Who Am I?

I am Matthew Broitman, a lifelong lover of video games and a veteran of the games industry with over 15 years of experience spanning games journalism, content creation, PR, production & project management. You can find my extended CV over on LinkedIn, but to give just a baseline of what I’ve done in the past…

As a Producer & Project Manager:

  • I've taken faltering projects, sorted through the mess, and gotten them to completion.

  • I've organized sprints and gotten new projects running at a healthy pace, both from the start and getting things back on track mid-way through.

  • I've sourced vendors for outside work, and organized and run betas for in-development tools.

As a PR Professional:

  • I've worked directly on over 250 games in varying capacities, and provided additional support and consultation to dozens if not hundreds more.

  • I've manually assessed thousands of requests for review keys and helped verify the vast majority of creators & press using the Terminals.io platform.

  • I've written hundreds of press releases for pretty much every kind of beat under the sun for pretty much every genre of game.

As a Journalist & Content Creator:

  • I've written countless reviews under strict deadlines & embargoes.

  • I've quickly learned and mastered new tools and formats to create polished written & video content.

  • I've managed healthy relationships with most major PR firms and publishers.

  • I’ve run (and continue to run) a moderately successful YouTube channel.

Close-up of a smiling man with a beard and long hair, wearing a white shirt and a necklace with a star pendant, outdoors with blurred green trees in the background.

Why “Barrel Band Games”?

  • For nostalgia. Back in the old country, before the Broitmans came to Canada, my family were all coopers, and my grandfather was immensely proud of this familial occupation. While the realities of life meant he was never able to take it up himself, he brought it up almost every time he met someone new.

    I knew I wanted to pay tribute to him with the name of my business, and whether you read “Barrel Band” as the iron hoop on a wine cask or the ring of steel on the front of a rifle, it helps keep things together, which is what I’m trying to do for the medium I love.

    Just as that band keeps the staves of a barrel tight and aligned, so do I keep the pillars of development in check, allowing you to focus on the ferment of creativity to make your game the best it can be. Just as that band keeps a rifle from flying into pieces from the force of fire, so do I help you brace for and endure the explosive experience that is launching your game.

    That is why it’s “Barrel Band”.

  • It’s Games because frankly that’s what makes the most sense to me.

    I’m not just here to consult from afar, I want to get my hands dirty helping devs make things work, so Barrel Band Consulting didn’t fit. I’m not here to replace a full scale PR or marketing firm, so Barrel Band Communications or Barrel Band PR didn’t work either. I’m not purely doing trailers or making assets, so Barrel Band Productions didn’t feel right. And while I am here to help guide and organize development, I’m not a publisher, with neither the money nor the want to acquire games in that sense, so Barrel Band Publishing wasn’t the way to go.

    But what will always be true, what I’ll always be here to do, and what I’ll always want to work on… is games.

    The medium of video games has been the guiding light of my life and it’s where all of my expertise and passion lies. No matter what, I want to work on games and make the industry and the medium the best it can be in my own small way, so Barrel Band Games it is.