SPEAKER_00: you know,
9:17
SPEAKER_00: we get good placement on Fire TV where we have lots of people come in
9:20
SPEAKER_00: and discover Luna for the first time,
9:22
SPEAKER_00: but we need to do more awareness off the device.
9:25
SPEAKER_00: So think of,
9:25
SPEAKER_00: you know,
9:26
SPEAKER_00: Luna is accessible from any And that's sort of the real value proposition
9:31
SPEAKER_00: of cloud gaming is that there isn't a download required.
9:34
SPEAKER_00: There isn't a bunch of work to jump in.
9:35
SPEAKER_00: You can just click and play.
9:36
SPEAKER_00: So I think for us, it's just getting the word out.
9:39
SPEAKER_00: Like I said, I've made the joke before, but I can make it again here.
9:42
SPEAKER_00: You could argue that Luna is the largest paid gaming subscription in the world.
9:46
SPEAKER_00: The problem is nobody knows about it.
9:48
SPEAKER_00: They don't have it.
9:49
SPEAKER_00: We think that Prime Video Integration will do a bit to address that,
9:52
SPEAKER_00: but there's a lot more work we can do across different Amazon properties.
9:55
SPEAKER_00: You know, Twitch is a really big opportunity for us as well.
9:59
SPEAKER_01: Yes, of course.
10:00
SPEAKER_01: Just that small thing that you own.
10:02
SPEAKER_01: I think the only other friction that exists even with streaming is the need for control.
10:07
SPEAKER_01: And I know that some of your games,
10:08
SPEAKER_01: Courtroom Chaos,
10:09
SPEAKER_01: that you're a new Arnold Schwarzenegger game as well, people play using the phone.
10:12
SPEAKER_01: How key is it,
10:14
SPEAKER_01: do you think, having games playable using a phone when it comes to this opportunity?
10:18
SPEAKER_00: Well, I think it's important in terms of breadth and just reaching a broader group of people.
10:21
SPEAKER_00: You know, we believe one of our real strengths is just the breadth of our catalog.
10:25
SPEAKER_00: So everything from AAA,
10:26
SPEAKER_00: you know,
10:26
SPEAKER_00: like I said,
10:27
SPEAKER_00: Hogwarts or FC 26,
10:29
SPEAKER_00: all the way down to very light casual games, a board game like Ticket to Ride.
10:33
SPEAKER_00: That's great.
10:33
SPEAKER_00: But if you're not that type of player and you just want to jump in and play
10:36
SPEAKER_00: who wants to be a millionaire for 15,
10:37
SPEAKER_00: 20 minutes, that's where the phone's perfectly suitable.
10:39
SPEAKER_00: And that's kind of where we see the opportunity to grow the market.
10:59
SPEAKER_01: And I think for a lot of people,
11:00
SPEAKER_01: if they think, oh, I can play this game on a phone, I might as well play it.
11:04
SPEAKER_01: And then they play it for a bit and they go, actually, I need a controller.
11:06
SPEAKER_01: That's a journey that you can take them on because that barrier isn't there to begin with.
11:10
SPEAKER_01: Have you played Unhinged?
11:12
SPEAKER_01: Have you played that one?
11:13
SPEAKER_00: I actually played it last night.
11:14
SPEAKER_00: I absolutely love what...
11:17
SPEAKER_00: Some people ask us about Netflix as a competitor.
11:19
SPEAKER_00: Like I said earlier, I think I love what they're doing.
11:21
SPEAKER_00: And this is a great example where I think...
11:23
SPEAKER_00: We want to do more of these things to restart to push the envelope a little bit more
11:27
SPEAKER_00: in terms of new types of creative endeavors.
11:29
SPEAKER_00: And I think back to my real little riff about the integration between TV and video
11:34
SPEAKER_00: and video games,
11:34
SPEAKER_00: I think there's an opportunity to create a lot of these newer experiences
11:37
SPEAKER_00: that are sort of not traditional video games,
11:40
SPEAKER_00: but think of them as almost extensions of the video viewing process.
11:43
SPEAKER_00: And this is just a cool narrative story.
11:45
SPEAKER_00: So I love.
11:46
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah.
11:46
SPEAKER_01: I think both of you are at this stage right now where It's rising tide, right?
11:51
SPEAKER_01: If you can both succeed in bringing people in, that will benefit both of you.
11:54
SPEAKER_01: We spoke about this before, but Amazon Games and Amazon Luna, right?
11:57
SPEAKER_01: Everything's come together now, is that right?
11:59
SPEAKER_00: It is.
12:00
SPEAKER_00: It's something,
12:00
SPEAKER_00: you know,
12:01
SPEAKER_00: I got here a little over a year ago,
12:03
SPEAKER_00: and I would say at the time,
12:04
SPEAKER_00: no fault of anybody, but we had some structural challenges.
12:07
SPEAKER_00: We really had basically three distinct gaming organizations within Amazon,
12:12
SPEAKER_00: and that's not even counting Twitch.
