Deconstructor of Fun podcast is created by games professionals for games professionals. We explore the business side of the games industry with the goal of bringing listeners content that is relevant, insightful, and entertaining on a weekly basis. Hosts: Michail Katkoff www.linkedin.com/in/michailkatkoff/ Eric Kress www.linkedin.com/in/erickress/ Phillip Black www.linkedin.com/in/phillip-black-economist/ Jen Donahoe www.linkedin.com/in/jenniferdonahoe
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Nov 13, 2026 · 1:03:14
AppLovin now has better margins than Hermès and Ferrari.This week we break down AppLovin’s record quarter and Unity’s first profit since its IPO, and look at why a debt-funded…
Nov 9, 2026 · 44:03
Some puzzle subgenres keep producing hits. Others give us one winner and then disappear.Ahmetcan, Tom Storr and David Nelson look at three subgenres that showed up recently:…
Nov 5, 2026 · 50:17
Roblox beat its own guidance, and the stock still dropped 18%.This week we dig into Roblox’s Q3, where bookings came in above a number that had already been cut, DAUs fell 9% and…
Nov 4, 2026 · 1:11:59
Sun, sea and a whole lot of paperwork.One year ago, Phil swapped the cold for Cyprus and Mishka made the move to Athens. In this episode they trade stories on surviving southern…
Nov 2, 2026 · 56:27
Every studio says it wants a franchise. Luis de la Camara, who has led marketing on Angry Birds, Candy Crush and Sonic, says most can’t define one. His test is simple: an IP only…
Oct 29, 2026 · 1:08:54
Half of Roblox’s 2025 revenue came from steal games, and the platform can’t seem to quit them.This week we debate whether steal mechanics are a passing trend or the real engine…
Oct 26, 2026 · 47:44
Discord spent years saying it would never run ads. Now it sits on 90 million daily users who mostly play games with friends, and Chief Business Officer Jules Shumaker, who…
Oct 22, 2026 · 1:29:10
Is Steal an Egg the real engine behind Roblox’s revenue?This week the crew argues over a Konvoy piece saying Roblox should go private. With the stock well off its highs, $6B in…
Oct 19, 2026 · 46:07
Riot shipped one game in ten years, then four in the next two. Mark Sottosanti, CFO of Riot Games, was there for all of it. He joined in 2012 as head of monetization after…
Oct 15, 2026 · 1:00:38
Xbox has a franchise problem, and Gears of War E-Day just made it obvious.This week we look back on Mobidictum in Istanbul and argue about why Turkey became the puzzle capital…
Oct 12, 2026 · 58:13
Retrofitting AI into a 1,300-person company and building one around it from day one are different problems. Mishka Katkoff sits down with Liaz Kamper, AI Experience Architect at…
Oct 8, 2026 · 1:00:10
AI-made mashups of games like Skate 3 and Modern Warfare II took over social media, and publishers responded with takedowns. Google launched Playground, joining Roblox and Meta…
Oct 5, 2026 · 1:03:42
Most startup hiring mistakes come down to two things: hiring too fast and hiring too narrow. Garry Hill, head of talent at Makers Fund, sees both across a portfolio of 130+…
Oct 1, 2026 · 1:07:45
Strip out inflation and the games market has barely grown in a decade. This week we dig into Newzoo's latest numbers and what they say about where growth comes from: mature…
Sep 30, 2026 · 1:02:21
War Dogs sold 2.2 million copies in four days and nobody saw it coming. This episode we break down Bulkhead's early access hit. A hardcore milsim with three teams, no matchmaking…
Sep 28, 2026 · 51:39
Mark Pincus founded Zynga that was later acquired of $12.7B by TakeTwo and still thinks he misplayed the hand. On this episode he unpacks the playbook behind Life at the Speed of…
Sep 24, 2026 · 59:00
Xbox is cutting niche studios and signing a niche Kojima project in the same month. We try to make it make sense. Sony pulled funding on Physint after budget concerns, and Xbox…
Sep 23, 2026 · 41:06
Disney Solitaire is one of the biggest launches of the year, and it might be too successful for its own parent company. This episode breaks down how SuperPlay turned a solitaire…
