Alexander Rehm

Why is it important to understand games? Because they explain how a party turns 35% of the vote in an election into over 400 seats in Parliament. Labour’s win in the UK general election is many things. A sign that voters could not do anything other than boot out a tired and incompetent Conservative Party; a relatively unenthusiastic trade off of steady competence over wider vision; a least worst option that has opened the doors to smaller parties. It’s also a victory for ruthless campaigning. It’s an operational masterclass in which financial and personal resource was directed with strategic precision to get as many Labour MPs over the top as possible. And it is derived from a fundamental truth: elections are games with clear rules. Labour’s strategy - and, to be fair, The Liberal Democrat’s approach - rejected the idealism of “the best vision wins out” to say “how do we win this game within the set rules” to avoid another 2019 style disappointment. It’s an approach that is central to great campaigning. It is also, as Kelly Clancy posits indirectly in her great book Playing With Reality, a perfect example of minmaxing a game: controlling and risking as little as possible from your side while maximising opportunities within the rules (and errors from your opponents). Clancy argues that our failure to understand play and to take it seriously within society means we can’t understand fully the social, cultural and biological drivers that lead us to create the rules based systems that we play within. Elections are therefore one of those rare times where the dynamic of play is surfaced in a way that we can truly see, that we can understand explicitly and that we can talk about easily - demonstrating its immense value in a way little else can. P.S. If you like reading about the surprising ways games reshape society, think about subscribing to my newsletter Video Games Industry Memo. There will be plenty more where this has come from in the year ahead.

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Another games jobs cut situation today at CI Games as reported by Game Developer's Christopher Kerr and confirmed by the company, saying "This restructure affects approximately 30 roles across production" https://lnkd.in/eHmMFztw Here's where this puts us. I will start exposing these statistics regularly as a reminder of the human cost of these decisions: 100+ games layoffs in 2024 One games layoff situation on average every 1.3 days in 2024 (apologies for getting this inverted in the picture) Over 10,000 games layoffs in 2024 YTD Within 500 cuts of hitting 2023's games layoff number...in May If you were in fact affected by these cuts, I have no words to express my feelings. However, our community has three resource "homes" built to help you: HOME 1 - 🔗 AMIRSATVAT.COM: Our hub offering 15 resources to help you find work, including a fully updated design. - 🔗 Games Org Support Posts: Find a template at AMIRSATVAT.COM (Category 4, Resource 10). If you can provide information from your team (with their consent), I’ll help edit and disseminate the final product, reaching 100,000+ people. These posts are highly effective in increasing visibility and we have done 96 of them. HOME 2 - 🔗 Please visit discord.gg/amirsatvat to join our Discord, a live extension of our community resources. With over 2,700 members, we are in an open-join phase. HOME 3 - 🔗 LinkedIn: Our community here includes over 86,000 members, with 1-3 daily posts offering support and career assistance in the games industry. To our broader community, your involvement makes a difference. Here’s how you can help: - Spread the word: Reshares and comments on this post amplify the visibility of these resources. - Offer support: Utilize the 13 ways listed on AMIRSATVAT.COM under "How You Can Help" to assist, or simply lend an ear or advice on our Discord server. - Join our movement: Volunteer with us at AMIRSATVAT.COM to support our colleagues in the games industry. Our network has facilitated over 1,800 jobs and 33,000 coaching conversations to date and has been visited by over 3,000,000 gamers lifetime. We're committed to providing daily encouragement and support during these challenging times. We will never stop fighting for you!

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It's Develop this week but do you know what never stops however busy the industry conference calendar is? Video Games Industry Memo, that's what. I'm putting together two newsletters this week. Regular VGIM will hit nearly 2000 subscriber inboxes on Thursday morning and will feature a deep dive of everything I've learned by the seaside one of the UK's biggest industry conferences. And the second Ask George newsletter will arrive for VGIM Insiders on Friday morning, giving them - and you too - the chance to ask me anything you fancy about video games. To help me get them done between a veritable wall of back-to-back meetings, there are two things I am looking for: 💼 Details of hot off the press job moves OR excellent open job roles within the video games business. ❓ A final question for the Ask George column for me to sink my teeth into. Able to help with either? Leave a comment below or message me via LinkedIn DM if you think you can help. In the meantime, here's an image of a Question Block from the Mario series to illustrate the point about asking questions. It's not the most imaginative content I've come up with but, y'know, it is Monday morning 🤷‍♂️

