We recently connected with Lionel “Kuma” Alexander and have shared our conversation below.

Lionel “Kuma”, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Coming up with the idea is so exciting, but then comes the hard part – executing. Too often the media ignores the execution part and goes from idea to success, skipping over the nitty, gritty details of executing in the early days. We think that’s a disservice both to the entrepreneurs who built something amazing as well as the public who isn’t getting a realistic picture of what it takes to succeed. So, we’d really appreciate if you could open up about your execution story – how did you go from idea to execution?

The idea for Nerdy Bear Studio didn’t start yesterday, in fact, it started many years ago as a young boy who fell in love with the art form of video games. I remember being in love with the pixelated wonderlands of early Nintendo and Sega. At a very early age being enamored with not only the games themselves but how they were made and the business of video games.

I spent my developmental years writing stories of both fantasy and Non – fiction. Stories that I knew one day I would bring to life. I would learn very early on that this path wouldn’t be a straight one and I would attempt many different ways to achieve this goal. My original vision of my studio was just me creating everything. The artwork, the music the programming I was going to be a one-man show. Like the stories, you read about in the magazines the rock star Indie Dev. After researching and observing that the longevity of that type of dream was not very long I decided to restructure it into something closer to what Nerdy Bear Studios is today.

That day was actually October 18th, 2018 when I decided to form my LLC and create a more structured approach to game development and build a team around me. I observed many structures of different game studios and origin stories from the risk at all game studios to the well-thought-out and structured game studios and decided to build NB Studios to mirror a combination of several businesses.

This is when I realized that my dream would it require much more than a knowledge of how video games work I needed to figure out how the business worked as well as leadership. so I began in many seminars and classes to learn how businesses run. Through the pandemic it allowed me to reshape and reform

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Hello world my name is Lionel and I am the founder of Nerdy Bear Studios. An Atlanta-based Studio that creates video games and animation. How I got into this position as a founder is on Orthodox as you will find most game development to be. Although I went to school to attain a degree in computer science I work my fair share of jobs that gave me worldly experience. I have always wanted to create video games in one way or another whether it be worth working with somebody or creating my own Studio. So in 2018, that’s exactly what I did.

Nerdy bear Studio functions as its own entity that creates intellectual property and a boutique Studio that can create assets for third-party vendors. From single assets to full game development Nerdy Bear Studio has a team equipped to handle most project sizes.

One of the main pillars behind the mission of Nerdy Bear Studios is to properly represent the communities in which we create games for and about. Our unique method of developing games and animation allows us to accurately represent communities not only physically but culturally.

I am most proud of being able to bring this labor of love to life in a way that’s meaningful and impactful. Allowing representation to be at the forefront of our creations. All the while creating something new and exciting. Coming together at the intersection of video games and culture has always been a dream and Nerdy Bear Studios was making it a reality.

When it comes to Indie development the reason why Indies are so successful is that teams around the size of ours are allowed to explore very meaningful conversations that happen in the real world whether that be things like the workplace, relationships, Humanity, history, or whatever else is a powerful and important topic to talk about.

Have you ever had to pivot?

So as we all know the last 2 years have been very trying. While starting up any business is treacherous, independent game studios in particular are known to have a dangerously high failure rate because of the initial startup cost. Luckily when I incorporated I planned for hard times and chose to fund my studio out of pocket so that lenders would not have a reason to pressure me or my studio. However, after the shutdown of 2020, no one could have prepared for it. So I was forced to slow down production in order to maintain the studio’s viability and ethically pay my people. This was one of the hardest decisions that I have had to make thus far. To have a 10-year plan for game development and basically have a two-year slowdown changes a lot as far as expected return on investment and overall business growth. now a lot of business owners would have chosen to take out a loan however according to the research a lot of businesses that incur debt exponentially also go under exponentially.

Can you talk to us about how you funded your business?

The funding portion for my studio because we decided to fund everything out of pocket was a very interesting choice to make. because generally businesses need revolving credit a large savings but we have been able to make it work for about 4 years now. the only policy that we followed was to bootstrap in the very beginning and put in Sweat Equity.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.nerdybearstudio.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nerdybearstudios/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/nerdybearstudios/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/NerdyBearStudio
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@nerdybearstudios
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/nerdybearstudios