Inside Gardens: From Journey, Sky & Edith Finch to a New Collaborative Game

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all of those projects in this conversation but the main impetus for this episode is that Chris and Steven are also now co-founders of a new and ambitious games company called Gardens and they just raised a large series a to go with it so we'll also be spending a good amount of time talking about what they're building and how it both expands upon and differs from some of their earlier projects so I don't know about you but I'm excited to dive in Steven Chris welcome to the Pod thank you so much for having us yeah happy to be here awesome uh well let's go ahead and start with some quick introductions um and so maybe if you could each just tell us a bit bit more about your backgrounds and as a part of that too I just have to know what your favorite game is that you've helped develop so far in your career so Chris let's start with you for this one sure um hi I'm Chris Bell I'm the co-founder CEO creative director and president uh here at Gardens um I got my start well first making a

student game called in ground school called way which pairs uh strangers up uh to go on an adventure together it's all non-verbal it's kind of like Journey before journey and that project actually got me noticed uh by that game company and got me working on Journey whereas I was a designer producer from there I went on to be the lead designer of what remained to be to the finch and after that was the lead designer of Sky Children of the light up until launch and then co-founded Gardens with Stephen and Lexi dostile so what was your favorite favorite game that you made um this is maybe a strange answer but um I I'm actually maybe most proud of my student game way and the reason for that is just because of um what it was able to achieve in such a small form um I think it actually uh leaves a great impression on players and so we can talk more about how that game works and and what it is exactly but um it's it's hard I love I love all the games I've worked on um they're all you know I I hold them in high regard in all

respects and um in various respects and I enjoyed working on them and I think and I loved working on them with those teams so um but I'm gonna go with the student game just because it's it's different and stands out in its own way awesome I like that answer and in preparation for this episode I I was actually on YouTube watching a couple interviews you did over a decade ago when you were super passionate what it was coming out so I took some notes from that well maybe we'll get back to that but Stephen how about how about you yeah yeah I um Stephen Bell I'm uh one of the co-founders also we have another co-founder Lexi dostile who's not here um so I just want to shout him out but um I am both narrative director and chief strategy officer here at Gardens we kind of wear a bunch of different hats um especially when you're a young company um I got my start I came up in like the film and TV space like I write and direct um still do a little bit um and kind of Chris and I had always like collaborated on projects together so just through his

you know working on journey I was kind of around for the tail end of Journey you know helping out a little bit like play testing talking through things getting to know like the Indie scene in La um who you know and more and more I would meet Studios and they would find out like I was a writer or whatever and they might be doing something narrative and they'd ask me to check out you know check it out and like maybe do some Consulting so forth so I kind of went from being like a story consultant games writer to narrative designer to kind of a full-fledged designer um first wrote my first Like official gig was like writing on what remains me to Finch um I bounced around did a lot of different types of you know contract work for for Studios stuff that like Annapurna put out Quantic dream um kind of all over the place um while founding Gardens I co-created this game called baseball which is very different than what we're doing here at Gardens but it's like a weird web-based Fantasy Baseball yeah ttrpg thing

um yeah and so it just kind of you know been very lucky to to work on a number of cool projects and and get to just help out really really great teams um in terms of my favorite project it's so tough uh I would say that I would have to say it's a kind of a tie um what remains Vita Finch was my first title it obviously like you know we you know we won the bafta and like that was all crazy but um just you know Season some of the fan responses there uh was amazing and our family history like so many moments and memories from our family is like all over that house like yeah that's and that goes that goes for the whole team as well it's just like it's so autobiographical in so many ways that people don't understand um so you know like if you if you're in Edith Finch and you're like creeping through the crawl space um and you look at like the AC compressor unit if you zoom in you'll see like a sticker on the compressor and

it's like that's our dad has a plumbing small plumbing and heating company and you'll see like the logo for his company on the compressor like there's just things all over the house that are just literal memories pulled you know pulled from from our family history um so that and then also baseball um baseball is such a weird thing it's such an amazing energy the the fan base and Community was so incredible and that was a thing that was just rapidly iterative um in getting immediate feedback you know sometimes within a week or two um I've never had an energy like that before so um that those two I'd probably say are my favorites okay those are great answers we'll talk more about what remains of Edith Finch in a little bit that's one of my my favorite games too so part of that fan base um but before we do that um I before we dive into that and even just get into some of more details about the new company and the new game you're working on I do want to take a bit more of a trip down memory lane here and explore some of the ideas and learnings

