With video game film franchises such as Universal’s Super Mario Bros. thriving at the box office, gaming remains essential to the entertainment landscape.
But gaming is serving a different purpose for NBCUniversal-owned Peacock, where unscripted TV IP is being leveraged in innovative ways.
Peacock’s mobile app is home to a growing roster of gaming options, among them titles based on the stalwart TV game shows Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy! Like other streaming services, including Netflix and Disney+, Peacock is branching out into gaming as a means of diversifying its content options to maximize the time users spend on the app.
“We’ve been experimenting with games for longer than pretty much any other streamer, and what we’ve learned is that great IP like Wheel of Fortune really resonates, particularly on mobile,” said John Jelley, NBCUniversal’s SVP of Product and UX for Peacock and Global Streaming.
He was joined by Sally Umsted, SVP of Brand Partnerships, Licensing and Experiences for Sony Pictures’ game show group, and game studio Lil Snack’s CEO and co-founder, Eric Berman, on a panel I moderated last month at GamesBeat Summit to discuss the game offerings on Peacock’s mobile app.
One year ago, Sony Pictures TV entered into a multiyear licensing pact for Peacock and Hulu that covers Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune, enabling subsequent tie-in games for those properties. Peacock launched its first Jeopardy! game on its mobile app Monday, where 10% of Peacock’s audience has engaged with such titles, per Jelley.
“Our focus is on getting people back to the app regularly, and when we listen to customers, the biggest challenge they have is they’re short of time, and they want more speed, they want more control, so new formats like snackable, easily accessible games … really resonate,” said Jelley, who called out live sports, podcasts, microdramas and gaming as important components to Peacock’s streaming equation.
Beyond what NBCU licenses for Peacock, its own unscripted IP supercharges engagement on the service. Luminate’s Streaming Viewership (M) tracker clocked Love Island as having the most-streamed season of TV out of any original streaming series in 2025.
The extensive hub of programming under NBCU’s Bravo brand is where Peacock is actively experimenting with AI. Its “Your Bravoverse” feature compiles short clips from over 5,000 hours of Bravo programming in custom playlists for users and comes with an AI-generated avatar of Andy Cohen to guide them through the selections.
But as Lil Snack’s Berman noted, AI is also a key component of the streamer’s mobile games. “We’ve been able to bring on folks who have never made games before that are utilizing AI tools in really unique ways,” he said, referring to software designed for ease of use that makes it possible for folks within SPTV to actively work on games derived from their IP, as opposed to relying fully on game developers.
While these smaller, “snackable” mobile gaming experiences make for pro-AI use cases fitting the needs of multimedia streaming platforms, the use of generative AI in AAA games remains controversial.
On a separate panel, veteran studio head Glen Schofield, who created the 2008 sci-fi horror game Dead Space, co-founded Call of Duty studio Sledgehammer Games and The Callisto Protocol studio Striking Distance, lamented the pitch of gen AI as a reliable tool that will make developing AAA titles an easier, more affordable process.
“I think there’s this false thing that everybody’s like, ‘Oh, hey, let’s make it cheaper and faster and smaller and better … we’ll just go home early,’ ” Schofield joked.
“That’s not going to happen,” he added. “You’re gonna get charged with the back-end tools and get charged with the front-end tools, so I don’t know how that’s going to work out and I don’t know how cheap that’s going to be. Maybe you’re going to have smaller teams, but they may be just as expensive.”