Sep 21, 2026 · 51:47
Michael Martinez, co-founder and CEO of FunCraft, tried to sell his mobile game studio in 2025. Trusted people said "don't do it yet". He chose otherwise. A banker pitched the…
Sep 17, 2026 · 53:06
Gaming is back, and this week had a lot to talk about. BlizzCon delivered the biggest slate of announcements Blizzard has had in years, but the timelines and team sizes raise…
Sep 14, 2026 · 1:02:35
Cyberpunk 2077 sold 13 million copies in ten days, then Sony pulled it from the PlayStation Store. CD Projekt Red joint CEO Michal Nowakowski was the one taking the calls. He…
Sep 10, 2026 · 1:16:20
400 episodes in, and yes, we swear more than anyone will admit.This is the big one. Before the retrospective, we tear apart the latest "video game industry is crashing" clickbait…
Sep 7, 2026 · 1:13:56
McKinsey, the United Nations, Skype, Rocket Internet, Facebook, King. Then Akin Babayigit co-founded Tripledot, spun out Luna Labs, and now runs Arcadia Gaming Partners, a $100M…
Sep 3, 2026 · 57:17
GTA VI just proved it can break Netflix, the EU just put Roblox under its strictest rulebook, and one of the best reviewed games of the year is already falling apart behind the…
Sep 2, 2026 · 1:00:32
Shooters are having one of their best summers in years, and every major franchise still can't agree on what to do about it.The crew runs through the battle pass shakeup hitting…
Aug 31, 2026 · 40:18
Mattel owns Barbie, Hot Wheels, UNO, Masters of the Universe and Street Sharks. Marcus Liassides runs its digital business, which now Roblox, Fortnite, and a licensing program…
Aug 27, 2026 · 1:02:49
Rockstar is fighting a leak it cannot plug, and the leaker has turned the whole thing into a token economy.Episode 398 covers a week where the data says growth and the job market…
Aug 26, 2026 · 1:13:42
Everyone's telling you cohort financing is free money to scale. It's not, and the contract fine print is where that story falls apart.Josh Chandley (President & COO, Wildcard…
Aug 24, 2026 · 43:46
In March 2025, Jon Bellamy became CEO of Jagex and Alexis Bonte became CEO of Stillfront. Both inherited companies with legacy, scale, and a long list of things that needed to…
Aug 20, 2026 · 1:07:29
Crew breaks down another packed week in games. Roblox faces mounting pressure over child safety as Congress launches an investigation, Apple rewrites its EU App Store economics…
Aug 20, 2026 · 44:18
Jen sits down with WEBTOON and Square Enix to break down a channel that reaches mobile, PC, and console at once.UA is saturated and everyone is hunting for new reach. WEBTOON has…
Aug 17, 2026 · 1:40:53
Affan Butt has advised on 110+ gaming M&A deals worth $40 billion. He breaks down how game studios actually get sold, what acquirers pay for, and why earnouts wreck founders. We…
Aug 13, 2026 · 1:10:12
Crew breaks down a packed week in mobile and games. AppLovin's stock craters despite the SEC closing its inquiry with no action, Unity sells Supersonic to Tripledot for a…
Aug 10, 2026 · 1:08:46
Emmanuel De Maistre didn’t build Scenario by choosing between Silicon Valley ambition and European pragmatism. He learned to use both.In this conversation, the Scenario founder…
Aug 6, 2026 · 1:07:15
Xbox prices in Europe jumped as much as 50%, and the console math now writes itself.The crew digs into a rough week for hardware and a strange one for puzzle. PS5 is suddenly the…
Aug 3, 2026 · 32:21
After years of saying not yet, Sensor Tower finally estimated mobile ad revenue, and the number is $12 billion for 2025.Josh Chandley and Sensor Tower's lead gaming insights…
Jul 31, 2026 · 53:33
The crew breaks down Sensor Tower's big H1 2026 report, digs into why downloads keep falling while nobody seems to want new games, and asks whether ad revenue was ever going to…
Jul 27, 2026 · 36:52
Why is Toon Blast still growing while every other Blast game is fading away?In this episode of Puzzle Monthly, we break down Toon Blast's remarkable resurgence, from its early…
Jul 23, 2026 · 58:25
