Can a stick of butter keep you sober during high-stakes diplomatic meetings? Eric is sure to tell us. Chris provides a compelling theory for the death of mods, while Phil undergoes a Supercell detox after analyzing Squad Buster's launch. The crew gets back in touch with their microeconomic selves and looks at one of the most interesting explanations for the gender pay gap.

• ONE COHORT AT A TIME: A NEW PERSPECTIVE ON THE DECLINING GENDER PAY GAP

Play to earn hits Steam, and the crew is here to dissect the phenomenon. Why now, and why bananas? 

Phil is back into the economics of social casinos, while Chris develops a progression model for Darts. Eric and Phil debate the externalities of bots, while Chris solves for equilibrium. 

Inflation is a wild word, with everyone playing fast and loose with the definition of in-game economies. Eric isn't convinced inflation is the evil Friedman claims it is, while  Chris defends the honor of game tokens from Phil's stablecoin inquisition. The crew debates the meaning of game inflation: in what units and for whom? The answer is not as clear as first thought.

Price discrimination is the economist "duh," yet few firms engage in the *welfare* enhancing practice. What's with that? Dr. Bill Grosso, CEO of Game Data Pros, joins the crew to tell us that sometimes it's just about more columns in the database... We cover his efforts to build price personalization at scale, community pushback, the pricing power of brands, and the best things about game economists.

[1] A two-armed bandit theory of market pricing

It's finally here...the EVE episode. The crew speaks to one of the world's first Game Economist, Dr.Gudmundsson, who helped manage and advise on one of gaming's most durable and well-known game economies...ever. We cover the origin of E.V.E. (a simulation!?), his biggest wins at CCP, the role of game economists, and if crypto has a future.

Somehow, the cast wrings another guest, David Nelson, the former VP of Experimentation at King. Christopher Kaczmarczyk-Smith runs a regression on negative price, while Eric Guan explains the economic dynamics of rewarded video - bots and all. The crew debates how to solve the F-99 monetization problem and checks out what the NEW Experimentation Group is up to.

You won’t want to miss this episode of Game Economist Cast.

Guest! Finally! Dr.Julian Runge is here to add some much-needed seasoning to the regular crew, bringing the takes. We discuss the role of art, science, and academia, analytic organization structures, the role of flow in retention, the role of sales versus personalization, and the best theories of difficulty.

We cover a lot of PUBLICLY published research in this episode (most by Dr.Runge!) that most industry venters haven’t seen!

[1] Getting ML-Based App Personalization Right: The Engagement Engineering Framework
[2] Price Promotions for “Freemium” App Monetization
[3] Why Free-to-Play Apps Can Ignore the Old Rules About Cutting Prices
[4] Quantity discounts on a virtual good: The results of a massive pricing experiment at King

Chris wants to close the loop on game economies, while Eric compares Pikmin to Marx's Labor Theory of Value. Phil thinks Hawked is the next evolution of extraction shooter but doesn't understand why Indiana Jones needs to be involved. The American Time Use Survey is in, and... surprise, the crew plays Magic but can't decide to dust or auction cards.

Chris beguiles us with tales of Disc Golf, while Eric describes, in detail, the "fully modeled genitalia" of Baldur's Gate 3. Phil is too busy brushing up his Redditor voice which will surely get him canceled. The crew laments the declining utility of cosmetic economies but doubles down on the mechanics of emergent gameplay.

Eric brings us to the streets of Vegas for EVO while Phil finds solace in another hypercasual hit. Chris has a new metric for web3, and the crew laments inflation: it got ranked systems. The crew debates taking a bullet for millionaire execs who desperately need the help.

Chris takes another swing at mid-2010 gaming with an update on his Brawl Stars experience. Eric takes us to Vietnam for League of Legends game patching while Phil laments the very slow, not-so-fast F2P Revolution.  Battlebit made waves as a low-poly indie shooter at $15 -- should they have gone free-to-play?

[1] Battlebit utilizes Low-Poly to beat Battlefield at their own game

The crew celebrates July 4th with a travel mishap, poor driving, and a lack of Sam Adams. Eric chooses Guile to explain Street Fighters' live service attempt, while Phil demands a blood oath from the crew. Chris is glued to ads and won't let go.

The crew convenes to square off on....what counts as a store of value? Is Match3 the best game economy of all time? Is progression a wage rate? Will Chris buy digital Gloomhaven? Was Eric among the five people who watched Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire? Will Phil get the crew on a regular posting schedule? E27 IS HERE!