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No squatch sightings last weekend...but wow...what a week since. A massively productive one for The Glitch (on all fronts), and apparently some other things happened around the industry as well...huh. Alright...let's-a-go: OMY@C 🤘 ⛏ - Metallica will be in Fortnite soon. The event is called "Metallica: Fuel Fire Fury," and it will kick off on June 22nd. The San Francisco band got on the Fortnite Festival stage yesterday - so if you're curious...hop on in there. RIP Cliff. RIP Eddie. 🍎 - Apple's WWDC was this week...and their formal entry into Ai was the big takeaway. "Apple Intelligence," was the name they landed on. Essentially, it's Ai integrated through every aspect of their various OS's...adding personal context to everything. My first reaction was...do I want that though? On one hand, this feels like the first real indication of where consumer Ai is headed...on the other: privacy? A big part of Apple's presentation of their Ai is "setting a brand-new standard for privacy in Ai." So...they're well aware of the line that's being crossed. Apple's 5-minute video overview (on their site) shows you how "Ai for the rest of us" will work...and it's easy to be cynical about it. A squirrel DJ...cool. Custom emoji's...neat. Still...you should watch it. When app devs finally start building for this though...look out. PREDICTION: iPhone 16 will be the best selling iPhone yet. The 6 sold 222M units total...71.5MM units in it's first 3 months...so we'll know by year's end how this crazy statement is trending. 📺 🎮 - Mike Verdu will soon be leaving his role as VP of Netflix Games (and starting a new role with the company). Speculation is rampant about what this means for the games unit. It's possible that it means...nothing at all. I'm still massively bullish on the gaming opportunity for Netflix. My personal opinion is that transmedia is the biggest, most exciting play here...but I've also heard there are internal headwinds on that. 🤷‍♂️ 🍷 ⛵ - I'm not going to Cannes...again. Maybe some day. I'll drink rosé and look important at home...again. I'm not bitter. 📺 🎮 - Follow Friday: Two nerds with a webcam...that you absolutely should be following if you're in the games business: 1) Chris Melissinos (Principal Evangelist for Amazon Web Services (AWS) - Video interviews with games industry legends, deep retro dives, and discussions on the top news. 2) Alexander Seropian (Founder/CEO of Look North World) - Host of "The Fourth Curtain," is always a headliner event. 📺 - Palm Royale (Apple+). Kristen Wiig as a social climber in 1960's south Florida. So good. Save a grasshopper for me. 🎵 - Spotify's "Daylist" - pull the throttle back a bit with your list names though. "90's Indie Twee Friday Afternoon," might be accurate...but it's embarrassing. 🎮 - It's been 2 weeks since I picked up Hogwarts Legacy and Vampire Survivors...haven't started either yet. THAT's how busy it's been.

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Back from seeing a lot of great people at Develop Brighton, which was busy enough to distract me from doing the usual daily recaps. Let's continue, shall we? Today on GamesIndustry.biz... (Thursday, July 11th 2024) 1. Your must read is Chris' opinion piece on yesterday's Xbox Game Pass price hike announcement, exploring how the move reflects the need for profitability, the strength of Xbox's first-party line-up, and how determined Microsoft is to make Game Pass work https://lnkd.in/e5-rqs5R 2. In the news, Shift Up - the South Korean developer behind Stellar Blade - raised $320m with its IPO, which was the largest for a games company from that nation since 2021 https://lnkd.in/eUQzGTNf 3. Splash Damage is the latest studio to face layoffs, with the studio telling us a "small number of roles" will potentially be made redundant following a review of the business. These are said to be mostly operational roles, with development largely unaffected https://lnkd.in/ejA-f6Ri 4. GAME has reportedly dropped yet another part of its offering. After ditching pre-owned, its loyalty scheme, and Xbox All Access, the retailer will now apparently stop taking in-store pre-orders from August 1. The reason? According to staff, it's because the tills have to cope with too much so parent company Frasers Group is making it so GAME stores (or rather concessions) can only sell and refund products https://lnkd.in/ehMY4sg3 5. Tencent is shutting down free-to-play shooter Synced after just one year of it being available to play https://lnkd.in/e4r3C-kP 6. And Embracer has secured a new €600m ($652m) revolving credit facility with a two-year tenor, replacing the existing €420m ($456m) one, due in May 2025 https://lnkd.in/eGNwZC3g There's more news over at www.gamesindustry.biz and make sure you're signed up to the GI Daily to get it all delivered to your inbox: https://lnkd.in/eAkx_zen

