With your team
Product partnership
Senior craft on the loop, the economy, the live plan, and the people who own them.
Product partnership · Custom AI Transformation
Partnership, or Custom AI. Same standard.
Senior product work for long-lived games, from development through live. Custom AI when you need applications of your own.
15+ yrs · 50+ titles Employed at EA, Ubisoft, SYBO, Spil and Nazara
How we work
Two ways in.
Make something wonderful for makers and players. Models amplify; they do not invent commitment or taste.
Built for your studio
Custom AI Transformation
Applications built for your studio. Models amplify craft. They do not invent it.
The standard is the same: something wonderful for the people who make the game and the people who play it.
Fixed-scope entry offers are the shorter way in: book time for an entry conversation, a workshop of one to three days, or one review of six or twelve weeks. Twelve weeks include the six. Partnership and Custom AI Transformation stay on this page.
Product partnership
Where partnership craft goes deep
The areas a partnership covers — product, live, analytics, talent.
Product
Loop ownership, roadmaps, economy, prioritisation — player value and commercial truth together, including year model and sustenance before scale.
Live production
Build to live, soft launch, and seasons after: cadence and ops so events sit inside a longer plan.
Analytics & research
Metrics that force a decision this week — in test with real people and in live — cohorts, AFITMRR™ lenses, commercial honesty.
Talent
Product and live hires who own loops — role design, bar, and interview judgment. Product talent can also embed on the plan in a focused partnership.
For Custom AI Transformation — service page · Building with AI essay.
Custom AI Transformation
What studios ask us to build
People first — then applications your room can run. Decision support, population intelligence, live briefs, principle-led analytics, workflow agents — scoped to a real studio problem, with care as the standard.
An application your team can run. Not a chatbot on the side.
What transformation builds
- People first — makers and players before models
- Applications scoped to a real studio or team problem
- Commitment, people experience, and craft no model replaces
- Humans in the loop; capability left behind — not a black box
How we engage
Shape fits the problem
Expertise stays constant. Depth and horizon adapt.
Workshops
Focused days: shared language, economy/live-plan review, decisions not only slides.
Short term
Days to weeks on one lever — onboarding, economy, cadence, or year honesty.
Fixed term
A quarter or launch window with clear outcomes and capability left behind.
Consulting & longer arcs
Advisory or embedded over months — strategy, live health, talent. Exit designed in.
Often: conversation → workshop or short diagnostic → deeper term. Limited on purpose — senior craft for a focused window, without forcing permanent overhead. Why that shape exists.
How we show up
Domain expertise. Lockstep with your goals. Professionally delivered.
Live-game judgment, aligned to what you’re building — not generic process. Frameworks and practice tools help; delivery is professional and clear.
Domain
Multi-title live craft — MRM, AFITMRR™, economy and player populations shaped for games.
Lockstep
Free tools sample the craft; partnership applies it to your roadmap and live plan — year model, economy, and scorecard where they help the product.
Delivered
Clear scope, hands-on work, capability left behind. Decisions stay with your team.
Founder
Paul Dutta — Founder, Yardstick Games. Fifteen years and more than fifty titles, from inside the team to leading it. Employed at EA, Ubisoft, SYBO, Spil and Nazara.
1. Reach out
Stage, platforms, what hurts. A short note is enough.
2. Align
Name the product goal. Shape the engagement to it.
3. Run
Hands-on in lockstep — craft stays when we leave.
First step
Tell us where the game is. We’ll say how we’d work. For what partnership means day-to-day — talent, how we start, FAQ — see how partnership works. Free-to-play and live services in more depth: F2P & live services. Custom AI Transformation: service page · essay.