What’s the most common mistake you see companies make in the industry with their businesses?

This is hard to answer because I generally dislike pointing to other’s mistakes when it comes to games, development 🙂 it dehumanizes the process a little, and it’s so easy to point the finger to what you think others do wrong. ONE thing I will say – is that I have noticed that there are sometimes major disconnects between business needs and the needs of a production team – and this is apparent in the external communication and marketing strategy. I often sense when, let’s say, the goals and objective for a game in Alpha or Beta, are not clear between marketing and development teams – and this is then felt by players through lack of clarity, marketing efforts that don’t match production constraints, which in turn, create a lot of confusion for players and makes for poor experiences. This fine line, of meeting both business objectives, without them being at the detriment of the game itself, is very hard to walk but crucial – the give and take between development and marketing that needs to constantly be kept in check. From an INSIDE perspective, I will say: not empowering development teams on all business-related topics, is also a huge mistake. I deeply believe that development teams need to be equiped with the roles within their team – to be accountable and responsible for business needs, in order for games to maximize their chances of success.

What was your childhood favorite game?

I have many favorite games, but I’ve had TWO that I feel had an enormous impact on me. Okami is one. It was a game that made me feel the artform of games in a way I hadn’t experienced before, from the art direction, the gameplay and how I drew on screen to summon abilities – I was truly captivated and in awe. The second is very different; Catherine, developed by Atlus. This game’s challenging puzzle solving with a very immersive story changed how I view games entirely – it felt unique in its horror romance genre, it took many risks and I believe it paid off. To this day, the climbing of those towers, racing against your own fears as a character in the world of nightmares, I played this game endlessly.

What game are you playing now?

I’m a game butterfly so I am playing three games at the moment, Hades II, Expedition 33 and the Final Fantasy Tactics the Ivalice Chronicles (for Nostalgia’s sake)