How to make a publisher fall in love with you

What the talk is about

Nikita Vladymyrov explains what a publisher or investor looks for in a team before deciding to work with it. His main point is that they seek a good team for the long run rather than a single game, since the industry is a marathon, not a sprint. He names five areas of expertise a team should have: business, game design, art vision, engineering and project management. Each has an artifact that shows how deeply it was thought through: a one-pager with sales forecasts and market segment, game and technical design documents, a description of the art pipeline, a development plan with milestones and a budget, and the key people's résumés. He also stresses that a team should show it can listen and learn, illustrating this with the Dunning–Kruger effect. Useful for indie teams and studios preparing a pitch to a publisher or investor.