Game studios build worlds that players live in for years. Those worlds run on systems that handle thousands of purchases along the way.
Modern games operate like digital economies. Players buy content, unlock features, and participate in systems that move enormous transaction volume every day. Behind each of those moments sits something that has to work instantly and reliably.
That's why payments teams show up at the GDC Festival of Gaming, even if it means a few payment nerds are stepping onto gaming's home turf.
Aeropay Chief Commercial Officer Sarah Stapp and Head of Revenue Nathan Paredes spent several days at GDC talking with studios, operators, and platform teams about what's happening behind the scenes.
After a few days on the floor, we asked them what stood out most.
Sarah: Besides my step count? Honestly, how openly people were talking about the systems behind modern games.
People weren't just discussing gameplay or monetization on their own. They were talking about the full picture: payments, trust, fraud, checkout, and how all of it works together to shape the player experience.
It felt like the industry is becoming more comfortable acknowledging that great games also depend on great systems behind the scenes.
Nathan: What stood out to me was how much operators are thinking about scale.
A lot of conversations weren't about launching a title. They were about what happens once a game takes off. When millions of players show up, the systems behind payments and checkout get tested immediately. Reliability and uptime stop being technical details and become real business questions.
In a lot of ways, studios are starting to think more like platform operators. They're running persistent economies, managing high transaction volume, and building for constant demand. Launch is just the beginning.
Nathan: When you look at games processing thousands of purchases, the way players pay starts to influence revenue more than people expect.
Card fees add up fast at that scale. If players are constantly buying upgrades, content, or digital goods, those costs become very real, very quickly.
Guaranteed ACH is worth paying attention to if you're running a game at scale. You know the payment cleared at the moment it happens, with no lag or uncertainty about whether the money is actually coming. And the economics are better than card. For studios doing a lot of transaction volume, that reliability and those savings start to matter a lot.
It also aligns well with how younger players already think about money. A lot of Gen Z consumers are comfortable connecting accounts directly and skipping the card step altogether.
That's the revenue guy answer. Sarah probably heard more about how this plays out for players.
Sarah: A lot of the conversations I had at GDC were about options.
Studios understand card payments well. But many are starting to explore alternatives, especially as their player economies grow.
What matters most for adoption is the checkout experience. If the flow is fast, trusted, and easy to complete, players are usually open to trying different ways to pay.
Not everyone making a purchase is the one holding the controller. Gen Alpha is showing up in gaming in a big way, but it's Millennial parents making the actual purchases. When a kid asks for something in a game, that transaction has to be smooth for the parent completing it or it's a lost sale.
That's where pay by bank fits naturally. For in-game purchases, a simple bank-authenticated payment can create a clean experience for players (and parents) while improving the economics for studios. And once that connection is set up, buying again is even easier than the first time.
Better for players and better for studios. You could call it a double XP moment.
Sarah: Trust was a big theme.
Players are investing real time and money into their experience. When something goes wrong with a payment, whether that's a fraudulent purchase, a chargeback, or a checkout failure, it can disrupt that experience in ways studios don't always anticipate.
The stakes are high. Studios are competing for players' attention not just against other games, but against everything else pulling people online. So even small hiccups in how purchases work can ripple outward. It's not just a payments problem. It affects how players feel about the game and, over time, the studio behind it.
This is where my inner payments nerd gets excited. The right payment and risk systems can quietly protect that experience without players ever noticing.
Nathan: Sarah's right. Fraud and disputes get treated as a payments problem, but they're really a system design problem.
With card payments, chargebacks are built into the model. That creates a lot of operational overhead for studios processing high transaction volume.
Bank-authenticated payments change that dynamic. When a player verifies directly with their bank, you remove most of the ambiguity around who authorized the transaction. That reduces disputes and helps operators keep more of the revenue they've already earned.
As transaction volume grows, you need systems you can rely on. The studios thinking about this early are going to be in a much better position.
Nathan: Checkout has to match the pace of the game.
Players move quickly between gameplay and purchases, whether they're on console, PC, or mobile. If the payment flow slows them down, you risk losing someone who was just trying to enjoy themselves.
As a gamer, I feel this one personally. If buying something takes too long or feels clunky, it pulls you right out of the experience.
The best checkout experiences remove friction. Faster authentication, fewer steps, and confirmation that happens almost instantly. As someone who has rage-quit a checkout before finishing a purchase, I can tell you that part matters a lot.
Sarah: Nathan actually plays the games, so he probably feels this one more than I do.
Walking GDC actually made me think about how much gaming has changed. It used to be very gameplay-forward. Now it's an entire ecosystem where the game is almost just the starting point. There's the marketplace, the community, the streaming, the content built around the content. Payments are woven through all of it.
What I kept hearing from studios is that purchasing should feel like a natural extension of that experience, not a separate process players have to stop and think about. When checkout is simple and consistent across devices, players barely notice it. They just get what they want and keep playing.
Those small moments add up. The easier it is to complete a purchase, the more likely players are to come back and do it again.
Sarah: Fizzy.
There was so much energy on the floor and ideas bubbling up everywhere. Everyone was talking, riffing, building on each other's thoughts. It had that feeling of an industry that knows something big is coming and can't wait to figure out what it is.
Nathan: Primed.
Everyone there, from indie studios to major publishers, is thinking about how to keep their games fresh and their players engaged for the long haul. The whole ecosystem depends on that. The more studios can rely on payments just working, the more they can focus on what they actually do well: building great games.
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