Episodes
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Marc’s first gaming job was at Sphere, which was later renamed to Spectrum Holobyte. He worked as a software engineer on the games Vet and Falcon 1. When Spectrum Holobyte merged with Microprose in 1993, Mencher was asked to staff the entity and hired over 200 people. He later joined The 3DO Company, a game console manufacturer, as Staffing Manager, and helped to build The 3DO Studio (The 3DO Company’s Game Development Studio) from scratch, hiring over 300 people.In 1996, Mencher decided that he enjoyed the work so much, he opened his own recruiting firm, Virtual Search, which was later renamed to GameRecruiter in 2004, with Mencher as CEO, along with co-founder Howard Taule. The firm specializes in career opportunities within the worldwide gaming industry and is based in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, with satellite offices in Austin, Texas, Las Vegas, Nevada, San Francisco, and Los Angeles.While running the recruiting company, Mencher also contributed to the gaming industry as a producer of games such as Nikopol: Secrets of the Immortals and was given special thanks in the credits of Force 21 and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare.Mencher has written many articles for game industry periodicals and websites such as Gamasutra, with advice and observations on gaming careers. He has also been interviewed as an industry expert on Blog Talk Radio and in periodicals such as Wall Street Journal, Boston Globe, the Florida Sun-Sentinel and The Washington Post. In 2002, he wrote and published his first book, Get in the Game!. The book guides and prepares readers to start a career in the game industry, and shows the reader how to research, network, meet the right industry people, access the unadvertised job market, and present an effective demo. The book also gives advice on writing resumes, handling interviews, and negotiating salary packages. Additional advice is included from several industry experts who discuss different types of careers in the industry.Visit http://www.playmakerspodcast.com/ (www.playmakerspodcast.com) to get access to the full blog post for this episode and much more!VqSo6jueEvNwny0Kw3bU
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Ian has been in the gaming business for twenty years, including time as an environment artist, the art director for the Dead Space games, and the creative director of Battlefields 4 and Hardline. In 2016 he became Game Director for Crystal Dynamics directing the Tomb Raider Series.
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Adrian Crook is an award-winning game design consultant with over 20 years’ experience in the social, casual, and core games sectors. He has produced and designed over two dozen products across platforms ranging from early Nintendo and Sega Genesis to PlayStation 1, PlayStation 2, PC, Xbox 360, Wii, Facebook, iOS, and Online. In 2006, Adrian was named Producer of the Year by the Canadian New Media Awards and his products have won numerous awards, including “Game of the Year.”
In January 2008, Adrian founded Adrian Crook & Associates, a game design and strategy consultancy that has contributed to the success of over 90 valued international clients. Adrian’s experienced team is focused on social and mobile game design, gamification, business development, and startup growth strategy.
Adrian is an advisor to several game industry firms and is currently a creative mentor at Execution Labs, a game incubator, and accelerator. He has given interviews on G4TV and other TV, print, and online news outlets, and has spoken as a social games expert at conferences such as GDC, SXSW, ICE, Casual Connect, INplay, and GameON: Finance.
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Gordon P. Bellamy is an American video game executive. He has over 19 years of experience and leadership in the interactive entertainment industry. Gordon was the Executive Director of the International Game Developers Association from August 2010 until July 2012.
Gordon has spent the past nineteen years producing and marketing interactive content, and developing strategic business partnerships with video game publishers, social media developers and technology partners.
As an executive consultant for MTV, Bellamy provided creative guidance on the content, direction and strategic marketing partnerships for the annual Spike TV Video Game Awards show and the highly rated weekly program GameTrailers TV with Geoff Keighley, also on Spike TV. Previously, he was Executive Director of the game industry's trade organization, the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences. Bellamy has also played key business and product development roles at Electronic Arts, where he was named the company's Rookie of the Year for his work on the Madden NFL franchise, THQ, and Activision subsidiary, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Z-AXIS&action=edit&redlink=1 (Z-AXIS). Gordon previously served as Chair of the Board of the International Game Developers Association and serves as a judge for the Promax/BDA MI6 Awards, which celebrate the best in marketing, advertising and design within interactive and game entertainment.
