The Purpose Made Podcast

Purpose Made

Welcome to the Purpose Made Podcast, your hub for transformative conversations, hosted by Peter Bell. This podcast is dedicated to the exploration and unlocking of untapped potential that resides within each one of us. From entrepreneurs, artists, scientists, to dreamers of all walks of life, we delve into the personal narratives of individuals and companies who have harnessed their purpose to create an impact. Our mission? To inspire, educate, and ignite that spark of purpose in you. We believe in a world where everyone is living with intention, passion, and purpose, and through engaging interviews and thoughtful dialogue, we aim to pave the way for our listeners to do the same. Each episode weaves together themes of personal growth, mental resilience, leadership, creative problem-solving and more, as we navigate the highs, lows, and everything in between on the journey to personal and professional fulfilment. We celebrate the power of conversation as a tool for change, challenging perspectives and prompting growth. Whether you're in search of inspiration, aspiring to personal or professional development, or simply yearning to broaden your worldview, the Purpose Made Podcast is here to accompany you on that journey. Together, let's unearth potential, embrace the transformative power of compelling storytelling, and unleash potential, one conversation at a time. Intrigued? Let's dive in!  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  1. 6d ago

    Ep 98. "Making games is 10x harder than making films"

    "Making games is 10 times harder than making films." Danny Bilson, Chair of USC Games, has spent 50 years doing both: The Rocketeer, The Flash and Da 5 Bloods on screen, then The Sims, Medal of Honor, Harry Potter and James Bond at EA, and Saints Row and Darksiders at THQ. He explains what makes games the harder craft, why he quit EA mid-project over a Bond game that broke his heart, and why the studios behind his biggest successes never invited him back. Danny co-wrote The Rocketeer with Paul De Meo and ran The Flash for CBS in 1990, then spent the 2000s running franchises at EA before becoming EVP Core Games at THQ. He co-wrote Da 5 Bloods for Spike Lee. Today he chairs USC Games, teaches the next generation of writers, and is writing an unannounced AAA extraction shooter. In this conversation: The Rocketeer, page to screen. Finding Dave Stevens' comic in the bins at Golden Apple, the free option Stevens gave two broke B-movie writers, Jim Cameron's tip-off that opened the door at Fox, and the opening weekend against Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves that killed it.The EA years. A card dropped on a script, fixing The Sims, demoing the first Harry Potter game to the author in black and white after an Edinburgh blizzard, and sending a driver for Viggo Mortensen's Elvish dictionary.THQ. Saints Row III, Darksiders, uDraw, and executives who don't play.Writing now. The unannounced AAA extraction shooter, the two things every story needs, and what he tells his students at USC.The sequel that never happened. The Rocketeer follow-up he, Paul De Meo and Dave Stevens planned but never got to make, and working with Oliver Stone and Spike Lee on Da 5 Bloods. Watch the video version with full chapters on YouTube: https://youtu.be/S9X6Ct97UIk TIMESTAMPS: 0:00 — Introduction 3:20 — Why sequels dominate film and games 5:17 — "They don't want the old voice": locked out of The Flash and The Rocketeer 12:40 — How The Rocketeer got made: Jim Cameron's tip and Dave Stevens' free option 25:23 — Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves and the opening weekend that killed it 28:47 — A card dropped on a script: EA, fixing The Sims and the franchise years 36:18 — Quitting EA over the Goldfinger vs Dr. No game 41:23 — Demoing the first Harry Potter game to the author in black and white 46:53 — Nightfire, Judi Dench and Viggo's Elvish dictionary 56:14 — The THQ years: Saints Row III, uDraw and executives who don't play 1:01:23 — The unannounced AAA extraction shooter and the two things every story needs 1:07:42 — Da 5 Bloods: Oliver Stone, Spike Lee and the Milius seminar 1:28:22 — Write the movie you want to see the most Connect: Danny Bilson LinkedIn | USC School of Cinematic Arts Pete Bell: LinkedIn | Instagram Purpose Made is hosted by Pete Bell, gaming industry consultant and interviewer of the people who shaped the games, films, and culture you love. Know someone who's shaped games, film, or culture? Pitch a guest: https://purposemadepodcast.co.uk/guest-pitch The Daily Digest, daily intelligence for the people shaping the future of franchises: https://www.thedailydigest.co.uk/ Topics Covered: Danny Bilson, The Rocketeer, franchise IP, game development, screenwriting, EA, THQ, Da 5 Bloods and more. This podcast was produced by Purpose Made. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  2. Jul 13

    Ep 97. Platform or Publisher, "You Can't Do Both"