12:13
SPEAKER_00: So you had Prime Gaming,
12:14
SPEAKER_00: Which was effectively a benefit for Prime members where we gave away codes
12:18
SPEAKER_00: and you go redeem them on other platforms.
12:20
SPEAKER_00: Great value for players.
12:22
SPEAKER_00: We had Amazon Game Studios,
12:23
SPEAKER_00: which was making games,
12:24
SPEAKER_00: but mostly MMOs that were geared at other platforms, not our own platform.
12:29
SPEAKER_00: And then we had Luna,
12:30
SPEAKER_00: which set an entirely different group
12:32
SPEAKER_00: that had built really impressive cloud gaming technology,
12:35
SPEAKER_00: but was still really in search of, you know, what's the purpose?
12:38
SPEAKER_00: Who's the audience?
12:38
SPEAKER_00: Who's it for?
12:39
SPEAKER_00: What are the games?
12:40
SPEAKER_00: So we brought all those things together under one roof.
12:44
SPEAKER_00: You're never going to have an org chart solve a customer problem.
12:48
SPEAKER_00: But I have seen org charts to prevent a solution from being found.
12:51
SPEAKER_00: And so this was kind of step one for us in terms of just streamlining.
12:55
SPEAKER_00: So we have a single gaming strategy.
12:57
SPEAKER_00: We think about content alongside the platform.
13:00
SPEAKER_00: What kind of games do we want to make, et cetera.
13:03
SPEAKER_00: So that was the structural problem.
13:04
SPEAKER_00: And then I think second was just a bigger strategic question around
13:08
SPEAKER_00: where Amazon fits into this space, if at all.
13:11
SPEAKER_00: Why does Amazon need to be in the video games business?
13:14
SPEAKER_00: We really like to try to focus on where are the places that we can add some unique value.
13:18
SPEAKER_00: What we didn't want to do,
13:19
SPEAKER_00: kind of look at the landscape and you looked at PlayStation and Xbox and Steam
13:23
SPEAKER_00: and what I'll call kind of all the core platforms.
13:26
SPEAKER_00: The world doesn't need another one of those.
13:28
SPEAKER_00: They don't need another, a fourth entry.
13:29
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's a great question.
13:32
SPEAKER_00: I think that's a great question.
13:44
SPEAKER_00: That's where we saw some fairly unique opportunities where Amazon could add value.
13:48
SPEAKER_00: And it's kind of looking at all the assets that Amazon has from MGM and all
13:52
SPEAKER_00: the IP associated with that prime video.
13:54
SPEAKER_00: And obviously this integration,
13:56
SPEAKER_00: things like Fire TV,
13:58
SPEAKER_00: things like Twitch,
13:59
SPEAKER_00: things So like NFL, NBA rights, you have a lot of assets to work with.
14:03
SPEAKER_00: And then I think the bow on top is we can do so many things through Amazon Prime
14:08
SPEAKER_00: with hundreds of millions of customers worldwide.
14:10
SPEAKER_00: We can push a bunch of value into there.
14:12
SPEAKER_00: And that's just,
14:12
SPEAKER_00: you know, a lot of those things are just assets that other companies don't have.
14:15
SPEAKER_00: So that's what gives us confidence that we're bringing something a little bit unique
14:18
SPEAKER_00: to the table here and providing a lot of value and not trying to compete head
14:21
SPEAKER_00: to head with the incumbents.
14:25
SPEAKER_01: You mentioned Twitch twice now.
14:27
SPEAKER_01: How does that fit into this?
14:28
SPEAKER_01: Is it still very much a separate thing that you can tap into?
14:31
SPEAKER_00: It's a separate thing,
14:32
SPEAKER_00: but obviously it's a place that serves gamers really,
14:34
SPEAKER_00: really well today and is interacting and engaging with gamers,
14:38
SPEAKER_00: both on the creator side and the viewer side.
14:39
SPEAKER_00: So nothing to announce today, but I think we see a ton of opportunity.
14:43
SPEAKER_00: In fact,
14:43
SPEAKER_00: right when I finish with you,
14:44
SPEAKER_00: I have a meeting with the Twitch team, so that's why it's top of mind for me.
14:47
SPEAKER_00: But I think there's a lot of opportunities where we already have
14:49
SPEAKER_00: a qualified audience to reach them with some of the things that we're doing
14:52
SPEAKER_00: with Luna.
14:53
SPEAKER_01: So you've clearly decided MMOs aren't part of this vision,
14:56
SPEAKER_01: this strategy, this plan, but Tomb Raider is.
14:59
SPEAKER_01: So what games fit with what you're doing?
15:01
SPEAKER_00: What doesn't fit?
15:02
SPEAKER_00: I mean, I can guess.
15:03
SPEAKER_00: I think everything technically fits, so I don't want to be coming across as though we can't...
15:08
SPEAKER_00: You know, handle those games.
15:09
SPEAKER_00: We can.
15:10
SPEAKER_00: I think for us, it's clarity around the audience that we're really targeting.
