This session looks at how teams can build strong production foundations without losing the creative spark that drives great games. Through lessons learned in both small indie teams and larger studio environments, Michael will share insights into different workflows, team structures, and approaches to sustaining both people and creativity. 

Session Takeaway

• Practical strategies for balancing sustainable workloads with efficient production pipelines.
• Clear approaches to structuring teams and workflows that support both accountability and creative experimentation.
• Actionable methods for maintaining team well-being while delivering innovative, high-quality games.

Michael Meaden
Athena Worlds

The most common company value is integrity while the second most common is collaboration. But how many truly live by those values when pay structures reward competition and the most important decisions are made behind closed doors? Values alone don’t shape studio culture.

This talk is a case study of what happened when an industry veteran and an outsider founded a co-dev studio where pay is transparent, power is shared and the company culture is built within the studio structure.

Leveraging her background as a Research Scientist, Daph frames this talk as an experiment. She walks you through the original hypothesis, what rethinking pay and power meant, and their observations as the studio grew from 2 to 18 people over two years, contributing to multiple AAA co-dev projects. She will also provide a practical evaluation of these structural decisions, including their difficulties, successes and impact.

This talk is for anyone from any discipline interested in learning about how studio structure can build resilience, improve retention and affect collaboration in a co-dev environment.

Session Takeaway

• An case study of how transparent and aligned pay structures influence collaboration, competition and retention
• An understanding of how studio culture can be shaped by structural decisions, and not just values
• A new perspective on industry norms related to pay, power and resilience

Daph Janssens
Day III Digital

In absence of any sort of studio backing, funding grants, publishers, or doing anything the industry tells him to do, Stanley Baxton has managed to develop several award-winning narrative games, and went on to be part of BAFTA Breakthrough 2025 with his game LATEX, LEATHER, LIPSTICK, LOVE, LUST. In this talk, he’s going to break down how he did it, making a case for abandoning the “normal” way to develop games, and how the industry is ignoring vital talent at the fringes.

Session Takeaway

• Why we need to look beyond “getting into” the industry as a means to make meaningful games, and how this makes the entire field stronger.
• Why making “hyper-local” game for very specific “audiences” should be pursued by more developers, and can be as culturally impactful as it is artistically fulfilling.
• How someone can start striking out into making “non-commercial” games in “not real” game tools, why they should, and why I believe this needs to become more common advice to newcomers and students.
• Why, despite the fact that I’ve been able to do this, that I am still in several positions of economic privilege, and that we need more systems to support artists on the fringes.

Stanley W. Baxton
Stanwixbuster

They're old. They're tired. They're barely hanging on. Mike Rose (No More Robots) and Rami Ismail (previously of Vlambeer) have been knocking around the video game industry for 15 years now, Mike on the publishing side, and Rami on the developer side. Now they've finally fulfilled their dreams of starting a video game industry podcast (which is an entirely unique idea and has never been done before), through which they tell terrible stories, give terrible advice, and swan around like they own the place.

In this very special live episode of Mike & Rami Are Still Here, the duo will talk memories of past Develop:Brighton visits; what is on the horizon for our industry at a time of extreme worry, and maybe even take a question or two from the audience, if they can stomach it.

Session Takeaway

• A better understanding of publisher funding in 2026. What should you be asking for? How many units will you actually sell?
• What can we expect sales to look like going forward into 2027? Are things levelling out? Are they getting worse?
• What tips and tricks are there for surviving as a studio right now? How can you rise above?

Mike Rose
No More Robots

Rami Ismail
Rami Ismail

Arseniy Klishin from Party for Introverts shares the tips and tricks he wishes he knew while securing funding and a publishing deal for their recent narrative RPG Cabernet. In his talk he provides an array of developer-friendly insights and advice about the pitching process, developing prototypes, making adjustments to the pitch and demo based on publisher feedback, and more. With topics ranging from the common challenges indie developers experience in the publisher-oriented market to demo improvement suggestions to setting expectations for the meeting and beyond, he will provide easy alternatives to lessons usually learned the hard way.

Session Takeaway

In this presentation, attendees will gain an increased confidence in pitching abilities, a breakdown of what to expect from pitch meetings from the developer perspective, and strategies for a more successful pitching process.

Arseniy Klishin
Party for Introverts

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2: Heart of Chornobyl - a first-person open-world shooter built on Unreal Engine 5 - was released under the extraordinary circumstances of full-scale war in the developers’ home country. In this session, Agostino Simonetta, Chief Commercial Officer at GSC Game World, shares the real story behind launching this unique Ukrainian title: self-publishing without a traditional publisher, the pivotal Microsoft partnership, integration with Game Pass and cloud services, and the immense challenges of shipping a major game during wartime.

Session Takeaway

- How to successfully self-publish a major title without a traditional publisher, including key decisions on control, risk management, and partner selection

- Real strategies for building and maintaining an authentic indie-style marketing voice that resonates with fans, even under tight resources and high pressure

- Practical ways to keep development and release on track during extreme external disruptions like war, blackouts, and team relocation, while still delivering post-launch support and maintaining player trust

Agostino Simonetta
GSC Game World

From having the rug pulled out from under my feet in the waves of layoffs, to funding and shipping my very first indie game, this session will look at how I started a company and we made The Quiet Things against a challenging backdrop. I’ll take you through my journey, from making the first prototype of the game for a University project, to raising £150k in funding through a mixture of grants, crowdfunding and bootstrapping. I’ll talk about the challenges and benefits of self publishing, and show a roadmap of what our budget and production really looked like, all the way to release.

While the talk doesn’t directly involve in depth discussion of the games’ content, it’s worth noting The Quiet Things deals with some challenging topics around childhood abuse.

Session Takeaway

• Funding options available to indie developers.
• Marketing a game with limited time and resources.
• A realistic picture of what it takes to ship an indie game.
• Managing self publishing as a small team.

Alyx Jones
Silver Script Games