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Tales of the developers of your favorite games about what they are proud of

Strange and terrible times have come. But I am always very reassured that people find it possible to rejoice at something, remembering something that they consider significant. Right now, it seems especially important to hold on to what makes us proud of what we do and who we are. And I especially like it when people talk about the results of their work, which they are pleased to recall.



I suggested that many game developers bring back something that makes them remember the past. Here I want to share their stories with you. Among them is the story of Harvey Smith, who recalls working on Deus Ex and Dishonored. Here is a story by Derek Yu about one of his very first games. Here are the stories of those who are proud of their contribution to the game that someone else created, the stories about the power of small things and small discoveries ... But enough of the preface. Let's just enjoy a good piece of escapist positive.

Sanna Berg - Totally Accurate Battle Simulator Pirate Queen



The main occupation of someone who plays TABS is war. But, as Sanna Berg proves, this does not mean that war cannot be something worthy of admiration.

At Landfall, I do 3D graphics. My job is primarily to create weapons and armor for warriors in the fancy TABS war game. The game began to be developed long before I joined the company, as a result, many characters have already been created. Almost all of these characters were masculine. I decided to change that and started creating more female characters. Among them there is one which I am especially proud of. The strongest and most expensive character in the pirate faction is the pirate queen. She's cool and looks great. I even voiced it myself.

Petri Purho - The Amazing Flying Brothers



Petri Purho, one of the creators of Noita’s physical sandbox , has also written many talented experimental games. He recalls one of these games, which was made in less than a week in 2007.

One of the games that I am especially proud of is The Amazing Flying Brothers . This is mainly due to the fact that I still like to play it. This is a relatively simple one-button game. Here you play as an air acrobat who jumps between the bars, performs tricks and makes mistakes. Watching your rag dolls fall face down on the floor is one of the simple joys of life. A few years after the release of the game, Dennis Belfarge and I made a two-player version calledMen On The Flying Trapeze .

Emily Short - Teeth Weapons from Fallen London



There are few writers and theorists of interactive fiction is as wise as Emily Short ( Emily Short ). But she does not disdain to use her skills in Fallen London when creating wonderful moments, examples of strangeness in her highest manifestation.

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— Beyond the Black Hole



The creator of Baba Is You, Arvi Teikari, is known for his stunningly intricate and imaginative puzzle design. But he recalls with pleasure the details of the game that he made for himself and never released.

Around 2010, I was working on a simple puzzle called Beyond the Black Hole. I can’t say that the puzzles in the game were very difficult, but the visual style of the game really pleased me. In particular, I really liked the rain effect on the same level, combined with the parallax effect. In those days, it seemed to me something very significant. One of the games of Niklas Nygren inspired me to create this effect .. As a result, I got a pleasantly worked out effect. True, perhaps this is more like hail rather than rain. I still warmly recall this project, although I have not completed work on it.

Subset Games - Into the Breach Visual Effects


For programmer Matthew Davis and artist Justin Ma, Into the Breach is the sum of the results of their collaboration. Let's look at a couple of points that they like most.

Here's what Matthew Davis says about it.


I always liked the game aesthetics of the mini-dioramas that Justin created, but I rarely influenced them directly, since I'm not an artist. The rain effect was a small detail of the visual design that I once designed and expressed in code. What I did, given the simplicity of this effect, always made me happy.

And here is Justin Ma's comment.


I don’t really like creating animations, so I always tried to get by with a minimum of animations in games. For example, characters do not rotate in the direction of movement, they only have animation applied to their stationary state, and so on. I myself do not know why I invested so much time in the picture of exploding rocks. The result was much better than I could expect, and I am always pleased to look at it.

Robert Young Finale Getting Over It



Robert Yang (Robert Yang) - a teacher, scientist and game developer , decided not to talk about something that he did. But, as he says, game development is, by its nature, a process of collective creativity, and “creating something” sometimes means “helping someone do something”. (Beware, spoiler!)

(Bennett Foddy) — NYU Game Center. (: — ), , , « », , . -, Node.js, . , , . . , , — , -, , . — .

— VVVVVV



Bennet Foddy, creator of QWOP and Getting Over It, followed a humble tale by Robert Young, who was proud not of his own games, but of being able to help others. He recalls how he helped to give birth to a game created by another person (they are interesting, these guys from NYU).