15:13
SPEAKER_00: So it doesn't mean we exclude anybody,
15:15
SPEAKER_00: but when I think of that kind of mainstream audience,
15:17
SPEAKER_00: which we call mid-core all the way down to casual,
15:20
SPEAKER_00: we found some things,
15:21
SPEAKER_00: especially on the AAA side,
15:22
SPEAKER_00: that are really And it's big IP,
15:26
SPEAKER_00: familiar IP, relatively simple game mechanics that are easy to get into.
15:31
SPEAKER_00: So you think of Hogwarts Legacy, you think of Indiana Jones, you think of Tomb Raider coming up.
15:36
SPEAKER_00: All those games are big known IPs.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: But they're also relatively easy to jump into.
15:41
SPEAKER_00: There's obviously levels of complexity you can get in as you go through the game.
15:44
SPEAKER_00: But that's where we've found a sweet spot since our relaunch
15:47
SPEAKER_00: in October is those kinds of things.
15:49
SPEAKER_00: And maybe not trying directly to go compete for the hardest
15:52
SPEAKER_00: of hardcore players who's playing multiplayer competitive shooters,
15:55
SPEAKER_00: at least not today.
15:56
SPEAKER_01: I sort of do understand why those MMOs perhaps don't necessarily make sense
16:01
SPEAKER_01: for what you're trying to do,
16:02
SPEAKER_01: but I have to say,
16:02
SPEAKER_01: I did think, because I played it at Summer Game Fest, the Mavericks game, Clutch.
16:07
SPEAKER_01: I could see how that could fit with what you're doing,
16:09
SPEAKER_01: but obviously you didn't agree with that, so why not that one?
16:13
SPEAKER_00: Well, that decision actually was made before I took over,
16:17
SPEAKER_00: so I can't speak to all the mechanics behind it.
16:19
SPEAKER_00: I can tell you that I too like the game.
16:23
SPEAKER_00: We've reached out to them recently, and we're trying to see if maybe it is a fit for Luna.
16:27
SPEAKER_00: So it'd be a different business relationship than the one we had before,
16:30
SPEAKER_00: but it's not a case where we don't think the game looks great.
16:33
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, wow.
16:34
SPEAKER_01: Definitely looks promising.
16:35
SPEAKER_01: When it comes to games that you're sort of funding or publishing yourself,
16:39
SPEAKER_01: assuming you're still going to be doing some of those,
16:40
SPEAKER_01: what investment levels are we looking at here?
16:42
SPEAKER_01: Is it AAA?
16:43
SPEAKER_01: Is it Indies?
16:44
SPEAKER_01: Is it AA?
16:45
SPEAKER_01: Do you have a strategy around that?
16:46
SPEAKER_00: We do, and it's all of those.
16:48
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
16:49
SPEAKER_00: From what we call game night games,
16:51
SPEAKER_00: which are those phone as a controller games,
16:53
SPEAKER_00: which I think of as,
16:53
SPEAKER_00: you know,
16:54
SPEAKER_00: single A games that are in the single millions of dollars to develop all the way up
16:57
SPEAKER_00: to triple A.
16:58
SPEAKER_00: We have obviously we've announced the two Tomb Raider titles,
17:01
SPEAKER_00: you know, Atlantis comes February 12th of next year.
17:03
SPEAKER_00: And then we'll follow on in 2028 with the next one.
17:06
SPEAKER_00: So we're excited about those.
17:08
SPEAKER_00: There are some other, you know, AAA things that are in various stages of discussion right now.
17:12
SPEAKER_00: So I do think,
17:13
SPEAKER_00: you know,
17:13
SPEAKER_00: and we've talked a lot about MGM and Amazon IP and opportunities to kind
17:18
SPEAKER_00: of leverage I think ultimately we want to build an identity with Luna where we have
17:21
SPEAKER_00: a content portfolio that resonates with people where they think, oh, gosh,
17:25
SPEAKER_00: that's the place that has Tomb Raider and maybe they have Bond
17:28
SPEAKER_00: and they have these other things.
17:29
SPEAKER_00: And I think that takes time, obviously, to go build.
17:32
SPEAKER_00: But I think for us to be the platform we want to be and
17:36
SPEAKER_00: the one we believe we can be, you very much have to have some original content.
17:41
SPEAKER_01: Amazon has spent a lot of money on this already and a lot of it has been written off
17:44
SPEAKER_01: and started again and reset.
17:45
SPEAKER_01: And this is what I know I've been in this industry long enough
17:47
SPEAKER_01: to know this happens all the time.
17:48
SPEAKER_01: But do you have much time to be able to sort of get that identity and explore these areas?
17:53
SPEAKER_01: Or is there an element of you need to get this right quickly?
17:56
SPEAKER_00: Now, Amazon is notorious for taking a very, very long view on things.
18:00
SPEAKER_00: I think,
18:01
SPEAKER_00: you know,
18:01
SPEAKER_00: Jeff Bezos said it many years ago,
18:03
SPEAKER_00: willing to be misunderstood for long periods of time.
18:05
SPEAKER_00: And does that mean there's infinite timelines for every business?
18:08
SPEAKER_00: No, of course not.
