Aileen: 0:02
This episode features Andrew Baluyot, founder and CEO of GameOps. GameOps is a video game company that provides live operations, customer support, and quality assurance for over 50 international online games. Andrew joins us today to talk about the benefits of finding a solutions provider that understands the ins and outs of the video game industry.
Andro: 0:24
Most of the time now, I work with the Game Developer Association of the Philippines and the Philippine government trying to advance the state. of the video game industry in the Philippines.
Aileen: 0:35
You mentioned what you're doing is mainly a player support partner. What are the scope and what are the roles that a player support partner plays?
Andro: 0:43
Okay, well, in a nutshell, I think everyone has heard of games as a service. Now back like 5 10 years ago, this wasn't so much the same kind of thing. But all video games, you can classify into two things, right? Like single player experience games or multiplayer experience games. In both cases, but in multiplayer games more so, you have to be able to support your player base, right? With any issues they might have. Gameplay, account systems, anything like that, but basically supporting your player base so that they can continue playing your game or they can keep playing your game. So player support in a nutshell, this is really just the video game industry's term for customer support. Compared to traditional customer support, player support has a much wider breadth, in my opinion. If you're doing support for something like a product off the shelf, usually it's typically very simple. How does the product work? How do I use it? You know, what troubleshooting, that sort of thing. But when you're, when you're talking about video games, there are all sorts of different kinds of issues you can encounter. So the scope is much larger in my opinion. From a video game publisher's perspective, live operations are clear support. It's a very important source of information, especially for the future development of the game as a service, especially multiplayer games. Most of these games are continuously evolving. In my opinion, when you say customer support, what you mean is very traditional type of customer support where, you ever issues has a corresponding procedure and once you once you've addressed that issue, you're done. But when you're thinking in terms of player support or life operations. Understanding the impacts of the kinds of issues you receive, cataloging that data, analyzing it, you know, creating the appropriate reports. That's sort of an extra mile that is very important specifically to video game publishing.
Aileen: 2:31
What are the advantages of choosing a support partner that specializes in game as opposed to somebody who has a lot of experience in giving out support?
Andro: 2:40
Whenever we need a potential client, I usually really ask. Right off the bat, like what kind of support are you looking for? Because there are those two kinds, right? It's either traditional customer support or something that's more specialized, focused on player support. To be perfectly honest, in my opinion, neither is better or worse. They're just two different things, right? And it's a matter of choice and it's a matter of the needs of of a partner, right? Of any company. So usually I ask them like straight up, what are you looking for? You know, are you looking for very traditional type of customer support? You just need something that's -- here's the issue, answer the issue, and that's it, right? And then just produce raw data in terms of reports. No need for analysis, that sort of thing. And maybe, you know, in most of those cases, I hear that people resort to that when they need it en masse, right? Like they need hundreds of people and so on and so forth. Or are you looking for something that's more personal, I guess, right? Or much more specialized. It's, it goes beyond that part I was saying, which is just about, adhering to the process and resolving issues.
Aileen: 3:46
What are the advantages of choosing a player, a support partner that specializes in games?
Andro: 3:50
I used to be a video game publisher, like way back in, you know, the early days of video game publishing in the Philippines. I was the head of operations for the largest video game publisher in the Philippines. If you're thinking at that director level or senior management level, then you want to have a team that you don't have to micromanage, you don't want to be too far away from the operations but at the same time, you won't have time or you won't have the bandwidth to really be down in the trenches with the frontline and trying to solve every single issue, right? So small things like even like, why are people performing the way they are and, and trying to isolate exactly why this is happening and then doing something about that. I mean, that's the very time consuming, necessary, but very time-consuming work. And it should be left to the supervisors and the managers, right? So that the senior manager again, can focus on the more strategic and the strategic things. So that's, that's the main advantage of working, I guess, with a company that focuses specifically on player sport, because they understand this right off the bat, they understand the situation immediately,
Aileen: 4:57
how would I know as a game company that it is time to get a player support? What are the signs that I should be looking for to say that, " Hey, I need a partner"
Andro: 5:06
Sometimes we do encounter, you know, potential partners who don't have the same kind of experience. Some of them are happy for the option of being able to consult or are happy to see that we have that kind of experience because they know now that, okay. Like I've, I've worked with five games, but Game Ops has worked with 80 games, right? And so now they have the opportunity to ask and say like, Hey, what have you seen? Sometimes our partners are very experienced. They're as experienced as us, or maybe even more. In that scenario, what I see that they like is that communication and working together becomes very quick and easy because it's more like I don't have to explain every single thing, you know, that, that I'm talking about, right? Hey, so, you know, that function there, we're going to change it. So GameOps goes, Oh, okay. I get it. I understand that function you're talking about and I can see why you want to change it. Yeah. Because you know, it's creating this kind of issue, right? He's like, yes, exactly. It becomes very quick, very easy to work together.
Aileen: 6:01
What are those signals that tells me, Hey, I need help from somebody who does it.
Andro: 6:05
There are studios out there that have focused on a certain type of game. Pretty much their entire lifetime, the lifetime of the studio, right? We know these kinds of companies where they have a franchise and, but imagine what happens when, let's say they're making, I don't know, single player action type of games, story games, experience games. And they're really good at what they do, right? And then one day they say, you know what, let's make a multiplayer game. And then suddenly now, despite that a studio like that being extremely experienced, extremely high quality, so on and so forth, they're going into something that they've never gone through before, right? Suddenly now you have to provide service. It's no longer just, here's my game, it's on the store, buy it, done, you know, oh bugs, patch it, done. Suddenly now you have to create an account system, you have to create a payment system, you know, you have to create a surveillance system, all sorts of things. And this is totally new territory for even the most experienced. It's like Michael Jordan, basketball player, you're going to become a baseball player. And you're the greatest athlete in the world in basketball. You know, you're still an athlete, so, you know, you're still going to need, now you're going to have to hire a baseball coach and a baseball trainer, all sorts of things, right? So that's one situation I can think of, right. where you're going to want to work with, or it's, it's probably a good option to work with, with someone who has a lot of experience in this area that you are now heading into.
Aileen: 7:36
Those are great markers. I think you mentioned if I'm moving to a more diverse multiplayer game, it's a good sign to find a partner. If I'm adding account systems and other systems in place, it's a good time to find a partner. And also if I want to scale sustainably without having to train leadership. And all the structure that comes with, that is a good sign to start considering a partner. So now that I'm in that headspace where I'm looking for a player support partner, what are the top questions that I should be asking? Or what are the things that I should be looking for to ensure that I have a good player support partner? What are the questions? What do they look like?
Andro: 8:22
I'm sure the first obvious question is what games? Are you working with or have you worked with, right? That's the first most obvious question and it would probably give you an idea like, okay, this team is working with this particular genre of games on this particular platform of games. That's probably the first question you should definitely ask. Right. But then if you want to go a little deeper, then the question now is what scope of work do you do with these games, right? How much of the work have you done? Here's one very good example, because there are things which are regularly typically reserved for the client side or the partner side, right? And there's things that are typically reserved for the provider side. The next thing I would want to ask is, so what do you do? Right. What do you guys, or what have you guys for your current partners? What do you actually do, you know? So, you start asking like how much across. So if there's a line, let's say it's down the middle, right? Explaining like, okay, on the left side, these are all the provider-related duties. And on the right side, these are all the publisher related duties. How much of that line do you cross or how far do you cross that line, in your experience? That's probably what I would ask because then it would really give me that understanding of what their scope is, right? Are they, the type that can handle higher security, higher value type of work? Yeah, that's the, that's probably the second thing I would ask right away.
Aileen: 9:50
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