About GPCS
The Standard & Its Author
Devon Stanton
Creator, GPCS v0.6
Devon Stanton is a senior operations and communications leader with 15+ years in the games industry. He has held roles at Unity, Blizzard Entertainment, and 2K Games, and has supported projects across Ubisoft, CD Projekt, Rockstar, Activision, and Codemasters — with over 500 launches led across EMEA and APAC. Most recently he architected the Unity Awards 2025 platform, generating 36,000 votes across 14,000 participants and 100+ studios.
That breadth of experience across studios, publishers, and platforms gave him a clear view of how inconsistently the industry describes production capacity — and how much confusion that creates for developers, press, investors, and players. GPCS is his attempt to fix it: a structured, verifiable classification framework modelled on the bond-rating system, designed to bring the same rigour to game projects that financial markets bring to debt instruments. He writes about games, design, and industry systems at devonstanton.com.
Current Status
Version
v0.6.0
Comprehensive proposal under testing
Pilot Phase
Awards
Primary testing via Unity Awards programme (6–12 months)
Target v1.0
2026
≥200 classified projects, ≥2 implementation cycles
Important context
GPCS is:
- ✓A proposal under active testing
- ✓Voluntary — no one is required to participate
- ✓Transparent — all criteria are publicly documented
- ✓Project-centric — not a studio ranking system
- ✓Open to feedback and revision
GPCS is not:
- ✕A ratified industry standard (yet)
- ✕A quality assessment
- ✕A commercial viability prediction
- ✕Officially endorsed by any body
- ✕Mandatory for any purpose
Governance
Current (v0.6)
Maintained by the author (Devon Stanton). Community proposals via GitHub Issues. Quarterly review cycles, annual major releases. All changes documented in the changelog.
Future (when critical mass reached)
Advisory board with representation from studios, publishers, platforms, awards bodies, and academic researchers. Major changes require supermajority vote (7/9). Backward compatibility maintained — old ratings grandfathered with version label.
License & Citation
You are free to share and adapt this framework for any purpose, provided you give appropriate credit.
APA Citation
Stanton, D. (2025). Game Project Classification Standard (GPCS): A Bond-Style Rating System for Game Projects (Version 0.6.0). CC BY 4.0.
Implementation Attribution
Classification system based on Devon Stanton's Game Project Classification Standard (GPCS v0.6)
GitHub Repository
Issues, proposals, changelog
Full Specification
Read the complete white paper
Support This Project
GPCS is a solo, open-source initiative. A GitHub star signals industry interest and helps the standard gain visibility. If you find this work valuable, a Ko-fi helps sustain it.
Get in Touch
If you represent an awards body, grant programme, or platform and want to explore implementation — or if you have critique, suggestions, or questions about the methodology — the author welcomes engagement.