18:09
SPEAKER_00: But I think for us,
18:10
SPEAKER_00: it's really,
18:10
SPEAKER_00: like I said,
18:11
SPEAKER_00: For the first time in a long time, I feel like we have a single gaming strategy.
18:15
SPEAKER_00: We understand what we're doing,
18:17
SPEAKER_00: we understand what we're not doing, and we're executing against it.
18:20
SPEAKER_00: And obviously, time will tell how well we can execute and how right we are about our thesis.
18:25
SPEAKER_00: But generally, it's just about continuing to show growth.
18:27
SPEAKER_00: And I think integrating with Prime Video is yet another sign of us moving things forward.
18:32
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
18:33
SPEAKER_01: I'm a guy in my 40s.
18:34
SPEAKER_01: I live where I grew up.
18:35
SPEAKER_01: So I've got a lot of friends around me that aren't in the games industry,
18:38
SPEAKER_01: that aren't from that world.
18:39
SPEAKER_01: And they used to play games all the time when they were younger.
18:42
SPEAKER_01: And as they've got older,
18:43
SPEAKER_01: as the kids have come along,
18:44
SPEAKER_01: some of them haven't bought a games console since the PS3.
18:47
SPEAKER_01: They're excited for GTA 6, but they actually have no means to play it.
18:50
SPEAKER_01: And I think they're going to come for a bit of a shock when they look
18:53
SPEAKER_01: at how much it will cost them to do so.
18:54
SPEAKER_01: Not the game in particular, but obviously the hardware they'll need with it.
18:57
SPEAKER_01: So I do see there's a potential,
18:59
SPEAKER_01: I know that with Matthew Ball's spoken about it before,
19:01
SPEAKER_01: now he's at Xbox,
19:02
SPEAKER_01: He's been on the show,
19:03
SPEAKER_01: and he's been a little bit skeptical about it,
19:04
SPEAKER_01: but with these hardware rises,
19:07
SPEAKER_01: with these players that have been left behind,
19:08
SPEAKER_01: perhaps,
19:09
SPEAKER_01: and the fact that there are more games that are appealing to wider audiences,
19:13
SPEAKER_01: I think this is really interesting.
19:15
SPEAKER_01: The thesis makes sense, and it wasn't a question there.
19:18
SPEAKER_00: I have a follow-up regardless.
19:19
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think you're right.
19:20
SPEAKER_00: I said it earlier,
19:21
SPEAKER_00: but I do think that there had to be some sort of broader movement
19:24
SPEAKER_00: that would drive people in the direction of cloud gaming.
19:26
SPEAKER_00: I can squint and see it now.
19:28
SPEAKER_00: And that's not something I would have said three or four years ago.
19:31
SPEAKER_00: But I think the broader bit about People who are lapsed gamers really resonates.
19:35
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's kind of,
19:36
SPEAKER_00: a lot of times we're out talking with publishers and trying to convince them
19:39
SPEAKER_00: to bring their games to Luna.
19:41
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of times the skepticism you'll hear is, well,
19:44
SPEAKER_00: if I put my games on Luna,
19:45
SPEAKER_00: particularly if I push it into Prime,
19:46
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to go cannibalize all my sales on these other platforms.
19:50
SPEAKER_00: And the reality is,
19:51
SPEAKER_00: at least the pitch that we keep making,
19:53
SPEAKER_00: and it is the truth,
19:53
SPEAKER_00: is that this is about reaching players that a lot of those games are never going
19:57
SPEAKER_00: to be able to reach, particularly in a world of $1,000 consoles.
20:00
SPEAKER_00: And so I think if done right,
20:02
SPEAKER_00: and it's not just what we're doing here at Luna,
20:04
SPEAKER_00: I think there's other cloud gaming solutions out there,
20:06
SPEAKER_00: the opportunity is to unlock more players,
20:08
SPEAKER_00: and that's a good thing for the industry as a whole.
20:11
SPEAKER_01: 007 First Light.
20:12
SPEAKER_01: Obviously, I'm going to mention this.
20:13
SPEAKER_01: It's out.
20:13
SPEAKER_01: It's brilliant.
20:14
SPEAKER_01: It's the best Bond game I've played.
20:16
SPEAKER_01: And I'm the guy with a signed GoldenEye poster on my wall.
20:18
SPEAKER_01: But owners and obviously strategies have changed.
20:21
SPEAKER_01: And I appreciate you're not going to announce anything on this podcast.
20:25
SPEAKER_01: But is there anything you've learned from the launch of that game?
20:29
SPEAKER_01: Has it taken you by surprise?
20:30
SPEAKER_01: You've had a few moments to digest it, I suspect.
20:33
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
20:34
SPEAKER_00: Uh, number one, it's an awesome game.
20:35
SPEAKER_00: And so IO did just a tremendous job with the game itself.
20:38
SPEAKER_00: And I think one of the learnings,
20:40
SPEAKER_00: I don't think it was a surprise,
20:41
SPEAKER_00: but just,
20:42
SPEAKER_00: you know,
20:42
SPEAKER_00: they did it so well that it just shows that these single player sort
20:46
SPEAKER_00: of action adventure narrative Really resonate with a lot of people.