, (Terry Cavanagh) VVVVVV. - . : «Do I really have to name all of these?». , , . , . , . , . «Veni/Vidi/Vici».

— - Divinity: Original Sin 2



When I first played Divinity: Original Sin 2, I just had to be the Red Prince (you just look at him). But even he pales in front of the lizards created by leading character designer Alena Dubrovina.

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— Rimworld



After the creator of Rimworld, Tynan Sylvester sent me this picture, I showed it to my son, who had just played this game. He said that just five minutes ago, three lynxes killed all his colonists, after which a man in black appeared. “He missed three times and was killed,” the son said. “I should mention how little use is usually made of him,” Tinan replied.

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— Trigger Happy



Derek Yu (now I think you can talk about it) is the creator of the legendary Spelunky game . But he remembered not the game itself, but the path that he had taken before he began work on it.

Trigger Happy is a two-player battle-to-death game that I created when I was 12 using the Klik & Play game creation tool. The older I get, the more important it seems to me to appreciate what I did before. This, given all the shortcomings, was the best that I was capable of then. I am proud that I created this game myself and found the strength to publish it on the Internet as a finished project. It was then that I began to truly perceive myself as the creator of games.

Anastasia Wyatt - The Seven Gods of Heaven's Vault



Despite the fact that Heaven's Vault is a game in which the central place is given to texts, the creators of the game paid a lot of attention to its visual component. This is what Anastasia Wyatt, a 2D artist from Inkle , recalls about the details of working on this project.

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— Minit



I like the games, at first glance small, that give the impression of something big (yes, I play Animal Crossing). And Minit is the perfect example of such a game. I think that Kitty Calis really grabbed something when she talked about how big can exist in the small, in terms of how personal it is all perceived.

Nothing annoys me like a buzzing mosquito on a summer night that keeps me awake. Minit has a miniature mosquito - one pixel and sound. But this also reveals the power of limitations. This is a very small part of the game, but I think personal stories matter. They make games closer to those who play them. And therefore, I believe that in the development of games there is nothing too small. Therefore - get up and tell your stories!

Gwen Frey - Kine



The indie revolution has been going on for a long time, but I still, reading the stories of indie developers, see them as strong as ever. Gwen Frey was an artist and animator in the BioShock Infinite and The Flame In The Flood projects. Last year, she released her own musical puzzle, Kine .

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— Skin Deep



No one, as much as Brandon Chung, appreciates the sound of water being drained in the playroom. As a result, it’s quite natural that in his games, from Quadrilateral Cowboy to Thirty Flights of Loving, he’s done lovingly trivial details.

I, in my own way fighting the pandemic, am engaged in my current project, , , - — , . . , , . , , , . , , , , . , — , .

— Fortunate Navigator Sunless Skies



Olivia Wood has extensive experience in board role-playing games as an organizer and coordinator. This experience is clearly manifested in the complex characters of the game Sunless Skies . Her favorite character, which, most likely, is not surprising, directly shines with positive.

I am proud to have created a Fortunate Navigator officer from Sunless Skies. I, using some important materials by Ash McAllan, , . Sunless Skies — , , , , Navigator — . , (Skies — Failbetter Games), . , . . ( [] !).

— Deus EX Dishonored



I made an exception for Harvey Smith and allowed me to tell him about two games that he is proud of. And he wants to note that his personal feelings are largely related to working in a huge team that has contributed a lot to these feelings.

The last project I worked on using the level editor is the first Deus EX . In that fairly open space, my role allowed me to work on narrative, on the game system, on the design of missions and levels. Therefore, looking back, I am grateful to fate for every day spent in team work on this game. I created or very much reworked about half the levels of the game. But if you recall one mission for which I spent the most time, it turns out that this is the mission of Liberty Island.

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. , . , DLC Dishonored 2, Death Of The Outsider .

Both of the games described above include the exploitation of a pandemic by the upper strata of society, which is perhaps too close to what is happening in the world now, when we are sitting in isolation to minimize the spread of coronavirus. Around - a sea of ​​distorted information, conspiracy theories, against the backdrop of the impossibility of the market to provide enough (less profitable) medical supplies, knowledge, hospital beds and medical staff. I wish everyone good health and a speedy restoration of normal life in the world. I hope we all learn the lessons learned about society and health, and, going forward, we will not make the same mistakes.

Dear readers! Have you had any projects, ideas, finds that you can be proud of?

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