    Former PlayStation leader Shawn Layden spent 32 years inside Sony, from writing founder Akio Morita's speeches at 29 to running Worldwide Studios. He explains why Xbox must choose between being a platform and being the biggest publisher in the world, and why data-driven greenlighting is producing games nobody remembers when we should be focused on building phenomenal characters, stories, and worlds. Shawn joined Sony in Tokyo in 1987 and spent 25 years with PlayStation, from the original console through the end of PS4. He served five years on Morita's personal staff, ran the London studio era that produced The Getaway, and was there for the acquisitions that brought Insomniac Games, Naughty Dog and others into Worldwide Studios. Today he advises startups and works with the nonprofit Girls Make Games. The conversation opens with the tension pulling Xbox apart: you can make the pie bigger for everyone, or you can take the biggest slice, and the two imperatives point in opposite directions. From there it moves into why triple-digit-million budgets have crushed risk tolerance, why finance's demand for comparables makes a rhythm action game with unicorns unfundable, and what Shawn learned watching Morita launch products no market research would ever have predicted. He tells the story of getting laughed out of every major Hollywood studio with The Getaway ("What do you want to make? Pong the movie?"), then walking back into the same rooms 16 years later to found PlayStation Productions. He breaks down why Pokémon out-earns Mickey Mouse and Marvel, how the Insomniac acquisition came out of a dinner with Ted Price, and the question his first development mentor asked that ripped producers' hearts out: where's the fun part? He closes with three predictions: a return to tight narrative games people actually finish, a standardised game format that finally breaks the 250 million console ceiling, and the end of the 6-to-8-year development cycle. TIMESTAMPS: 0:00 — Introduction 1:39 — Xbox's Choice: Platform or the Biggest Publisher in the World 7:55 — Triple-Digit Budgets and the Death of Risk Tolerance 14:35 — Writing Speeches for Akio Morita at 29 19:35 — Three Concentric Circles: Games, Film and TV, Music 25:02 — GTA 6's Blast Radius and Gaming's Inverse Social Impact 28:28 — "Every 60 Years the Forest Has to Burn Down" 36:12 — Laughed Out of Hollywood with The Getaway 43:28 — Disney's Flywheel and Why Pokémon Out-Earns Mickey Mouse 49:34 — Scarcity, Storefronts, and the Carousel Choke Point 52:37 — The Insomniac Acquisition: "Let's Just Put a Ring on It" 55:25 — Prince of Persia, Kutaragi, and the Birth of PlayStation 1:00:05 — "Where's the Fun Part?" 1:02:26 — Three Predictions for Where Gaming Goes Next 1:06:31 — Wrap-Up Follow Shawn Layden: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/shawn-layden/ Girls Make Games: https://www.girlsmakegames.com/ Purpose Made is hosted by Pete Bell — gaming industry consultant and interviewer of the people who shaped the games, films, and culture you love. Website: https://purposemade.uk Follow Pete Bell: LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/peter-george-bell Instagram: @thepeterbell This podcast was produced by Purpose Made. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  3. Jun 26

    Ep 96. "It's In Dire Straits" — 38 Years In Gaming, What's Actually Breaking | Richard Browne