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Right, it's been a while so let's do one of my favourite things: hawk my newsletter to the lovely LinkedIn punters. Video Games Industry Memo comes out every Thursday morning with the mission to explain games to you in 15 minutes flat. Each newsletter is stuffed with: 🤔 One big read that unpicks a topic shaping the industry 📰 Five news hits to help you get across the news agenda 💼 The job movers and job vacancies in games worth checking out 📅 Events and conferences worth keeping an eye on 🎮 And three video game releases to play over the weekend The feedback on VGIM from my 1450 subs has generally been tip top, with readers describing it as "the gold standard of industry newsletters" and "like having a conversation with you every time I read it." Get subscribed to the newsletter ahead of tomorrow's edition, which looks closely at the fortunes of Embracer Group 👀 https://lnkd.in/eEd6mCPM

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I am sorry to report that Flaming Fowl Studios (Gloomhaven) laid off over 20 staff yesterday, as reported by GamesIndustry.Biz. I appreciate everybody's reposts to get the word out and so employees there can know of and use our resources. Hopefully we can also get Games Org Support Posts going for them, which have proven to be highly effective in getting affected gamers into new jobs. To those gamers affected at Flaming Fowl Studios, we have a wealth of always-free community homes and resources to help you: 🔗 Please visit AMIRSATVAT.COM, our community's games jobs resources hub with 15 resources that will help you find work. These resources are free and updated regularly. 🔗 Please consider joining our Discord Server, with nearly 1,000 members in just 48 hours of existence, a live extension of our community resources: https://lnkd.in/e2tyvpWv 🔗 Resource 10 is our games org support posts. There you will find a template. If someone on your team can own populating that with information from individuals on your team, with their consent, I will get the finished product edited and out to the community, hitting 100,000 eyeballs. I have done 95 of these, working directly with games teams, and they are highly effective in increasing visibility. To our community: please do your part in making a difference. Some options include: -Spreading the word. Every reshare of this post is appreciated to raise visibility as to these situations. - Offer Support: While you certainly can do it through our community's resources (at amirsatvat.com we present 13 ways you can help), any advice lent, listening ear provided, or other support given is appreciated for those navigating these changes. You can also offer help on our new Discord server. - Join Our Movement: Become part of our network of volunteers at AMIRSATVAT.COM, providing support to our colleagues in the games industry. Together, our collective of over 85,000 people has enabled 1,800+ jobs and 31,000 community coaching conversations, and we're just getting started. More importantly, this network and its content seeks to provide a daily source of encouragement in this tough time.

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Video Games Industry Memo came out earlier this morning with an important message to readers (and maybe just a couple of glib jokes) to get out there and vote. Don't waste your democratic rights, my friends. But alongside the exhortations to vote, there was plenty of the usual tip top video games industry analysis including: 📊 A deep dive into Newzoo's Global Gamers Report, including a close examination of the 31% of 'trend hunting' players who are spending big on new and engaging game content. 📰 A look at the big headlines of the week including Cloud Imperium Games having a mare in front of an employment tribunal, Keywords being bought and the Esports World Cup kicking off in Saudi Arabia. 💼 The job move news - including the appointment of a new CMO at Roblox, Director of Comms at Square Enix and Product PR Lead at Nintendo - and some great roles including a Public Policy gig at Epic Games and a Senior Game Designer role at Niantic. 🎮 The big game releases of the week, including Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail and Resi 7 making its way over to iPhone and iPad. I'll pop the link to the newsletter in the comments below shortly. But if you can't wait for me to do that, search Video Games Industry Memo and you'll be able to find it on Substack or the widest web the world has ever seen. (P.S. I mean it. Go and vote, ya filthy animals x)

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❤️ Some random recognition for #GamesIndustry founders who I know are under-recognised for their relentless hard-work, perseverance and selflessness. I've never met anyone who has run their own business and said "Yeah it's pretty easy", because it isn't. It's tough. Crazy difficult, exhausting and most of the time, pretty thankless. Especially for bootstrapped small businesses who are focused on doing things right by their teams and clients. Notably, these folks are ALSO acting intentionally to have a positive impact on the wider industry/world beyond their own personal gain, which is the most admirable trait of all in my book and something I have seen first-hand in all of the below. Whether that's directly a part of their business objective or efforts to support people and initiatives beyond the insane grind that is building a business: Adam Clewes-Boyne - BetaJester Ltd Alyx Jones - Silver Script Games Anisa Sanusi - founder of Limit Break Mentorship Annie Durwood - Antivenin Games Ashley Gwinnell - IMPRESS Cameron Keywood - DragonCog Interactive Ltd Declan Cassidy - Into Games George Osborn - Half-Space Consulting Jay Shin 🔜 WASD - Arrogant Pixel LTD Melissa Phillips - Games Leadership Network MJ Widomska - YRS TRULY Sam Swain - Apparance Studios Ltd Thank you to all you legends and keep doing what you're doing. Patience is the ultimate strategy and your work is noted and appreciated 🙏. This isn't an exhaustive list by any means. I know there are many more I could and should include here. But these are just some of the amazing people I've had the privilege to work or engage with recently you should add to your radar of small business founders putting in the hard yards to make the industry better. This post was inspired by a similar post by Kosala U. I encourage you to throw in some praise to founders you admire in the comments or make a similar post of your own and share some rare recognition 🙏