Convoy says 85 million copies in 60 days. That means 63% of every console owner alive buys GTA 6, and the closest anyone has come without a bundle is half that.The crew digs into…
Jul 21, 2026 · 54:35
Bungie built the defining live shooter of the decade, then spent ten years surviving its own crises. This one plays like the eulogy.The crew runs the full ups and downs of Bungie…
Jul 20, 2026 · 1:08:08
InnoGames didn't reach for AI to chase a trend. They reached for it because the alternative was shutting down a game people love.Thomas Lehr walks through how InnoGames kept…
Jul 16, 2026 · 59:10
Jen, Eric, and Phil break down a week where EA torched a premium launch, Sony declared the disc dead, and Riot reminded everyone that nostalgia is still the most reliable growth…
Jul 13, 2026 · 30:56
AppsFlyer just took attribution off mobile and put it on the open web, and it might be the biggest unlock D2C web shops have seen yet.Josh Chandley talks with Adam Smart, Global…
Jul 9, 2026 · 56:50
Xbox just got torched, and the math says new games can't win.Jen and Eric (two for TWIG this week) break down the biggest restructuring in Xbox history: 4,800 jobs cut, Asha…
Jul 6, 2026 · 50:00
Zoe Bell is the Executive Producer of Games at The New York Times. If you've played Wordle, Connections, Spelling Bee, Strands, Letter Boxed, the Mini, or the Crossword, you've…
Jul 3, 2026 · 1:05:25
Destiny is dead, Xbox is about to make the largest layoff in gaming history, and Google Play just completely changed how it charges developers.In this episode, we break down:•…
Jun 29, 2026 · 51:00
In this episode of Puzzle Monthly, we trace Good Job Games' path from two clean exits to a struggling Match 3 launch, and break down why the studio that built Zen Match and sold…
Jun 25, 2026 · 1:01:10
GTA 6 finally has a price tag, Steam Machine lands with a $1,000+, and Tencent is quietly pulling out of Japan. In this episode, we break down: ● Why GTA 6's $80/$100 pricing is…
Jun 22, 2026 · 56:17
Andrew Bowell, CEO of Iconic, who spent 15 years at Havok and a decade at Unity, discusses the future of game development, AI integration, and the challenges of building new game…
Jun 19, 2026 · 54:20
Roblox's Chief Safety Officer and VP of Safety Products join the podcast to answer the question every parent is asking: Is it actually safe?What's covered:● Why Roblox's safety…
Jun 18, 2026 · 1:04:21
Microsoft is laying the groundwork to spin Xbox off, Supercell just cut 70% of Metacore's staff after burning through $180M. Meanwhile, EA just launched a real ad platform for…
Jun 15, 2026 · 46:09
Gossip Harbor is beating Candy Crush, Merge Mansion is going to Supercell, and the Merge genre is at an inflection point. In this episode of Puzzle Monthly, we break down the…
Jun 12, 2026 · 51:36
Nintendo's stock is getting hammered without a new Mario, Monopoly GO is going all-in on The Simpsons, and Liftoff is back on the public markets. Meanwhile, Xbox finally seems to…
Jun 8, 2026 · 58:41
Two mobile games with a $500M annual run rate in just two years, with a fivefold revenue increase in the last 12 months alone. If you're building in mobile gaming or just want to…
Jun 5, 2026 · 55:33
Two thirds of Americans now play video games every week. That is more than 212 million people, the average player is 37, and among Boomers, more women play than men. These…
Jun 4, 2026 · 1:00:13
Call of Duty is getting back to basics, Sony is pulling the plug on PC ports, and Bungie is laying off staff after Destiny 2's final update. Meanwhile, Summer Game Fest is here,…
Jun 1, 2026 · 46:49
Most studios still treat influencer marketing as an experiment. Match Masters, a top 150 grossing game globally, has run it as a permanent growth pillar for 8 years. Jen Donahoe…
May 28, 2026 · 1:01:12
Griffin just handed $100M to indie developers, Lilith is back with a pachinko creature collector that's turning heads, and Toon Blast hired Gus Fring for reasons that actually…
May 25, 2026 · 1:04:27
The gaming industry has seen 24,000+ layoffs in 2024–2025 alone, and a wave of new consultants has followed. But how many of them actually chose this path?Michail Katkoff sits…
May 21, 2026 · 55:59
