Latest News
METANOMIC LAUNCHES ‘THUNDERSTRUCK’ – 1st gamer analysis tool powered by AI
Metanomic, the complete game economy and player analytics company, today proudly announces the global launch of its Thunderstruck player analytics platform; which is poised to revolutionise game developers’ use of behavioural data to improve retention and monetisation.
Thunderstruck is the first ever video game analytics platform to leverage AI-powered behavioural analytics. It makes use of Bayesian inference-backed AI to understand data from real in-game events, drawn directly from game servers. Thunderstruck analyses player motivations, play styles, and reward preferences, providing developers with live information on who their game is for, what types of players have the highest retention, and which players spend the most in-game. Until now, game creators have had to rely on outdated player classification models combined with market research, and plug gaps in insight with assumptions and guesswork.
Metanomic was founded in 2021 by veteran game designers, AI experts, and professional economists, and has successfully secured USD $2.9 million pre-seed funding to-date. Thunderstruck is launching with 7 player types – Killers, Achievers, Explorers, Socialisers, Speedsters, Conquerors, and Scientists – which can be tailored to the priorities of individual game titles. Player types will be refined and added to as the platform analyses data from more titles, while its Bayesian AI means Thunderstruck can even identify the series of events that lead to specific player actions.
Announcing the launch of Thunderstruck, Theo Priestley, CEO and Founder of Metanomic, said:
“For too long, game developers have relied on blunt instruments to understand their players. It’s no exaggeration to say that the bulk of the games industry’s framework for player classification dates back to a 1996 essay by Richard Bartle. A generation later, Thunderstruck is the next big leap forward, taking just a few days to generate more insight than a team of analysts could in a month. We understand that players can straddle multiple personas or even change persona based on their motivations, and use custom AI and live data to accurately anticipate how they’ll respond to metagame changes. Thunderstruck is all about empowering game developers with a better way to identify, acquire, and impact the right players for their game.”
Thunderstruck is equally suitable for mobile, console, and PC; existing as well as new games; and web3 as well as traditional web2 games. It works in tandem with Metanomic’s free Economy Engine platform, which was launched earlier this year to help studios to build, simulate and monitor their game economies.
Thunderstruck is launching with 7 player types.
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Killers
These players enjoy killing, creating chaos, and competitive elements most of all. They focus on winning, climbing player rankings, obtaining status, provoking, and imposing drama onto others. |
Achievers
These players are competitive and enjoy overcoming difficult objectives, whether set by the game or themselves, in order to obtain prestige, prizes, and other types of material possessions. |
Explorers
Those that like to learn as much about the game as possible, Explorers seek to understand the finer details of game mechanics. The thrill of discovery and uncovering hidden areas or objectives motivate these players over points or prizes. |
Socialisers
Players that experience fun in interacting with other players through social systems like using chat, managing guilds, or role-playing rather than playing the game itself. They tend to collaborate or join forces with others to achieve objectives than they could on their own. |
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Speedsters
Cheetahs race to objectives in order to be among the first to reach the end-game content or the highest level. They spend most of their time grinding experience and playing for long hours. |
Conquerors Conquerors enjoy the struggle against adversity and beating impossibly difficult odds. They are persistent, forceful, and repetitive in their pursuit to overcome their objectives. |
Scientists
Commonly referred to as ‘Crafters,’ Scientists seek to improve their skills by gathering resources and creating or improving items for themselves and to sell to others. They find enjoyment in more passive forms of game mechanics and objectives. |
The Thunderstruck player personas are also influenced by ‘passion’ – how often and how well they play. They can also be tailored by the game developer or publisher depending on their priorities. For example, in different types of game, ‘Achiever’ could mean the highest skilled, the richest, or the players with the most wins. In future, Metanomic will frequently add additional and more granular player types to further studios’ understanding of their players. |
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Alessandra Rosati Country Manager (Italy) at Booming Games
Booming Games adds 100 slot titles to Casino di Venezia online platform
Deal expands Booming Games’ Italy footprint and boosts Casino di Venezia’s digital catalogue with titles including Cash Pig 2 15,000.
