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On this week's episode of the Game Developer podcast, celebrated game designer Harvey Smith and former Arkane Austin executive producer Ben Horne—also the co-founders of the new game studio Black Pony Immersive—join senior editor Bryant Francis for a conversation about the creative principles at the heart of their new venture.  When you're talking about founding any new company, you're usually discussing topics like funding and "addressable marketplaces," but Smith and Horne have had far deeper and more intense discussions about the creative craft of game development—and are ready to explain how those philosophies can make for a successful studio. Learn more about Black Pony Immersive: https://www.blackpony.com/ - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

What's changing in the world of co-development (co-dev) and external development (ex-dev) GDC Side Quest returns with another interview recorded on the show floor of the 2026 GDC of Festival of Gaming, this time speaking with Microsoft veteran and XDS Spark co-founder Sam Carlisle. Content marketing manager Beth Elderkin joins Carlisle, who has over fifteen years of experience sourcing high-quality external content for major game development projects, to discuss why this development practice is becoming more and more essential in the changing world of video game production.  Learn more about GDC Festival of Gaming: https://gdconf.com/ Learn more about XDS Spark: https://www.xds-spark.com/ Game Developer and GDC Festival of Gaming are sibling organizations under Informa Festivals. - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

On this week's episode of the Game Developer podcast, senior editor Bryant Francis chats with Peter Hodges, director for ecosystem strategy for developer platforms at ARM. Peter is a game development veteran who uses his experience in the game-making profession to help developers integrate ARM technology into their workflows. He's currently focused on helping developers understand ARM's new Neural Technology—a collection of on-chip AI techniques that improve frame rate and expand lighting possibilities on mobile devices. You can't talk about the benefits of new dev tools without discussing why developers use them—that's why today's episode doesn't just talk about the possibilities of on-chip AI, but also the impact of art like Hollis Framptons' 1969 7-minute short film Lemon. Learn more about ARM Neural Technology: https://developer.arm.com/mobile-graphics-and-gaming/neural-technology Learn more about Lemon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemon_(1969_film) Learn more about Somerset House's  MC Escher exhibition: https://www.somersethouse.org.uk/whats-on/mc-escher-the-exhibition - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

On this week's episode of the Game Developer podcast, senior editor Bryant Francis sits down with Bit Reactor CEO and co-founder Greg Foertsch, who also served as creative director on Star Wars Zero Company, the newest adventure in that galaxy far far away. Foertsch sat down to discuss important perspectives on making good camera perspectives, the value in having every team member think of themselves as a "game developer," regardless of their job title, and why he loves the character  Huyang from Star Wars The Clone Wars and Ahsoka: A Star Wars Story. Learn more about Bit Reactor: https://www.bitreactor.com/ Learn more about Star Wars Zero Company: https://www.ea.com/games/starwars/zero-company Learn more about Huyang: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huyang - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

GDC Side Quest is back with another fantastic interview straight from the show floor of GDC Festival of Gaming. This month, celebrated composer Austin Wintory joins content marketing manager Beth Elderkin for a conversation about his creative process as a composer on games like Journey, Sword and the Sea, Aliens: Fireteam Elite 2, and other excellent titles. Austin also breaks down the process for crafting the Developer's Concert—an annual musical celebration of the art of game development only available at the GDC Festival of Gaming.  Learn more about GDC Festival of Gaming: https://gdconf.com/ Learn more about Austin Wintory: https://www.austinwintory.com/projects-videogames - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

This week on the Game Developer Podcast, senior editor Bryant Francis, former Maxis senior engineer David "Rez" Graham and former Take-Two head of AI Dr. Luke Dicken—both celebrated experts in the field of video game AI—are tackling the "black hole" of a topic that is generative AI. Graham and Dicken have spent their careers studying AI techniques to help developers make better, more exciting games, and they have had lots of opinions watching their field of expertise become the explosively large business driving excitement in Silicon Valley. This is a conversation about AI and AI techniques, but it’s also a conversation about the nature of work, what goals we’re trying to achieve when we use AI technology, and the inherent value of AI in game development. Learn more about David “Rez” Graham: https://www.academyart.edu/academics/game-development/  Learn more about Luke Dicken: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lukedicken Learn more about Suck Up: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2726370/Suck_Up/ - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