Turkey's game industry is overheating, Xbox just hired a chief strategy officer that has the panel in meltdown mode, and Roblox is betting big on a HD pivot that could blow up in…
May 20, 2026 · 53:15
Marathon’s player numbers are collapsing, Apex Legends is surging again, and rumors suggest Disney may be entering the extraction shooter genre.In this episode, we break down:●…
May 18, 2026 · 58:06
John Wright and Vincent join Josh Chandley for the monthly deep-dive into what's actually moving the needle in mobile user acquisition.Questions we answer in this episode:● Is…
May 14, 2026 · 1:00:30
Supercell enters the toy business, Playtika fully embraces casual games, and Turkey’s puzzle game machine keeps printing hits and billion-dollar studios.In this episode of TWIG,…
May 11, 2026 · 53:37
Why are gaming VCs shifting capital to consumer apps? In this episode, Henric Suuronen and Harri Manninen, founding partners of Play Ventures, one of gaming's top venture funds…
May 7, 2026 · 1:03:06
Supercell absorbs Merge Mansion, Xbox fires its veterans and hires from Instacart, and the math behind gaming's VC collapse finally gets laid out in full. In this episode of…
Apr 30, 2026 · 1:01:47
Xbox doubles down on a DAU strategy with no real plan to get there. Ubisoft keeps cleaning house while its franchises collect dust. And the most doom-and-gloom post ever written…
Apr 28, 2026 · 44:26
Match-3 is harder than ever to win, clones are getting taken down, and Royal Kingdom is scaling toward the top of the puzzle market.In this episode of Puzzle Monthly, we break…
Apr 23, 2026 · 1:07:02
Game Pass just got cheaper, China is rewriting the mobile market, and Ubisoft ships one of the most polished mobile games in years. Topics Covered: ● Xbox drops Game Pass…
Apr 22, 2026 · 50:49
Two kids. Zero filter. All the takes. Rocky and Mickey are back for Twig Jr., and they didn't hold back. From aging out of Roblox to explaining brain rot to calling out in-game…
Apr 22, 2026 · 1:19:35
The mobile gaming ecosystem is shifting fast this month. We break down the shocking deplatforming of Freecash, a $500M+ rewarded ad network, and what it signals for the future of…
Apr 20, 2026 · 1:05:04
We sit down with Joakim Achren, serial entrepreneur, former GP at F4 Fund, and now AI-first founder, to talk about why he walked away from venture capital and what he's building…
Apr 16, 2026 · 1:01:32
A lot happened this week in games. Kids are outsmarting Roblox's age verification, Xbox is cracking under its own pricing, and Pokémon is running laps around everyone else's…
Apr 13, 2026 · 1:15:59
We sit down with Ben Porter, Director of Consulting at Newzoo, to go through their 80-page 2026 PC & Console report page by page.Topics Covered: ● Newzoo calls it an Inflection…
Apr 9, 2026 · 1:11:07
This week, we go two-on-two for a lighter, looser TWIG, but there’s nothing light about the topics.We break down the biggest shifts across film, platforms, AI, and where…
Apr 7, 2026 · 1:04:00
What to do, what to do about Marathon? The crew considers radical shock therapy with surprising answers and solutions. Deadlock pushes systems design to its logical extreme in a…
Apr 6, 2026 · 59:36
Roblox has over 150 million daily active users, a million concurrent hits, and some of the fastest game iteration cycles in the industry. So why do so many Roblox games still…
Apr 2, 2026 · 1:11:25
The industry isn’t slowing down. This week, we break down the biggest shifts across games. Topics Covered: ● Disney and Epic: Why the speculation is picking up and what a bigger…
Mar 27, 2026 · 1:04:44
The games industry is hitting another inflection point, and the "old rules" of growth are being rewritten. This week, we’re unpacking: ● Google’s "Level Up" Program: Is it…
Mar 25, 2026 · 1:00:54
The mobile ecosystem is experiencing some massive shifts this month. We dive into the real implications of Unity Vector's new D28 campaign, break down what Google’s recent fee…
Mar 23, 2026 · 31:22
It's been 2030 days since Google pulled Fortnite, and the Epic vs. Google settlement is finally here. We sit down with AppCharge CMO Gil Tovly to read the fine print of Google’s…