Chris discovers a small indie title called Fortnite, Eric throws salt on Diablo's big numbers, while Phil peddles his Game Thesis. The group tries to understand Reddit monetization while Phil tallies another win for the supply-siders. 

Talked about links:

• Diablo Esquire Exposé
• Reddit drama unfolded

The economics of platform success, taxation, and lots of autochess. Definition and implications of the metaverse.

The mailbag has arrived with all the weirdness you'd expect;

• Can we get a little bit about each of your backgrounds? We know that Chris' parents believe that Pokemon is the devil's creation, but what else is there? 
• What are some actual new models where play to earn can work?
• How many swords do you own? Follow up:....why?
• What examples of innovative or unique approaches to game economies have you seen in recent years? 

NEXT EPISODE IS ALL MAIL. We'll read and respond on air. SEND QUESTIONs/COMMENTs to mail@gameeconomistcast.com! 

• The full crew is back after a stealth EP5 drop. 
• We refuse to stop talking about Hogwarts, earn our economist bread & butter discussing Eric's new piece on markets, and try to solve for a $6M Super Bowl ad.

• Eric had to leave early, we’ll see more of him next episode!
• Mail episode: only two away! We have 12 messages; the next episode is the last reminder. Lots of crypto questions.
• Phil talks Harry Potter and Deluxe Editions, while Chris talks double auctions and market efficiency.

The crew returns for the most irregular cadence yet.  We talk about the price of Costco Hot Dogs, go under the matchmaking hood, and obsess over the progression problems of Marvel Snap.

Send mail to mail@gameeconomistcast.com. Mailbag E07 is coming!

The crew is back to think about the 2023 web3 meta, and digital Georgism, before closing with our most exciting games of 2022.

Remember to send in mail. On episode 7, we’ll read it and respond. Thanks to those who already sent mail in.

• Phil, Chris, and Eric talk about buying organs, cookie art, and a game that's not quite as good as Hades.
• We dive into the economics of subscriptions, what makes a marketplace fun, and the line between games and gamification. 
  • Learn more about Eric's analysis of fun marketplaces here.

NOW WITH HATE MAIL. 

• Send comments, questions, or concerns to mail@gameeconomistcast.com.
• We will have a mailbag episode soon!

Phil gets Eric pilled into a trio of roguelikes, where we prime the pump for Squad Buster's eventual shake-up of the genre. Chris ran another NFT sale and lived to tell about it. We Snap our fingers for Eric's take on Snap's doubling cube mechanic. Should all ranked systems use it? Should the bet limit expand to infinity? We conclude with a discussion of Eurovision's political economy.

https://ericguan.substack.com/
https://chriseconomics.substack.com/

Dr. Sam Rosen of Temple University finally unleashes the Veblen Goods model for which every Game Economist yearns. We discuss:

• Why don't sold-out artists raise ticket prices?
• Why do NFT projects go boom or bust?
• Should auction-based goods mask demand for their products?
• What types of Pokémon are optimal for collecting in Go?

Dr.Rosen's paper, co-authored with Dr.Anthony Lee Zhang & Sebeom Oh, is out now!

Eric reminds us that The Wizard of Oz is a heated monetarism debate, while Chris goes six layers deep on enforcing royalties. Phil thinks Warzone Mobile is a good executive Powerpoint math muddled with poor execution, but good economics secured him Taylor Swift tickets. 

• Subscribe to Chris' Substack and Eric's Substack
• Limit Break's New ERC standard

• Eric Guan on the economics of the video game job market
• Phillip Black on why big gaming co. employees are frustrated
• Dr. Julian Runge build a theory of persona and personalization in an Uber to the airport
• Christopher Kaczmarczyk-Smith solve for the missing web3 UGC game

Plus, a GEC After Hours on the state of San Francisco.

Matthew Melnyk joins the crew to finally tell us what's social about social casinos. Eric discovers a genre outside of CCG roguelikes...Psych, this time, it's Cobalt Core. Chris bends the supply survey backward to explain progression windfalls, while Phil tries to connect the dots between leaderboards and auction systems.

No Palword take is too late; something is not lost on the Game Economist Cast crew. Eric beguiles us with Cassette Beasts' analysis, while Chris reminds us of web3's oft-forgotten but newly popular Airdrop mechanics. Bonk? Phil can't get over the post-COVID decline in weekly gaming hours, but Eric cooks on a theory that a growing leisure pie might save us all.