behind some of these earlier games and successes some of which I imagine actually help set a foundation for what you're building next and so it'd be fun to explore um some of those some of those ideas and so maybe first of all um Chris ever since you were that college student and created way and soon after that Journey it seems like you have obsessed at least a little bit about creating these like collaborative more joyous experiences that's happened to like a range of more positive emotions maybe and actions that most games don't prioritize or maybe you can correct me if I'm wrong here just kind of frame it as as you see it but I'm just curious like why have you kind of stuck with that Focus over the years because it seems like you guys also might have a similar bench with Gardens as well sure yeah you know when it comes to the games I like to design but also the games I like to play multiplayer is definitely um at the Forefront of well what we care about I think about you know the power

in in strangers coming together in the the the the opportunity of another person of what they can bring to the table and the things they can offer you and the drama that can unfold or the different kinds of experiences and so you know um you get a lot for free when you when you make a multiplayer game in a way because you you know versus being on the more of a Content driven game where you're trying to uh you know create a bunch of um experience or whatever for the player to go through or systems or what have you you know you you get a lot by just bringing this other player that that brings their whole self and whatnot into the world um so you know when I was in in college and grad school um I made uh my feet my thesis project uh was called the universal play project and the goal for that project was let's make a game that gets two strangers to become friends we couldn't we didn't really have many great examples we knew think we there was examples of things that um of like games that have some of the qualities that we were looking for but there wasn't really a specific example

that that hit on all the characteristics that we were set out to to hit and um so ultimately that that thinking and those ideas around um communication collaboration constructive play um coalesced into this game way where uh two strangers uh get paired up in a foreign world uh it's all non-verbal um and it's split screen and one player is kind of like a platform like a puzzle platformer one person's going left to right one person's going right to left and uh they can see into each other's worlds but what we don't tell you at the outset is that you see the world differently from each other and um that you actually have to communicate how you see the world differently using um non-verbal means and so um ultimately you have the experience where these two strangers meet in this foreign place where they're both kind of in need of each other and and meet each other's help to progress and uh communicate non-verbally with one another and uh to spoil it because the

game's unfortunately no longer supported the unity versions no longer supported so it's not playable currently uh when the two finally meet and that person going left to right meets meets the person going right to left because really they've been heading towards each other from opposite ends of the world been slightly metaphor towards of their different perspectives and backgrounds uh they meet in the middle they can they can hug they can hold hands they can punch each other or whatever they're using the same puppetry mechanics that they were using to communicate non-verbally but most importantly they come to a map of the world and they can draw on it for the first time and it's there where they can communicate for the first time using words and so someone might write like oh great job like that was amazing um in circle you know you know I'm in Los Angeles I mean by a Circle Los Angeles on the map but then someone else might respond in kanji or Arabic and you realize that you've been communicating with this person non-verbally the entire time over challenges only to discover um that you can that you don't even necessarily speak the same verbal language and so that's a big Epiphany for for players it's it kind of makes them take a seat back to step back and kind of observe and think about

themselves and maybe their own assumptions about uh this person they were playing with or or what it means to communicate with a stranger from around the world so um that you know a seeing the how strongly players resonated with that game um and you know uh how you know it was able to sort of conjure some of these uh moments that we that we love from online games that's what got me working on journey and uh it was pretty much a really kind of um perfect fit in a way because I was already kind of working on this game about pairing up vulnerably with a stranger and going on this adventure so Journey was like a natural extension of that and it's continued um up into this day I think you know we'll talk a bit more about the game that we're working on in a bit um but you know you talk about making like collaborative joyous experiences that's certainly true that said uh we are definitely interested in asking the question of can you create a a collaborative experience to a degree or get players to collaborate when they

don't have to or when they can potentially work against each other and can you still create like a foundation of cooperative play that inspires them to to work together and play together um in spite of maybe uh their the fact that they don't necessarily have to or it could go the other way yeah that's that's a really cool idea and just kind of seeing your your chain of how you've kind of evolved your thinking over time it's pretty interesting too because even way I would argue it's still like a pretty Innovative idea we're making like the core gameplay non-verbal Communication in some ways like that still is a pretty big powerful idea that I I don't think too many other developers have toyed around with or thought about it as much as as much as you have and so I'm curious um maybe as a follow-up here what do you think is there anything that you think is underappreciated or that other developers don't think enough about when it comes to making these types of

collaborative experiences I think you know one thing I think about is just like how do you make these games playful how do you make them expressive how do you make sure that the player has a voice and you know even though we're taking it's non-verbal these games um it's still important that you can see the player behind the Avatar and kind of understand what they're thinking or get an impression of of what they're going through or feeling so um taking like a nuanced sensitivity towards that and uh building in those expressive tools so players can you know perform for each other and kind of fill in the gaps and then um yeah just looking at the the nuances of that communication I think you know an example of a multiplayer game where uh players can work together you know non-verbally is a game like Portal 2 uh where players can use the different um they have like a tagging system where you can kind of tag objects around the environment to kind of suggest what you communicate different ideas uh just the one thing about that game that's that's you know different than whey is that um I do think in Portal 2

um there's this uh it can it can have this effect where uh one player is the more players start competing to solve the puzzle before each other yeah and that's because once a player explains the solution it's no longer interesting and so um full two ends up having this more competitive aspect so definitely something to to consider but yeah I think I think I I put a lot of emphasis on how to bring in how to make the players expressive as possible think about those expressive tools and the affordances they have and then how do we take those expressions and that playfulness and that those ways of communicating and interacting with one another and and form a game around it that's compelling that brings these people together that sends them on an emotional Journey Etc yeah super interesting and related four years ago Sky Children of the light was released and one of the the Innovative features of that game was that it made it impossible to progress without being generous um to to other players um and the game also you know has native features that help players get over

language bears and and so you know there's a bit of a motif here in that and I know that you both played a role in that game so I'm curious to hear both of your takes on just like what unique challenges or opportunities you faced in designing or building narrative around that kind of unique experience and Stephen maybe I'll start with you on this one if you have thoughts I I were I was on sky in a much more limited capacity than Chris but um just looking at it from like a narrative angle um I think the game is is beautiful and succeeds in a lot of ways I think like one challenge we faced was like okay does this need a narrative on top of it and I think it kind of it sometimes in in my opinion there's attention there um it definitely is like a spiritual sequel to Journey it it shares a lot of the same beats um um but I don't think that's exactly what the game wanted to be um I think it has bloomed in a lot of ways um since that first launch

um once once people went on that that full Arc um got to like a literal ending and then you have to invent reasons to come back right like I I think like we like I don't know if it's still there I haven't played in a while but like we rolled credits at the end of that right and I think like personally that's a mistake uh I think I can say um just because you hit an end point and then as a player you're like all right well I'm done I've finished it like why am I gonna go back and that definitely is meant to be much more of a continuously expansive experience um so finding ways to to think of narrative differently um than I think we had been is something that I think we did to a degree but you know I think that that was a lesson learned um and it's something that you know a lesson that we've learned as we move into the the project that we're making now right um I am much more interested as a narrow designer in

um kind of just burying story is deep in a virtual world as I can and letting players dig it out really trying to um create like an emergent narrative ecology we always say um build a foundation for interesting you know multiplayer stories to just emerge between players let them really Drive The Experience um that's what that's what we're setting out to do here gotcha how about eucharest any notable Reflections from that game um it took a long time to get right I actually came in uh middle of Midway through that projects development I was working on Edith Finch for a while and then um finished that game and then came over to help out on sky and I will say that when I when I joined Skye um it was still kind of a shell of a game of a game it had a lot of different pieces in it a lot of different ideas and and um characters or mechanics and whatnot but it was it was a real Challenge and

struggle to say you know what's what's really most important here what really belongs what need what stays what what needs to go away or get killed what's part of an earlier idea that never really came to fruition or you know and so coming into a project Midway where it has all these moving parts and um um is is so complex in a lot of ways uh it took a lot of time to kind of just read see through all of that understand what really mattered what was really important um and then also you know the game was also just has a lot of you know Innovations you know it's a 3D let's call it a platformer or you know flyer whatever um on phones uh doesn't those don't really exist you know trying to create like really well-controlled gameplay on a phone in a 3D moving Avatar is something that you don't really see um the the free-to-play Economy based around gifting was a you know a new um Innovation and uh it took a lot of

