Short Form As A Key Ingredient to Game Discovery

Two things are true about how players discover games. The first is through short-form content. The second is through their friends. And the friends, more often than not, discovered it through short-form content. This is especially true for new IP. Most players know what they are buying before they get to Steam.

Medal is a platform where 17M gamers come to clip, watch, view, and share the games they love. They aren’t content creators trying to make a career from covering campaigns, simply regular fans capturing their player memories, copying links, and sending them to a friend. 50M clips get taken on Medal every week across every genre: shooters, RPGs, fighting, MOBAs, MMOs, and even VR and trivia. We believe games deserve a place where a publisher, studio, or marketer can reach the right audience that gets to the core of why someone plays a game: because it’s like another game they enjoyed or co-experienced with a friend. We believe game discovery also deserves its own space, a niche environment with less clutter, separate from the “everything is here” sites like YouTube and TikTok. 

Our quest systems have driven demo download spikes of +200%, clip volumes of +800%, and unique clipper volume of +600%. We’ve lifted Steam Store traffic and found studios tens of thousands of playtesters. We are the way your game gets discussed in thousands of tiny group chats at scale.  

But we believe that the best go-to-market isn’t a single channel. It’s a confluence of things firing on all cylinders that can light the match around a good game, and we’re building a one-stop shop discovery engine for PC games. Clips, moments that are organic and authentic, and social content made by professional content creators, go hand in hand.  

So, why Jestr?

That’s why we’re teaming up with Jestr. Jestr connects indie and AA studios with a network of handpicked content creators. For the creators, it’s a way for them to get paid for covering new and upcoming games, something they probably would have done anyway. For studios and publishers, it’s an efficient way to deploy affordable, structured campaigns. 

They’ve done some pretty cool stuff. In just short of a year since they started, they’ve run 350+ campaigns, generated 500M+ short form views, published 37K+ social posts, and paid $1M+ to their creators. They’ve also powered some standout moments in the industry. 11 of the top 50 demos during February 2026 Steam Next Fest leveraged Jestr campaigns, and they’ve supported games like YAPYAP, LORT, and Totally Secure Airport (one of these went viral at 15M views)!

We take influence and direction from people who dedicate their time to curate and polish an opinion (which is why we follow journalists or celebrities), and we’re impressed with how Jestr has helped build awareness for games that make people want to play. 

Medal and Jestr are both here to light a match around game launches and keep the fire burning. Jestr helps to create an initial wave of content and awareness across TikTok, YouTube Shorts, and Instagram, and Medal can get a million-person army of organic real players clipping and sharing moments with their friends. 

What Does This Mean for Studios, Game Publishers, and Marketers? 

Studios and publishers have done the hard work of making exceptional products. For qualifying studios¹, we’re offering Jestr campaigns at 0% fees. 100% of your budget will go to creators and not to platform overhead, saving you 20-25%.

How Does It Work? 

If you’re greenlit as part of the Medal and Jestr partnership, you’ll receive a code you can use to strip out the fees. You can activate this code when you set up your campaigns on the campaign setup page. At checkout, you’ll enter your Medal code and reduce your fees to 0%. These are one-time use per Medal activation, valid for the agreed amount associated with that activation, and expire after 3 months.  

What If the Budget Is Unfilled? 

No sweat! Budgets with Jestr rollover, and you can use it on the next activation. But if it’s not a part of a Medal x Jestr package, remember, the fees apply. 

What Does It Mean to Qualify? 

Studios qualify if they activate Medal campaigns (quests, platform featuring, key selling, media, or other initiatives) and commit to a minimum spend in relation to the Jestr campaign. Not all campaigns are a fit for Medal or Jestr. For example, it's possible that Jestr creators aren’t likely to cover a certain kind of game. For Medal, campaigns work best when you can put the game (a demo, a beta, or official launch) into the hands of real players. Campaign approval is subject to review because of this.  

What If I Want To Spend More on Jestr?

We understand that launch plans change. If you decide to spend more with Jestr than you communicated at the time of your Medal activation, the excess campaign budget does not qualify for 0% fees unless associated with another Medal activation.  

How To Get Started:

Reach out to us here to get started, or if you have questions, and someone from Medal.TV will reach out. Check your unfocused inbox as always for new emails.