Meta’s apparent comeback runs headfirst into shifting UA economics, rising creative costs, and new pressure from platforms like Reddit, forcing marketers to rethink what “working” actually means. We unpack whether Meta is truly back or just delivering short-term dopamine, why in-app ads could reshape ad-monetized LTV, and how CPMs, payback windows, and creative volume are redefining the hyper-casual and hybrid playbooks. Cihan and Josh join to break down the latest Appsflyer data, Reddit’s Max campaigns, China’s UA surge, and Liftoff’s IPO and to debate whether AI is leveling the field or quietly squeezing the middle out of mobile marketing.Chapters: 00:00 Welcome to Deconstructor of Funds + UA Monthly kickoff00:17 Meet the guests: Jihan (Scaling.Games) & Josh (Wildcard Games)01:06 Today’s agenda: Meta’s return, Appsflyer report, Reddit AI ads, Liftoff IPO01:29 Is “Meta back” real? The 2.5 Gamers breakdown & the dopamine-hit spike02:52 What Meta’s actually doing: rollout strategy, templates, and market impact06:05 In-app ads explained: why Meta buying inventory could boost ad-monetized LTV07:48 Ad quality debate: intrusive formats, churn-per-impression, and broken incentives12:58 Can hyper-casual come back? CPMs, payback windows, and hybrid monetization18:38 State of Game Marketing report: shrinking US spend, growth in Turkey/India20:16 The creative arms race: AI variations, the ‘middle class’ squeeze, and rising noise23:25 AI Shrinks the Creative Gap: Small Teams Catch Up, Mid-Tier Stalls24:41 China’s UA Surge + iOS Outspending Android: Where the Scale Is Coming From25:38 30 Creatives a Day: The New ‘Tax’ of Competing in Mobile UA26:07 Ripoffs, Ethics, and Beating the Filters: The Dark Side of Creative Volume28:00 Hero Creatives Aren’t Dead—But Copy Speed Forces Smarter Variations30:16 Copying vs. Trends: When ‘Stealing’ Is Real (and When It’s Just the Market)31:40 Is the Market Really an Iceberg? US Spend Down, Web Shops, and the ‘Hidden’ Picture34:27 Reddit ‘Max’ Campaigns: Advantage+ for Reddit with a Promise of Transparency37:19 Top Audience Personas: Useful Insight or Just a Fancy Dashboard?39:34 How to Test Reddit Max: Onboarding Friction, Learning Periods, and Scalability Unknowns40:58 Liftoff Files to Go Public: Valuation, Margins, Debt, and the AI Black-Box Race45:44 What’s Liftoff’s Moat? Engine vs. Fuel, Data Advantages, and the AppLovin Comparison48:35 Wrap-Up: UA Monthly Feedback, What to Cover Next

We recap the Clash Royale creator controversy and CEO apology, dig into what’s broken with evolutions, heroes, and pay-to-win, and debate whether streamers can actually drive a comeback. We also cover Savvy’s rumored MoonTon deal, Blizzard’s updates across Overwatch, Diablo, and WoW, the slowdown in mobile games, the frozen state of M&A, and a reality check on AI in games - from hype to hard limits.

00:25 Welcome & Episode Lineup (No More Car Talk)

01:52 Rumor Mill + Why We’re Skipping Matthew Ball (For Now)

03:10 GDC Plans, Events, and Content Plug Roundup

06:00 Ad Break: Sensor Tower Pitch

06:20 Clash Royale Creator Controversy Recap + CEO Apology

09:44 What’s Actually Broken in Clash Royale: Evolutions, Heroes & Pay-to-Win

11:45 Do Streamers Drive the Revival? Twitch Data, Correlation vs Causation

13:02 PR Playbook Debate: Groveling vs Proactive Creator Celebration

21:53 Savvy’s Buying Spree: $6–7B MoonTon Rumor (Mobile Legends)

27:15 Overwatch Drops the “2”: DAU Surge, Live Ops, and Monetization Revamp

32:43 Blizzard’s comeback tour: Diablo drops, WoW housing & Overwatch’s 10-year arc

35:49 Mobile check-in: Habi’s 2026 slump and the post-Survivor.io reality

38:16 The real engine behind Habi: Gorilla Games and the “publisher outgrown” problem

40:36 M&A hypotheticals: Scopely, Savvy, and why deals feel frozen right now

42:36 AI in games debate: calling out the hype and what actually changes the medium

44:50 Why AI won’t make games cheaper: IP moats, attention scarcity, and AI-native platforms

49:17 East vs West AI reality check: layoffs, pipeline bottlenecks, and player backlash risk

57:03 Embark as an AI efficiency poster child? The smoke, mirrors, and AAA cost skepticism

01:01:43 Closing thoughts: mobile growth is over, share-of-time wars, and next week’s plug

User-generated content (UGC) isn’t “make anything.” It’s “make something that someone cares about.” In this Deconstructor of Fun conversation, Julia Polatovska, founder of Dorian, a creator platform for mostly women + Gen Z, goes past the pitch and into the operator questions. Who creates, who wins, what monetizes, and what breaks at scale when you're building a UGC platform.

Connect with Julia: www.linkedin.com/in/palatovska/

Supercell’s annual CEO blog post reads equal parts culture memo and a recruiting pitch. We break down what is behind the PR spin before zooming into Clash Royale’s Lil Wayne halftime show as a case study in where “brand” ends and product-led fandom begins.

From there, we triangulate the broader market: Newzoo’s year-end PC/console recap as a reminder that attention is consolidating, not expanding; Roblox’s growth story as it starts acknowledging gravity; and an update on Budge and PE as capital keeps rewriting the rules of what “good” looks like. We close by wishing the best to the team impacted by Riot’s 2XKO layoffs.

00:31 Podcast Overview and Today's Topics

00:58 Market News: Roblox Earnings and More

02:14 AI and Gaming Industry Insights

03:25 Unity's Financial Struggles

04:43 Community Engagement and Volunteering

20:44 Game Industry Updates: Budge Studios Acquisition

24:23 Roblox Q4 Earnings Analysis32:19 The Challenge of Monetizing Young Audiences

32:33 Roblox's Strategy to Age Up

33:02 Advertising Challenges for Under-18 Demographics

33:26 Negative Margin Users on Roblox

35:19 Upcoming Episode Teaser: Roblox's Algorithm Changes

38:23 Supercell CEO's Annual Blog Post

39:05 Clash Royale's Rebound and Marketing Strategies

44:14 Squad Busters: A Postmortem

44:54 Supercell's Future and Industry Insights

49:01 The Role of PR in CEO Letters

52:18 Supercell's Innovation vs. LiveOps Debate

01:02:21 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

The evolution of art direction, the integration of AI in creative processes, and the balance between creativity and business acumen. That's on the menu as SciPlay's Sr. Art Director, Peter Franco, joins Michail Katkoff on the podcast.

Read more about Peter's work on modernizing a top-grossing game: https://tinyurl.com/mn2bdweb

Timestamps:

2:12 - Peter's journey into Social Casino

4:42 - Evolution of art direction roles

7:13 - Balancing creativity and business

9:23 - User feedback in design

12:07 - Importance of seamless UX

15:44 - Player behavior insights

20:28 - Benefits of using IPs

25:16 - AI in art pipelines

30:18 - Future skills for art directors

35:33 - Maintaining stylistic consistency

40:49 - Future of art direction

45:07 - Personal influences and career advice

53:25 - Advice for aspiring art directors

59:25 - AI and creativity

Mobile publishing isn’t dead, it’s mutating!

In this TWIG episode, we break down how Ares Interactive is trying to resurrect Glu with a $70M Series A and what that says about the current “publisher vs. studio” power balance.

We also tackle Google’s new immersive world model, Genie 3, and the industry’s first defensive reflex: how do you keep the genie in the bottle when the bottle is an API?

Phil drags us into Highguard Marketing, making us unpack the pitch, the incentives, and why “pseudo-defending” it still feels like a red flag.

Finally, we hit Arknights: Endfield launching off the back of a reported 35M pre-registrations, and what that number does (and doesn’t) predict once the game meets CPI, retention, and live ops gravity.