time to to get right you know I think there was even a a period in in the Studio's uh history where uh in that project history where it could have where it was just kind of debate or is it meant to be more of this playground this like playground experience where it's more of a Sandbox is it meant to be more of this linear experience where it's more of like a hero's journey kind of like journey and then it ends up being it ends up somewhere in the middle I think by the end uh being this kind of theme park uh like experience that we've designed so um uh lots of lots of learnings and um and challenges along the way uh but ultimately I think came together into something that that was quite uh holistic and uh successful cool if we had another hour I'd spend some more time unpacking some of the the bigger ideas here you guys have worked on a bunch of interesting games that we could spend a bunch of time on each of them but um one more question before we start talking about Gardens um

Stephen um you mentioned that you have an extensive background in writing and narrative design including for what remains Vita Finch which I mentioned is is a game that that resonated with me quite a bit and it's cool to hear some of the the lore behind you know the the you mentioned the autobiographical parts of it um and I guess for quick context for those who haven't played um but should no spoilers but the basic premise of the game is that like there's a collection of short stories that the protagonist experiences and they're all about the day that um you know someone has died in in the past and um one thing about that game that I still think about years later is how diverse of a tone all of the stories are in that game and how it makes you feel a range of emotions ultimately culminates in in a touching ending and of course all of that takes place in just one game um and so bigger picture Stephen I'm just curious like what have you learned about or leveled up in narrative design

over the years to really make the most of players going through wide-ranging stories and feeling connected to these games through you know all sorts of those different emotions I guess I I think it's just been my approach to narrow design has been like an evolving thing right as again you know just as I've developed as a designer and you know I think like the most important thing when it comes to to narrative design is um you have that relationship between the the player the virtual world and that Central mechanic that is driving the experience and um just doing whatever I can to not disrupt that relationship um I never want to pull you know like put myself in the middle of that or um pull agency away from the player I think like one one it's weird to say as an air designer but I'm like not every game needs

narrative or every game tells a story in its own kind of particular way um I think like too many games are like try to be interactive movies which I don't think can be successful uh personally um when it comes to like the things that we're building now or what I'm interested in I'm really interested in kind of like both emerging narrative whether whether systemically from like a proxim perspective or just between uh players right and so it's it's really about like I said trying to just like bury as much story if you're creating a big virtual world various much story as deep as you can you can have history and lore and all of that um but you don't need to spoon feed your audience you don't need to hammer them over the head with like a million cut scenes like let them go dig it out I think the most interesting uh experiences that I've seen in games especially from like around narrative or like you know the discoveries that players make and then go share outside

the game as they build their communities together I look at you know we look at The Works of life for me to owata whether that's like shout out to Colossus which is like my maybe favorite game of all time to Last Guardian to even like the the souls games right and I you know the souls games have like a ton of text in them I don't really read any of that ever like I'll read a little bit it's really in the environmental storytelling and stuff and often like when you do read the text it often like um is contradictory or you know some some details in the environment kind of undercut what you've read I think that's the most interesting part because then you start finding communities built outside of the game where they're speculating they're kind of filling in the gaps together um I want to leave space for the player um I'm not just trying to take them through a guided you know end-to-end call it interactive movie or what have you um I want them to feel like they are digging out story they are oh sorry that's my puppy uh they are digging out

a story they have agency um they are kind of authoring their own their own Legend all right well as I've mentioned I could talk about these games that you have worked on in the past all day but we probably should spend the majority of the conversation at least from now talking about what you're working on next uh which is um your new company Gardens and the new game that you're starting to build um over there and from what I can tell despite having been leaders on many games in the past Gardens is your first company and it's been in motion for a couple years now um and so I I just have to ask and Chris I'll start with you on this one how has it been taking on just like a new level of responsibility seeing a new type of work that's involved and um being a Founder what have your Reflections been so far yeah I mean it's been really rewarding for filling it's something that we wanted to do for a long time is start a studio and kind of create the the the culture and work environment that we that we want to show up to every

