Time
Company
Documents about Time
Thomas Brush35 min
Being A Solo Dev Is Horrifying — Full Time Game Dev Podcast Ep. 003
Transitioning to full-time independent game development requires a fundamental shift from a passion-driven creative mindset to a disciplined, entrepreneurial approach.
- Transitioning to full-time independent development requires shifting from a creative-only mindset to an entrepreneurial approach that treats game projects as professional business ventures.
- Developers should validate niche concepts through rigorous market research, SEO analysis, and audience surveys before committing significant resources to production.
- Securing visibility in a saturated market is best achieved by integrating the community into the development process, such as involving streamers in voice acting or content creation.
Thomas BrushJun 2022
Thomas Brush61 min
The Married, Full Time Indie Dev Team — Full Time Game Dev Podcast Ep. 002
Operating as a full-time, married indie development team, Black Tabby Games demonstrates a sustainable model for independent production through the creation of the episodic narrative horror title Scarlet Hollow.
- Black Tabby Games sustains long-term project viability by treating marketing as a holistic, ongoing practice that prioritizes deep community integration over traditional press coverage.
- The team drives recurring revenue and wishlist growth by utilizing Early Access and episodic releases, supplemented by consistent Patreon support and A/B testing of store assets.
- The studio maintains complex narrative depth in 'Scarlet Hollow' by using a tracking system that monitors ten character variables across five axes to influence evolving relationship dynamics.
Thomas BrushJun 2022
Thomas Brush43 min
He Quit His Job To Make A Game — Full Time Game Dev Podcast Ep. 001
Transitioning from a stable engineering career into full-time independent game development requires a disciplined approach to financial planning and risk management.
- Transitioning to full-time independent game development requires a personal financial buffer to mitigate the risks of project delays and the high probability that a title will not achieve profitability.
- Market viability should be validated before committing full-time by securing crowdfunding, publisher interest, or a dedicated social media following.
- Developers can build an audience by leveraging nostalgia and established genre aesthetics to create a recognizable identity for their project.
Thomas BrushJun 2022
PocketGamer.biz22 min
Boost Engagement in Your Game by Supercharging Live Ops With Time-based Machine Learning
Machine learning serves as a powerful tool for mobile game developers to enhance player engagement, retention, and monetization through personalized experiences.
- Effective machine learning in gaming relies on event-based data—such as session starts, wins, losses, and spending—rather than static demographic data, to predict future player behavior based on past patterns.
- Predictive modeling should focus on achievable, short-term goals like seven-day engagement or churn rather than attempting to predict long-term metrics like 365-day lifetime value within the first few minutes of play.
- The most predictive features are discovered by mapping player events onto a timeline, allowing models to identify specific moments of friction or engagement that influence retention.
PocketGamer.bizJun 2022
Thomas Brush91 min
Starting A Full Time Indie Game Studio At 20 YEARS OLD
Establishing a successful indie game studio requires a strategic balance between creative ambition and the pragmatic humility to seek mentorship.
- Commercial viability in a saturated market is best achieved by pairing proven gameplay mechanics with a distinct visual style to target niche audiences rather than competing directly with AAA studios.
- Achieving significant sales benchmarks, such as surpassing 100,000 units, requires persistent iteration, high review scores, and a long-term commitment to project scalability rather than relying on an initial launch spike.
- Crowdfunding campaigns should avoid the common pitfalls of over-promising on stretch goals or platform-specific ports, as these commitments often lead to technical debt and compromised product quality.
Thomas BrushMay 2022
Game Developers Conference63 min
How a Time Loop Influenced 'Deathloop's' Narrative Design
Deathloop centers on the integration of a non-linear time loop structure with player-driven narrative progression.
- To reinforce the theme of being trapped in a cycle, narrative designers categorized content into two types: reactive systems (radio calls, floating messages) that provide a sense of progression through persistent memory, and static content (notes, tapes, overheard conversations) that emphasizes the repetitive, unchanging nature of the loop.
- The game forces players to kill eight visionaries within a single day to break the loop, creating an 'impossible' task that serves as the core narrative driver and justifies the necessity of the time-loop mechanic.
- To ensure players feel the weight of the loop, the team designed the antagonist, Julianna, as a persistent-memory guide and sounding board, allowing for snarky, non-repeating banter that evolves as the player progresses.
