About this episode

The episode discusses the potential of Portugal becoming a significant player in the gaming industry through insights from industry veteran Jefferson Valadares.

Between 2018 and 2024, the turnover of Portuguese games companies went from around 5 million to nearly 100 million. In this episode, Kalie Moore sits down with Jefferson Valadares, Co-Founder and CEO of partNerd and President of the Portuguese Association of Game Development Companies, to unpack whether a country long known for exporting its best talent can become a home for original IP. Jefferson has seen the industry from nearly every seat, as Studio GM at EA, Executive Producer at BioWare, Head of Mobile at Bandai Namco, and a board member at Rovio before its sale to Sega. They explore what the AAA years taught him about when to spend and when to wing it, why big companies keep funding games they already know won't work, and what he learned running studio acquisitions at Fortis Games about why most deals quietly lose their value. The conversation also goes inside partNerd, the four-person studio he's building now, and why they're making an original co-op game exclusively for Nintendo Switch 2. Jefferson explains the thinking behind designing for asymmetric skill levels so parents, kids, and non-gamers can play together, why GameShare shaped their commercial model, and how hard…

People in this episode

Host: Kalie Moore

Guest: Jefferson Valadares

Topics covered

• gaming industry growth
• game development
• original IP
• co-op gaming
• asymmetric skill levels
• studio acquisitions

Keywords

• Portugal gaming
• game development
• original IP
• co-op games
• Nintendo Switch 2
• gaming industry
• studio acquisitions

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: partNerd, Portuguese Association of Game Development Companies, EA, BioWare, Bandai Namco, Rovio, Fortis Games, Nintendo Switch 2, Doppio

Places: Portugal, Lisbon, Helsinki

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