Return Entertainment: What It Is Like to Pioneer in the Cloud Industry

In February, Helsinki-based gaming startup Return Entertainment announced it raised €5.3 million. The company shared that it's going to use the funding to develop two initial cloud-native games that would be playable both on browsers on PC and mobile devices with one of them intended for the casual market and the other one for the hardcore market. We talked to Return Entertainment's CEO Antti Sartanen and the company's Chief Growth Officer Tanja Levo to ask them about the cloud-native market, monetization models, and future plans of the company.

Return Entertainment

Antti Sartanen: We’re a team of 23 people mostly working in Finland and we are now growing a team in Poland too. A lot of us have backgrounds in more established companies like Ubisoft, Supercell, Housemarque, and so forth but there are a few younger shining stars as well.

The seed was planted in 2019 when the founding team started building a game around totally destructible environments and quickly found out that using the cloud might be the only option to realize it. We then quickly got thinking that there might be more into this cloud gaming thing, especially if you build games specifically for the platform. It’s not too different from a decade ago when people had to figure out how to best make games for smartphones and tablets.

We think the cloud has huge amounts of potential from instant access to persistent worlds and streamer/viewer interaction. In the long run, we want to make something that uses the whole spectrum. But something that the cloud can already do better than any other platform today is removing the barrier to entering the game, playing it on any device, and inviting your friend to join the same game within seconds, no matter what device you or your friend are using.

Funding Round

Antti Sartanen: We were fortunate to have great connections to major industry players like BITKRAFT, Sisu Game Ventures, Vgames, 1Up Ventures, and SMOK who helped to put together the funding.

All of them are in this for the long run which was a must for us as we often refer to ourselves as the Indiana Jones types of the cloud industry. We have to do a lot of research to solve problems that nobody else has encountered but we also get to do cool games and explore what is possible. And often see what explodes in the process.

The cloud gaming space is still relatively volatile but incredibly exciting. It’s like reliving the era of early mobile gaming. There is a solid commitment from the supply side, i.e. platforms and service providers, and I can truly see a potential shift happening within the studios as well in the next few years after initial success cases have emerged. Hopefully by us, of course!

Cloud-Native Games

Antti Sartanen: We think there are three distinct angles to why cloud-native games will be beneficial for game developers and publishers.

The first one is the creative side, we can now create games where we can let go of the hardware limitations almost completely. To generalize, there is no lowest denominator, no legacy hardware to support. The only limitation is your imagination.

The second one is monetary. While it takes some resources to create a control scheme that can conform to different end devices – something we had to create ourselves but in the future will surely be made easier with tools – and pay for the rendering and streaming, the studios will save potentially millions in removing expensive porting costs. And gain access to platforms that they had never reached before.

The third one is rethinking community. When a game can be played via a website or any app, we can start to blur the boundaries between what is a game, what is a chatroom, and what is a viewing experience. Can it be all of those at the same time? When we can open a popup that can enable you to play a fully-fledged game or use an editor with a streamer in real-time we start blurring the lines between viewers and participants too, who we call Active Viewers. This all creates new types of communities and moves people between different modes and roles.

Monetization Models

Antti Sartanen: With every major platform shift, we have seen new kinds of monetization. All the way from arcade machines to home consoles to mobile games. With the new cost structure of cloud servers, there is a need to update the model again.

UA Strategy

Tanja Levo: In the cloud-native environment, the games will be played on the web browser and are therefore accessible without visiting a store and downloading or installing anything. This gives us a competitive advantage over the game distribution platforms.

In theory, we can have a 100% conversion rate from a click on the ad to a player, they get to experience the game immediately. After that, it’s up to us to retain them. Furthermore, when the user can start playing the game directly from the link, the cost of UA will be much lower as there are fewer conversion points along the way. The user experience is instant, from seeing an ad to playing the game. It can start a whole new era in user acquisition and what players expect from advertising.

Future Plans

Antti Sartanen: We are very much in the discovery phase in 2022 and perhaps 2023 as well. We want to validate our assumptions on what does and doesn’t work in cloud gaming by releasing cloud-native games and features.

Being one of the early ones in the sector means that you have the burden of pioneering a lot of the things that may hopefully one day become conventions. But it’s also what drives us forward, being the first ones to make it work. For a fitting analogy, the sun always shines above the clouds, you just need to fly through them first.

P.S. We’re hiring people who are equally excited to shape something totally new!

Antti Sartanen and Tanja Levo, Chief Executive Officer and Chief Growth Officer at Return Entertainment

Interview conducted by Ana Kessler