Game Wise: The IGEA Educates Podcast
Game Wise: IGEA Educates is the podcast that brings together the best minds in and around the Australian games industry. Hosted by IGEA, this series is about unlocking industry knowledge to help you navigate the business of making games and building sustainable businesses.
Covering all aspects of game development, emerging challenges and industry trends, we tap into IGEA’s extensive network while also bringing in experts from outside the gaming space to give you fresh perspectives and practical advice.
Whether you’re an indie startup, a growing studio, or an industry veteran, Game Wise is your resource for navigating the business of games in Australia and beyond. Let’s get wise about games!
Game Wise: The IGEA Educates Podcast
Making Sense of 2025 with VGI: Games Data, Trends, and Turning Points
In this episode of Gamewise, Jens is joined by Video Game Insights' Vic Bessey for a data-driven look back at 2025 and what it tells us about where the games industry is heading.
Drawing on VG Insights’ latest datasets and reports, the conversation explores global game sales and spending trends, the growing dominance of Steam, and the mounting challenge of visibility and discoverability in an increasingly crowded market. Vic breaks down why success is no longer guaranteed, even for well-funded projects, and what metrics like wishlists, demos, and platform showcases really mean in practice.
The episode also dives into VG Insights’ Soulslike Report, highlighting the genre’s continued growth and its strong traction across the Asia-Pacific region, as well as the Big Game Engines Report, which shows how Unity and Unreal continue to dominate development pipelines despite ongoing industry debate.
Packed with practical insights for studios, publishers, and policymakers alike, this episode offers a clear-eyed view of 2025 as a year of “shifting sands" – and what developers should take with them into 2026.