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An American video game designer who is best known for his work as the lead designer and creative director on the Ratchet & Clank series developed by http://www.insomniacgames.com/ (Insomniac Games) for the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, and PlayStation 4.
In 2017, he self-published the book Directing Video Games: 101 Tips for Creative Leaders. Written and illustrated by Brian, the book covers the top principles and tips for both aspiring and experienced creative directors.
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Dave Rohrl has more than 22 years experience designing and producing online games for a mass audience. Over the course of his career, he has led design or production on more than 50 games and overseen or consulted on dozens more and held senior positions at Pogo, PopCap, Zynga, and Playdom.
In this episode, we discuss the design process, especially as it pertains to preproduction on casual games. Listen to learn why he encourages bad code and art early in the process and many of the tactics he brings to bear in order to achieve "fun" fast.
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Alfonzo Burton is one of the top designers in UI/UX. His insight and unsurpassed design techniques have been utilized by many of the top grossing games in the marketplace to date, many achieving the 100-Million-dollar mark. Alfonzo has founded two design companies that have both been a driving force in UI/UX for the past 15 years. He worked as a Director of UI/UX for both Glu, and Pocket Gems and then moved on as CEO/Creative Director to begin Uxmagicians Inc, a San Francisco-based full-service user experience design agency that focuses on gaming experiences and digital products.
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Robin Hunicke is an innovative American video game artist. She's also a professor of game design at UC Santa Cruz and the co-founder of Funomena.
Hunicke is recognized in the industry for her support of independent game development, experimentation in game design, research in dynamic difficulty adjustment, and the advocacy of women within the games industry.
In this interview, we discuss her unique take on games as art, and the process she uses to imbue her games with emotion.
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Eric Zimmerman is a game designer the co-author of four books including Rules of Play with Katie Salen, which was published in November 2004. Eric Zimmerman has written at least 24 essays and white-papers since 1996, mostly pertaining to game development from an academic standpoint. He's currently a founding faculty at the NYU Game Center. Eric Zimmerman is deeply embedded in New York Game scene. Having originally cofounded Gamelab, the studio that went out to create Diner Dash.
In this episode, Eric explains how he designed Gamelab to be a place where people who worked there felt ownership and authorship of the intellectual property that they were creating. We also talk about the value of game design "frameworks" and the art of game design as a way of being in the world.
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Ed Kuehnel, a screenwriter (Lumberjack Man) and game writer who has worked on over fifty video games for publishers such as Disney Interactive, Paramount Digital, Vivendi/Universal and Ubisoft.
Ed's work won Best Narrative at the Game Awards 2014 with Valiant Hearts and has written on critically acclaimed games for some of the most beloved studios in the industry, including Twisted Pixel Games, Uber Entertainment and Telltale Games.
In this interview, we discuss some of the key lessons he's learned along his path to success, and Ed shares the powerful frameworks that he finds consistently useful in crafting great in-game tales.
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Lorne Lanning is an American game designer, director, writer and voice actor. He is also co-founder of Oddworld Inhabitants. He is best known for creating the Oddworld series including Abe's Abe's Exoddus, Munch's Oddysee, Stranger's Wrath and Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty! He is currently working on Oddworld: Soulstorm.
In part 2 of our 2 part interview, Lorne discusses further into Kickstarter campaigns and crowdfunding.
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Lorne Lanning is an American game designer, director, writer and voice actor. He is the co-founder of Oddworld Inhabitants and is best known for creating the Oddworld series including Abe's Oddysee, Abe's Exoddus, Munch's Oddysee, Stranger's Wrath and Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty!. He is currently working on Oddworld: Soulstorm.
In part 1 of our 2 part interview, Lorne presents his path growing into the role of an artist as a social critic and lays out the specifics of how he weaves an artistic message into his games. He also reveals secrets for creating game worlds that have lasting fan cultures and stand the test of time.
**Jordan here, I just wanted to add that this interview was very inspiring to me personally, and helped me reconnect with why I make games, and what I would like to achieve in coming years. I feel that the way Lorne expressed his point of view up in this interview was an incredible gift to our community. I hope you'll accept his challenge to make great entertainment that is also great art!
