Smart & Wright : The Business of Gaming

Adam and John Wright compare the current realities of mobile and Steam game publishing, with a focus on why the two markets demand very different strategies. They also dig into the biggest blind spot in current industry forecasts: direct-to-consumer revenue, which may be reshaping how investors and analysts read the gaming market. Speakers covered John Wright — Explains how mobile publishing used to be more predictable, why that changed after ATT, and why Steam is not an easier substitute Adam — Pushes on the market-size comparison, questions the shift from mobile to Steam, and raises concerns about missing revenue in industry forecasts Key topics Mobile and Steam are not interchangeable markets, even if they can look similar from the outside Mobile publishing used to be driven by clearer KPIs, organic lift, and more calculable UA unit economics Post-ATT mobile became harder to forecast, with fewer new breakout games and larger drop-off points in the funnel Older games now make up a larger share of mobile revenue More of the new game pipeline appears to be coming from APAC rather than the West Steam is a different business, with premium pricing, heavier reliance on influencers, and far less visibility into its algorithm Hoping for a Steam breakout is not a strategy because success there is less predictable and depends heavily on community momentum Direct-to-consumer revenue may be missing from current market models and forecasts Negative industry sentiment may partly result from data tools failing to capture DTC performance • • Analysts and investors may be making decisions without full visibility into where gaming revenue comes from

Welcome to episode 1 of Smart and Right, a weekly, no-nonsense catch-up on everything happening in mobile and console gaming, hosted by Adam Smart (AppsFlyer) and John Wright (Turborilla). In this launch episode, we break down our biggest conversational takeaways from Gamescom 2026: AI adoption has exploded, from supporting single departments a year ago to running across entire game studios today. But it's not all upside: we talk real stories of runaway token costs (one employee burned $30k in a month) and why "head of AI operations" might be gaming's next big hire. Rising mobile CPIs are pushing studios toward web-to-app strategies to cut user acquisition costs, is it actually working? AI is collapsing prototyping timelines from months down to weeks, letting studios take more shots on goal with less spend. The slow death of physical media, PlayStation dropping discs, Switch 2's move to cartridge codes, and what the industry loses as a generation raised on Roblox and in-app purchases takes over as gaming's biggest spenders. China's growing footprint at Gamescom, with major studios like miHoYo targeting female and casual audiences while Western studios stay risk-averse. If you work in gaming, mobile marketing, or just want an honest, unfiltered take on where the industry is heading, subscribe new episodes every week.