Use a four-to-eight-week working plan for a bounded first release, with a separate allowance for unresolved permissions. This is a proposed project schedule, not an observed average. A small authorised embed may require much less implementation work; unresolved upstream rights can prevent launch regardless of development speed.
The schedule below assumes an existing website, a modest initial catalogue, access to a developer and a named legal reviewer. Activities overlap.
| Stage | Suggested working allowance | Accountable owner | Required output |
|---|---|---|---|
| Define the brief and must-have games | 2–3 working days | Product owner and editor | Sourcing brief and priority list |
| Qualify routes and request evidence | 3–5 working days, followed by supplier waiting time | Founder or procurement lead | Comparable responses and evidence register |
| Resolve rights, territory and privacy questions | Allow 1–3 calendar weeks initially; extend where necessary | Legal/privacy reviewer | Approved scope or explicit unresolved issues |
| Validate catalogue and model costs | 3–5 working days | Editor and product owner | Usable-catalogue workbook and budget |
| Build the pilot | 5–10 working days | Engineering lead | Staging integration and operational controls |
| Test, remediate and obtain sign-off | 5–10 working days | QA and product owner | Test report and release decision |
| Release in controlled batches | 2–5 working days | Product and engineering | Production checks and rollback record |
| Maintain and reassess | Recurring | Named service owner | Monitoring, updates and renewal decisions |
Do not confuse account approval with procurement completion. First Look Games says manual account approval should take no longer than 24 hours. That is its stated onboarding expectation—not a commitment covering your contracts, US availability assessment, integration or testing. (firstlookgames.com)
Assign five responsibilities even if three people perform them:
- Budget and supplier owner: approves expenditure and owns escalation.
- Catalogue owner: decides what matters editorially and checks game identity.
- Technical owner: implements launch, synchronisation, security and monitoring.
- QA owner: defines evidence of a successful playable session.
- Legal/privacy reviewer: assesses the actual publishing and promotional model.
Do not leave supplier management implicit inside the developer’s role. As a useful staffing signal—not a publisher staffing benchmark—White Hat Studios’ integration vacancy explicitly separates onboarding, testing/sign-off, documentation and staging/production support responsibilities. (ats.rippling.com)