Game Republic partnered and presented a fireside chat with Devolver at the first Liv Game Summit at Liverpool’s BOXPARK on Thursday 5th June. Organised by Marek Smagala at the Liverpool Game Dev Network, the Summit was an opportunity for more than 130 students, developers, educators and support companies to come together for networking, pitching sessions, demos and talks/panels from industry leaders.
The first panel was entitled “The business of Co-development, Practical Strategies for Growth” hosted by Smagala and also featuring David Harper (Skyhook Games), Alison Lacy (Radical Forge) and George Rule (Lucid Games). There was some excellent advice for developers looking to co-dev – Lacy said that you need to deliver what you said you would deliver, and get the estimation on delivery timelines correct, or you may end up with penalties if you don’t deliver.
“You have to be strategic on the projects you pitch for, be super-professional – this is a partnership and you must have communication on expectations and make sure the client reviews your work regularly, not just after a six-week deadline. Make their lives easier.”
Harper added that devs needed to
“really understand the brief – ask enough questions and get that in the contract and get legal advice. Have a post-mortem at the end of the project – learn what worked and what didn’t, with KPIs and whether you were on budget and time. Feed this experience back into future projects.”
Rule gave advice to developers to
“start small. It might be small contract work such as character art. Get a feel for this kind of work. Nail the contract, build a reputation so that potential clients know you are a reduced risk to work with.”
The next session was a Game Republic Fireside Chat between Jamie Sefton (Game Republic) and Andy Kelly (Devolver) touching upon subjects such as what Devolver looks for in a game to sign (“we can’t say what is a Devolver game but we know when something isn’t a Devolver game!”), using influencers, getting your game heard above the noise, approaching publishers, pitching with the essential “X Statement” and more. We’ll have a full news story on the Devolver Fireside Chat very soon.
The final session was a panel, “From Classroom to Career: Strengthening the Path into the Games Industry” hosted by Marcia Deakin of the Next Gen Skills Academy, with whom Game Republic has recently run successful bootcamps for game studio start-ups and graduate games industry readiness in North Yorkshire. The session touched upon the current state of education and industry links with other special guests from City of Liverpool College, The Game Assembly, Universally Speaking, Sony, and The King’s Trust.
The Liv Game Summit continued after the talk sessions with networking and more opportunities for developers in Liverpool and across the North to meet each other and discuss potential collaborations. The event will hopefully return again in 2026.
For game developers and those who support the games industry in The North, you can find out about networks, projects, initiatives on the Great Northern Games Discord here
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