This week on the Game Developer Podcast, we’re diving into the discipline of localization—the undersung heroes of the video game industry. Localizers and translators are the ones who make it possible for games to sell beyond the borders of their native language—but they’re also the ones facing brutal cuts and threats to their jobs in the face of cost-cutting and dodgy implementation of generative AI. They sometimes aren’t even properly credited for their work. As it turns out, many developers never get a chance to speak with their colleagues in the world of localization, and there’s plenty of best practices that haven’t proliferated across the industry. Today we’re bridging that gap with our guests, Concha Fernández Álvarez and LocQuest’s Aurélie Perrin, and Guido Di Carlo. Learn more about Concha Fernández Álvarez: https://cfernandez.me/ Learn more about LocQuest: https://locquest.com/ - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

It's time for another episode of GDC Side Quest and another fantastic conversation recorded live on the GDC Festival of Gaming Show Floor. This month’s guest: acclaimed actor Samantha Béart, known for her work in Larian Studios' Baldur’s Gate III, Cloak and Dagger Games’s The Excavation of Hobbs Barrow, and IO Interactive’s 007 First Light. The powerhouse actor took time to discuss how they’ve seen developers better integrate acting performances in the creative process, their conversations with showrunner Craig Mazin about his planned Baldur’s Gate III TV show, and the challenges of doing great work in a sometimes secretive recording environment. Learn more about GDC Festival of Gaming: https://gdconf.com/ Learn more about Samantha Béart: https://samantha-beart-shop.fourthwall.com/ Learn more about It Takes A Village: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdETg9xOislGXARi19-Tfm8SOUH46RHrl&si=5MLI1R2u4D8D4cE4 Game Developer and GDC Festival of Gaming are sibling organizations under Informa Festivals. - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

This week on the Game Developer Podcast, Jackbox Games CEO Mike Bilder joins senior editor Bryant Francis to discuss how the makers of the Jackbox Party Pack series survived the—in hindsight—inevitable decline of sales after the end of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic lockdowns. It’s a trend that’s battered game developers all over the industry, and if Jackbox had overexpanded after its success, things could have taken a turn for the worst. Instead, Jackbox has endured the downturn and set up a new publishing arm to support other developers making weird, unique comedy games like Toot Games’ My Arms Are Longer Now. We're quizzing Bilder about Jackbox's strategy for navigating hard times and what kinds of games it wants to publish. Learn more about Jackbox Games: https://www.jackboxgames.com/ Learn more about My Arms Are Longer Now: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2646170/My_Arms_Are_Longer_Now/ - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

This week on the Game Developer Podcast, NexusMods CEO Victor Folmann joins senior editor Bryant Francis for a conversation about the unique and fascinating world of video game modding. For years, players have used the site as a platform to host a bona fide treasure trove of creative modifications to their favorite games. Now, Folmann believes the company can evolve from a file-hosting company to a bona fide user-generated content (UGC) platform. How? To find out, we’re digging into the unique dynamics of running an open-source platform defined by players who set the terms on what they want from video game mods. It’s a group of highly-technical and shrewd players who will do whatever it takes to alter the game of their choice, even if it means digging through obscure and poorly-documented file systems.  Can this kind of content be brought to more players? That’s what we’re here to find out. Learn more about NexusMods: https://www.nexusmods.com/ - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

This week on the Game Developer Podcast, Skybound Entertainment CEO David “DA” Alpert and co-chairman Jon Goldman join senior editor Bryant Francis to explain the company’s future video game strategy following the successful release of Quarter Up’s Invisible VS. Even in a tough economic environment for the video game industry, Alpert and Goldman are bullish on the company’s strategy and its ambitions to expand the worlds of The Walking Dead, Invincible, and its other properties in video games. Alpert and Goldman are both tenured entertainment industry professionals—Alpert co-founded Skybound with comic book creator Robert Kirkman, and Goldman’s video game career began with the founding of Foundation 9 Entertainment—once a pillar of independent game development in the industry. Learn more about Invincible VS: https://invinciblevs.com/ Learn more about Skybound Entertainment: https://www.skybound.com/ - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

