"The most accessible platform to reach South Africans is mobile"

The Dubai Game Expo Summit powered by Pocket Gamer Connects returns on May 7th to 8th 2025, offering a chance to gain insights into the world’s fastest-growing games market, MENA.

In an exclusive interview with Pineapple on Pizza Studios CEO Kushal Jeethendra Sithlu, we discuss the company's upcoming mobile titles, tapping into the global market and funding challenges.

PocketGamerbiz: Could you tell us a bit about Pineapple on Pizza and what you’re up to right now?

Kushal Jeethendra Sithlu: We’re a game studio that started out in 2023. Back then, we were a small team of part-timers, and now we’re eight strong and have been part of multiple incubators and accelerators leading us to Paris, France and Bangalore, India in 2024.

This year, we’re readying a new stream of mobile and pc game releases, focusing on locally influenced but globally accessible content. We’re bringing a variety of new titles and revamping our old ones with a fresh coat of paint.

How many staff do you currently employ, and where are they based?

Right now, we’ve got eight people, including the four founders and we also worked with UVU Capaciti to host two interns for six months, which came to an end on the 6th of March.

They’re all South Africa-based. Even though we are working primarily online, this makes it great to actually meet up once in a while and have some fun.

You've developed games for PC (Steam), iOS, and Android. How do you decide which platform to target for a new game?

We’ve got a big project in the works for PC and console, and we’ve got several mobile games coming. We’re focusing on South African-influenced games with most of our mobile releases, and the most accessible platform to reach South Africans is mobile. The stats show that most gamers in Africa are mobile players, and we aim to please. 

Most of our mobile games are going to be made available on PC in some way, whether through webGL, Steam or Itch.io. When it comes to PC and console, sometimes the scale of the idea and the impact you want to make is too big for mobile.

Sometimes, you want to create something that can compete and go beyond your community. That’s what we’re doing with our upcoming PC title. We want to bring a lot more eyes to South Africa and our games industry, and sometimes you need a meteor to cause a tsunami that ripples across the world.

What are some of the biggest challenges you've faced in the localisation process, and how have your games been received internationally outside Africa? 

Localisation is always hard, especially because it doesn’t come free. It takes a lot of time and expertise, and that means money. Language-wise, we get around it with smart UI design that doesn’t rely on language to understand (primarily for mobile and WebGL). From a content perspective, we believe that when it comes down to it, if the gameplay is good, it’ll always be accessible.

If people can enjoy what they can see and feel, then even if it’s different, there’s an immediate ability to connect with the content. You start thinking, “Hey, this is really fun,” and a few hours in, you’re starting to wonder and discover more about our local culture. It’s our ticking time bomb of fun and flavour.

We’ve only recently begun making our titles available to international audiences, but in general, we’ve seen similar reviews to our local players, just in smaller quantities.

Africa has a vast number of mobile users. What do you think is the key to tapping into this audience? And why do you think some still overlook the market despite its growth potential?

It’s all about content people can relate to. We all have favourite songs and movies, and despite what ratings say, we’ll stand by those picks because something about them connects with us and our experiences.

That means local content. I think we’re often overlooked partly because of negative stereotypes of African nations, but times are changing, and now we have access to information that can allow us to compete with the world by creating our own content and benefiting from it.

Across Africa, we are so insanely creative and all in different ways with different cultures, views and art; I can’t see a reason not to invest in mobile games for African gamers.

What potential do you see in EdTech for Africa's future? And does Pineapple on Pizza have any ongoing or planned projects related to EdTech?

I think EdTech can be huge internationally, especially in Africa. Education is very important to me personally, and I’ve seen first-hand how our schooling system fails to handle neurodivergent and learning-disabled children, and this is where I think games can change everything.

We’re actually partnering up with Dibber International preschools to help bring to life Beyond Limits: The Power of a Unique Mind. This is a 3-day event that brings together education experts and families to break boundaries and aid children with Autism, Neurodivergent traits, dyslexia and other learning disabilities.

There’s going to be games, prizes, talks and workshops for parents and their kids. I’m really excited about it, I truly believe we need better education that helps children with different ways of learning to still succeed.

What are your thoughts on emerging technologies such as AI, AR and VR in games? And do you have plans to incorporate AI into your game development process? 

First off, AI isn’t going anywhere and second, I think it depends on your situation, as contentious as that may sound. It’s great that platforms like Steam allow but label AI-generated content because for some developers, especially in developing nations, AI might be the means for you to make your first solo game. For a big studio to cut corners and jobs to save a quick buck and replace people with AI is something I’m firmly against.

I avoid AI use in everything but code. AI is great for solving code bugs, but ultimately, it is a tool and for a developing industry like South Africa, it’s important to use all the tools we can. Time is money, and we have neither, so use that AI to make your life easier where you can. Ethically, of course.

In terms of funding and support for gaming studios in Africa, what has been your experience navigating the funding landscape? And how do you think the African games market could attract more investment? 

There’s not a lot of funding. It’s like a mosh pit of people fighting for breadcrumbs at game jams and sponsored events. Locally, it feels like a lot of investors don’t quite understand the potential and ways to incorporate game design on things other than games. Internationally, there are opportunities for accelerators and incubators.

Some competitions and investors understand the field of games better, but the amount of people willing to just invest in a group or game from Africa still feels very low. I think the lack of support locally is more disheartening though. We need more government support as an industry, we need to give teams and studios the room to fail a little and have a chance to grow.

Right now, there are the few big guys that have been at it for years, and tons of small fry struggling to survive. There’s so much talent and so little support to nurture it. With the bit of funding and reputation we’ve managed to raise, one of the core goals is to bring the eyes of investors to South Africa by making awesome and innovative content that lets people see what we can do as developers and how we can connect with our players.

What are your plans for 2025? Will you be exploring new platforms? Are there any specific initiatives or projects on the horizon that we should look forward to?

We’ve got some awesome new titles coming out for mobile. We hope to set ourselves up to become the largest mobile games developer in South Africa. Chow Down, our South African cuisine merge game, is currently out in Early Access on Android! We’ve got a brand-new arcade experience called Amataxi, where you’ll take to the streets of Johannesburg to drop off passengers and cause some chaos.

And a last reveal for mobile, HadeDie, a whack-a-mole style game where you’ll get to release your frustration on some irritating Hadeda birds, the bane of every South African!

Around July, we’ll be releasing a demo for our upcoming PC title, and this is a big one! I’m so pumped for it, and everything the team has been doing has me feeling like this is going to be a hit worldwide. Though I can't share more at this time, not even a title, until the teaser trailer.