Booming Games has signed a partnership with Casino di Venezia to distribute its casino content on the Italian operator’s digital platform.
Under the agreement, Casino di Venezia has integrated 100 Booming Games titles. The initial rollout includes Cash Pig 2 15,000, 64 Gold Coins Hold and Win 20,000 and Buffalo Hold and Win Extreme.
Booming Games positioned the deal as part of its strategy to grow in regulated markets and increase reach in Italy. The supplier also said it plans to accelerate releases this year, including localised content tailored to specific markets.
Alessandra Rosati, Country Manager (Italy) at Booming Games, said: “We are pleased to be partnering with Casino di Venezia, a brand with unrivalled pedigree and an outstanding reputation for delivering premium gaming content. The collaboration marks the latest chapter in our pursuit to broaden the reach of our premium titles in Italy, a market that presents a number of exciting growth opportunities. We’re confident that this is the beginning of a successful, long-term relationship with Casino di Venezia and look forward to working with the team.”
The post Booming Games adds 100 slot titles to Casino di Venezia online platform appeared first on Eastern European Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
AI
Fincore integrates TRI Platform with Sportradar’s VAIX Personalization AI
Fincore and Sportradar have announced an integration connecting Fincore’s TRI Platform with Sportradar’s VAIX Personalization AI, with the companies positioning it as a way for operators to act on AI-driven insights in real time within existing stacks.
Under the deal, VAIX’s recommender models and player insight predictions are delivered into Fincore’s TRI ecosystem, which the company says can plug into existing PAM, gaming and bonus systems. The companies said the setup is intended to avoid “wholesale replacement” while meeting audit and access-control requirements in regulated markets.
Sportradar said VAIX monitors player behaviour in real time and can trigger recommendations and rewards during live play across sports. The company also said that within days of a player’s first activity, VAIX generates forecasts including lifetime value, churn risk, deposit likelihood and bonus recommendations.
Mateja Popovic, CEO at Fincore, said: “The technology landscape in gaming is evolving and operators are increasingly seeking to embed best-of-breed innovation directly into their core operations.
“Our partnership allows Sportradar customers to act on powerful AI-driven insights instantly, closing the gap between prediction and execution. By enabling personalised and automated recommendations and rewards without disrupting existing platforms, we are helping operators unlock greater engagement and more efficient promotional strategies that help them stand out.”
Andreas Hartmann, VP Personalisation at Sportradar, said: “Our AI platform gives operators a decisive edge in player engagement and retention, delivering highly accurate predictions on player activity, lifetime value, churn risk, deposit behaviour and more per user, in real-time.
“With Fincore’s TRI platform supporting real-time and deep personalisation, integration was a natural fit, allowing us to turn our industry-leading AI models into measurable commercial impact for the operator, across the user journey.”
The post Fincore integrates TRI Platform with Sportradar’s VAIX Personalization AI appeared first on Eastern European Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
Interviews
Beyond the Burn: How Systemic Responsibility Drives Long-Term ROI
In a data-driven era, short-term player extraction is a losing game. Lars Kollind, Business Development Director at VeliTech, discusses the shift from anonymous poker rooms to real-time ecosystems, revealing why the most profitable operators are those who prioritise sustainable player lifecycles over “dark patterns”
Lars, you’ve seen the industry evolve from the early poker days to the current platform-led era. What is the biggest difference in how we view ‘the player’ now compared to 20 years ago?
Twenty years ago, the player was largely anonymous and the experience was relatively contained. You logged in, played and the risk was limited to that moment. Today, the player exists in a fully connected, real-time environment where every interaction is tracked, optimised and personalised. The experience is faster, more immersive and much more data-driven.
We’ve moved from simple player activity to managing a full player lifecycle, but that shift changes our responsibility. We’re no longer just offering games, we’re shaping behaviour over time.
