Building Better Games

Free Live Workshop for Game Dev Leaders: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg/leaders-workshop
Are you leveraging external development to lower costs, or are you secretly creating a project-management nightmare?
In this episode of Building Better Games, Ben sits down with Catalin Butnariu, Chief Strategy Officer at Amber. They dive deep into the evolving landscape of external development in game dev; from navigating contract models and overcoming loss-of-control fears to building effective communication layers and utilizing AI without alienating your audience.
What you'll learn in this episode:
What drove the post-pandemic acceleration of external development in game studios
How co-development differs structurally from outstaffing or staff augmentation
What different types of external development contracts are typically used
Why you might want to pay for an extra producer
How studio leaders can overcome the fear of losing control when externalizing tasks
What communication frameworks keep multi-tiered teams aligned across internal and external studios
How game developers can navigate client restrictions and player backlash around AI usage
Where AI tools offer real efficiency gains without replacing human creativity in game pipelines
If you're a leader in game dev who wants to scale production, manage risk, and run external partnerships smoothly without burning out your core team, this episode is for you.
🔗Connect with our guest through LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/catalin-butnariu-6b24186/
🔗Learn more about Amber Studio: https://amberstudio.com/
Connect with us:
🔗Ben's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjamin-carcich/
🔗BBG's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/building-better-games/
🔗Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/buildingbettergames/#
🔗Website: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg
🔗YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@buildingbettergames
If you want help leading teams and studios to better games players love, you can reach me at: info@valarinconsulting.com
#GameDev #GameDevelopment #ExternalDevelopment #GameProduction #CoDevelopment

Learn to apply Agile to Game Dev: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg/agilefundamentals
Is your game building on solid foundations or building on mud?
Building a game from scratch is brutally difficult, and game developers often debate how much to invest in genre fundamentals versus chasing new, shiny innovations during early pre-production. While some push for an ultra-lean approach to reach the experimental phase faster, skipping or rushing core genre foundations creates an unstable prototype, misleads early player validation, and forces massive, costly technical rewrites later in development.
In this second installment of our ongoing episode series with Leif, Leif and Ben dissect why mastering "minimum lovable" genre foundations early is essential for setting up innovation, shielding player credibility, and maintaining team momentum.
What You'll Learn in This Episode:
What genre foundations are and why they act as the essential Legos for game design
Why lean genre fundamentals take on profoundly more risk than building them up front
How shoddy technical and gameplay foundations create a massive tax on new ideas
When to stop iterating on a genre fundamental using the "not distracting" quality razor
What separates a minimum viable product from a minimum lovable experience
Why early player feedback can be deeply flawed if core fundamentals are janky
How small teams can tackle genre fundamentals efficiently without overstaffing
How game development leaders can balance humility and direction when guiding subject matter experts
If you're a leader in game dev who wants to de-risk early pre-production and build games on rock-solid fundamentals before chasing new ideas, this episode is for you!
🔗Connect with Leif on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/leif-johansen-52139141/
🔗 Watch the first install of this series here: https://youtu.be/woOMalag9MA
Connect with us:
🔗Ben's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjamin-carcich/
🔗BBG's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/building-better-games/
🔗Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/buildingbettergames/#
🔗Website: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg
🔗YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@buildingbettergames
If you want help leading teams and studios to better games players love, you can reach me at: info@valarinconsulting.com
#GameDev #GameDesign #GameProduction #IndieDev #PreProduction