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Lev Chapelsky is a founding partner and general manager for http://www.blindlight.com/ (Blindlight), a Hollywood-based production company that has been operating at the nexus of the videogame and Hollywood industries for the past 12 years. Leading game producers from all of the global top 20 game companies have turned to Blindlight when they want creative contributions from Hollywood, or when they need help navigating the murky waters between these two industries.
This episode will interest Hollywood and game industry writers, voice actors, composers, and producers who want to understand the intricacies that go into Hollywood deals and voice-over work.
In this conversation, Lev presented several surprising considerations and approaches when working with Hollywood talent, and presented several common mistakes game producers make along the way.
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Mike Mika has 20+ years game development experience. He helped launch NGMoco, pioneering some of the first free-to-play games for iPhone. He's run studios and played a major role in the shift to digital content distribution with Xbox Live and PSN. He has shipped over 190 games on every platform since the Game Boy, his most recent title, #IDARB was downloaded by over a million people in the first week of its release.
Mike's improvisational approach to game design can inspire any game designer to spend more tame creating interactivity and less time working only with documentation. His enthusiasm for game development and the game business is also very palpable in this interview.
In this episode we cover his work on several hit franchises, his experience creating #IDARB, his approach to prototyping quickly and effectively, and surprise attention he recieved in 2013. That was the year when the rest of the world became aware of Mike as “The Donkey Kong Dad” when he modified the classic Donkey Kong game for his daughter, so she could play as Pauline and rescue Mario.
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Jason Della Rocca is the co-founder of Execution Labs, a hands-on early stage investor for independent game developers. Prior, he served as the executive director of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA) for nearly nine years.
If you're a studio founder or indie developer looking for funding, this interview will help you understand how to make your project and studio attractive to investors. If you're a game designer or programmer considering creating a studio, this interview will help you get started on a path of success and sustainability.
In this episode, Jason tells us about the birth of Execution Labs, elaborates on the specific phases of Venture Capital, and provides highly targeted advice for studios looking to pitch potential partners for capital or publishing.
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In this short intro, host Jordan Blackman explains the genesis of the podcast, discusses who will get the most out its programming, and briefly outlines his own game industry experience.
This show is designed to be valuable to ambitious game industry professionals. We cover how to make better games, build better studios, and have better careers. The way we do that is by bringing on top industry experts and achievers and interviewing them for useful know-how and insights.
This show is for you if:
You want creative and business success in the game industry.
You're an ambitious indie developer who wants to make a great game that's also received by a big audience.
You care about great game design and game stories.
You're a lead at a studio looking to learn from the industry's top creators.
You work at a publishing company and want to understand what today's business leaders are doing to drive brand successes.
You want to understand how Free to Play gaming works.
This show is not for you if:
You don't think the business aspect of making games is important.
You are looking for the latest industry news.
You're looking for subjective opinions about various game platforms.
You're looking for "hacks" or quick fixes to make your game or company a success.
About your host, Jordan Blackman:
Jordan has been writing, producing, and designing games for over a decade. He is a mobile game design expert, an accomplished producer, and an instructor of Game Design. His work for Novalogic, Zynga, and Ubisoft has generated several hundred million dollars. Jordan has produced and designed for numerous million-selling franchises, including FrontierVille, Delta Force: Black Hawk Down, Joint Operations, CSI:, and CastleVille. Jordan is the industry leader who brought CSI to Facebook with the smash hit, CSI: Crime City. He went on to Zynga where he led the creative team on FrontierVille, one of the most popular and profitable games of all time. Jordan has collaborated with top studios worldwide including Telltale games, Area/Code, Other Ocean, Buzzmonkey, Ubisoft Shanghai, and Zynga SF. Partners Jordan has worked with include CBS, Ogilvy, Sony, American Express, and many more. He currently serves as a consulting designer and producer for leading organizations inside and outside the game industry. His clients include Nickelodeon, EA Sports, Beeline, AMC Networks, the Pokemon Company, and others.
