Our guest today is Michail ‘Mishka’ Katkoff, the Head of Studio at Rovio. Mishka has worked on hit games at Zynga, Supercell, Digital Chocolate and FunPlus - and is the founder of the very popular and very insightful Deconstructor of Fun blog that is very much an authority on the gaming space - I definitely recommend checking it out if you haven't done so already.

In today’s episode, we ask a very important question - how to build a studio that can make genre-defining hit games. Even though game mechanics are powerful forces, what can truly drive massive and sustainable growth are culture, processes and teams that drive high-performing studios - a perspective that I’m excited to dig into today. I’m truly thrilled to get Mishka’s insights distilled from hundreds of games from tens of studios in our interview today. 

Key Highlights:

🤔 Why is it important to know and understand how to build a successful studio, versus, say how to make successful game mechanics?
🎮 The seven elements that make for a great studio. 
✅ Why ‘right sized’ teams are important to a great studio.
👨🏻‍💻 Why Mishka values software and art over presentations.
🎨 Why Mishka considers an art director a key early hire.
❌ The one common characteristic of unsuccessful games.
📐 How engineers, designers and business people on teams look at problems from very different perspectives.
💭 Why a PM or businessperson-driven culture can find it hard to release anything genre-defining.
✌️ How to change the composition and leadership of studio teams as a game matures.
💯 How to think about being design driven vs. metrics driven.

Check out the full transcript and show notes here: http://mobileuseracquisitionshow.com/episode/how-to-build-genre-defining-gaming-studios-with-michail-mishka-katkoff-head-of-studio-at-rovio-founder-at-deconstructor-of-fun/

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