Following its transition to an independent publisher after a 2025 management buyout, Arc Games is entering a new era. The company, long known for its work across live service and multiplayer-driven experiences like Neverwinter, Star Trek Online, and Champions Online, is now refining its identity around sustainable franchise building and developer-first partnerships as a growing publisher.

Last year's Fellowship and the upcoming Order of the Sinking Star are good recent examples.

In this interview, CEO Yoon Im and other members of the leadership team outline how Arc is balancing premium releases with ongoing live service support, why the AA and indie spaces represent key opportunities, and how the publisher is adapting its global strategy to better connect developers and audiences across regions.

Arc Games has evolved significantly over the years, culminating in its transition to an independent publisher following the 2025 management buyout. How would you describe the company’s journey and what defines Arc Games today?

Yoon Im, CEO: Arc’s journey has been one of continuous evolution. From its early days to its time within a larger organization, and now as an independent publisher, each phase has shaped how we think about games and our role in the industry.

The management buyout in 2025 was a defining moment—it gave us the independence to focus on what we believe matters most: supporting developers, building sustainable franchises, and operating with both creative and financial discipline.

Today, Arc Games is defined by that balance. We are a focused, independent publisher with a clear strategy, a strong operational foundation, and a commitment to building games that last.

Your portfolio now spans both marquee solo titles and long-running live service games. How do you balance these two fundamentally different models from a publishing and operational standpoint?

Yoon Im: They are different models, but they are complementary. Premium titles are about delivering a highly polished, complete experience at launch, while live services are about sustaining and evolving that experience over time.

From a publishing standpoint, it comes down to discipline in how we allocate resources, set expectations, and measure success. Premium titles require strong upfront execution and marketing alignment, whereas live services require long-term operational excellence.

At a portfolio level, having both allows us to balance risk and create a more stable business, while also giving our teams the opportunity to work across different types of experiences and be current with the latest market trends.

Arc Games has positioned itself strongly in the AA and indie publishing space. What opportunities do you see in that segment that may be underserved by larger publishers?

Yoon Im: The AA and indie segment is where a lot of innovation is happening, but it’s often underserved in terms of publishing support. Larger publishers tend to focus on blockbuster-scale investments, which leaves a gap for high-quality, mid-sized projects that need both capital and operational expertise.

We see an opportunity to partner closely with developers, provide flexible support, and help them bring distinctive ideas to market without forcing them into a one-size-fits-all model.

It’s a space where creativity and discipline can coexist, and where you can build meaningful franchises without requiring massive budgets.

With your recent leadership updates, how do these structural changes reflect the company’s next phase of growth and priorities as an independent publisher?

Yoon Im: We are taking a two-pronged approach that reflects both stability and growth as an independent publisher. On one hand, our existing live service games provide predictable, recurring revenue, creating a strong and stable foundation for the business.

On the other hand, our third-party publishing efforts allow us to be more agile—to take calculated risks, invest in new types of games and IP, and explore emerging markets.

These structural changes are designed to balance operational discipline with creative ambition, ensuring we can sustain the business while continuing to innovate and expand our portfolio.

Jason Park’s expanded role as COO includes overseeing commercial strategy and global distribution. How is Arc Games approaching global publishing differently today compared to previous years?

Jason Park, COO: In previous years, we’ve always been a very low-volume publisher that releases maybe 1 or 2 games a year. That helped keep our quality bar as high as possible in everything we did.

Our approach moving forward will be operating more games at a smaller scope, but maintain the same quality bar without sacrificing anything. As the industry shifts, we will need to be smarter and shift accordingly in how we work with development teams, how we market our games, how we launch, and how we continue to grow the audience post-launch.

Live services continue to evolve rapidly across the industry. What are the key challenges and opportunities Jooyoung Chung will focus on as VP of Live Services, particularly around player engagement and long-term retention?

Yoon Im: Live services today are fundamentally about trust and consistency. Working together with our internal studio, Cryptic, the focus is on delivering a steady, high-quality content cadence while deepening player engagement over time. Our key role as a publisher is to magnify awareness and bring in the right audience for the games.

The challenge is that player expectations continue to rise—they want meaningful updates, not just frequent ones. Retention is no longer driven by volume alone, but by relevance and quality of content, community connection, and a sense of progression.

The opportunity is that when you get it right, live service games can build incredibly durable ecosystems. Our focus is on leveraging data more effectively, strengthening community feedback loops, and ensuring that each update adds real value to the player experience.