day and want to contribute to and build and grow and also you know just get to get to make the kind of games that we want to work on um we we spent a a good chunk of time just at the early outset when we first formed the company of just kind of getting things on its feet you know uh there's a lot that we didn't know there's a lot of learning that we had to do there's a lot of process and paperwork and whatnot to to get a company on its feet and so um uh there was definitely a lot there but as we progressed you know further on I can more and more my um my attention can can return to the game and to into the team and um um yeah it's been a really rewarding experience uh it's like I said it's something that we've considered for a long time so to be able to have the opportunity and to be able to have uh investors and partners that that see you know are the vision for what we're trying to grow um it means the world and um we're really excited to be able to make the most of it I gotta ask how's how is it

being co-founders as brothers um I'm enjoying it I don't know Steven it's been great like I we people joke about it a lot but you know like do you ever well great I think I can count like on one hand the amount of times like Chris and I have ever really argued um we've just always been very close and collaborated really well and I think share very similar sensibilities and similarly with our our co-founder Lexi um so it's something that we've talked about doing for a long time as Chris said um and you know after Sky launched we started you know talking about it really in Earnest and still took like I think a year and a half couple years before we actually you know pitched the studio in the game that we're we're building we we took we were just you know working other projects Consulting for people Etc and just like in off hours kind of working together to to iterate on you know not only what we wanted

the game that we're gonna make to be but the studio to be um we we got pretty far with a few different ideas and kind of kept going back to the drawing board and saying uh we like this or we like that or there's some something here but there's not enough you know the legs aren't there um until we got to the idea you know that we ultimately pitched the studio on so it was a it was about a couple of years of like real iterative design until we finally got to the point where we felt confident in you know raising Capital uh to start the the company and yeah it's been it's been amazing I mean I feel very lucky that I get to to make cool stuff you know with Chris every day and um we're learning how to you know run a company that was we definitely are leaning on the support of our partners and stuff we know what we're good at we know what we have to learn um it's definitely been a learning process but just trying to yeah just trying to build a place that we want to work at um and and you know build the game that we want to be playing in every day cool but we'll get back to some of that

but I don't want to leave the audience hanging too much let's talk about your game um and so I guess um according to your announcement materials the game is described as an ever-evolving Online PVP ve fantasy Adventure sandbox arpg there's a lot in that description so maybe could you guys unpack what you what you mean by that tell us a bit more about what you're what you're building Chris what does that mean yeah so I'll break down each of those uh individual words a little bit so you know um online so uh shared world uh playing with other players big focus on uh crossing paths with others um pvpve uh so uh there is um both collaborative and competitive mechanics in this world at play um social fantasy Adventure sandbox so it is a Sandbox game um uh very very much yeah interested in

um building a a world that players want to return to every day that we can host events in that can kind of be a forever game that becomes a place that players want to return to that players form community in that players can can grow and build go on endless adventures together and then arpg uh action RPG is what the a stands for Action um and you know I think some of these um certain online games or MMOs are a bit more um kind of like idle you know kind of you you click you wait you know that kind of thing uh we're very much interested in getting players into the the bodies of their characters in in really having this embodied play that's very tactile very warm and so a lot of the mechanics that go into the game into players working together um involve that and and so that you really feel the presence and weight of the other players you're playing with as they go on these adventures together with you yeah it's very much a a game that's inspired by I think we say this in the in the announcement but

um it's definitely it's a game that's like inspired by memories that have stuck with us playing online games over the years and it's like in particularly moments that we've shared with strangers uh Chris do you want to tell the final fantasy story sure yeah so um an example of that that I like to give is uh I was playing Final Fantasy 11 uh years and years and years ago um it was pretty much my first MMO and um I was playing that game and I was in a particular part of the world uh when it started uh to rain and uh it was a desolate part of the world not many people would travel there namely because there wasn't much mechanical incentive to be there it's not like that you would get like a lot of experience points by going there and so naturally it would end up being quite desolate and Barren but I would go and uh it started to rain and so um um I went to uh find a nearby cave to to sit and watch the rain and uh I was surprised when I found another player already sitting there and after some