Mar 20, 2026 · 1:03:20
The Deconstructor of Fun crew is back from San Francisco, recovering from a whirlwind GDC week to break down the massive shifts hitting the industry. No prep, no scripts. Just…
Mar 19, 2026 · 59:22
The full Deconstructor of Fun crew, all six of us, recorded live and on-site in San Francisco at the end of GDC week. No prep, no scripts. Just the real conversations from a week…
Mar 18, 2026 · 54:14
Extraction shooters are finally confronting their identity crisis. Is Marathon the answer, or just another branch of the same lineage?Phil, Sides, and Anjos break down a pivotal…
Mar 17, 2026 · 53:44
Sam Aune from Sensor Tower breaks down the State of Gaming 2026 - from Battlefield 6 proving premium is far from dead, to why free-to-play is getting harder to break into, and…
Mar 10, 2026 · 45:00
We talk about how Pixel Flow scaled so quickly, why its core design works for monetization, and how games like Hexa Sort and Magic Sort helped push the sort puzzle genre forward.…
Mar 5, 2026 · 1:04:55
We discuss Turkey’s new government subsidies for game developers and why the country may become one of the most attractive places to build a studio, the uncertain future of WB…
Mar 2, 2026 · 51:00
Guy Meiboom, Meta’s US EMEA Gaming Director, breaks down what actually happened to gaming performance after ATT and why Meta had to rebuild its gaming org from the ground up.…
Feb 27, 2026 · 1:19:32
Xbox is at a strategic inflection point. The question now is why, how, and what comes next. We break down the massive Xbox leadership shakeup, what it reveals about Microsoft’s…
Feb 23, 2026 · 1:12:07
Dead as Disco went from 50,000 Steam wishlists to over 400,000 in less than a month, with over a million unique demo players and a 98% Overwhelmingly Positive rating. They are…
Feb 20, 2026 · 49:45
Meta’s apparent comeback runs headfirst into shifting UA economics, rising creative costs, and new pressure from platforms like Reddit, forcing marketers to rethink what…
Feb 19, 2026 · 1:05:11
We recap the Clash Royale creator controversy and CEO apology, dig into what’s broken with evolutions, heroes, and pay-to-win, and debate whether streamers can actually drive a…
Feb 16, 2026 · 47:19
User-generated content (UGC) isn’t “make anything.” It’s “make something that someone cares about.” In this Deconstructor of Fun conversation, Julia Polatovska, founder of…
Feb 9, 2026 · 1:02:12
The evolution of art direction, the integration of AI in creative processes, and the balance between creativity and business acumen. That's on the menu as SciPlay's Sr. Art…
Feb 5, 2026 · 1:04:40
Mobile publishing isn’t dead, it’s mutating! In this TWIG episode, we break down how Ares Interactive is trying to resurrect Glu with a $70M Series A and what that says about the…
Feb 4, 2026 · 1:01:58
The question nobody in the West wants to answer honestly: the biggest shooters in the world are not the ones you argue about on Twitter.This episode rips into Highguard’s shadow…
Feb 2, 2026 · 1:28:30
Sensor Tower Report 2026 breakdown with Jonathan Briskman. We unpack the biggest mobile app trends 2026 and mobile gaming trends 2026. We discuss monetization shifts (IAP vs…
Jan 29, 2026 · 58:58
Ubisoft layoffs point to deeper problems in AAA, a16z fund performance shows VC money tightening up, and TikTok’s future as a growth channel for games looks far less certain —…
Jan 27, 2026 · 1:10:36
Zynga's EVP of Studio, Yaron Leyvan, shares his 13-year Zynga journey, from the early days to Zynga to today, where the company operates under Take-Two, and the acquisition…
Jan 22, 2026 · 58:12
Did someone say Liftoff? Ok, well, Jen and Eric don’t think so. Heartopia is here, with a dramatic cross-platform launch in 2026, but what does it need to do to monetize? Does…
Jan 15, 2026 · 1:11:45
This week in games, we go all-in on the hottest industry shake-ups: Fortnite turns the monetization dial up, Meta slashes Reality Labs in a major XR reality check, and Pixel Flow…
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