Xsolla to Sponsor First Playable Florence 2026, Equipping Indie PC Developers With Publisher Pitch Strategies and a Scalable Alternative to Paid Acquisition

Xsolla, a leading global video game commerce company, today announced its sponsorship of First Playable Florence (FPF) 2026, Europe's premier annual gathering for independent game developers seeking publishing deals, investment, and platform partnerships. On June 11 in Florence, Italy, Xsolla will host two developer-focused programming activations led by Inês Ramalho, Xsolla's expert in partner-driven growth and publishing strategy. Together, the sessions are designed to give indie PC studios concrete tools for two of the most consequential conversations they will have in the current market: the one that gets them published, and the one they have with themselves about how to grow sustainably once they are.

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First Playable Florence is purpose-built for the moment when a studio has something worth showing and needs to find the right partner to take it further. With publishers, investors, and platform operators actively meeting with developers throughout the event, FPF represents a concentrated window of opportunity in which preparation, positioning, and the ability to communicate a game's value quickly and clearly can be the difference between a follow-up conversation and a dead end. Xsolla's presence at FPF reflects the company's broader commitment to equipping developers not just with commerce infrastructure, but with the strategic knowledge to navigate the industry relationships that determine whether a game reaches its audience.

At FPF 2026, Xsolla will host two sessions on June 11:

Roundtable: You Have 5 Minutes — How to Hook a PublisherThursday, June 11 | 11:00 AM

Inês Ramalho will lead a free roundtable focused on a reality every developer at the event will face: in early publisher conversations, the window to make an impression is short, the competition is dense, and the gap between a strong game and a successful pitch is wider than most studios expect. The roundtable will focus on how to distill a game's core hook into language that lands immediately, what publishers are actually evaluating in those first five minutes beyond the game itself, the most common structural mistakes that weaken pitches from studios that have the product but not yet the framing, and how to position a title competitively in terms of audience, market differentiation, and commercial potential. Rather than theoretical advice, the session is designed as a working discussion, giving developers the frameworks and language to walk into publisher meetings at FPF and beyond with genuine conviction.

Speaking Session: The End of Paid Acquisition? How PC Games Are Scaling Through Creators & PartnershipsThursday, June 11 | 12:00 PM

Inês Ramalho will deliver a 45–60 minute session examining one of the most significant strategic shifts underway in PC game marketing. Steam discoverability has become increasingly difficult to engineer through paid means alone. User acquisition costs continue to climb. And the players most likely to convert are the ones who heard about a game from someone they already trust, a streamer, a YouTuber, an affiliate with a dedicated community, not from an ad served to them between other content. The session will make the case that creator and affiliate partnerships are not a supplementary channel alongside paid acquisition; they are a structurally superior alternative for studios that build the right infrastructure around them. Ramalho will walk through how Xsolla Partner Network connects studios with a global network of creators, affiliates, and media partners, centralizing campaign management, trackable link generation, performance dashboards, and automated global payouts into a repeatable, measurable growth engine. Practical use cases will span new game launches, live games, and international expansion into markets where regional creators provide access that paid campaigns routinely underpenetrate.

"The conversation about how PC games grow has fundamentally changed, and most of the developers we talk to are feeling that shift but haven't yet built the systems to take advantage of it," said Berkley Egenes, Chief Marketing & Growth Officer at Xsolla. "Paid acquisition still works, but the return is declining, and the dependency is dangerous. Creator and affiliate partnerships scale with trust, not spend, and when you build the right infrastructure around them, the economics are structurally better. That's what Inês is going to show developers at FPF: how to build. And before any of that, the roundtable is about making sure they don't leave Florence without having had the publisher conversations they came for. Five minutes is enough time if you know what you're doing."

Developers attending First Playable Florence can meet with the Xsolla team on June 11 to learn more about Xsolla Partner Network and how Xsolla's commerce infrastructure can support their publishing and growth strategy. For more information, visit xsolla.com.

To learn more about Xsolla’s participation in First Playable Florence, visit: https://xsolla.pro/First-Playable-Florence

About Xsolla

Xsolla is a global commerce company that builds and provides all the things developers need to launch, grow, and monetize video games. Headquartered in Los Angeles, California, the company supports studios of every size, from indie to AAA, with solutions across direct-to-consumer commerce, intelligent payments, entertainment-based IP, and player engagement products. Xsolla helps developers fund, distribute, market, and monetize their games at scale. Trusted by more than 60% of the top 100 highest-grossing games, Xsolla operates as the merchant of record across 200+ geographies with access to over 1,000+ local payment methods worldwide. Grounded in a deep belief in the future of gaming, Xsolla is resolute in bringing opportunities together and unlocking growth for creators everywhere.

For more information, visit xsolla.com.

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