Interview with a Game Product Marketing Manager: Jack Richardson

A Product Marketing Manager in the games industry is someone right on the coalface, managing the strategies that help games succeed and find their ways into the libraries of happy players. We now publish so many PC and console games that we need a whole team of Product Marketing Managers to manage them.

Meet Jack! He’s one of the shining lights in this team and he is impossibly busy – working in games while at the same time studying for a Creative Writing Master’s degree at the University of Oxford.

He’s a great chap to interview, and if you enjoy his perspective, be sure to read his blog on What Does A Game Publisher Actually Do? – it’s one of our most popular of all time on the Kwalee blog. Let’s chat to him about games, his career and lifting the lid on the game marketing and publishing process.
 

So Jack, let’s start off by talking about what you do in your role as a Product Marketing Manager?

Fundamentally, product marketing is a mixture of planning and prodding. Effectively I’m a producer of everything outside development (which is handled by the appropriately-named Producer). I look at what’s interesting about our games, how we talk about them, plan the timelines and make sure it all gets done.

It’s a very diverse role – I write copy and manage translation for store pages and marketing materials, produce trailer briefs for major marketing beats and work with internal and external creatives. I often represent our games at physical events and have a hand in organising their appearance in online showcases, too.

One of the most important areas is working with first-party platform holders and stores to boost trailers and marketing campaigns into multi-hundred-thousand-view juggernauts. We also manage relationships with platform, press, and hardware partners, including Sony, Microsoft, IGN, Glorious Gaming, and others, depending on the game in question.

What kinds of skills do you need to succeed?

You need organisation skills alongside excellent interpersonal skills. So much of my job is speaking to people inside and outside the company, getting people to come round to what I want them to do, or work out the best course of action. A bit of creativity helps, as you’ve got to come up with broad stroke tactics, and you’ve got to be able to spearhead initiatives.

You’ve been the product marketing manager for two of Kwalee’s most hotly anticipated games – Wildmender (released in 2023) and The Precinct (coming soon). What’s your favourite?

Both are excellent in their own right, and I couldn’t possibly pick a favourite. That said, The Precinct stands out to me as a game I’ve followed all the way from initial pitch to its current form. I’m excited to see it out in the world!

Things must move very fast in your role, what’s your latest news?

We’ve just announced the release date for Voidwrought, our upcoming cosmic horror Metroidvania (24 October 2024, on Steam and Switch – get wishlisting!). At the same showcase, we also announced our involvement with GladiEATers, a slightly bonkers turn-based creature battler with cooking mini-games and a surprisingly twisty story. It’s so great to be able to talk about things like that after keeping them secret for so long!

What do you do outside of Kwalee – any interesting hobbies?

I write creatively and I’m currently nearing the finish line of my Master’s in Creative Writing from the University of Oxford. I lived in Japan for five years before coming to Kwalee, so naturally that’s had an impact on how I spend my time – I write a lot of haiku poetry and have been practising kendo (Japanese fencing) for almost a decade. I’m big into live punk and garage rock music, too.

I’ve been lucky enough to travel widely. In fact, in my very first month at Kwalee I led our trip  to Bitsummit in Kyoto. It was a whirlwind of a weekend – having basically just come from Japan it was great to go back. The events have been one the most interesting parts of my job. I love to talk about games and show fans ours for the first time – particularly the aspect of interviewing and taking feedback from people.

Since you’ve joined the games industry, has it lived up to your expectations?

I didn’t know that there were jobs like this in games. Until recently, I assumed you needed to be a programmer, or an artist or a composer, and didn’t really think about all the other people involved in releasing a successful game.  Even if you’re not directly involved in making the game itself, there are so many ways to get involved with making games happen.

There’s no clear split between people who make games and those that promote them – we all care deeply about games as an art form and (it has to be said!) a commercial venture. Everyone is just a normal person – there’s issues in the industry, but there are no superheroes sitting in caves, just people working hard on something they care about.

The culture in the team is very relaxed – we’re good friends, not just in my team but broadly, I can talk to other teams and heads of departments. It’s a great fluidity that I’ve not experienced before. We’re friendly and relaxed with each other – it’s not a stuffy environment. We’re all on the same team and working hard to achieve the same aims.

I’ve been thrown headlong into the games industry – whereas before I joined Kwalee I was only ever partly involved in games. It has been exciting to come behind the curtain to see how games are made. Interesting people doing interesting things – which is very fulfilling.

Finally, if you had to pick your favourite games that you haven’t worked on?

Tunic and Outer Wilds are two games that continue to haunt me (in a good way). Looking bigger, I would have loved to work on a huge blockbuster like Horizon: Zero Dawn or a Final Fantasy game, too.

A lot of people reading this will be indie devs hovering over the pitch button. What would you say to them about Kwalee as a publisher?

I’ve been struck by how we are playing our games all the time, we’re all familiar with what’s happening. We’ve all played in the initial pitch process, so we’re all on side with the games we’re working on and we care a lot about them. Developers say that the bigger the publisher, the less airtime you get – we have multiple weekly meetings – so we give games a lot of time and attention.

Thank you for the interview Jack!

Do follow Jack on LinkedIn and Twitter and take a look at his brilliant job promoting the upcoming games Voidwrought and In Sink.