Caring for the Players - Part 1 of ?
The Player Support Newsletter - 14 JUN 2025
Noteworthy News
IBM Plans Practical Quantum Computer by 2029 - whether or not they will be able to deliver is another matter, but it seems that we have a consensus that the hard science challenges have all been identified. As always, the combination of speed and accuracy is at the root of the problem. Qubits may be fast, but they also produce a lot of errors. Microsoft, Google, and Amazon are also chasing quantum computing, but no one has yet launched something that is commercially viable. This race, together with the AI war, is one to watch.
Gamestops Continues to Decline - Q1 2025 revenue fell by about 17 percent, as the company continues to struggle with its restructuring and optimization exercises. Inevitably, the industry is changing, and they are still playing catch up. I strongly recommend they make Gamestop a destination business, instead of trying to just go digital. They have a unique opportunity to make Gamestops community hubs for gamers to hangout IRL. I hope someone influential out there is reading.
Apple Announces Their New Game Platform - later this year (not sure when exactly), Apple will launch their game platform that is meant to unify the gaming experience across many gaming apps. I do not know why you would want to do this, and I have not heard of any features that excite me. The one feature that I think would be amazing is not listed. Oh well, here’s to hoping they’re just staying silent about the real value-add!
Introduction: Defining a Broad Term
Taking care of your players, as taking care of your customers, is an obvious requirement for businesses looking for long-term relationships with the people that keep them in business. One big problem for game companies is that many of them have never bothered to define what that means for their complete business in practice. Much of the long-term, uphill fight for support teams (and many others in LiveOps) is helping the top levels of executive leadership not only understand core concepts, but also to influence the organization in a direction to best meet the needs of our engaged playerbase - our fans. There is a meaningful difference between a short-term optimized value extraction plan and the desire for a life-long fanbase that has multi-generational potential.
For me and my company, we are focused on the long-term, deeply valuing the human relationships that are possible between fans and the IP and brands they love. Our definition of player-focus, customer-centricity, or whatever term you like, is shaped by this core value. We believe in wisely balancing the tensions between creative vision, responsible business management, and player demands to create comprehensively great player experiences. This means that for companies who oversimplify their relationship to their players and want the cheapest thing possible - we are not for you, and that’s okay. The guidance you need for your support functions can be shared in a 1-hour call and summarized on the back of a napkin. Please don’t invest more than that as it would be inconsistent with your financial goals and waste more precious resources.
In this post, I will share my definition, which allows us to align with a lot of companies, but not all of them. We turn down opportunities when we don’t believe there’s a match, and are happy referring business to friends in the BPO world. We don’t sign sales referral contracts, there are no finder’s fees, no kickbacks, just people helping other people who deserve it.
The Player (Customer) Experience is First
I am going to state the obvious requirement for all of us involved in business to be profitable and leave it as a fundamental truth. The other important question that I will answer is, what is going to provide our fans with the best experience possible? If the overall games business is aiming to make lifelong customers out of their playerbase, then it follows that we should be interested in creating fans. This long-term view places the customer at the heart of a business, where they belong. Without the ability to consistently attract new customers and the care to keep those we have, a business will start to decline. The player experience must come first.
But what does this actually mean?
Below are two simple ideas with clear examples of how to execute:
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