[1] Sub to Eric and Chris's Substack!
[2] It's a bubble, it's a market, it's an Airdop!
[3] The Tremendous Yet Troubled State of Gaming in 2024

Eric starts 2024 with a new paper on League of Legends published by leading researchers. Is there an optimal amount of excitement in matches, and if so, where is it? Chris returns from Italy, and holy cannoli, did he have a "time" while  Phil laments subscription-based pricing as the antithesis of game monetization.  The crew agrees to spend money on Magic The Gathering this year.

Eric develops an economic model to explore or exploit game development decisions, while Phil wants a block-grant style gate process to align incentives. Chris is back at Marvel Snap, and boogies with some new social casino mechanics.

The team reviews a new Call of Duty matchmaking paper with some surprising and revealing data...

Phil and Chris return from Asia, and it's gachupon from here in-out. Eric talks vertical progression in single player games, while Chris actually agree on the future of web 2.5. The economics of unions weigh heavily: within or between professions?

The crew finally makes it to THE KING PAPER; Eric and Chris make surprising revalation.

Quantity discounts on a virtual good: The results of a massive pricing experiment at King Digital Entertainment

Economist Dr.Peter G. Klein joins the cast to discuss Why Managers Matter: The Perils of the Bossless Company. We debate Valve's organizational structure, the evidence for manager economic impact, and Sweden's success. 

Read more about Dr.Klein here and find his book below:
https://hankamer.baylor.edu/person/peter-g-klein-0
https://www.amazon.com/Why-Managers-Matter-Bossless-Company/dp/1541751043/

15:37 Why Managers Matter
22:29 CEOs
35:22 Valve

Loot boxes have all the markings of a moral panic. Dr.McCaffrey reviewed the emerging literature, and like the research on video game violence, it's destined for methodological malfunction.

We discuss why everything isn't a loot box, the apathetic interest of economists in games, what George R.R. Martin's economic equilibrium teaches us, and how to get more people interested in economics.

Follow Dr.McCaffrey on Twitter [1], see him on video games [2], and read his loot box and A Song of Fire and Ice papers here [3].

Is game balance bullshit? 

The crew goes toe-to-toe debating Sirland’s Don't Use Math in Balancing Games. Chris emerges from his Roblox hibernation, Eric tells us Street Fighter is more accessible than platform fighters, and Phil goes bonanza for All in Hole. 

Anti-cheat economics, web3 property rights, Deirdre McCloskey, institutional incentives, Halo UGC, and the if single player games have a natural advantage outside the West. Oh my.

Dr.Jason Arentz finally guest stars, and he's bringing the econ juice, finally striking a 50/50 web3 split on the case. 

Zynga Car Price Experiment: https://www.gamesindustry.biz/zynga-apologizes-for-random-dlc-pricing-experiment

The best tech firm experimentation seems to offer thousands of button color experiments. Dr.Runge has a better approach, which changes at every game development stage. We debate gaming's broken relationship with science, the proper experimentation framework, and how much you'd bet on yourself to complete Cousera assignments.

Read Dr.Runge's new paper NOW!

Showlinks:
Julian Runge
Gaming Companies Run Thousands of Experiments a Year
Game Data Pros
How to use games to build relationships with your customers

Pokémon TCG Pocket is one of a handful of games to implement P2P trading on mobile. Yet it sucks. On purpose. As @Eric explains, their game economy needs high sinks to combat hourly sourcing of card packs. Without the nearly 80% trading tax, prices would tend toward $0. However, that's secondary to a UX that is so gimped it makes Friend Codes look seamless by comparison.

We deconstruct Matthew Ball's new State of Gaming report slide by slide (or at least curated slides.) @Chris thinks we're failing to keep pace with inflation, putting the industry at risk, while @Phil wants to know why TikTok is winning at the margin. Is gaming becoming LESS compelling relative to social media?

Phillip & Eric navigate the strangely subdued landscape of GDC 2025, pondering if there really is such a thing as a free lunch. Chris dials in, wondering if his absence is secretly the key to Eric's roundtable success. 

They dissect the talks, the conference economics, the rise of mobile's respectability, and a guest in economy designer, Charlie Hsu.