Learn to apply Agile to Game Dev: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg/agilefundamentals
Are we witnessing a total structural collapse of North American AAA game development, or is the industry simply burning away its own excess to make room for a scrappy, highly efficient new era?
In this episode of Building Better Games, host Ben Carcich sits down with Leif Johansen to unpack the current state of game development. They dive deep into why US AAA studios are disproportionately suffering from massive lay-offs, how years of easy funding and ballooning team sizes created a culture of "poisonous success," and why the future of gaming belongs to generalists, AA studios, and scrappy fundamentals.
What You'll Learn:
What caused the structural brittleness and "boom-time" atrophy across US AAA studios
Why the global games industry outside the US is weathering the current economic storm much better
How hyper-specialization, bloated scopes, and "do you know who I am" executive energy distorted game greenlighting
What lessons modern game studios need to learn from the resilience of Japanese game dev
Why AA developers, indies, and multi-skilled generalists are positioned to become the industry's next leaders
How the end of cheap capital, Game Pass distortions, and speculative fads are forcing studios back to fundamentals
This conversation marks Part 1 of a multi-part series exploring how to make games effectively, so if you're a leader in game dev who is trying to navigate industry restructuring, unlearn bloated AAA habits, and build efficient, resilient teams, subscribe! This episode and this series are for you.
🔗Connect with Leif on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/leif-johansen-52139141/
🔗Learn to apply Agile to Game Dev: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg/agilefundamentals
Connect with us:
🔗Ben's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjamin-carcich/
🔗BBG's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/building-better-games/
🔗Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/buildingbettergames/#
🔗Website: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg
🔗YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@buildingbettergames
If you want help leading teams and studios to better games players love, you can reach me at: info@valarinconsulting.com
#GameDev #AAA #GameDevelopment #GamingIndustry #IndieDev

Level up your leadership: https://forms.gle/nqRTUvgFrtdYuCbr6
Are you optimizing four out of five teams on your project, only to find your final ship date hasn't moved a single day?
In game development, when multiple teams or disciplines are working toward a release, exactly one of them will decide when you ship: the long pole. If you can't identify which team is that long pole, you may be wasting critical leadership attention on teams that don't need it while leaving the bottleneck unsupported.
In this episode of Building Better Games, Ben Carcich breaks down how to identify the effort that truly dictates your timeline, measure real pace instead of stacking expert guesses, and focus your leadership energy where it actually changes your ship date.
What you'll learn in this episode:
What the "long pole" concept is and why it determines your actual ship date
Why relying on expert guesses and stacking assumptions ruins project plans
How to use historical team data and pace to project realistic release timelines
How long poles show up across multi-team projects, discipline pipelines, and sprint dependencies
Why pushing teams that aren't the long pole can waste time when the ship date matters
How to prevent hiring in the wrong places when trying to solve velocity problems
How to focus support on the bottleneck team without resorting to micromanagement or crunch
Why vision, culture, and prioritization matter far more than perfecting a plan
If you're a leader in game dev who is tired of guessing ship dates, drowning in complex Gantt charts, or pushing teams faster without seeing the final release date move, this episode is for you.
Connect with us:
🔗Ben's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjamin-carcich/
🔗BBG's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/building-better-games/
🔗Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/buildingbettergames/#
🔗Website: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg
🔗YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@buildingbettergames
If you want help leading teams and studios to better games players love, you can reach me at: info@valarinconsulting.com
#GameDevLeadership #GameProduction #AgileGameDev #ProjectManagement #BuildingBetterGames

Level up your leadership: https://forms.gle/nqRTUvgFrtdYuCbr6
North American AAA isn't just struggling in a downturn. It is actively choosing to die.
With record budgets and elite talent, senior leaders continue to reach for quick fixes like AI, outsourcing, and layoffs while ignoring the true rot: broken leadership incentives, political empire-building, and a refusal to adapt.
In this episode, Benjamin Carcich breaks down why the industry's current survival strategies are failing, why the leaders who can fix the problem are being pushed out, and what the future of game development looks like for those willing to build something better.
What You'll Learn in This Episode:
What the North American games industry reset reveals about the shifting balance of global development power
Why AI, outsourcing, and headcount cuts aren't fixing the real problems inside struggling studios
How bad incentives and politics keep studios stuck
Why fear of accountability can make risky decisions harder to challenge even when the warning signs are obvious
How emerging studios can adapt by staying smaller longer, facing reality earlier, and prioritizing shared vision over sheer output
If you're a leader in game dev who sees the structural flaws in traditional AAA and wants to build adaptable, high-performing teams for the future of the industry, this episode is for you.
🔗Watch my reaction to ShadowHand's video here: https://youtu.be/HCeqGKcMcLY
Connect with us:
🔗Ben's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benjamin-carcich/
🔗BBG's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/building-better-games/
🔗Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/buildingbettergames/#
🔗Website: https://www.buildingbettergames.gg
🔗YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@buildingbettergames
If you want help leading teams and studios to better games players love, you can reach me at: info@valarinconsulting.com
#GameDev #GameDevelopment #TripleA #GameIndustry #StudioLeadership