KO_OP 2018 Year in Review
Hey everyone! I’m Saleem Dabbous — studio director over at KO_OP. I’m in charge of production, business, communications, and generally making sure we’re able to make the games we want to make.
One of my major commitments in the upcoming year is to be more communicative in general — to that end I’m starting out with a 2018 year in review! This is something I’ve been thinking about for a while: how do you keep things interesting for folks when you don’t have a major game release? Well one way is to be more transparent about our work and goings-on (within reason…non-disclosure agreements still exist sadly).
2018 was a year of transition and major change for KO_OP. We’ve added new team members, we’ve started (and stopped…and started) new projects, and we’ve rethought our production model for making games completely. I’m going to dig into all that but first, in case this is your first intro to the studio or you’re a new fan, here’s a quick overview:
KO_OP is a studio owned and run by its members. There are currently 10 KO_OP members and as you can imagine, lots of little interesting projects and collaborations happening across the studio. We’ve released 2 commercial games so far: GNOG and Lara Croft GO: The Mirror of Spirits (an expansion in collaboration with Square Enix Montreal).
KO_OP is:
Samuel Boucher
Omar Dabbous
Saleem Dabbous (that’s me)
Kate Gray
GP Lackey
Kyle McKernan
Hope Erin Phillips
Nick Rudzicz
Lucie Viatge
Bronson Zgeb
More on us at our website: www.ko-opmode.com
Now, let’s look at 2018.
January — March:
Wrapping on GNOG
At the start of the year we were coming off the release of GNOG on Playstation 4 and iOS, the latter being a particularly great launch for us. However, we still had the PC version coming so Nick Rudzicz, the solo programmer on GNOG, had his next 6 months occupied by that. We also decided to update the VR interactions for GNOG with the more robust tracking we got with the Oculus and Vive wands, so we set about creating all new VR controls. Nick went into greater detail about GNOG’s evolving controls here.
The other GNOG team members, project lead Samuel Boucher and artist Lucie Viatge, started concepting all new projects.
Lucie’s Dressup Prototype
Lucie began work on what was to be a small side project called Witches Wardrobe, a 3D dressup game with a super cool and robust character creator. To make this happen we contracted our friend Hope Erin Phillips who we’ve worked with in the past to do the programming. Unfortunately the technical challenges with making the game in 3D were proving to be a huge strain on Lucie and Hope’s time and the scope started to creep up so we put a pause on the project. Here’s a look at it though:
The rest of the studio (Bronson Zgeb and GP Lackey) were contracting with Square Enix thanks to our successful collaboration on Lara Croft GO: The Mirror of Spirits. Their work helped keep the studio funded and allowed everyone else to work on internal projects.
I gave a talk about the studio and our coop model at GDC, it was really well received and the audience evaluations were extremely positive. That was a real highlight for me personally!
April — June:
New Projects
One of the reasons Lucie decided to cancel the dress-up game is that we landed on an idea in February that excited the whole studio. In talking to Kyle McKernan, a close friend of ours, we came up with a story idea for a game that from the moment we said it, we knew we had to make it. Lucie became the art director for the project, we hired Kyle as animator and co-creative lead (alongside myself), hired Hope full time as programmer, and brought on the excellent Kate Gray as narrative director and writer. KO_OP grew for the first time in years. The header image is the tiniest (and first!) sneak preview of the art from the game. While we don’t have a release date in mind yet, we absolutely know that in our bones we have to make this game, and we’re incredibly excited to unveil it one day in the future.
Sam Switches Gears
After working solo on his new project, Sam decided that the scope for the game was too intense and had too many unknowns. After the intensity that was GNOG we wanted to work on something that let us flex our creative muscles more easily so we put his project on hold and he started concepting a brand new game that we quickly greenlit based on his prototype. It’s going to be very special.
In April our contract with Square Enix ended, and for the first time in years the whole studio was working solely on internal projects.
July — September:
Production Ramp Up
In July, we shipped GNOG on PC with its all-new VR interactions, finally hitting our last major milestone for the game. Check out the trailer here:
With that, Nick joined Sam on his project and they kicked into full gear on their unannounced followup to GNOG.
GP and Bronson, back in the studio, began concepting their own project, which meant we now had three teams working on games. Unfortunately GP and Bronson hit design roadblocks and scope was looking larger than they wanted (a common problem we have, which is why we have a green lighting/prototyping phase!) We put their project on hold as GP came up with a new idea that they got much more excited about. Here’s a look at their cancelled project codenamed Beans of America.
That said, their new project is one that we’re all extremely pumped about and really lets GP express his amazing world-building abilities. If you’ve seen his art on Twitter and are a fan, you’ll enjoy what he’s cooking up.
October — December:
Kicking Into Full Gear
We now have three projects in production, and I’m acting as producer on each one, so I have to start figuring out a way to up my game and not get overwhelmed. More on production techniques in a later post maybe? If you’re interested leave a note and I’ll draft something up! At this point each project has passed the greenlight phase and is entering production going into 2019.
Meanwhile, GP showcased his upcoming side project Dépanneur Nocturne at Day of the Devs in November!
And Bronson has been working on a tricky physics worm game prototype on the side. More on that in 2019.
Overall concerns in 2018
A thing we’re worried about: how do we message the fact that we’re a collective of teams and artists working on multiple projects under the KO_OP umbrella (and not just the GNOG studio)? Well…being more transparent like this helps! We also started a Discord for the studio so we can talk directly with folks interested in our work. We’re committed to keeping it an inclusive space for all identities and tolerate zero bullshit. Join our Discord here and hang out: https://discord.gg/jqrVCVT
2019
The major upcoming internal change for us in 2019 is legally changing our structure from a corporation that operates like a coop, into a full blown legal cooperative. That process kicks off in January and we’re very excited to continue to publicize the model with an upcoming section on our website to help folks who are thinking of starting their own game studio coop.
Throughout 2018 our audio director Omar Dabbous has been producing a BUNCH of concept tracks for each project as we believe concept music is integral to shaping each of our games. We’d like to start a KO_OP Audio Label to release his unused work, as well as our upcoming OSTs for each game.
Finally, like I said above, we’ve been bad at communication in general, but I think we’re finally at a size where even if we can’t talk about our individual games, there’s plenty of interesting stuff going on at the studio that we can be more vocal about. Something I’ve been dying to do is start a podcast about our internal work and the struggles and emotions that affect us as we’re making our games. Fingers crossed I find the time in 2019 to make it happen.
Ok thanks for reading this giant update on our work, in all honesty without your support, we’d be without jobs. Thanks to each and everyone of you who’ve played our games, talked to us, or just follows our work, it means the world to us. We hope we can wow you in 2019. Scroll down below for an overview of the art we made this past year, and follow us on
Twitter: @KOOPmode
Discord: https://discord.gg/jqrVCVT
Art from 2018
KO_OP is made up of a bunch of artists, here are some of their highlights over the past year:
Lucie Viatge
Samuel Boucher
Kyle McKernan
G.P. Lackey
see u in 2019