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This is an interesting one: UK PETITION TO ‘STOP PUBLISHERS KILLING GAMES’ EMERGES For context, in the UK anyone who gets more than 10k signatures on a petition has the right to have it debated by the government. This petition gained 27k signatures very quickly. It didn't get the response they wanted (and got closed early because of the UK's upcoming election). However, it's an interesting one, especially in the detail. Essentially it highlights that when players buy a game the terms state that the game can be cancelled at any time. That applies to both games as a product or service - and there is debate over the definition of those two. And this happens a lot. The petition references Ubisoft's The Crew servers being taken down after 10 years. It's perhaps hard to totally get behind that. But the point is interesting. What the petition actually asks is: "Require publishers to leave video games (and related game assets / features) they have sold to customers in a reasonably working state when support ends, so that no further intervention whatsoever is necessary for the game to function, as a statutory consumer right." https://lnkd.in/ems4fd7z

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Video Games Industry Memo has landed in subscribers inboxes once again, providing my cadre of readers with the following golden nuggets: 📈 A finance cheat sheet that summarises financial results from Nintendo, Microsoft, Sony, Tencent, Roblox and EA in one handy quick read. 📰 The top news from the industry this week including an Epic fine, Ofcom forcing Twitch into changes, the Polish competition authority going after Steam and the PlayStation store and a fascinatingly thick non-disparagement clause. 💼 The big job moves and postings, including two CEOs in at PlayStation and great job roles going at places such as Double Eleven, Improbable and Dambuster Studios. 🚀 A shoutout for Homeworld 3 as my pick of this week's video game releases. VGIM readers were able to feast their eyes on the magnificence of the latest edition from 8am this morning. But if you're not signed up and want to have a read then never fear - you can check it out online too. Head to the website below and make sure you sign up on the dotted subscriber line to never miss an edition 👇 https://lnkd.in/eAjngNag

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Definitely agree with Richard here--it echoes a sentiment by a mentor, who taught me that to be a good game developer, you need to learn how to have fun. Let's expand upon it. These are things that can weigh down a lot of folks in our industry, and plenty of other creators on this platform reiterate statistics I need not echo. To navigate the "depressing stuff," know that it is okay to take a breather. Practice self-care, please--job hunting is intense but blocking out twenty minutes for a walk or to watch a show can really change things for the better. A scenario many colleagues often find themselves in is following (the well-meaning) advise of networking and applying. It's something I found myself guilty of as well--and it wasn't until I noticed that my calendar had little to no time left for... well, fun. It was a period of time I also participated in game jams, and looking back on the projects I could tell that had I consumed more media (be it games, shows, movies) my work would have improved by a lot. Find the hope and positivity in creative endeavors--I may be biased, but every day I look forward to creating stories and experiences. It isn't always about work. Looking forward to the next meal, the next walk, the next hike, next networking event, next portfolio update--these are "little big" things that when compounded on have helped me navigate this industry. Hopefully, this little positivity train that Richard started can also help others. I'll end this by showcasing an example of what I meant by how consuming media can nurture the "narrative design" brain: this weekend, I finished watching Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch of Mercury by Studio Sunrise through Crunchyroll. It was a lot of fun, and I highly recommend watching it--as the series progressed, it definitely inspired some ideas on combat systems, cinematic scripts and interactions that I would love to explore someday. Watch a show, have fun even if for thirty-minutes, and celebrate the achievement that is finishing a series--book, television, anime, whatever that may be! What's a show or movie that you all have seen recently? I'd love to hear how other game developers are inspired by other mediums! #gamedev #positivity #hope #narrativedesign #gundam #mecha

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Our 5 biggest struggles as a Glasgow based studio were: 1. Not being a London based studio 2. Limited local opportunities in our niche 3. Small local talent pool (voice actors) 4. Non local prospects wanted to work with a sound design partner on their street So here's what we did: 1. Persevered. And guess what? The world changed. The business landscape shifted. It turns out: 1. Not being a London based studio is now our biggest advantage 2. Now our local industry is growing and we can add tremendous value to it. 3. We cast our projects from all over the UK and beyond. Unbeatable casting service. 4. We only work with clients who focus on the creative and relationships. Not convenience. What areas have you or your studio struggled with? How have things changed?