Game Developers ConferenceMay 2022
PocketGamer.biz17 min
Increase Engagement, Stickiness & Revenue Opportunities with Real-Time Voice & Video
The integration of real-time voice and video into 3D gaming environments serves as a primary driver for increased user engagement, platform stickiness, and revenue growth.
- Integrating real-time voice and video into 3D environments increases user engagement and platform stickiness by enabling features like spatial audio and photorealistic human video streaming.
- The infrastructure supports over one million concurrent users per session and currently handles 50 billion minutes of traffic per month across hundreds of mobile applications.
- Latency and packet loss are minimized by using AI-driven routing through a global network of selective forwarding unit routers, bypassing the inefficiencies of public internet paths.
PocketGamer.bizApr 2022
PocketGamer.biz40 min
Panel: Living the Dream: How will the Metaverse Look in ten Years Time?
The metaverse is currently a nascent, multi-faceted concept rather than a singular destination, poised to evolve over the next decade into an intuitive, interconnected ecosystem.
- The metaverse is expected to evolve over the next decade from fragmented, proprietary platforms into a decentralized, interoperable ecosystem similar to the transformative impact of the smartphone.
- Market evolution is being driven by consumer demand for seamless cross-platform experiences and true digital ownership rather than top-down corporate mandates.
- Future technological development will likely shift beyond current virtual reality hardware to incorporate advanced neural interfaces for more immersive engagement.
PocketGamer.bizMar 2022
Extra Credits9 min
Why Time Loops Work Best in Video Games - Extra Credits
Video games provide a uniquely effective medium for time loop narratives because they align the player’s experience of trial and error with the protagonist’s in-game reality.
- Time loops uniquely align the player’s real-world trial-and-error process with the protagonist’s in-game experience, turning failure into a narrative-integrated tool for discovery.
- Unlike traditional games where death is a disconnected failure state, time loop mechanics transform repeated resets into a core pillar of character growth and progression.
- The genre fosters deep world mastery by requiring players to learn schedules and character behaviors, as demonstrated in titles like Majora’s Mask, Elsinore, and Outer Wilds.
Extra CreditsMar 2022
Game Developers Conference21 min
Visual Effects Bootcamp: Bringing Feature Film Effects to Real Time VR: Part 2
This presentation explores technical strategies for achieving high-fidelity, feature-film-quality visual effects within real-time virtual reality (VR) environments.
- Achieving feature-film visual fidelity in VR at 90 frames per second requires shifting from geometry-heavy assets to mathematical optimization through advanced shader programming.
- Complex visual effects like hyperspace travel and CRT-style glitching can be simulated using layered shader parameters and noise functions rather than traditional high-poly assets.
- Binary world transitions and scene changes can be executed seamlessly by using cell noise as a threshold to drive object transformation, eliminating the need for traditional camera cuts.
Game Developers ConferenceDec 2021
Game Developers Conference64 min
Real-Time Cloth Solutions on 'Marvel's Spider-Man'
Real-time cloth simulation in Marvel’s Spider-Man serves as a critical component for achieving dynamic, responsive character movement within an open-world environment.
- Insomniac Games used a hybrid cloth solution for 'Marvel's Spider-Man' that combined real-time Havok physics simulation with corrective blend shapes to achieve high-fidelity movement while maintaining performance.
- The team addressed the lack of cloth-to-cloth collision in the engine by using strategically placed collision capsules and limiting cloth complexity to prevent clipping issues.
- To achieve specific visual targets, the team used a three-tier approach: simulated blend shapes for initial poses, real-time cloth for dynamic follow-through, and additional corrective blend shapes for final polish.
Game Developers ConferenceDec 2021
GameMakers9 min
Moonton's Mobile Legends: Bang Bang Secrets to Success! With Chief Designer Skyhook
The success of Mobile Legends: Bang Bang is rooted in a design philosophy that balances the high-stakes strategy of Real-Time Strategy (RTS) games with the immediate, visceral satisfaction of action-oriented gameplay.
- Mobile Legends: Bang Bang achieved success by distilling complex PC-based MOBA mechanics into a mobile-first experience that lowers the barrier to entry while maintaining a high skill ceiling.
- The development team prioritized accessibility by removing high-friction mechanics like last-hit requirements and implementing screen locking to simplify operational complexity.
- Core gameplay design focuses on a hybrid model where visceral action mechanics provide immediate engagement, while deep strategic layers ensure long-term player retention.
GameMakersSep 2021