time I asked them you know why are you here and they said I come to watch the rain and that was the same reason that I was there and it was became this very much this like bonding moment where we became friends and um ultimately would um uh yeah go on to adventure together yeah you know Lexi and I talk a lot about you know like the experience of playing something like World of Warcraft and kind of like being out in the wild and pulling too many mobs and like exhausting all your options and then you know just as you're about to die at the last second you know someone like a Healer crosses your path or something and saves you um and then you just you know find yourself you know partying up together and adventuring together for hours and it's like it's it's how those those new relationships form and I think like um unfortunately a lot of games today too often kind of disincentivize or even prevent those kind of interesting and uh intimate emergent moments from happening between players um so we're really trying to build something that that Fosters that again and again by Design

very cool and I guess I mean you this is a virtual world and you mentioned Chris I think you framed it as more of a forever game uh which I think is a new type of game uh for for you guys to build you can correct me if I'm wrong but I'm curious um both kind of what sent what sent you down that path to to Really choose to to build that kind of game um but also just like you know because it's different what new or Innovative design challenges are you having to tackle and think through you know in these these stages of building it out so far um yeah so I can enter maybe that last one first um we really set out to make the game that we want to play every day um it's it's a game that's uh happily inspired like Steven said of the memories of us playing online games and said how can we you know make a game that that Fosters those those moments again and again by Design

um when we think about you know online games and and Community Building you know we think about how can this thing grow and sustain itself and live on and be and be at home for players and um uh you know rather than coming out with a sequel and maybe like bifurcating the player base or you know separating the community you know just continue to grow and to extend this thing and continue to add new features continue to add new environments new mechanics new narrative Etc as we flesh out this world um I think sky as well is is intending to be a front of game in its own right uh how uh just it's very much a collaborative Cooperative game um versus you know we talked about it's one of the challenges of what we're we're creating um I think you know we're trying to make something more cooperative and competitive play Can Happen uh together and we're trying to make a world where uh no matter what player type you are uh that there's a place here for you and there's a way to contribute to this world and and be a part of it and take

action in it uh whether you're you know a warrior who wants to you know solve things with a sword or whether you're a more pacifist player who just likes to make potions and cook for people or uh whatever kind of player type you are we want to make room for you and and give you the the opportunity to play here and and find something that that really matters and means something to you I think when it comes to the challenges um creating a game that is both cooperative and competitive that ultimately you know again with PVP essentially that ultimately strives to get players to work together even though there's that PVP isn't something that we've really seen before and it's it's definitely kind of like threading a needle because you know in a lot of games you you include PVP or competition and there's a lot of opportunity for toxicity there's you know there's um once you get situations where you're reliant on a stranger to to solve something or get something done that affects your playthrough and your progression and that maybe is somehow hindered in some way you know um these negative relationships can form so there's a lot there that this

tightrope walking that we have to do and kind of think about from a systemic design perspective of how do we get players and you know despite the ability to go the other way or to work against each other to ultimately feel kind of compelled to uh to collaborate and cooperate and make those Cooperative mechanics and mechanics and experiences all the stronger um I think it's or we think that um you know yes you know I think both journey and Skye are are beautiful games um but I think there's an opportunity to create something where you know in those two games you can all you can do is help each other kind of leave each other you know and kind of go off on your own uh you can't really work against each other in any way and uh there's a real challenge to us is is can we make a game where uh players choose to work together even when they don't have to and when they can work against each other because it makes the act of them working together and helping each other all the more meaningful in our opinion so you know can we strive for that uh and that's that's something that we're working on daily can you maybe tell me a bit more about

how you're threading that needle or are there other games out there that maybe are inspiring parts of how you think about balancing cooperation competition maybe let's just dive a bit deeper yeah I think it's um for us a big part of it is is can we can we create a foundation of Cooperative mechanics and cooperative play um and a you know a varied um you know Ecology of cooperative play where uh where players you know it's kind of like a sort of situation where you're you you won't go as far your rock might run out run out sooner if you try to go things alone but if you put your faith in other people if you put them in strangers if you if you learn to to be collaborative and helpful that you'll ultimately progress further in this world and so um you know a a simple example is you know just like coming upon a castle gate and you can't open it yourself and you need someone