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Did you spend your childhood battling Pokémon in games or slinging cards? Pokémon is the No. 1 media franchise. What’s your favourite Generation? 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗜 • Region: Kanto • Themes: Science • Years: 1996 – 1999 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗜𝗜 • Region: Johto • Themes: Cultural Traditions • Years: 1999 – 2002 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗜𝗜𝗜 • Region: Hoenn • Themes: The Environment • Years: 2002 – 2006 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗜𝗩 • Region: Sinnoh • Themes: Time and Space • Years: 2006 – 2010 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗩 • Region: Unova • Themes: Truth and Ideals • Years: 2010 – 2013 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗩𝗜 • Region: Kalos • Themes: Life, Death and the Ecosystem • Years: 2013 – 2016 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗩𝗜𝗜 • Region: Alola • Themes: Day and Night • Years: 2016 – 2019 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗩𝗜𝗜𝗜 • Region: Galar • Themes: England and Its Culture • Years: 2019 – 2022 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗲𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗜𝗫 • Region: Paldea • Themes: Past vs. the Future • Years: 2022 – present My top pick? Generation I ❤️ Oddish /\/\ |\ \ \ \// / o_o\ \____/ /_\/_\ Sources: TITLEMAX®, Wikipedia

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FAO: All my #founder #CEO and #entrepreneur friends. Entries are open in the Barclays Entrepreneur Awards, with nine categories covering a whole range of business sectors. One category is focused upon innovation in games - so a lot of people across #Scotland and the #UK should think seriously about getting an entry in for themselves, or someone who's work you admire. #games #Scotland #UK #business #videogames

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A little blog post I wrote on how we do flexible working at Netspeak Games - always keen to hear what other companies do! Comment in the thread below 👇 https://lnkd.in/eJY8FXwd #flexibleworking #gamesindustry #blog

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Friends, after a series of very important but tough posts around Project Flagpole and the statistics for how challenging it is to get into the games industry, one of our community regulars asked me to share something very uplifting for those looking for a position. Absolutely. It Only Takes One Remind yourself that it only takes one successful application. It's easy to feel discouraged by rejections, but each rejection is not a definitive statement about your value as a candidate. Job searching is not about a trending pattern; it’s more binary. You just need one person to recognize your potential. Think about my own experience: I have a lot of solid experience in BD, strategy, and operations, but in games, I only have about four or five years. I have a lot of education and various hard and soft skills, but I've definitely done more varied things rather than only having one single-minded track, which some people may like and others may not. Also, some value a lot of education and things like MBAs, and some don't. A big part of my life mission is significant multitasking with Amir Satvat's Games Community and my family responsibilities while also doing my job well, which is not only good humanity but also good moral business because we are all people first working in the games industry. Some people understand and handle that; some don’t. For me, working remote is non-negotiable. Some people understand that; some don’t. I'm very positive and upbeat, and many of you know that from our community interactions. Some people like that; some don’t. You don’t need a hundred or ten or even five employers to understand your unique profile; you just need one. Someone out there is going to covet what you offer - they just haven’t found you yet. I encourage you to see the application process as finding that one employer who recognizes your worth. Stay positive and keep searching. Today, this week, or this month might be the time you find that one employer and then it won't matter what anybody else thinks. This is, again, why I encourage people to go as wide as possible with both industries outside of games and looking at all ~3,700 companies charted by our community rather than only the 5-10 everybody applies to - you have more chances of finding that one employer. Best of luck to all of you! Amir

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Scottish games industry is shit. The government need to support businesses better. The attrition rate is so awful it needs to be addressed. Stable studios means stable job opportunities. We can’t tackle education before this otherwise there’s no jobs for graduates. Or worse, no support if they try start their own studios. Let’s stop putting the horse before the cart, it’s time to address the very real issues facing Scottish development studios. - lack of targeted financial support because we aren’t our own sector - lack of tax deductions and local council support. - acknowledgement of the business models employed by studios to survive.

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