In the past, responsible gambling felt like a legal disclaimer at the bottom of a website. Why is that “compliance-first” mindset dangerous for the industry’s long-term growth?
A compliance-first mindset creates a false sense of security. It turns responsibility into a checklist rather than a design principle, and this means you can meet every regulatory requirement and still fail the player. Because the real risks are not in the rules, they’re in the experience itself. The speed of the game, how rewards are structured and how frictionless the journey is all play a much bigger role than a disclaimer or a limit setting screen. If those elements aren’t designed responsibly, compliance alone will not protect the player or the business in the long run.
It seems your belief is that responsibility sits in the systems operators and technology providers build. Can you give a concrete example of how a poorly designed system fails a player, even if the operator has good intentions?
A common failure is when all safeguards sit at the end of the journey. A player can deposit easily, play continuously and only encounter friction once certain thresholds are triggered.
At that point, the system is reacting rather than preventing. Even with good intentions and the right tools in place, the design has already allowed the player to move into a vulnerable position. Responsibility needs to be built earlier in the experience. It has to be part of pacing, visibility and interaction design, not just alerts and limits after the fact.
VeliTech sits at several layers: game provider, aggregator and platform. How does having control over the content (VeliPlay/Heaven of 7) allow you to bake in safety features that a standard platform provider might miss?
What makes our position unique is that we operate across several layers of the ecosystem, so we aren’t just looking at responsibility from one angle. At the content level, you can influence how games are designed and how players experience them. At the aggregation level, you gain visibility across a large volume of games and player behaviour, which allows you to identify patterns that would otherwise go unnoticed. At the platform level, you can enforce decisions consistently across the entire environment. When those layers are connected, responsibility becomes systemic rather than fragmented. It’s no longer dependent on a single tool or intervention but embedded across the full player journey.
When we talk about data in responsible gambling, people often think of spreadsheets. How can we use real-time data to intervene before a player even realises they’re at risk?
Data should not only be used for reporting or analysis after the fact. Its real value is in real-time application. You can detect changes in behaviour as they happen, whether that is increased session intensity or a shift in betting patterns. This allows you to intervene earlier and more intelligently. The goal is not to stop the player, but to guide them before they reach a point where control is lost. That is where data becomes a tool for sustainability rather than just conversion.
There is a tension between thrilling game design (like crash games) and safe gaming. How do you challenge your game designers to create excitement without relying on addictive “dark patterns”?
There is a tension between excitement and responsibility, but it’s also where good design comes in. Engagement does not have to rely on manipulation. Strong game design should be built on transparency and clear player experience, not on mechanisms that push players beyond their intent. If a game depends on speed, confusion or psychological pressure to retain players, it’s not sustainable. The real challenge is to create engaging experiences that respect the player’s control. That’s where long-term value is created.
Operators are often afraid that strict safe gaming tools will hurt their bottom line. With your 20 years of experience, what would you say to a CEO who is worried that responsibility will drive their VIPs elsewhere?
In the short term, it might look that way. But over time, the opposite is true. A player who burns quickly may generate strong revenue initially, but they’re not sustainable. A player who is managed responsibly will stay longer, engage more consistently and provide value over years rather than days. The real question is not whether responsibility reduces revenue, but what kind of revenue you want to build. Sustainable growth always outperforms short-term extraction.
If you could change one thing about how the industry currently discusses responsibility at the regulatory level, what would it be?
The industry still focuses too much on who is responsible instead of how responsibility is implemented. Regulation tends to measure outputs such as limits and disclosures, but it doesn’t always address how systems are designed. That’s where the real impact lies. If the conversation shifts toward system design, including game mechanics, platform architecture and the use of data, we can create a more consistent and meaningful standard across the industry.
The post Beyond the Burn: How Systemic Responsibility Drives Long-Term ROI appeared first on Eastern European Gaming | Global iGaming & Tech Intelligence Hub.
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