20:50
SPEAKER_00: And I think that's shown up in the sales that we've seen.
20:54
SPEAKER_00: We're excited about the franchise and, you know, I think where it can go from here.
20:58
SPEAKER_00: And right now it's,
21:00
SPEAKER_00: you know, the game's two months old, so we're kind of going to let it breathe.
21:03
SPEAKER_00: For a while before everyone wants to ask about a sequel, I think it's an awesome game.
21:07
SPEAKER_00: I think those kinds of games,
21:08
SPEAKER_00: as I mentioned earlier, really do seem to work on a platform like Luna.
21:13
SPEAKER_00: So when I think of Tomb Raider and some of the things we have on the roadmap,
21:16
SPEAKER_00: I get excited that that's where we're going to find real audience.
21:19
SPEAKER_01: See, because obviously their approach to that Hitman trilogy,
21:21
SPEAKER_01: the World of Assassination, which some people now forget was a trilogy.
21:25
SPEAKER_01: The first game, they had all the cost on it, really.
21:27
SPEAKER_01: And then they made the next, the second game, the third game so much less.
21:30
SPEAKER_01: So for me,
21:30
SPEAKER_01: I'm obviously hoping that it continues because I think there's a,
21:34
SPEAKER_01: not only can the games,
21:35
SPEAKER_01: you know,
21:36
SPEAKER_01: each Hitman game is better than the previous one, but they cost less as well.
21:38
SPEAKER_01: And I like their sort of iterative approach to the way they develop games and
21:41
SPEAKER_01: the way they keep engaging with them.
21:42
SPEAKER_01: It feels like it could fit,
21:44
SPEAKER_01: but I guess there's conversations to be had and there's lots
21:47
SPEAKER_01: of different parties involved in MGM as well, of course.
21:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but they made an awesome game and that's,
21:51
SPEAKER_00: you know, if there is a sequel, I think all we want is another awesome game.
21:54
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
21:55
SPEAKER_01: You know,
21:55
SPEAKER_01: this is not a question I was trying to ask,
21:59
SPEAKER_01: but I don't know if you know about this, I'm sure you do.
22:01
SPEAKER_01: There's actually a completed HD remake of GoldenEye somewhere that Rare made,
22:05
SPEAKER_01: I think they made like 20 years ago,
22:07
SPEAKER_01: and it got canned at the 11th hour for some form of licensing issue.
22:11
SPEAKER_01: That's low-hanging fruit for you.
22:13
SPEAKER_01: You get all those 1997 N64 kids back into games and playing on the Luna.
22:20
SPEAKER_01: I've been dying to get that game on an old console.
22:24
SPEAKER_01: Are there any other IP that Amazon owns that you're eager to explore
22:27
SPEAKER_01: that you think might be opportunities?
22:30
SPEAKER_00: Nothing to share today.
22:31
SPEAKER_00: I think there's a broad portfolio of things.
22:33
SPEAKER_00: And so I think it's really a matter of kind of obviously working with the teams
22:36
SPEAKER_00: at MGM and figuring out what makes sense,
22:38
SPEAKER_00: where we think we can actually make an interesting, fun game.
22:41
SPEAKER_00: Not every IP translates into a great game.
22:43
SPEAKER_00: And so I think it's kind of having that creative eye and sense of taste to kind
22:47
SPEAKER_00: of figure out what works and what doesn't.
22:49
SPEAKER_00: But that's a massive opportunity,
22:50
SPEAKER_00: as I mentioned earlier, for us and a really key part of our content strategy.
22:54
SPEAKER_01: I guess how long's a piece of string,
22:55
SPEAKER_01: but how many of these projects are you able to sort of commission?
22:59
SPEAKER_01: What's your capacity?
23:00
SPEAKER_01: Obviously there's partnerships that you have to do with developers bringing
23:03
SPEAKER_01: the games to the platform,
23:03
SPEAKER_01: then there's sort of the ones that you might publish and handle yourself.
23:06
SPEAKER_01: What's your capacity?
23:08
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, we can do pretty much whatever we need to right now.
23:11
SPEAKER_00: Now we're working with Crystal Dynamics on the Tomb Raider titles,
23:13
SPEAKER_00: and so those people don't sit in our house directly,
23:16
SPEAKER_00: but we work very closely with them.
23:18
SPEAKER_00: And then we have a lot of other things,
23:19
SPEAKER_00: you know, single A, double A that are in development internally.
23:22
SPEAKER_00: Now some of those you can take on more of those projects because they're
23:24
SPEAKER_00: a little bit smaller in nature.
23:26
SPEAKER_00: So I feel we're well resourced to go do these things.
23:29
SPEAKER_00: It's a matter really of figuring out what are the right things to make and what aren't.
23:33
SPEAKER_01: So what's the team like now?
23:34
SPEAKER_01: Because obviously you've had all these cuts and changes.
23:36
SPEAKER_01: Paint me a picture really of how the structure's like.