Michael Borras joins as VP of Business Development with deep experience across AAA, indie, and platform ecosystems. What strategic gaps or opportunities is this role intended to address?

Michael Borras, VP of Business Development: I wouldn't necessarily see my role as filling missing gaps as much as I'm amplifying what’s already working, just with a different perspective that I've developed from nearly 25 years working in all corners of the games industry.

In my career I’ve worked on everything from the most AAA games you can imagine at Rockstar Games ("GTA III", "Grand Theft Auto: Vice City", and "Max Payne"), to founding 3 of my own indie studios where I worked on PC, Console, Social, Mobile, free to play, and massive live service games, as part of Nexon Korea, Dalian Zeus Entertainment, and over the past 5 years, a Studio Head under Coffee Stain Publishing who were part of the Embracer Group.

I've spent many years on the "other side of the table", building and growing indie studios, self-publishing games on every platform, and navigating what it takes to make those partnerships thrive. That experience really deepened my appreciation for holistic, sustainable approaches to game development and indie publishing, built around trusting small teams of globally diverse indie developers, giving them the space and opportunity to do their best work.

That’s the lens I'm bringing into my new role: practical, developer-first, and focused on mutually beneficial, long-term outcomes rather than short-term wins.

The opportunity here is to help grow what’s already in motion, whether that’s discovering new indie teams in places we might not have looked before or shaping partnerships that feel genuinely collaborative and tailored to each developer I meet. We have a long and successful reputation of supporting great development teams around the world. My goal is to help strengthen that reputation further now that we're independent, while opening a few new doors and identifying new opportunities for the business along the way.

From a partnerships perspective, what types of developers or projects is Arc Games most interested in working with moving forward?

Michael Borras: For our 3rd party publishing, I'm focused on discovering indie teams from around the world who have a clear understanding of their scope and vision, and are building games with a clear identity, compelling gameplay loops, and engaging systems. 

We have decades of experience publishing co-op, multiplayer, and massively multiplayer games, which have nurtured communities of players to form around them. It's what we do best, and we're always very receptive to community-driven games with long-term potential if they hit in the right way.

That doesn’t necessarily mean only large-scale, live service teams or games, but games of all sizes that players want to come back to, share with friends, and build communities around over time. Being that we're a global publisher, with offices in the SF Bay Area, Amsterdam, and Shanghai, we’re also very mindful of global audiences. There are so many incredible indie developers coming up across Asia and SE Asia, and we're extremely well-positioned to support those developers.

We excel at helping developers from Asia reach players worldwide, while also helping Western developers connect more meaningfully with the Asian markets in return. It really comes down to the developers and what they're creating. I want to partner with teams who care deeply about what they’re making and want a global publishing partner to build something lasting with together.

Looking ahead, how would you describe the shape of Arc Games’ upcoming portfolio in terms of genres, scale, and player experiences?

Yoon Im: We are taking a two-pronged approach that reflects both stability and growth as an independent publisher. On one hand, our existing live service games provide predictable, recurring revenue, creating a strong and stable foundation for the business.

On the other hand, our third-party publishing efforts allow us to be more agile—to take calculated risks, invest in new types of games and IP, and explore emerging markets.

These structural changes are designed to balance operational discipline with creative ambition, ensuring we can sustain the business while continuing to innovate and expand our portfolio.

Are there particular trends, whether in live services, cross-platform development, or player communities, that you believe will define Arc Games’ strategy over the next few years?

Yoon Im: A few trends stand out. First, cross-platform play and progression are becoming table stakes for many genres. Second, player communities are more influential than ever in shaping a game’s lifecycle. And third, live service design is evolving toward more meaningful, player-centric content that respects players' time.

For us, the focus is on integrating these trends in a way that enhances the player experience rather than chasing them for their own sake. Discipline in execution will matter more than simply adopting every new trend.

Finally, what does success look like for Arc Games in this next chapter, both in terms of creative output and business growth?

Yoon Im: Success for us in this next chapter is about evolving while staying true to our core strengths. We were originally founded as a company that brought Eastern-developed games to Western audiences, and that foundation continues to shape how we think about global publishing.

Today, with the continued growth of the Asian market, we see an opportunity to expand that vision. In addition to serving our existing Western audience, we are increasingly developing and publishing experiences with Asian players in mind from the outset—building a portfolio that resonates across regions while growing the business in a sustainable and balanced way.

Arc Games, Development Studio, and Publisher

Interview conducted by David Jagneaux

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