What happens inside a studio when a game explodes past every projection on launch day? Jeremy Fielding, Community Manager and Narrative Coordinator at Stunlock Studios, was there when V Rising hit 150,000 concurrent Steam players — and he walked us through all of it: the chaos, the 60-hour weeks, the improvised official servers, and the feedback systems they built on the fly.

Joined by Steve McLeod, founder of Feature Upvote, this conversation covers the full arc of community management at scale — from why every community manager is fundamentally a game developer, to how Stunlock built player trust through transparency, to why studio announcements largely don't work and what does instead.

If you work in community, player support, or live ops — this one is packed.

What We Cover:

• Why community managers are game developers (and why that framing matters)
• What it was actually like inside Stunlock during V Rising's early access launch
• How to build feedback systems that scale before you think you need them
• The case for private beta feedback boards — and the "Dracula pun" password strategy
• Why AI bots in Discord often backfire — and what players actually want when they reach out
• How transparency converts skeptical players into studio advocates
• The measurement problem: why community impact is real but hard to quantify
• The rise of the double-A studio and why mid-size teams have a community advantage

Guests:

• Jeremy Fielding (Jeremy Berson online) — Community Manager & Narrative Coordinator, Stunlock Studios | playvrising.com
• Steve McLeod — Founder, Feature Upvote | featureupvote.com | LinkedIn

Timestamps:

• 00:00 — Intro & warm-up
• 02:00 — Are community managers game developers?
• 05:30 — How game dev is really about solving problems you made yourself
• 09:00 — Translating player feedback to dev teams — the middle seat
• 13:00 — V Rising's early access launch: what 150K concurrent looks like from inside
• 21:00 — AI in community support: when it helps, when it backfires
• 27:00 — Why honesty builds the community that defends you
• 30:00 — Feedback tools at scale: what to look for, what to avoid
• 38:00 — Private beta feedback with Feature Upvote (and Dracula passwords)
• 44:00 — Turning feedback into competitive advantage
• 49:00 — Why studio trust is the new double-A advantage
• 54:00 — Guest intros & where to find them

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