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Why EVE Online’s studio bought itself back for $120m - and partnered with Google DeepMind
CCP Games has entered a strategic period of independence following a $120 million management-led buyback from Pearl Abyss.
- CCP Games (now rebranded as Fenris) completed a $120 million buyback from Pearl Abyss to regain independence and pursue a distinct, tech-focused portfolio strategy.
- The studio is collaborating with Google DeepMind to use EVE Online’s complex, player-driven economic and social environment as a training ground for AI agents.
- Fenris is open-sourcing its proprietary 'Carbon' engine and technology platform to encourage third-party development and long-term ecosystem sustainability.
PlayStation's Live-Service Initiative Could Not Have Gone Worse
PlayStation’s strategic pivot toward live-service gaming, initiated around 2020–2021 with the goal of launching a dozen such titles by 2026, has largely failed to yield the intended results.
- Sony's live-service initiative, which aimed to launch a dozen live-service titles by 2025-2026, has largely failed, resulting in significant resource depletion and the cancellation of multiple high-profile projects.
- Guerrilla Games has rebooted 'Horizon Hunters: Gathering' following poor performance in playtests conducted throughout 2026, casting doubt on the project's future.
- Naughty Dog canceled its 'The Last of Us' online project in 2023 to avoid the long-term resource trap of becoming a dedicated live-service studio.
Arkane veterans Harvey Smith and Ben Horne reunite: “We’re going back to the games we love”
Black Pony Immersive, a new independent studio founded by industry veterans Harvey Smith and Ben Horne, aims to revitalize the immersive sim genre through a commitment to single-player, narrative-driven experiences.
- Black Pony Immersive, founded by Harvey Smith and Ben Horne, is a new independent studio focused on developing single-player, narrative-driven immersive sims.
- The studio operates with a core team of 26 U.S.-based professionals and utilizes a milestone-based funding model to maintain financial control.
- The founders explicitly reject games-as-a-service models, prioritizing a singular, cohesive creative vision over industry trends.
🎯 The 2026 D2C Survey: Why 41% of studios still DON'T have a web store (and why they're wrong)
The mobile gaming industry is currently undergoing a strategic pivot toward direct-to-consumer (D2C) channels, with 59% of studios now operating web stores.
- Direct-to-consumer (D2C) web stores now account for 30% to 46% of total revenue for studios that have successfully integrated them.
- While 59% of mobile studios currently operate web stores, 41% remain hesitant due to perceived technical, legal, and platform-friction barriers.
- Studios are shifting their primary D2C motivation from margin optimization to gaining brand visibility, first-party customer data, and control over pricing and promotional strategies.
S07, E29: AI's impact on the labor market (with Brian Albrecht)
Technological advancement, particularly the integration of artificial intelligence, does not signal the obsolescence of human labor but rather initiates a structural shift in economic demand.
- The economic impact of AI on labor is currently difficult to quantify due to messy data, though early evidence suggests entry-level jobs with high AI exposure are the most susceptible to displacement.
- Technological innovation typically leads to economic reorganization rather than total obsolescence, as seen in historical transitions where productivity gains from automation freed up labor for new service sectors.
- Personalized pricing models can improve market efficiency by reducing the deadweight loss associated with traditional discounting methods like coupons, which require consumers to waste time or effort to secure lower prices.
Can Portugal Become Europe’s Next Gaming Powerhouse?
Portugal is rapidly evolving from a traditional exporter of technical talent into a burgeoning hub for original intellectual property.
- Portugal's gaming industry has experienced significant growth, with total turnover for domestic companies rising from approximately 5 million to nearly 100 million between 2018 and 2024.
- The primary challenge for Portugal’s gaming sector is transitioning from a talent exporter to a hub for original intellectual property (IP), which requires local studios to scale their own successful products rather than relying solely on foreign investment.
- Large-scale studio acquisitions often lose value over time due to a failure to align strategic goals post-merger, a trend observed by Jefferson Valadares during his tenure at Fortis Games and his analysis of Electronic Arts' historical M&A activity.
How long should a game wait to enter PlayStation Plus?
