Mastering Live Service Gaming: Overcoming Challenges, Seizing Opportunities, and Anticipating the Future

Ahead of the Live Service Gaming Summit, we spoke to Benjamin Pommeraud, General Manager - Strategic Initiatives at King, Pommeraud shared his experiences on managing a diverse portfolio of games, the key challenges and opportunities in implementing a Game-as-a-Service model, and the importance of continuous improvement and player engagement.

Given your experience in managing multiple games, and more recently your work in M&A, can you share some of the primary challenges and opportunities faced by developers in implementing a Game-as-a-Service model? What can platforms such as console and PC, learn from the success of mobile games?

To me, Game-as-a-Service (GaaS) means a game's success isn't determined at launch. Continuous improvement can make a game more successful over time, but this requires focus and resources from across the business. Data shows that players' loyalty is not driven by changing the full game play, but our capacity to improve and build on the core game experience. Think about chess or soccer: infinitely replayable games with always the same rules. Although the entertainment in each is found in the different outcome.
In live games, balancing innovation and iterative improvement is key. Initially, this balance might be 30/70, but in my opinion it should shift to 20/80 or even 10/90. As a leader, placing the right people in the right roles is essential.
Finally, data is crucial to know if your strategies work. At King, we run numerous A/B tests and can detect small fluctuations in our data, which allows us to make small but productive changes. These small improvements, compounded, lead to significant growth.
I don’t think PC and console developers necessarily need to learn from mobile. It’s all about our beliefs as a team. If we decide to believe that live ops is the way, then the recipes are the same across platforms. Taking examples from companies I worked for: Rainbow 6 Siege is a great example of a product that really grew post launch due to sustained efforts on content and community. League of Legends is another example of a game that received the full focus of a company for 10 years, and thrived accordingly. King is similar: our focus on making great content for Candy is a key component of our growth.

You previously managed the operations and P&L for Farm Heroes Saga, Pet Rescue Saga, Bubble Witch Saga and Candy Crush Friends Saga and Jelly Saga. For you, what are the core approaches for developers to sustain the longevity of live games and maximise the customer lifetime value?

Managing growth and sustainability are two distinct strategies. For example, we manage the King catalog of games in a variety of ways, always tweaking and reviewing which titles will help us grow our audience and then which titles can sustain a healthy audience.
It's crucial to understand the core experience that your players are looking for, and always prioritize that. In puzzle games, this means more levels; in MOBAs, it's about balanced champions and a non-toxic, cheat-free environment. At King, consistently producing levels and delivering the best player experience is a priority. Being sustainable means using your resources wisely. Managing a portfolio allows for synergies, such as shared technology and flexible teams. Which is something we’ve continued to deliver at a high standard at King. It is one of our super powers.
Growth management requires more resources as you can't compromise on basics and need additional personnel to pursue significant innovations.That being said, if you can strike a good balance of the two, you’ll find a more harmonious balance. Innovation in games can be risky. It can be hard to determine the end result or feedback from players. But it does sometimes make sense to innovate if you work with strong producers and strong designers, which we have at King. They can build and test features quickly, reducing time to value. Finally, managing technical debt is crucial; neglecting it can make the game unmanageable over time.

Your current role is identifying large opportunities for King, internally and externally, and incubating them. What do you think the direction is for the live games industry over the next 5 years? And if you can, what will be the nuances for live games on different platforms?

AI is a real revolution in the games industry. From an industry point of view I believe it’s an immense opportunity for smaller companies, and for the larger ones who will know how to embrace it. AI will enable small teams to build AAA games quickly and at a low cost. AI will make it easier to personalize content at a player level, and potentially create new game genres. But AI could also lead to an inflation in the number of game releases and contribute further to the saturation of the market. I believe that winning companies will be the ones that focus on their communities of players and build strong, decade-long IPs, and probably the well-funded companies that will be able to spend a lot of money on user acquisition.

The audience attending the Live Service Gaming Summit will be at various stages of product and portfolio development when it comes to live games. I would therefore be interested to get your take on risk management in live service models, particularly as your role explores new opportunities. Can you share some insight on how businesses can look to balance risk, including business-led decision-making and strategic hiring, and maximise the opportunities for a new live game product?

To ensure a successful live game, plan for it from the start. Establish robust systems like a strong data pipeline and flexible design for new content creation. If live ops are new to your company, avoid improvisation. Instead, recruit and trust experienced leaders and advisors. Take your time to focus and avoid the fallacy of diversification. Prioritize shipping a quality product and achieving profitability. Contrary to popular belief, successful companies do not rely on burning marketing funds at a loss to generate growth.

What discussions are you hoping to have with your peers at the Live Service Gaming Summit?

The two ingredients to make successful games are great people, and not the ideas but their execution. I have many friends in other gaming companies, and I enjoy learning from their experiences—both successes and challenges. The games industry is a great place to learn from one another and I'm looking forward to engaging in these discussions at the summit!