PocketGamer.biz Podcast

Recorded live on-site at GDC, host Peggy Anne Salz sits down with Justin Graysmark, founder of Eplay Studios, to unpack the unlikely path from teaching English in Poland to building a portfolio of 25 competitive games and driving 2 million installs on the Skillz platform.

Justin didn’t come into games through the usual route. He started with a love of competitive trivia, a serious winning streak on the leaderboard and the conviction that real rewards could make skill-based games even more compelling. In 2016, that spark became Eplay Studios.

What followed was not overnight success. It was persistence, testing, missed shots, hard lessons and a lot of getting back up.

As Justin puts it, game development has plenty in common with martial arts: you get your butt kicked, you learn, you try again. That mindset helped him move from early misses to games players actually wanted to play.

In this episode, Peggy and Justin get into:
How Justin turned a competitive trivia habit into a full-time indie studio
Why fairness, balance and trust are make-or-break in real-money competitive games
What 25 games and 2 million installs taught him about working backward from the player
How Skillz helped Eplay focus on gameplay while handling matchmaking, payments and competitive infrastructure
Why the Skillz and Beamable combination gives small studios more tools to build, test and iterate faster
Why Justin started sharing his journey on YouTube to show other developers that success is possible

The big takeaway: competitive games are not won by one great idea. They are built through persistence, player feedback and the willingness to keep testing what flies and what fails.

If you are building your first game, your tenth or your next shot at something bigger, Justin’s story is a reminder not to give up too early. In his words: “When you stick with it long enough, that’s where the magic happens.”

Chapters
00:00 – Martial Arts Discipline
00:38 – An Unconventional Path
02:54 – Starting Eplay Studios
04:17 – Milestone: 2 Million Installs
05:27 – The Importance of Fairness
06:31 – Infrastructure for Small Studios
08:02 – The Skillz/Beamable Bundle
09:21 – Documenting the Journey
11:07 – Future of Competitive VR
12:45 – Advice: Don't Stop Early

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Check out more world-class speakers sharing their insights and expertise at one of our events. You can find details of our next event here - https://www.pgconnects.com/next-event

PocketGamer.biz head of content Craig Chapple, deputy editor Paige Cook and news editor Aaron Astle talk through the latest games industry news on the 90th episode of the Week in Mobile Games Podcast.
On this week’s show we discuss:
Apple CEO Tim Cook's decision to step down and what his legacy will be.
The removal of Almedia's FreeCash app and what it means for rewarded UA.
The Super Mario Galaxy Movie's $755m box office.
How the Pokémon anime looks to be leveraging the mobile games for the new series.
The importance of government support for games.
Xbox's decision to cut the cost of Game Pass and remove day-one Call of duty releases from subscriptions.
00:00 - Introduction and Personal Updates08:18 - Tim Cook's Tenure and Apple's Future14:08 - Government Incentives18:36 - Super Mario Movie Success23:42 - The Freecash Controversy29:08 - Xbox Game Pass: Pricing Changes36:57 - Pokemon Anime
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👉🏻 The Top 50 Mobile Game Makers 2025 - https://www.pocketgamer.biz/the-top-50-mobile-game-makers-of-2025/
👉🏻 Download the PocketGamer.biz Mobile Games Developer Trends Survey Winter 2024/25 report - https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSf3tbjUxVkG17CuHHljMblfmUC3DZ6gNAzV8qiz8bAALUXSvQ/viewform
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Recorded following Pocket Gamer Connects London, hosts Peggy Anne Salz and Craig Chapple sit down with Nick Poole, CEO of Ukie, for a candid conversation about risk, ambition and what it will take to make the UK the best place to build and scale a games business.

Nick brings a rare perspective to the role. Before leading the UK’s trade body for games, he worked across libraries, museums and chaired Wikimedia UK. His throughline has always been culture, creativity and how institutions shape innovation. Now he’s applying that lens to games.

In this episode, we unpack:
Why the UK risks becoming an “incubator economy” if it cannot retain IP and talent
What’s broken in the funding ladder from prototype to scale-up
Why tax relief is about competitiveness, not handouts
How risk appetite across the industry has shifted post-2020
Why studios must build companies, not just games
What the Games Growth Package, expanded UK Games Fund and new skills initiatives actually mean in practice

Nick is clear: the industry cannot afford to talk itself down. The UK remains one of the most creative and export-driven games markets in the world. But ambition and coordinated action are essential.

We also explore the future of play, the role of generative AI in production pipelines and why automation should unlock creativity, not replace it.
If you are a founder, investor or studio leader navigating 2025–26, this episode is about one thing:

Reclaiming agency.

Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Pocket Gamer Connects London Highlights
01:14 Guest Intro: Nick Poole's Career Path from Museums to Games
03:57 Understanding Ukie: The Sword and Shield of the UK Games Industry
05:40 Why Historical Government Support for UK Games Has Lacked
07:41 How Studios Can Lobby Effectively: The "Made in the UK" Campaign
11:51 Fixing the "Broken Rungs" in the Game Funding Ladder
14:55 Building the New: Adapting Business Models for 2026 and Beyond
16:14 Tax Reliefs and Fiscal Stimulus: Moving from VGTR to VGEC
22:04 Industrial Strategy: Skills, Trade Missions, and the UK Games Fund
36:58 The Future of AI in Games: Productivity, Curation, and Discovery

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Check out more world-class speakers sharing their insights and expertise at one of our events. You can find details of our next event here - https://www.pgconnects.com/next-event

PocketGamer.biz head of content Craig Chapple, deputy editor Paige Cook and news editor Aaron Astle talk through the latest games industry news on the 89th episode of the Week in Mobile Games Podcast.

On this week’s show we discuss:

- Supercell CEO Ilkka Paananen's BAFTA Fellowship award.
- Is BAFTA taking mobile gaming seriously?
- Direct-to-consumer revenue hits record highs in Q4
- Playtika up for sale.
- The Super Mario Galaxy Movie's blockbuster Box Office numbers.
- Game of Thrones Dragonfire gears up for launch.
- The Division Resurgence's opening salvo.
- What a power shift from West to East means for the games industry.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction and Pokemon Champions
05:47 BAFTA Games Awards and Recognition for Mobile Games
12:40 The Division Resurgence's Opening Salvo
17:47 Super Mario Galaxy Movie Success
22:17 Record D2C revenue
25:59 The West to East shift
29:44 Game of Thrones Dragonfire
33:20 Playtika up for sale
36:08 Wrap-Up

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👉🏻 Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/PGbiz
👉🏻 Website - https://www.pocketgamer.biz
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👉🏻Pocket Gamer Connects Speaker Submission form - https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdoS5n-vdHu6aU-2d_rR7x1FAgewG51y3nlU1aB8RdetiKaGw/viewform
👉🏻 The Top 50 Mobile Game Makers 2025 - https://www.pocketgamer.biz/the-top-50-mobile-game-makers-of-2025/
👉🏻 Download the PocketGamer.biz Mobile Games Developer Trends Survey Winter 2024/25 report - https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSf3tbjUxVkG17CuHHljMblfmUC3DZ6gNAzV8qiz8bAALUXSvQ/viewform
👉🏻 Join the AI Gamechangers newsletter - https://aigamechangers.substack.com

Recorded live on-site at GDC, hosts Peggy Anne Salz and Craig Chapple sit down with Robert Burnett, Head of New Content at Skillz, and Jon Radoff, CPO of Beamable, to unpack what just changed for developers building competitive mobile games.

With the acquisition of Beamable, Skillz is pushing into a bigger role: giving developers more control over progression, LiveOps and monetisation inside the game, while still handling the infrastructure that is hardest to build well.

As Jon puts it, the goal is to build “a business operating system for a game studio” so developers can focus on gameplay instead of racking up debt. “If you’re spending any of your effort building the tech instead of the fun, you’re accumulating debt that doesn’t do you any good.”

Skillz also unveiled the Pro SDK at GDC, opening up more control inside Unity for developers who want to build competitive games with richer progression, more flexible monetisation and a stronger live-service layer.

In this episode, Peggy and Craig get into:
Puzzle Blockz, the first live proof point for the combined platform
What this shift means for smaller teams that want to move faster without building every part of the stack themselves
How advertising, IAP and competition can start to work together instead of sitting in separate silos

If you are serious about building competitive mobile games that can keep players and grow revenue, start here.

Chapters
00:00 New Ways for Developers to Monetize
01:34 The Acquisition of Beamable by Skillz
01:59 Solving Pain Points with the Pro SDK
04:46 A Business Operating System for Game Studios
06:27 The Role of AI in Rapid Prototyping
10:14 Economies of Scale in Game Development
11:51 From Vibe Coding to Agentic Systems
16:01 Case Study: The Puzzle Blocks Proof of Concept
22:50 Iterating Based on Real-Time Player Feedback
34:31 The Future Roadmap: Intelligence and Automation

Let's Connect
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Check out more world-class speakers sharing their insights and expertise at one of our events. You can find details of our next event here - https://www.pgconnects.com/next-event