    Richard Browne has spent 38 years in the video game business. He ran production at Universal Interactive, ran external development at THQ for the best part of a decade, and spun up the publishing operation for Digital Extremes alongside Warframe. Now he advises studios on funding and survival, he thinks most of the industry is getting it wrong, and he calls Game Pass "cancer" for the business even as it props parts of it up. This is a straight conversation about why the AAA model has stopped working and why Microsoft has talked itself into a corner with Xbox. We get into the challenges nobody wants to say out loud: you cannot spend $300 million and five years on a brand new IP and expect to survive. Richard makes the case for beachheading an IP at $10 to $20 million, proving the audience, then committing to a ten year, three game plan. The path Naughty Dog, CD Projekt and Larian all actually walked. We also cover the generation gap quietly reshaping everything: why his kids treat a game as one tab in an ecosystem of Discord and YouTube, why Roblox is the modern playground, why photorealism stopped growing the market, and why a 15 hour game you actually finish beats another 400 hour epic. Plus the Championship Manager origin story, killing games (he's shut down 35), the Concord post-mortem, and what's worth your time once GTA 6 clears the runway. CHAPTERS 0:00 — Cold open: "It's in dire straits" 0:30 — 38 years in: from the BBC Micro to consulting the industry 1:33 — Why the market is in dire straits, and the COVID live-service hangover 2:53 — "Dad's IP": why kids won't touch Star Wars, Doom or Gears 5:32 — The broken maths of AAA, and the $10–20M beachhead 5:58 — The ten-year, three-game plan every IP needs 8:23 — Why a 15-hour game is enough, and the GameStop trap 9:39 — What he plays, and how his kids play completely differently 11:50 — Coding at home again: AI, Steam and where Minecraft came from 13:11 — Roblox as the modern playground, and the Payday conversion problem 16:11 — Why photorealism stopped growing the market 18:24 — The Microsoft mess and the Gears exclusivity mistake 26:04 — Nintendo is Disney: the power of generational IP 27:47 — Do we even need a PS6? The end of the visual arms race 29:08 — What investors want now, and why it doesn't build games that last 30:50 — The Championship Manager origin story 33:16 — Low risk, high reward: Crash, Among Us, and community first 37:01 — Killing games: Concord, ego, and the 35 he shut down 38:24 — Character vs world: The Last of Us and the God of War pivot 43:11 — "I think it's cancer": the case against Game Pass 51:54 — Netflix games, streaming latency, and what actually works 56:28 — Why Xbox can't build a studio system you can't live without 59:30 — How US studios survive now: small core, global outsourcing 1:03:38 — GTA 6's blast radius, what he's hyped for, and the takeaway Guest: Richard Browne https://www.linkedin.com/in/brownerichard/ Purpose Made Podcast, hosted by Pete Bell https://purposemadepodcast.co.uk/ https://purposemade.uk/ Subscribe for long-form conversations with the people building games, entertainment and IP. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  4. Feb 24

    Ep 95. 82 Marvel Covers. Two Heart Surgeries. One Universe.

    After 30 years at the top of entertainment, Marko Djurdjevic reached a point where nothing in client work excited him anymore. So he shifted his focus to building an entire transmedia universe, funding it out of pocket while his wife runs the outsourcing side of SIXMOREVODKA. The Kickstarter launches February 26th alongside a free playable Steam demo. Marko is one of the most prolific cover artists Marvel has ever had. He produced 82 covers in his first year, was deliberately placed on titles close to cancellation because his art spiked sales, and ran 23 consecutive issues on Daredevil. His concept art fed the early MCU, and his studio held a seven-year exclusive partnership with Riot Games on League of Legends. The conversation covers why client work stopped exciting him after 30 years, what The Last Unicorn at age six taught him about storytelling, how a viral X-Men redesign brought Marvel's talent scouts to his door at the exact moment he'd met his wife, and why he believes 2008 was the last great year of cinema. Marko shares the painful lessons from Degenesis, a cult tabletop RPG that collapsed when free PDF downloads hit 3,000 per release while sales dropped to 80. That failure shaped everything about his new franchise, Orken, which spans novels, illustrated editions, graphic novels, and a video game built with Demagog Studio. In 16 months he's produced 1,400 edited pages, over 350 original illustrations, and six books for print. He survived two heart surgeries during production. His wife thinks he's lost his mind. His son read the first novel and pitched it back as a 10-episode animated series. This is a conversation about creative ownership, the cost of building something that's fully yours, and why the future of independent storytelling depends on small authentic communities rather than viral moments. Timestamps: 00:00 Building a multimedia IP from scratch 01:14 Meet Marko Djurdjevic 02:35 No books at home: drawing as survival and 80s influences 04:30 Why The Last Unicorn still hits after 40 years 05:21 What's wrong with modern storytelling? 07:15 The anatomy book that changed everything at age 11 08:41 The viral X-Men redesign that brought Marvel calling 10:15 82 covers, cancelled titles, and the art of keeping deadlines 13:10 Beyond Marvel: the MCU pipeline and building a studio 15:32 Riot and League of Legends: seven years of exclusivity 19:17 2008 was peak cinema and he never went back 20:13 Orken's visual DNA: cultures the games industry ignores 23:01 Why creator-owned work dies in large teams 25:00 Degenesis: 3,000 downloads, 80 sales, and pulling the plug 27:35 How failure shaped Orken's transmedia architecture 29:11 Novels, graphic novels, illustrated editions, and a video game 30:49 The real motivation: autonomy, mastery, and running out of time 32:54 1,400 pages, two heart surgeries, and a Kickstarter 36:39 Working with his wife while betting against her instincts 42:19 The future of indie storytelling 43:55 Closing thoughts Orken Kickstarter (live February 26th)Wishlist Orken on Steam (free demo February 26th)SIXMOREVODKADiscord: https://discord.com/invite/sixmorevodka Host: Pete Bell Guest: Marko Djurdjevic This podcast is produced by Purpose Made. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  5. 12/19/2025

