With more than 10 years of experience in the free-to-play market, Javier Barnes is a well-rounded game designer that currently works as Senior Product Manager at Candy Crush, King. He has also worked as Senior Product Manager at Tilting Point; Lead Tokenomics at Euler Tools (Blockchain); Game Lead & Lead GD at Social Point (Take-Two Interactive); Game Economy Director at Gameloft Montreal & Barcelona and as Freeland GD at The Irregular Corporation (Mediatonic).
In the public talk, Javier made the following key points:
- He explained to us why the game economy is key to the long-term sustainability and growth of the game.
- He also shared a framework that can help the participants on designing and modelling your game economy.
- He provided tips to monitor the health of their game economy, and make it easier to work with.
Taking advantage of his stay as a mentor at the F2P Campus, we didn’t want to miss the opportunity to interview him and get to know a little more about him and his expertise.
F2P Campus (F): Who is Javier Barnes and which game have you been playing on your way to Vitoria-Gasteiz?
My name is Javier Barnes and I have been in the games industry for about 10 years in positions related to game economics and product management. And the game that I have been playing on my way to Vitoria-Gasteiz has been Royal Match, just because I play every single game in the match 3 space; and it is one of the few that allows you to play without an Internet connection.
F2P Campus (F): What advice would you give someone who is making a free-to-play game?
My top advice would be to protect the fun and make it a a fun game. Fun is ultimately the thing that we sell as game developers and is the foundation of every single KPI. If the game looks fun, the CPI will be low. If the game is fun to play the players will stay for long, they will be willing to pay and they will bring others into the games, therefore, generating a strong community. So, no matter if you are doing free to play or premium games, or blockchain games, try to make it fun and protect fun at all costs.
F2P Campus (F): Why do you think the F2P Campus is important?
On top of the beautiful city and the like organization is great. I think that it is one of the few places in the world and programs that allows you to work closely with other projects and other teams in free-to-play. You can get expertise from experimenters on the Spanish game development scene, and there are a lot of companies. Spain is one of the hoops in terms of free-to-play mobile game development in Europe, so don’t miss the opportunity!
Many thanks to Javier Barnes for answering the F2P Campus’s questions!