We’ve invested in better engines, smarter tooling, stronger pipelines – and yet predictability in game delivery remains frustratingly out of reach. This roundtable asks the question many leaders quietly avoid: why, in 2026, are we still so bad at shipping games?

This is a closed door, operator led conversation grounded in lived experience, not postmortem theater or motivational reframing. We’ll explore the patterns that repeat across studios and genres: optimism that outpaces evidence, decision latency disguised as flexibility, capacity added to compensate for issues everyone senses but struggles to name. These aren’t edge cases – they’re systemic behaviors leaders recognize the moment someone else says them out loud.

The focus is on shared war stories: launches we knew were at risk long before anyone admitted it, trade offs that felt reasonable until the bill came due, and “one time exceptions” that turned into permanent failure modes. There’s no blame here – but there is accountability.

If you’re responsible for shipping – not just greenlighting – this session offers a rare chance to compare scar tissue with peers and ask an honest question: what are we still pretending not to know, and what would it actually take to get better?