    Ep 94. 2025 Year In Review: The Shows, Games & Films Actually Worth Your Time

    Why 2025 proved gaming matters more than ever and the shows that reminded us what great storytelling looks like. In this conversation, also available on YouTube (https://youtu.be/8XgCmQOtb2w?si=o4qIDtZTglgW9EW-) Russell Binder and I reveal: ➡️ Why Severance was 2025’s most relevant show ➡️ The game that made us forget about GTA 6 (for five minutes) ➡️ Netflix’s $83 billion Warner Bros acquisition and what it means for the future of entertainment ➡️ How Slow Horses became the show everyone should watch ➡️ The Last of Us, Fallout and why video game adaptations work ➡️ Jake Paul vs. AJ - Boxing’s credibility crisis? ➡️ Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 & The Years Best ➡️ 2026 And What We’re Actually Excited About. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ TIMESTAMPED CHAPTERS: 00:00 Year-End Reflections 2025 00:25 The TV Shows That Earned Your Time 02:47 Films That Stuck With Us (And Why) 08:22 Netflix’s Empire Building & The Streaming Wars 11:49 Boxing, Jake Paul & Sports as Spectacle 15:34 Gaming’s Defining Moments of 2025 19:02 The Podcasts & Books Worth Your Attention 22:14 2026 Preview: What We’re Actually Excited About 26:33 Final Thoughts: Why Stories Still Matter ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ FEATURED SHOWS & GAMES: 📺 Slow Horses • Severance • The Last of Us • SAS Rogue Heroes 🎮 Kingdom Come Deliverance II • Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 • Hollow Knight • Planet of Lana • NBA 2K • PGA Golf • Mafia: Old Country • Wanderstop 🎬 Masters Of The Universe • Street Fighter • 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple 🔮 Coming in 2026: Judas • GTA 6 ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ Subscribe for entertainment analysis that goes deeper than hot takes 📺 Watch Next: Ken Levine on Why He Spent 10 Years Making His Most Personal Game (   • "My Atari Was My Best Friend" - BioShock C...  ) 💬 Drop a comment: What was YOUR moment of 2025? The show, game, or film that you can’t stop thinking about? And what you’re most looking forward to in 2026. ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ 2025 reminded us that great storytelling transcends medium. Whether it’s Slow Horses proving spy thrillers can be character studies, Kingdom Come Deliverance II showing historical games can be art and some of the best storytelling ever in games, or how Netflix is reshaping the entire entertainment landscape with aggressive acquisitions, this year challenged our assumptions about what entertainment can be. This conversation explores why certain games, shows, and films broke through when most content disappeared into the algorithmic void and what that tells us about where entertainment is heading in 2026. Enjoy Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  6. 11/13/2025

    Ep. 93 "My Atari Was My Best Friend"

    BioShock creator KEN LEVINE reveals why he spent 10 years building his most personal game yet - where relationships are living systems that track hundreds of your choices and genuinely change how characters feel about you. Ken Levine is the creative director of Ghost Story Games and legendary founder of Irrational Games. He created the BioShock series and System Shock 2 - games that earned multiple Game of the Year awards and redefined narrative storytelling in gaming. After BioShock Infinite, he made the controversial decision to close a 200-person studio and start over with a small team, spending the last decade developing revolutionary "Narrative LEGO" technology for his new game, Judas. In this conversation, Ken reveals: ◼️ Why his Atari 2600 was his best friend growing up - and how childhood loneliness shaped his career ◼️ The brutal truth: "We were lost for 5 years" in Judas development ◼️ How Judas characters track hundreds of player actions and genuinely change their feelings about you ◼️ The quality standard that transformed his creative process. ◼️ Why he walked away from guaranteed BioShock to risk everything on an experiment ◼️ What George Orwell's 1984 taught him about game design ◼️ The vending machine confession: why he created his most autobiographical character yet ◼️ Why games matter to people and how they provide refuge TIMESTAMPED CHAPTERS: (00:00) Introduction to Ken Levine and His Work (00:59) Ken Levine's Journey and Inspirations (03:23) The Concept of Narrative Lego (08:13) Building Complex Relationships in Games (09:52) Challenges and Evolution in Game Development (14:15) Influences and Reflections on the Gaming Industry (29:51) Philosophical and Literary Influences (34:38) Exploring Horror as Metaphor (35:07) Family Dynamics in Storytelling (35:51) Political Themes and Personal Reflections (37:29) The Role of Ideology in Games (42:56) Character Development and Narrative Depth (44:29) Challenges and Rewards of Game Development (1:00:07) Adapting Games to Other Media (1:03:59) Final Thoughts and Reflections Follow Ken Levine: Ghost Story Games - https://www.ghoststorygames.com/ Watch the Judas Official Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T5_r-un--bA Ken's GDC Talk on Narrative LEGO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58FWUkA8y2Q Play the BioShock Series: https://store.steampowered.com/agecheck/sub/127633 WATCH ON YOUTUBE: https://youtu.be/i3ueLqpU6K8?si=wVIL2W0aWuObmkfW Subscribe for more deep dives with legendary game creators 📺 Watch Next: The REAL Reason Hollywood Only Makes Sequels Now - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uJJ29cn0XZw&t=24s 💬 Drop a comment: What game world gave you a place to escape to when you needed it most? Ken Levine's approach to game development has always prioritized deep narrative design and player agency. From his early work on System Shock 2 to the critically acclaimed BioShock series, Levine has consistently pushed boundaries in video game storytelling. His new project, Judas, represents a decade of game development focused on creating dynamic character relationships through innovative Narrative LEGO systems. The BioShock creator's journey from Irrational Games to Ghost Story Games showcases how AAA game development can embrace experimental design while maintaining immersive sim traditions. This interview explores game design philosophy, the creative process behind building revolutionary AI-driven character systems, and why emotional storytelling in games matters more than ever. #KenLevine #BioShock #GameDevelopment #Judas #GhostStoryGames Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