The question nobody in the West wants to answer honestly: the biggest shooters in the world are not the ones you argue about on Twitter.This episode rips into Highguard’s shadow drop, the “beta that isn’t labeled beta” problem, and the stubborn reality that the shooter market has converged into two and only two genres: Battle Royale and tactical.We talk Highguard and Spectre Divide as case studies for why “ex-Apex devs” is marketing copy, not a strategy, and why in 2026 a shooter doesn’t get a long runway to “fix it live.”Guest: Christopher Anjos, with Chris Sides and Feras Musmar.We discuss:- High Guard as a MOBA-raid shooter hybrid and why its best moments arrive only after five minutes of downtime.- Defense phase, resource phase, then the game finally becomes itself: mounts, CTF energy, base raiding.- Shadow drops vs. tech tests: why the Apex Legends playbook doesn’t port cleanly into 2026.- “Early access” is just launch, and Steam labels don’t save you from retention.- The 3v3 trap: high risk formats where one leaver or one death warps the whole match.- Why 3-person squads feel like a couple plus a third wheel, and when 3v3v3 or 5v5 might actually work.- The “two genres” thesis: Battle Royale and tactical shooters as the market’s default equilibrium.- The creator-credit illusion: “ex-Red Dead lead designer” as a brand signal that often means nothing.- Players want auteur vibes; production reality is thousands of hands and fuzzy accountability.https://graygoatgaming.com/

Sensor Tower Report 2026 breakdown with Jonathan Briskman. We unpack the biggest mobile app trends 2026 and mobile gaming trends 2026.

We discuss monetization shifts (IAP vs ads), market localization strategies that actually move the needle, and the rise of AI-powered apps changing consumer behavior and competition.

State of Mobile 2026: https://bit.ly/4bvjI2b

Chapters:

02:13 - Downloads plateau, in-app purchase revenue up

07:15 - Apps overtaking traditional gaming in revenue growth

12:05 - US market trends: AI, short drama, social media

15:14 - The rise of generative AI platforms

16:03 - In-app revenue growth comparison: apps vs. games

20:09 - Non-game monetization lessons from successful apps

26:49 - Top performers in downloads and IAP

32:50 - The attention economy

46:05 - The explosion of generative AI content in social media

60:13 - Trends in hybrid casual, hyper-casual, and ad spend efficiency

65:18 - Market barriers and the advantage of existing data for new entrants

73:35 - Investment opportunities

82:29 - Future outlook: differentiation through tailored, niche AI solutions

Ubisoft layoffs point to deeper problems in AAA, a16z fund performance shows VC money tightening up, and TikTok’s future as a growth channel for games looks far less certain — from ownership issues to slowing ads and algorithm risk. We talk about what this means for user acquisition, why AI video apps are starting to matter, concerns around GDC attendance and safety, The New York Times stepping into mobile games, and why monetizing word games remains so hard. We also cover the launch of High Guard and wrap up with what to watch next as the industry enters its next reset.

00:00 Welcome01:49 Meeting Mihir Va from EA05:50 PGC Recap and Rumors17:23 Ubisoft Layoffs and Critique21:28 A16Z Fund Performance Analysis30:44 TikTok's New American Entity31:18 TikTok's Impact on the Gaming Industry31:51 Ownership and Future of TikTok in the US33:37 Concerns Over Content Moderation and Algorithm34:36 TikTok's Stagnation and Advertising Decline35:36 Emerging Threats: AI Video Apps38:31 GDC Attendance and Safety Concerns43:46 New York Times Enters the Mobile Gaming Market49:36 Challenges in Monetizing Word Games52:13 Launch and Reception of High Guard57:33 Conclusion and Upcoming Topics

Zynga's EVP of Studio, Yaron Leyvan, shares his 13-year Zynga journey, from the early days to Zynga to today, where the company operates under Take-Two, and the acquisition strategy behind successful post-acquisition integration in mobile gaming.

Yaron breaks down how Zynga builds forever franchises: sustainable games powered by live ops, repeatable game development, and disciplined iteration, where innovation is real, and data-driven decisions don’t kill creativity.

We also get into studio culture after an acquisition: protecting speed, talent density, and decision-making while aligning with parent-company expectations.

Chapters:

00:20 Yaron's Journey

10:00 Creating Forever Franchises

19:40 Post Acquisition Studio Management

30:45 Day in the Life of a Head of Studios

47:38 Hubris and Humility

59:18 The Role of AI and Future Outlook