23:38
SPEAKER_00: Probably the easiest way to think of it is, you know, I mentioned I came from Xbox.
23:42
SPEAKER_00: It's the same way that Xbox is organized.
23:44
SPEAKER_00: There is,
23:44
SPEAKER_00: I guess they're back to being called Xbox now,
23:46
SPEAKER_00: but it used to be Microsoft Gaming and there were There's really two pillars of
23:49
SPEAKER_00: that.
23:50
SPEAKER_00: They had Xbox Game Studios, and they have Xbox The Platform.
23:53
SPEAKER_00: And that's pretty much what we are.
23:54
SPEAKER_00: Amazon Gaming is sort of the all-up entity, but we have two pillars.
23:57
SPEAKER_00: One is Amazon Game Studios,
23:59
SPEAKER_00: and that's where all the relationships with Tomb Raider titles,
24:02
SPEAKER_00: that's where we make a lot of these game night games.
24:04
SPEAKER_00: They all come out of the studio, so that's our game studio.
24:07
SPEAKER_00: And then Luna is our games platform,
24:08
SPEAKER_00: and we're really trying to use AGS to serve content to Luna,
24:12
SPEAKER_00: but that doesn't mean that those titles won't go elsewhere as well.
24:16
SPEAKER_01: Okay, I'll ask one final question,
24:17
SPEAKER_01: and it's a question I always end with,
24:18
SPEAKER_01: which is, where would you like to see Amazon games in five years?
24:22
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, big question.
24:25
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
24:25
SPEAKER_00: In more places,
24:26
SPEAKER_00: I think,
24:26
SPEAKER_00: you know,
24:27
SPEAKER_00: bring it home here on Prime Video,
24:28
SPEAKER_00: it's making it more accessible to people and easier for them to jump in.
24:32
SPEAKER_00: That's the benefit of cloud gaming.
24:33
SPEAKER_00: So how do we get into places where players are?
24:36
SPEAKER_00: But ultimately,
24:36
SPEAKER_00: you know,
24:37
SPEAKER_00: tens of millions of players,
24:38
SPEAKER_00: we believe we can build It's still the net scale gaming platform that's serving
24:41
SPEAKER_00: that,
24:41
SPEAKER_00: you know,
24:41
SPEAKER_00: as I said,
24:42
SPEAKER_00: that two and a half billion audience that I think is a little bit underserved today.
24:46
SPEAKER_00: So, you know,
24:47
SPEAKER_00: obviously there's a lot of work we have to do to get our content portfolio right,
24:50
SPEAKER_00: to get our product right, to get our messaging and awareness in the right place.
24:54
SPEAKER_00: But, you know,
24:55
SPEAKER_00: things like integrating with Prime Video,
24:57
SPEAKER_00: things like trying to figure out how to go deeper with Fire TV.
25:00
SPEAKER_00: You know, I mentioned Twitch now three times, like there are opportunities there.
25:04
SPEAKER_00: And so I think those are all the pieces that we have to work with.
25:07
SPEAKER_00: And what I'd love to say five years from now is that,
25:09
SPEAKER_00: you know,
25:09
SPEAKER_00: we're much more deeply integrated across the broader Amazon and we're serving,
25:14
SPEAKER_00: you know, tens of millions of players versus millions of players.
25:17
SPEAKER_01: Well, I do see a role for streaming, particularly in this console market.
25:21
SPEAKER_01: We're talking about a diskless future now, aren't we?
25:23
SPEAKER_01: And it feels like something that could work.
25:26
SPEAKER_01: I know there's people that are skeptical about it because it's
25:28
SPEAKER_01: a lot more complicated than streaming TV and film,
25:30
SPEAKER_01: and there's obviously the restrictions for the controllers,
25:32
SPEAKER_01: but I just think,
25:33
SPEAKER_01: I don't know,
25:33
SPEAKER_01: I think there's perhaps more of a willingness and a drive to try
25:36
SPEAKER_01: and solve those little issues because the industry kind of needs a new outlet
25:39
SPEAKER_01: that isn't reliant too much on RAM.
25:43
SPEAKER_01: Even though I guess you are still around to a
25:44
SPEAKER_00: degree.
25:45
SPEAKER_00: But look, technology only gets better.
25:48
SPEAKER_00: And so I think,
25:48
SPEAKER_00: you know,
25:49
SPEAKER_00: even in my time,
25:50
SPEAKER_00: you know,
25:51
SPEAKER_00: from xCloud coming to Luna and seeing what we have in terms of streaming quality,
25:54
SPEAKER_00: it's gotten so much better just over the course of the last And so I expect that
25:58
SPEAKER_00: to continue.
25:59
SPEAKER_00: Obviously there'll be technology breakthroughs that happen over the course of the next decade.
26:03
SPEAKER_00: And so I do believe in this as a long-term vehicle,
26:05
SPEAKER_00: but I think historically the industry maybe has been a little bit off by trying to,
26:09
SPEAKER_00: the messaging and trying to win console players over to the cloud.
26:12
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if that's the right place to start.
26:14
SPEAKER_01: No, no.