  7. 09/15/2025

    Ep. 92 The Man Who Was Minecraft's First Advisor Reveals Why GTA 6 Will Completely Reshape Gaming

    Stefan Lampinen has been gaming's secret weapon for 40 years. He launched Xbox 360 in Russia when everyone said it was impossible. He watched the rise and fall of Nokia. He was in the room when Minecraft turned down buyers flying in with blank checks. Now he's breaking his silence on what's really coming in 2025 and why the industry's about to change forever. This conversation reveals the shifts happening RIGHT NOW that will determine gaming's next decade. TIMESTAMPS: 0:00 – The Gift from Bill Gates. 2:45 – 18 years old. Opens game store, becomes Nordic's gaming gateway. 8:30 – Xbox 360: How they beat PlayStation to digital. 15:20 – "Russia was impossible" - How he conquered it anyway. 22:15 – Nokia beat iPhone by 4 years (and still failed spectacularly. Why) 28:40 – Why Sweden is gaming's best sandbox. 35:10 – Inside Minecraft's war room (shielding them from the world's buyers). 42:30 – "The industry just hit maturity" - What that actually means. 48:15 – GTA 6 will eat EVERYTHING (The industry doesn't understand what's coming). 52:40 – Europe's studios are dying - The exodus nobody's discussing. 58:20 – The Last of Us changed the game (Hollywood finally gets it). 1:04:00 – Saudi Arabia's power play (it's not what you think). 1:08:30 – His #1 career lesson after 40 years. KEY REVELATIONS "People were flying in from all over the world wanting to buy Minecraft. My job was to shield them." "GTA 6 is going to take enormous amounts of players and money from EVERYTHING. The industry doesn't understand what's coming." "Sweden had 70% gaming penetration because we don't dub. We had to learn English. We had to think global from day one." WATCH ON YOUTUBE BEFORE FIVE ON FRIDAY NEWSLETTER 📫 Sign up:   / before-5-on-friday-7244349280012886020   GET IN TOUCH 🌍 Our website: https://www.purposemade.uk/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Ratings & Reviews

4.8
out of 5
32 Ratings

About

Welcome to the Purpose Made Podcast, your hub for transformative conversations, hosted by Peter Bell. This podcast is dedicated to the exploration and unlocking of untapped potential that resides within each one of us. From entrepreneurs, artists, scientists, to dreamers of all walks of life, we delve into the personal narratives of individuals and companies who have harnessed their purpose to create an impact. Our mission? To inspire, educate, and ignite that spark of purpose in you. We believe in a world where everyone is living with intention, passion, and purpose, and through engaging interviews and thoughtful dialogue, we aim to pave the way for our listeners to do the same. Each episode weaves together themes of personal growth, mental resilience, leadership, creative problem-solving and more, as we navigate the highs, lows, and everything in between on the journey to personal and professional fulfilment. We celebrate the power of conversation as a tool for change, challenging perspectives and prompting growth. Whether you're in search of inspiration, aspiring to personal or professional development, or simply yearning to broaden your worldview, the Purpose Made Podcast is here to accompany you on that journey. Together, let's unearth potential, embrace the transformative power of compelling storytelling, and unleash potential, one conversation at a time. Intrigued? Let's dive in!  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.