Antti Kananen

In a market increasingly saturated with live service titles and battle passes, there's a rising countercurrent: studios opting to craft premium-first or premium-only games. The challenge, however, is significant. How can you build a premium game that sustains itself for years, without the constant drip-feed of content updates or FOMO-inducing mechanics? The answer I’ve seen usually has been that studios opt-in for these approaches in order to build games that are fun to play, for the time they get played — and that’s kind of it. Some studios will do well with these, alone or through the partners they have; and it will be all good for them. But for most? I’d say they should take a more deeper approach, about which I’m discussing more on this article. Also, thinking about the challenges here — it’s quite exciting to provide […]

Fresh Design Frontier In the current era of incipient genre-blending, the walls separating campaign, mixed, and multiplayer experiences can be dissolved. The above images: 1) three vertical vectors, and 2) three interconnected loops — illustrate the Campaign, Mixed, and Multiplayer modes and their interlinking red arrows, symbolizing this systems design approach. This direction encourages player autonomy while enabling e.g., a continuous flow of character and gear progression across distinct yet connected gameplay experiences / sub-vectors. In this article, we explore how this tri-vector design can create a rich, player-driven experience where gameplay modes evolve organically, offering new frontiers for e.g., RPGs, MMORPGs, looter shooters, and beyond — in a way we’re talking about blending and cross-play innovation through certain gameplay mechanisms fitting for achieving this innovation depth. Note: Readers should acknowledge that there can be duo-vector approaches as well to […]

In game development, it once took a village to ship a feature. Today, it might only take a curious designer, a good AI assistant, and a couple of hours. Soon, that same developer might be getting advice from an AI-trained CPO or sparring with a virtual co-founder over product-market fit. As AI tools embed themselves into the workflows of game studios, we’re not just talking about productivity. We’re witnessing a deep, structural shift: how roles are defined, how people learn, how teams are formed, and how the games themselves evolve. This isn’t about replacing artists or designers — it’s about unlocking multidimensional creativity. Note: This post discusses strong foundational AI concepts and is written with a thought-provoking tone, intentionally. Why? Because, overall, I don’t think what’s happening on global level stops — and everyone needs to buckle up for what’s […]

In the world of modern game development — especially F2P and hybrid monetization models — matchmaking is often treated as a technical backend feature. Something you just plug in. But in truth, matchmaking is far more than an algorithmic necessity. It is the engine that governs balance, progression, tension, reward, and even how well a game monetizes. Across genres — from ARPGs and MMORPGs to extraction shooters and team-based PvP brawlers — the way you match players determines not just who wins, but who sticks around, who spends, who grows, and who churns. Matchmaking Is More Than Just ELO Let’s start with the obvious: ELO-style ranking systems, widely used to match players of similar win/loss performance, are limited (incl. limitations to your business and scale). They assume skill is binary and ignore the full human context of play. That’s like […]

In a time when many games lean heavily on established systems — battle passes, gacha mechanics, and copied meta loops — this post is about looking beyond. In this post, I’m exploring, and discussing, Manipulator Mechanics (more specifically, “modern” Manipulator Mechanics in a systemic form, as we’ve had some forms of manipulator mechanisms in games existing for ages, e.g., time manipulation tied to a core gameplay — so, just for clarity, every time I discuss about Manipulator Mechanics / systems in this article, it’s about these “modern” types of systems instead of simplified ones) — a system that lets players tweak and influence the very nature (/the core) of gameplay runs through meta layers; offering a new layer of agency, strategy, and excitement across genres. The aim of this post is to inspire developers to imagine beyond what's typical and […]

After playing recently hours, and hours more, extraction shooters and several mobile games for entertainment — as well as for research purposes, as the case may be — I’ve grown being interested, and even hooked a bit, to the tension elements of these games. In addition to engaging with games with tension playing a big part in them, I’ve also become interested of how tension can be used effectively in game design, economy design, monetization design as well as on live ops and product marketing. This is what we’ll be covering in this article. Tension in Game Design Tension is a critical component of game design, shaping player engagement, emotional investment, and overall immersion. It plays a role across various genres, from fast-paced mobile battles to slow-growing, high-stakes encounters in PC and console games. In this post, I’ll break down […]

Given the industry’s hardships and recent dynamics on all fronts from macro to micro, I’m giving here a shot on listing down principles and DNA for building sustainable games for the future — over which I think the industry would benefit on making bets vs. repeating what has driven to us where we are today. So, buckle up! It’s going to be a bumpy and insightful ride all together when you’re reading this article. As a special mention, before jumping straight to things, it should be noted that I’m keeping these principles and points on high-level, as I’ve extensively covered each of these topics already in my blog. For diving further to these mentioned points, I highly recommend checking my posts. Principles and DNA of Sustainable Games In the rapidly evolving landscape of game development, creating long-term sustainable games requires […]