In this episode:

• Is the game industry actually shrinking, or just taking a nap? And if Web3 isn't the savior, what's left besides... sweeps?
•  Is GDC just a cleverly disguised wealth transfer from sponsors to developers
• What's the latest "reasonable" pitch for Web3 in games?
• What's the economic model behind those San Francisco walk-up shops overflowing with candy bars right next to the register? High margins? A tourist trap? Something... else

Pokémon's patent of spherical objects throwing of cartoon creatures threatens Palword's lifeblood, while Tim Sweeney has lifted, at least a percentage point, in total gaming GDP with its injunction success.

How does Apple's rent-seeking rate change in the face of this ruling? Should Apple lower its rate to 15%, like it did in subscriptions? Remember, it faced competition primarily from "webstores" too. We premier a new segment: SOLVE that for EQUILIBRIUM.

We discuss the marginal *monetization* effects and debate the benefits of personalization opportunities (hint: there are none) with webstores.

@Chris is intrigued by Joost's piece on rising game costs, while AI's effects on the industry are measured in the Solow model. @Phil insists rising game costs mean rising revenue and stable margins, while Eric has his own doubts.

Eric's on IP Laws: https://substack.com/home/post/p-161276950
Joost's On Gaming Costs: https://superjoost.substack.com/p/gamings-billion-dollar-gamble

What is the GDP-maximizing set of copyright protections? 10 years? 5 years? None at all? Chris, Eric, and I debate the relevance of patents and copyright protections and the gains to network effects of knowledge. Does the "gentlemen's agreement" to avoid patent protections on game design help or hurt the industry? 

Chris talks about Monster Hunter's lineage and woeful service, while Eric introduces a novel use of AI in game design. Phil believes the Gini coefficient is underutilized for measuring live-ops-driven revenue.

Yat Siu, Co-founder and Executive Chairman of Animoca Brands, steps cast to defend Web3 against @Eric and @Phil’s vigorous skepticism. @Chris just want to know why gamers don’t get it. Is Web2 fundamentally incapable of grasping the promise of open markets? What is and should be promised to token holders? 

We discuss:

• Laying down Web3’s steelman case
• Why the West still doesn't get Web3 like the East
• Examining the original token sin, where did it all go wrong?
• Do digital property rights actually hold back economic growth?

Eric covers the economy and the system’s design of Ukraine’s Drone squadron. What does economy balancing look like in the face of war? Phil can’t stop gushing about Heroes of History, but there's one economy design piece holding it up. The crew descends into a John Maynard Keynes debate as a 4* or 5* character. Chris covers the economic impact of the UK’s new obligation for internet providers, potentially transforming UGC as we know it.

https://ericguan.substack.com/p/ukraine-gamified-drone-warfare

Eric Seufert joins to dissect AI hype, marginal ROAS, Jeremy Bentham's legacy, and managing a multi-million-dollar marketing budget that falls empirically short. WE discuss:

• How do you evaluate an “AI startup” in 90 seconds without being duped?
• Can LLM-driven hypothesis testing replace the Monday creative meeting and outperform it?
• If marginal ROAS is the real constraint, why do teams still optimize to averages?
• When should a Battlefield-scale launch actually spend less on day one and wait two weeks?
• Why did free-to-play economics conquer games but stall on platforms like Twitch or Spotify?
• Will AI-driven volatility make electricity markets funky?

Forget the endless autopsies on why Web3 gaming flatlined, @Chris gets past the clichés and gets into the real pathology: a misdiagnosis of what “play-to-earn” was ever good for. 

• @Eric & @Phil on vertical progression is the most important retention driver for several specific reasons
• The “market for lemons” problem in developer <> publisher relations: why developers can banbooze publishers

Sub to Eric and Chris' Substack here:

• https://substack.com/@ericguan
• https://substack.com/@chriseconomics

00:00 Introduction and Free Trials in Drug Dealing
00:28 Economics of Drug Dealing
02:11 Personal Experiences and Data Collection
03:24 Car Dealerships and Market Monopolies
04:57 Gaming Industry Insights: Clash Royale
19:08 Battlefield 6: Gameplay and Strategy
27:11 Rollerblading Adventures
28:36 Rollerblading Economics
30:16 Web3 Gaming Struggles
34:54 Understanding Play-to-Earn Mechanics
43:42 The Market for Lemons
52:24 Conflicting Data on Gen Z Spending
56:51 The Importance of Reliable Economic Data
01:05:43 Conclusion and Future Topics