Amazon’s play strategy has never really been clear. It has been very active in the space: acquiring Twitch, launching its cloud gaming service Luna almost six years ago, investing heavily in MMOs during the peak of the live-service wave, and gaining access to a large slate of franchises through Prime Video and the library of MGM Studios. Late last year, the company announced a major pivot, relaunching Luna with a focus on party games you can play with just your phone as a controller — including an AI-powered game featuring Snoop Dogg as a judge — and jumping ship into MMOs.
At the time, it looked like a setback, but Amazon says it isn’t. “The truth is that nothing could be further from the truth, but we haven’t come out and said that yet,” said Jeff Gattis, GM of Amazon Games, told. The Verge. And while the company says it has a new, more focused strategy, its gaming efforts are spread across several different pillars.
Part of that new focus comes from a structural change, as the company now has what it believes is a simpler way. “Luna is our gaming platform, Amazon Game Studios is our development and publishing platform,” Gattis said. He admits it’s “not at all similar” to the Xbox approach, which is part of the Xbox platform and Xbox Game Studios. And with Amazon’s push for cloud-streamed party games that you can play right on your phone, Gattis can match Netflix’s strategy, too — which also has its own twists and turns. Until recently, Amazon has tried to go after the “core” players, but Gattis says that part of the market is “well served” by things like PlayStation, Xbox, and Steam. Amazon isn’t abandoning that group, but it also sees an opportunity to attract a more liberal audience.
Gattis joined Amazon in March 2025 after years as an Xbox executive. Gattis says he came to Amazon because he saw many opportunities. “I, myself, can’t accept that Amazon, as one of the largest consumer entertainment companies in the world, can’t get into the first half of consumer entertainment revenue,” he said. Since joining, Amazon has merged its three separate gaming groups — Prime Gaming, Amazon Game Studios, and Luna — into a single entity. “None of these groups were cooperating with each other,” said Gattis.
On Luna, a select collection of games is included with an Amazon Prime subscription (including GameNite party games) and you can pay $9.99 per month for Luna Premium, which has a larger selection of titles. As for Amazon Game Studios, its biggest known games in the works are remakes Tomb Raider: Legacy of Atlantis again Tomb Raider: The Catalystsomething new in the series. Both are currently slated for launch in 2027. And Amazon’s involvement with games extends to live action. Tomb Raider a Prime Video show starring Sophie Turner as Lara Croft.
Amazon’s bet on placement Tomb Raider everywhere – there are even a few titles available through Luna – showing where the company sees things going. “We really believe that the line between TV and video games is getting more and more blurred” so much so that “I think every major IP is going to have to have a video game story” as part of its go-to-market strategy, Gattis said. He also points to Amazon’s rights deals with sports leagues like the NBA and NFL, saying there are “all kinds” of “friendship-type games” it could make.
Now that Amazon has creative control of James Bond, that seems like another obvious franchise for the company to build more games around, especially after the success of IO Interactive’s recent release. 007 First Light. IO Interactive is self-published First Light due to a deal made before Amazon took over the franchise, although Amazon “has a stake in the game” and the company is talking to IO about when to bring it to Luna, according to Gattis.
“That’s exhibit A for going to Prime Video, seeing Bond films, playing video games, buying merchandise [Amazon].com,” Gattis said. Amazon has the rights to “all future Bond titles” and “I think you can expect [the next Bond game to be] game published by Amazon Game Studios.” He would not confirm yet that IO will be the developer of any other sequel. [the next Bond game] look like? Who is the right developer? Which story line is correct? All those things.”
Currently, Amazon has 10 to 15 games in development, according to Gattis, who says “maybe 33 to 40 percent” are AAA titles. But those big-budget games aren’t needed for the new audience Amazon is pursuing with its new Luna games. The Snoop Dogg show came together in “less than a year,” Gattis said. Amazon is also a “big believer” in AI producing both AI-powered games like the Snoop Dogg title but also how it can help in general development. “To be clear, these are human-made games, but they use AI as tools,” he said. “We’ve never cut people off because of AI. We’re just using it to try to speed it up and try to make different kinds of games.” (Crystal Dynamics, which develops Tomb Raider resume, admitted to using “AI-assisted tools” during development.)
Scale is by no means a guarantee of success. Netflix has a big subscription business in streaming but hasn’t given up much on games. And even though Amazon seems more focused than ever, it still seems to be trying a bunch of different things to see what sticks, and that’s going to take time to play out. Gattis, however, is confident in Amazon’s approach. “Don’t sleep on Amazon in this space.”