26:15
SPEAKER_01: What does success actually look like for you?
26:17
SPEAKER_01: Is it tens of millions of players or is it Amazon Prime customers engagement?
26:20
SPEAKER_01: Do you have a metric?
26:22
SPEAKER_00: It's all those things.
26:23
SPEAKER_00: I think, you know, for me, I sequence it as player growth is our number one objective right now.
26:26
SPEAKER_00: And that's what we've kind of really leveraged pushing all of our Jeff,
26:29
SPEAKER_00: thank you so much for your time.
26:31
SPEAKER_00: Good luck with it.
26:32
SPEAKER_00: I think the industry needs it.
26:33
SPEAKER_00: And yeah, I hope the launch goes well.
26:58
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for having me, Chris.
26:59
SPEAKER_00: Always good to see you.
27:01
SPEAKER_01: Thank you to Jeffrey there.
27:02
SPEAKER_01: Good luck to Amazon.
27:03
SPEAKER_01: I know they've had a really tough year,
27:05
SPEAKER_01: but I like the plan if it can work, if the thesis is correct.
27:09
SPEAKER_01: There's just enough time for me to run through some of the other big stories of the past week.
27:13
SPEAKER_01: Let's begin with the US sales data.
27:15
SPEAKER_01: It's not happy sales.
27:16
SPEAKER_01: For the first six months of the year,
27:17
SPEAKER_01: the games market hit $27.5 billion, which is actually 1% behind 2025 levels.
27:34
SPEAKER_01: The decline is due to the fact that Nintendo Switch 2 launched in June last year.
27:38
SPEAKER_01: So Switch 2 sales naturally aren't as big this month as they were in their launch month.
27:43
SPEAKER_01: Switch 2 sales are in fact 79% lower than they were this time last year.
27:47
SPEAKER_01: PS5 sales are also down 19%.
27:48
SPEAKER_01: Also, it had its big price hike back in April.
27:52
SPEAKER_01: However, Xbox Series S and X revenue doubled.
27:55
SPEAKER_01: That's good news for Xbox.
27:56
SPEAKER_01: It obviously had its big showcase during June with lots
27:59
SPEAKER_00: of cool game announcements.
28:00
SPEAKER_01: UFC 6 was the best selling game of the month in terms of revenue,
28:03
SPEAKER_01: whereas Mecha Chameleon was number 2,
28:05
SPEAKER_01: but Mecha Chameleon cost $6,
28:07
SPEAKER_01: that's why it's not at the top of the revenue charts, but it sold 4 million units.
28:11
SPEAKER_01: In fact,
28:11
SPEAKER_01: I've got some data that suggests Mecha Chameleon may be the biggest selling game of
28:14
SPEAKER_01: the year already.
28:16
SPEAKER_01: The only growth area according to Takana in June was subscription,
28:18
SPEAKER_01: which increased 7% compared to last year.
28:21
SPEAKER_01: So pretty rough numbers for June.
28:24
SPEAKER_01: It's a story that's a little bit old now, but we haven't covered it on the news show.
28:28
SPEAKER_01: Bethesda has moved to reassure fans and the industry that it is working on some major products.
28:33
SPEAKER_01: After that brutal wave of layoffs that hit Xbox earlier in the month,
28:37
SPEAKER_01: the developer said that Elder Scrolls 6 is progressing well,
28:40
SPEAKER_01: Starfield remains an important part of its future,
28:42
SPEAKER_01: and that it is remastering classic Fallout games,
28:44
SPEAKER_01: namely Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas.
28:47
SPEAKER_01: It also confirmed the existence of a new Fallout title from developer Obsidian.
28:51
SPEAKER_01: Obsidian went for its own wave of layoffs.
28:53
SPEAKER_01: I understand it was nearly,
28:54
SPEAKER_01: you know,
28:54
SPEAKER_01: there was lots of conversation around what its future will be,
28:56
SPEAKER_01: and they've decided its future is to work on Fallout.
28:59
SPEAKER_01: There will also be a big update to online game Fallout 76,
29:01
SPEAKER_01: and Fallout 5 has just entered pre-production.
29:03
SPEAKER_01: We shouldn't expect that any time soon, of course.
29:06
SPEAKER_01: All the focus is on Elder Scrolls 6.
29:08
SPEAKER_01: A few other things going on at Bethesda.
29:10
SPEAKER_01: Elder Scrolls Online developer ZeniMax Online Studios,
29:12
SPEAKER_01: which was really severely impacted by layoffs,
29:15
SPEAKER_01: is now working closely with the core Bethesda game studio team.
29:18
SPEAKER_01: Gamefile reported that ZeniMax Online Studios head Joseph Berber,
29:22
SPEAKER_01: producer Sun Kaf,
29:23
SPEAKER_01: game director Rich Labatt, and production director Ala Diaz have all left the firm.
29:28
SPEAKER_01: Some positive event news.
29:30
SPEAKER_01: Gamescom has completely sold out of exhibition space for the 2026 show.
29:34
SPEAKER_01: That's never happened before.