This week on the Game Developer Podcast, senior editor Bryant Francis sits down with narrative designer Harrison Pink and game writer Emma Kidwell for a conversation about the craft of creating narrative content in games that don’t strictly have a narrative focus. Between Pink’s work on Diablo VII and Kidwell’s work on Sid Meier’s Civilization VII, the pair both have plenty of experience crafting stories for games where storytelling takes a backseat to complex, systems-driven gameplay. This kind of narrative design leans into the “educational” aspect of game writing—the art of using storytelling to teach your player about the rules of your game, and guide them through different segments of the experience. From tweet-length text to explicit instructions, Pink and Kidwell share plenty of tips and thoughts about this rarely celebrated element of the game development craft. Learn more about Harrison Pink: https://www.harrisonpink.com/ Learn more about Emma Kidwell: https://emmkid.info/ Game Developer and GDC Festival of Gaming are sibling organizations under Informa Festivals - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

GDC Side Quest returns to the Game Developer Podcast Feed, with the first of many interviews recorded live from the GDC Festival of Gaming show floor. This month, GDC Content Marketing Manager Beth Elderkin chats with Sandfall Interactive lead writer and localization producer Jenniver Svedberg-Yen about the creative decisions that went into Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, easily one of the most-talked about games of 2025.  Learn more about GDC Festival of Gaming: https://gdconf.com/ Learn more about Sandfall Interactive: https://www.sandfall.co/team Game Developer and GDC Festival of Gaming are sibling organizations under Informa Festivals. - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

This week on the Game Developer Podcast, we conclude our run of episodes recorded from the show floor of the 2026 GDC Festival of Gaming with a conversation about NetEase Games’ Marvel Rivals. The 2024 hero shooter defied the odds to become one of the most successful multiplayer games of the decade, with hundreds of thousands of players logging in each day and chatting on “the largest gaming Discord server” to date. Publishing and Marketing Lead Yachen Bian and Executive Producer Danny Koo joined us for a stellar conversation about running a gargantuan live service game in 2026, working with Marvel to make the game’s unique character skins, and the various ways NetEase tries to support players of all backgrounds. Learn more about Marvel Rivals: https://www.marvelrivals.com/ Learn more about NetEase Games: https://www.neteasegames.com/ Game Developer and GDC Festival of Gaming are sibling organizations under Informa Festivals. - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau

This week on the Game Developer podcast, we’re diving into Valve’s newest piece of hardware: the Steam Controller. The company behind Steam provided Game Developer with a pair of controllers to stress-test their capabilities, so we recruited regular contributor Alessandro Fillari to help us analyze the new device. We stress-tested the controller on first-person shooters, triple-A action games, colony sims, and real-time strategy games. For the most part, the controller impressed us—but what impact do we think it will have on the market? Who will want to pony up for a premium PC controller? These and other questions will be answered on today’s episode. Read more from Alessandro Fillari: https://afillari.pressfolios.com/ Learn more about the Steam Controller: https://store.steampowered.com/sale/steamcontroller Read more of our Steam Controller coverage: https://www.gamedeveloper.com/pc/-millimeters-matter-inside-the-steam-controller-s-flawless-physical-design (Note: this episode was recorded before Valve revealed the price of the Steam Controller) Disclaimer: This episode was recorded before Valve unveiled the release date and pricing of the Steam Controller Game Developer, Omdia, and GDC Festival of Gaming are sibling organizations under Informa. - - - The Game Developer podcast is a bi-weekly podcast chronicling game development triumphs, catastrophes, and everything in-between, as devs from all sides of the industry share lessons and strategies fellow game makers can use to hone their craft. Learn More at https://www.gamedeveloper.com Follow Game Developer for more game dev Podcasts, News, & Interviews Bluesky: https://www.gamedeveloper.bsky.social LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/gamedeveloperofficial Music by Mike Meehan Edited by Pierre Landriau