In August this year, we introduced a brand new series of deep-dive, stand-alone workshops which take an in-depth look at practical games design topics. And now in December, we are excited to announce that the PocketGamer.biz MasterClasses will return. We’ve worked with and lined up four top industry experts to create professional, half-day activities featuring tutorials, lectures and breakout groups, all accessible from the comfort of your home office.
These four MasterClasses will take place on December 1-3, all delivered through Zoom, with support tools like Miro, Mural and Google Docs for collaborative activities. Attendees of the sessions will explore a range of key game design topics from publishing and predicting commercial success, how to benchmark, create and validate fun, how to raise investor money and building value into your game. So depending on where you and your studio are in the life cycle of game creation, there’s expert advice on offer.
The PocketGamer.biz MasterClasses are no ordinary “listen and learn” lectures; tickets are limited to keep groups smaller and focused, meaning each attendee has plenty of opportunities to interact with the presenter and fellow learners throughout the session. Workshops are designed to be collaborative, practical experiences so be ready to engage with the subject matter individually as well as through group activities, feedback and break-out discussion groups.
Read on to find out more details for each upcoming MasterClass and be sure to book your place today before they sell out! Take advantage of our fantastic Black Friday offer and save 20% on all MasterClasses!
UPCOMING MASTERCLASSES
Tuesday, December 1 (2pm to 5pm UK time)
Game Design: How To Benchmark, Create And Validate Fun with Javier Barnes
Javier Barnes
Head of Game Design
Pixel Noire Games
Javier Barnes is the head of game design at Pixel Noire Games.
Previously, he was lead game designer of Monster Legends, as well as game economy and systems designer for top grossing mobile hits such as Despicable Me: Minion Rush and Asphalt 8: Airborne, among many others.
In the past, developers would create something they thought was fun, and then pray for the audience to enjoy it. Today there is a range of techniques to help us validate design decisions, understand who our audience is and what they will enjoy, and speed up the development process by avoiding creative dead ends and detecting earlier what works.
This MasterClass will provide you a series of good practices and tools to set up a solid game design, and teach you how to use a data-oriented methodology to validate it and improve it. It’s intended to be useful both for those working on new games, and for those running live games.
Javier Barnes is the head of game design at Pixel Noire Games. Previously, he was lead game designer of Monster Legends, as well as game economy and systems designer for top grossing mobile hits such as Despicable Me: Minion Rush and Asphalt 8: Airborne, among many others.
Wednesday, December 2 (9am to 12pm UK time)
How To Raise Investor Money For Your Game Studio with Joakim Achren
Joakim Achren
CEO
Elite Game Developers
Joakim is the Co-founder of Next Games, which is building the future of games. Before founding Next Games, Joakim worked for Supercell as Director of Analytics. Before Supercell, Joakim was building virtual worlds and social games in his first startup.
Joakim currently runs the Elite Game Developers podcast.
Attracting investors to invest in your game is challenging. You don’t know which investor to talk to, how to approach them, what they are looking for, and how you could improve your situation to be more attractive for investors.
This MasterClass addresses all of these issues and more. You’ll get a glimpse into some investment cases which were not attractive to investors early on. As the studio progressed, it started attracting an abundance of interest from investors wanting to invest in the studio.
Joakim Achren is a gaming entrepreneur from Helsinki, Finland. He started his first video games company in 2005 and ran it for six years before moving onto Supercell. He then founded his second company, Next Games, in 2013. In 2019, he left Next Games to start Elite Game Developer, with the mission of helping gaming founders build successful gaming companies.
Wednesday, December 2 (2pm to 5pm UK time)
Game Monetisation Design: Building Value Into Your Game with Oscar Clark
Oscar Clark
Consultant, Co-Founder
Fundamentally Games
Oscar Clark has been a pioneer in online, mobile, and console social games services since 1998. He is also author of the book, Games As A Service – How Free To Play Design Can Make Better Games.
In this three-hour online MasterClass, Oscar Clark will provide a framework to make practical decisions which can improve the commercial potential in your game. He will explore how price means more than a number, different forms of exchange, and the role of bundles and ‘unboxing’.
Oscar Clark is chief strategy officer of Fundamentally Games whose mission is to bring games to live. He has been a pioneer in games services since 1998 helping developers design, deliver, monetize, and operate games live. He literally wrote the book “Games As A Service” published by Routledge.
Thursday, December 3 (2pm to 5pm UK time)
Predicting Commercial Success in Free-to-Play with Martine Spaans
Martine Spaans
Owner
Tamalaki
Martine Spaans runs publishing label Tamalaki.com; a boutique publisher with a hands-on approach, specialised in Hidden Object, Match-3 and Simulation games.
Tamalaki joined forces with partner-company FGL.com, which focuses on idle/clicker gamer, card and board games, and silly puzzles.
After the hard work of designing and creating your game, how will you bring your project to life? It doesn’t start with the choice if you want to publish or yourself or work with a partner, but it actually starts with the question if your game is even ready for launch. Sadly many games fail at launch because the runway was simply too short and there is no sustainable way to adapt to the market.
This MasterClass looks to address those pitfalls. This session will look at how to use the game statistics to guide your design decisions and hand you a checklist on how to negotiate a fair publishing contract.
Martine Spaans runs publishing label Tamalaki.com; a boutique publisher with a hands-on approach, specialised in Hidden Object, Match-3 and Simulation games. Tamalaki joined forces with partner-company FGL.com, which focuses on idle/clicker gamer, card and board games, and silly puzzles.
BOOK NOW: Multi-buy & group discounts
Want to attend multiple MasterClasses? Book three workshops and get the fourth FREE!
Booking for multiple people? Take advantage of our 30% corporate discount for groups of six or more people from the same company.
For multi-buy or group discounts, please email sally.kevan@steelmedia.co.uk to discuss your bespoke package.
If you are an indie developer (small privately-owned studio with fewer than 10 members, engaged in game creation) or student you may be entitled to discounted tickets. Please contact us with proof of your status and we can discuss relevant offer codes: sally.kevan@steelmedia.co.uk
Tickets are limited so be sure to get in touch today to secure your place.