29:36
SPEAKER_01: As a result, the organizers are looking to make the already massive event bigger for 2027.
29:40
SPEAKER_01: The event runs August 26th to August 30th this year.
29:43
SPEAKER_01: Opening Night Live when a bunch of games get announced and shown and new trailers
29:46
SPEAKER_01: and all sorts are set for August 25th.
29:48
SPEAKER_01: Opening Night Live is of course run by Geoff Keighley who is the co-founder of
29:51
SPEAKER_01: The Game Business.
29:52
SPEAKER_01: Another event news is London Games Festival.
29:55
SPEAKER_01: That's going to run April 12th to April 19th next year.
29:57
SPEAKER_01: So an actual week.
29:58
SPEAKER_01: It's been longer as five weeks before, but it's now just a week.
30:01
SPEAKER_01: Most of it's now taking place at a central venue.
30:03
SPEAKER_01: The New Game Plus Showcase event,
30:04
SPEAKER_01: which has been getting bigger every year,
30:06
SPEAKER_01: and the game finance market,
30:07
SPEAKER_01: plus a few other networking and conferences,
30:09
SPEAKER_01: will take place at a very specific central London venue.
30:12
SPEAKER_01: Other events,
30:13
SPEAKER_01: including the BAFTA Game Awards,
30:14
SPEAKER_01: the Ensemble Exhibition and Screenplay Conference,
30:16
SPEAKER_01: will take place at different venues.
30:18
SPEAKER_01: So good news there for London Game Festival.
30:20
SPEAKER_01: I love that event.
30:21
SPEAKER_01: My former boss,
30:22
SPEAKER_01: Michael French, is the head of Games London, and he's done incredible work there.
30:26
SPEAKER_01: I think he got an OBE as well earlier this year.
30:29
SPEAKER_01: Director Consumer Commerce Specialist Neon has closed a $13 million Series
30:33
SPEAKER_01: A funding round led by Crafton with participation from A16Z,
30:37
SPEAKER_01: Griffin Gaming Partners and Renegade Partners.
30:39
SPEAKER_01: Neon says it has delivered 200% growth year on year for the first half of 2026.
30:42
SPEAKER_01: Obviously, I don't know what that growth is from.
30:44
SPEAKER_01: It says that publishers using its infrastructure is generating roughly 70%
30:48
SPEAKER_01: of monthly revenue through direct channels.
30:50
SPEAKER_01: The sector has become highly competitive,
30:51
SPEAKER_01: of course, with the opening up of the Google and Apple App Stores.
30:54
SPEAKER_01: Big names like Zola and stuff are in that space.
30:57
SPEAKER_01: And now Neon.
30:58
SPEAKER_01: More news,
30:59
SPEAKER_01: Joe Ziegler,
31:00
SPEAKER_01: the director of PlayStation and Bungie's Marathon,
31:02
SPEAKER_01: has left the studio four months after the game's launch.
31:05
SPEAKER_01: He was formerly the game director on Valorant.
31:07
SPEAKER_01: He's apparently joined another project,
31:08
SPEAKER_01: don't know which one that is,
31:09
SPEAKER_01: and Marathon will now be led by Del Sheffich III,
31:12
SPEAKER_01: who was previously
31:13
SPEAKER_01: the assistant game director alongside creative director Julia Nardin.
31:17
SPEAKER_01: GameStop has sort of shrugged its shoulders at Sony's news
31:19
SPEAKER_01: that it will be killing disc-based games in January 2028.
31:23
SPEAKER_01: CEO Ryan Cohen said it's irrelevant.
31:25
SPEAKER_01: It mattered in the past.
31:26
SPEAKER_01: Software today makes up less than 12% of the business and collectibles make up
31:30
SPEAKER_01: over half the business.
31:30
SPEAKER_01: So it's totally, totally irrelevant.
31:32
SPEAKER_01: They sold that to Bloomberg.
31:35
SPEAKER_01: A couple of other final stories.
31:36
SPEAKER_01: Assassin's Creed Black Flag Resync has now sold three million copies worldwide.
31:39
SPEAKER_01: It did that in its first week.
31:40
SPEAKER_01: And esports communication agency,
31:41
SPEAKER_01: The Story Mob,
31:42
SPEAKER_01: is expanding its remit to cover game publishers, consumer brands and tech companies.
31:45
SPEAKER_01: It's also launching a consultancy called Playmakers,
31:47
SPEAKER_01: which will help brands understand gamer culture.
31:50
SPEAKER_01: That's it from the news this week.
31:52
SPEAKER_01: And it's that for me today.
31:54
SPEAKER_01: We'll be back next week, of course, for more news analysis and interviews.
31:57
SPEAKER_01: If you enjoy our news, why not consider becoming a paid subscriber?
32:00
SPEAKER_01: You'll get a bonus micro podcast from us every Monday alongside a monthly market report.
32:05
SPEAKER_01: You can find out how to subscribe by going to thegamebusiness.com.
32:09
SPEAKER_01: But that's it for me today.
32:12
SPEAKER_01: Until next time, thank you for tuning in.