Sony’s strategic approach to the PlayStation Plus Game Catalog reflects a broader industry shift away from day-one subscription releases, favoring instead a delayed entry model that maximizes long-term revenue and churn reduction.
- Sony added Helldivers 2 to the PlayStation Plus Game Catalog approximately 2.5 years after its initial release, serving as a churn-reduction strategy for the subscription service.
- Large third-party games can receive payments of roughly $10 million for inclusion in PlayStation Plus, though compensation varies significantly based on the title's scale and developer status.
- The paid user-generated content (UGC) market is expanding, with platforms like Mod.io reporting an average revenue per paying user (ARPPU) of $10 for titles such as BMX Streets.
Unity vs AppLovin: Which One Is Actually Winning?
The mobile gaming industry is currently navigating a period of significant volatility and strategic realignment, characterized by intense competition between major ad networks and shifting market valuations.
- AppLovin experienced a $27 billion loss in market value and a 29% share price decline despite reporting a 53% year-over-year revenue increase to $1.9 billion.
- Unity is attempting a strategic pivot by integrating engine data into its advertising infrastructure through its Vector AI initiative and new day-28 (D28) optimization models.
- Unity remains at a competitive disadvantage because it must pay fees to bid into AppLovin’s MAX platform while simultaneously competing against AppLovin’s superior data scale.
Cyprus Video Game Industry Report 2025
Cyprus has emerged as the world’s most efficient video game development ecosystem, functioning as a critical hub within the $263.7 billion global gaming market.
- By 2025, Cyprus's video game industry became a critical global hub, comprising over 400 companies and 4,300 employees, contributing approximately €1.15 billion directly to the national GDP.
- The industry's rapid expansion, with firms more than doubling between 2019 and 2024, is driven by a mobile-first strategy, a favorable IP Box tax regime, and high mobile game installs per capita.
- Cyprus ranks third globally in mobile downloads and eleventh in mobile in-app revenue, reflecting a mature, export-oriented sector.
Appendix J: Apple's and Google's Privacy Changes
The mobile advertising ecosystem is undergoing a fundamental transformation as Apple and Google implement restrictive privacy frameworks, including App Tracking Transparency, the Privacy Sandbox, and Intelligent Tracking Prevention.
- Apple and Google’s privacy frameworks—including App Tracking Transparency, Privacy Sandbox, and Intelligent Tracking Prevention—have fundamentally disrupted the technical infrastructure for third-party ad targeting and attribution.
- The restriction of device-level identifiers like IDFA and AdID has increased costs for developers while simultaneously reducing the efficacy of digital marketing campaigns.
- Apple’s proprietary attribution tools, such as SKAdNetwork, provide lower data granularity than the insights available through Apple Search Ads, creating a competitive disadvantage for third-party advertisers.
Session: From Code To Continent: Distribution Strategies & Partnerships For Scaling H5 Games......
The expansion of H5 gaming into emerging markets, particularly Africa, offers a significant growth opportunity for developers seeking to move beyond the saturated landscapes of China and the West.
- Africa represents a high-growth frontier with a population of over 1.3 billion, characterized by a young demographic (average age 19) that relies on mobile devices as their primary internet access point.
- H5 gaming is the dominant distribution model in emerging markets because it bypasses the need for app store installations, which is critical for users with limited device storage and data constraints.
- Traditional user acquisition playbooks fail in Africa; success relies on community-based distribution and social discovery, where games gain traction through peer-to-peer recommendations on platforms like WhatsApp rather than individual app downloads.
Panel: Bridging The Gap: Dissecting The East's & West's Ad Monetization Playbooks.
The panel discussion at the Pocket Gamer Connects Summit Shanghai 2026 explores the divergent ad monetization strategies between Eastern and Western gaming markets.
- Eastern publishers typically integrate ad monetization into their product strategy during the early development stages, whereas Western publishers tend to be more cautious and reactive.
- Enforcing strict ad quality to block malicious or deceptive content can lead to a long-term increase in ARPDAU, with data from partners like Voodoo showing an average 5% increase after an initial adjustment period.
- Eastern markets benefit from highly integrated digital ecosystems like WeChat, which allow developers to leverage comprehensive user data for targeted ad monetization, a model Western markets are still working to replicate.