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Xsolla President’s New Book Reveals How Gaming Companies Can ‘Get Off That Hit-Driven Hamster Wheel’
Xsolla president Chris Hewish has published a new book titled "Durable Advantage: Five Pillars of the Modern Game Business," unveiled at Gamescom 2026 in Cologne. The book addresses the gaming industry's current challenges of layoffs and contraction by proposing a strategic framework built on five pillars: relationships, commerce, intelligence, trust and time. Hewish argues that gaming companies have become overly dependent on third-party platforms such as app stores, which control critical business functions and restrict their ability to build direct relationships with players and gather complete business intelligence.
Hewish, a former executive at Activision and DreamWorks now leading a payment software fintech company, advocates that gaming companies must move away from the "hit-driven hamster wheel" by gaining full ownership of their business data and decision-making processes. A critical weakness he identifies is that many companies lack complete visibility into their own monetisation and player behaviour data when relying on third-party platforms to handle payments and commerce. Hewish illustrates this with an example: a company observing revenue decline in a particular country might incorrectly assume it needs more localised content, when in reality the drop could stem from players switching to a newly introduced payment method that the company's platform hasn't integrated—data invisible to the company if payment information remains with the platform.
In short
- Xsolla president's book argues gaming companies should reduce third-party platform dependency
- Complete business data ownership is key to escaping reliance on blockbuster hits
- Incomplete payment data can lead companies to make costly wrong strategic decisions
Steelman: both sides, in good faith
The strongest fair case each way — we don't pick a winner.
The case for
Gaming companies should minimise dependence on third-party platforms and build direct player relationships whilst maintaining complete control over their business data and monetisation systems. This independence enables data-driven decision-making based on comprehensive visibility into player behaviour and revenue streams, avoiding costly mistakes arising from incomplete information—such as misattributing revenue declines to content gaps when the real cause lies in payment infrastructure blind spots. Greater autonomy from platform gatekeepers also protects companies from arbitrary policy changes and creates sustainable business models less vulnerable to external disruption.
The case against
Third-party platforms provide essential infrastructure, security systems, fraud detection and payment processing capabilities that most gaming companies would find prohibitively expensive and complex to replicate independently. These platforms deliver unparalleled reach to vast audiences and handle technical challenges that allow studios to concentrate resources on game creation rather than commercial infrastructure. Smaller and mid-sized studios particularly benefit from shared services at scale, and the collaborative ecosystem approach has enabled the gaming industry to achieve substantial growth and innovation that might not have occurred with fragmented, individual systems.
Explained simply
Video game companies often depend on a small number of successful releases to bring in revenue, while the industry has also faced layoffs and contraction. Many sell games and in-game items through third-party platforms, such as app stores, which manage parts of the payment process and player data.
Chris Hewish is president of Xsolla, a company that provides payment software to the games industry, and previously worked at Activision and DreamWorks. In his book, he argues that relying on platforms can limit companies’ access to information about player behaviour and purchases, making it harder to understand changes in revenue.
That information can affect business decisions: a fall in sales in one country might be blamed on a lack of local content, when payment options could be the cause. Hewish’s proposed framework centres on relationships, commerce, intelligence, trust and time, with the aim of helping companies build more durable businesses.
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