Tips from King studio Nonstop Games on growing your own game startup

It’s easy to register a business and call it a game startup, but how do you take it beyond a two or three-man outfit into a powerhouse studio more akin to Rovio or Supercell?

Head of studio Juha Paananen from the King studio, Nonstop Games was at the Games in Asia Singapore Meetup yesterday to share more.

Nonstop Games started in 2011 with co-founders based in Singapore and Finland. At that time, it was called GamesMadeMe, and was developing free-to-play HTML5 games. It received a pre-seed financing round in May 2011 from Lifeline Ventures, after which it launched two HTML5 games in early 2012 – Dollar Isle and Paint Stars.

See: Nonstop Games: social HTML5 games with a twist

Almost a year after Nonstop Games rebranded itself from GamesMadeMe, it raised a US$2.9M seed round from Creandum and Lifeline Ventures, which allowed it to continue working on the free-to-play iOS strategy game, Heroes of Honor. Nonstop Games also moved all its operations to Singapore. The game launched in January 2014 and was featured globally, as well as given editor’s choice on the App Store.

In August 2014, Nonstop Games was acquired by King of Candy Crush Saga fame. Paananen says that King proved to be a very good fit for Nonstop Games with its similar culture. The studio is currently working on a new game which will launch in the second quarter of 2015. But you’re probably wondering how it got to where is is today, so without further ado:

Juha Paananen at the Games in Asia Meetup.

Decide what kind of company you are

There are many types of successful game companies. There are the indie studios who go for free-to-play, venture capital backed growth-focused game companies, indie studios that focus on premium games, and studios working on crowdfunded games, among others. However, it’s important to know what kind of company you are. Studios who try to get funding may not always be the kind of startup VCs look to invest in.

Investors, according to Paananen, back only certain types of companies: those that seek growth; those on growing platforms like mobile and tablet; and those with potentially lucrative monetization models like free-to-play. It’s tough for premium games to get external funding.

Build a really great founding team

Founding teams are important because they are usually the basis of a studio’s success. Some characteristics of a good founding team are: