As the current largest annual videogame event,Gamescomcelebrates the industry in Europe each year. In 2024, the South American version,Gamescom LATAM,in partnership with the Brazil Indie Games Festival (BIG), debuted, and was a massive success, drawing a record-breaking crowd of 335,000. This year, figureheads, fans, and creators are once again flocking to São Paulo, Brazil to share in all things gaming from both the local region and around the world.
Game Rant was in attendance atthis year’s Gamescom LATAMand caught up with its CEO Gustavo Steinberg to talk more about the evolving structure of the showcase. Steinberng delved into the various factors that go into creating and promotingGamescom LATAM, differences in regional markets and perceptions, and balancing these and other aspects to provide the best possible venue and experience for all its patrons.The following interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.
Gamescom LATAM CEO Gustavo Steinberg Talks About His Role and Organizing 2025’s Event
Q: To kick things off, could you tell us about your day-to-day as CEO of Gamescom LATAM?
And then there is the side that, since 2022, has been a learning experience for me, which is the relationship with the bigger publishers. At the beginning, I thought it was going to be very different from the relationship with the small studios. But at the end of the day, everybody that I talk to is trying to develop the region. It’s a different level, different problems, but the feeling of trying to make it happen here is the same. We were also acquired by a bigger company in 2022, so there’s a lot of internal politics now because there are many partners.
And then, of course, there is the side of the public audience, which is also something new for me because, as I said, my background is much more in B2B and development. And finally, in order to keep things growing, we have the whole part where we teach peoplehow to develop games, so more studios come out, and more professionals are able to be hired. So it’s a mixture of all that.
Q: Could you talk a little bit about organizing this year’s event?
A: It’s like designing an event from scratch. We already knew what we were doing, but now it’s completely new. I’m very happy because I don’t know if you agree, but I think the space is much nicer, it’s much bigger. The venue is owned by the same company. When we signed our first contract with them, I wanted to come here already, but it was being completely reconstructed. They tore the whole thing down and built it from scratch, and now it’s very modern. Very few columns, which is like a dream for an event organizer, because then you don’t have to worry about them!
There was something else the team did that I liked a lot. We took theBIG Festival, which was the original one that we designed, and now it’s a section that’s spread around the whole event. First, to create more attention for indie games, because all the production here is independent. But also to create a better way for visitors to understand what these games are. So we created an explanation on each of the islands for the categories like best art, narrative, and gameplay, so people can understand. There is a track you may follow and see all the different categories and understand a little bit more about the development process, which I think is nice.
How Gamescom LATAM 2025 Redesigned the Experience and Expanded its Presence
Q: This is the second iteration of Gamescom LATAM in its current form. How did you attempt to improve over last year?
A:We tried to make everything a little better. Spreading the BIG festival around the show floor was a realization I had when I was looking at it last year. I was paying attention to the visitors, and there were the people who are really intoindie games, and it was really nice because everything was all together. But for those who were maybe not searching for these games, they were looking at the area like, “I don’t really understand what it is. I don’t see any titles I know, so I’m going to go elsewhere,” and that was something that we improved.
As I said, it’s a new venue, a new show floor. It’s more like redesigning and asking ourselves, “Where do we put everything? How do we spread the areas?” because we have many that are curated by ourselves: the artists' area, cosplay lounge, creators' lounge. But there are a few new things, like the creators' stage, which is a success. We copied the model a little bit from CCXP, our other in-house event. There are no chairs, people sit on the floor, people stand, it’s a lower stage to create an interaction with these verypopular influencers, and I think it works well. It’s probably something that we’re going to increase further next year.
Last year, we had two separate stages and somebody asked me, “What is the real difference between them?” I was like, “Well, there is a little bit in terms of curation, but not enough to make them different.” So I said, “Let’s bring them all together.” Now we have this huge stage with four others, and it becomes one single stage after the B2B stuff for the B2C. At that point, there are no headsets anymore, there are real loudspeakers for influencers, new game announcements, and so forth. During the weekend, it’s just a unified stage, there is no division. We’re always trying to improve many things. For example, with the B2B, we’ve integrated our own matchmaking tool with the general Gamescom business. So when you register, you’re already registered on Gamescom too, things like that.
It’s also the first time that we’re beingfeatured on Steamfor more than 2 hours. 72 hours on the front page in the whole of Latin America, which is cool. We decided to feature all the PC games that are on the show floor this time, not just the BIG Festival ones. So we divided them into categories with a banner on the homepage, and it’s a nice addition to the event. I think all the participants are happy with it.
We partnered with the Future Games Show and with the Latin American Games Showcase. I’m anxious to see those numbers, because we have a lot of media partners - it should be very global. We completely reversed the model from last year. We were hosting it in Portuguese and simultaneouslytranslating to English. But I thought, “That doesn’t make any sense at all, it’s a global industry.” So we’re hosting it in English, both FGS live from Gamescom LATAM and the Latin American Showcase. We have simultaneous translations to Portuguese, Spanish, Mandarin, and Japanese because we have media partners all over the place, so I think that could be very cool, and the trailers are great.
Gamescom LATAM 2025 Strives for Accessibility and Environmental Friendliness
Q:Gamescom at Koelnmesse in Germany is very environmentally aware. Is that something that Gamescom LATAM focuses on as well?
A:Yes. We’ve always recycled from the start because events like this generate a huge amount of trash. This year we’ve partnered with a very traditional NGO to save the Atlantic Forest. It’s not as well-known as theAmazon Forestbecause it’s been 90% destroyed. It used to be the whole of São Paulo. When the Portuguese arrived here, what they saw was the Atlantic Forest. It’s by the coast now, but São Paulo used to be covered by it. you’re able to still find some parts with native trees. I thought it would make more sense to try to save something that is close to where we actually stage the event, so we decided to partner with this NGO because it’s a very cool one for a good cause.
We work with two NGOs actually, that one andAbleGamers, which is for accessibility in games. We have a very long-lasting partnership with them. They tell me, and I believe this is the case, that we are the most accessible gaming event in the world. It’s difficult to cover everything, but we have sign language and audio descriptions for many of our talks and parts of the show. We have a tactile map. In terms of mobility, everything is accessible everywhere. Not only the venue, because the law is you have to have accessibility to the bathrooms and so forth, but we have ramps to the stages. We make sure that accessibility is in place for all the participants.
Gamescom LATAM CEO On His Favorite Games and the Latin American Market’s Place in the Industry
Q: What are some of your favorite games that are here?
A:I never talk about this one. I have to like all of them![laughs]What I can say from an industry point of view is that seeing big publishers showing up more and more is super cool.Supercelltold me that it’s their first standalone booth outside the US and Finland. We have Gravity for the first time. We have a partnership with Xbox, and Bethesda has a standalone booth.Robloxhas been with us for quite some time, Epic and Nintendo too.
Another very cool thing about Steam is that their B2B booth was a construction with them. It makes sense because they don’t have a lot of presence here, and it’s the most logical thing for them to be able to get the contact information for all the developers here that are anxious to talk to them, because most of the games developed here are for PC.
Q:I’ve spoken with publishers several times and whenever we’re discussing markets, Latin America is always a very important one to everyone. In your perspective, what about the Latin American market makes it so important but also so special?
A: Well, there are two sides to this. One: the number of gamers that we have. It’s bigger now than theNorth American gaming market. It’s 350 million players against 280 million in North America, I think. Still, of course, the purchase power in North America is way higher because of the economic situation. But I think everybody realizes that Europe and North America are getting to a saturation point, so where is the new market to expand? There are many limitations in Asia, so it’s kind of an obvious choice. Although we’ve been fighting for this for quite some time, people don’t really realize that.
In terms of development, I think studios and publishers are finally realizing that we’re a Western culture in many ways. Even though we are not classified as that, we are mostly Western, but with a different taste, a different look at things, which is something that is essential for the creation of new stuff that will enchant audiences. We’re conveniently located between the American and European time zones with a good exchange rate, and lots of creativity. And people really,reallywant to make it. The show is only this big because the professionals here are also huge. It’s nice to see that, for instance, at theID@Xboxbooth, there are, I believe, two or three games that were picked here last year. So it’s happening and has been for some time, and it will happen more and more.
Q: You’ve already touched on this, but what would you say about the event, Latin America as a whole, and their roles on the world stage in the gaming industry?
A:Well, we want to be the center of game development![laughs]Not the center actually, because it’s very difficult. We don’t really have big publishers here, so that’s why I think it’s a win-win situation where publishers can profit from the talent that we have, and the talent can profit from partnerships with the publishers and investors from elsewhere. What I usually tell professionals and investors is, “If you don’t come, you’re wasting money.” It’s pretty simple.
Q: Is there anything else you’d like to say or add about Gamescom as a whole, this event, or Latin America as a final point?
A:I think it’s important to say that if you think that you’re going to meet the kind of developers here that you meet elsewhere in the world, you’re wrong. They don’t go. It’s too expensive for them, and more and more foreigners are coming here. So if you haven’t, you should.
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