else they get you know ultimately what's behind that game may be you know something unique to you you know some part of your your questline or whatever but ultimately there's another player that you need and so that game where you actually have to recruit and call upon each other um to to get through these experiences hopefully lead to new relationships and to to new adventures between strangers Stephen can you maybe unpack The Narrative design side of that I'm sure you're thinking about building something new and you mentioned kind of the like the I'm forgetting the term but like the immersive world that you know it's it's yeah yeah it's kind of like emergent narrative yeah I I mean we really want the the players themselves to be authoring the experience and to be you know the main drivers of um the dramatic moments that are happening you know again and again um we have some fairly Innovative features and and systems that I don't know that I can talk about yet but like um our world kind of by Design offers

new opportunities and and experiences every time you play um so that alone lends to a lot of just exploration and Discovery um and you know uh so it goes back to like I said you know kind of just like creating a world that feels rich with history and lore and secrets and you know um a feeling of like dormant magic in the world that you want to dig out and awaken so that you're encouraged you know just continuously continuing to to find ways to to give players these you know sometimes big sometimes mini calls to Adventure to encourage them out um it is you know uh not supposed to make Tolkien references but it is very much like a game of like strangers to coming together to form like little fellowships and go on you know adventures together and that might be a Cooperative one that might be a competitive encounter um

but you know Finding ways to just like give them opportunities for play uh without forcing them down a certain line and just like if we can continue to give them opportunities they'll seek out the kinds of experiences that they they want and then it's our job to support that and that it goes back to like can you have different you know tones and and things like that I think like if it's you build something holistically if it's you know you you want a sense of very similitude into the terms of like in terms of like your adventuring and stuff but like also like lean into the playfulness of it lean into the Jank a little bit of it and players will kind of run with you um and so we're definitely you know looking to kind of strike a fine balance there so that players can seek out the kinds of experiences that they want um in building a world that you know will just kind of like organically support that while also something that continued to be expanded over time and um you know we have there's a bunch of you know secret lore that I can't get

into but like creating a space that feels magical that feels ever expansive that you are kind of continuing to discover continuing to coax magic out of um that's the goal well that sounds exciting and I look forward to learning more um one day and experiencing that for myself um but I guess kind of Switching gears to talking a bit more about the business side of this too because you know as Founders you're not just building a game you're building a business too it was announced recently that your that you raised a series a which was 31.3 million dollars um it was co-led by our partners at Lightspeed uh with involvement from many others and so my first question here is why go so big that's a big raise like can you maybe just unpack the some of like why be so ambitious so so early on what are you thinking here in terms of that from the business side yeah yeah we raised the way we did to meet the

ambition of the the project in the studio um the the vision that we have for it um it is an ambitious project we want to be able to scale up to to fully execute that um we you know we're going to be as like our announcement noted you know we're hiring again we're going to be continuing to scale up over the coming years um but you know and and this is meant to be something that lives on Beyond launch and continues to expand and offer new experiences to be online so just so you also to be able to support that uh it's not just it's not just the capital that we brought in but also like the support from you know our co-leads at Lightspeed and crafting to we have a number of other um you know companies and angels that that came in that are offer all sorts of different talents and expertise to help us build out this Vision um and yay I think like games are expensive this is an ambitious title uh we wanted to make sure that we

were bringing in enough Runway to support the studio I think like unfortunately you're seeing you know a lot of stories of like Studio closures and layoffs um we want we have a responsibility to our team to take care of them you know to protect them we want to be building this with them for many many years to come um so building in real you know solid runway for the studio allowing us to go after world-class talent and retain them um you know when we just looked at our goals for where we wanted you know what we wanted this video to be what we wanted for the project where we wanted to go um it just kind of made sense to to really go after it with this race maybe a follow-up to that your investor list is sort of a who's who of not just VCS but also you know companies and leading Executives from many if not most of the industry's leading platforms and companies it seems like and so I mean for one congrats on building a great

um team of investors that that have your back but I'm also just curious um how did you decide who to add to the cap table like what is this wide range of elite investors like tangibly bring to you as a studio can you maybe just unpack a bit more like how you thought about you know bringing all of these you know impressive people on what are you what are you really unlocking there yeah I'll I'll take the first part of that Kristen you can kind of jump in um I mean one it's it's it's kind of a reflection of the game we're making too right it's like we're making definitely making we're making a game about strangers with different backgrounds and talents coming together to you know try to create something new and create Magic together um we definitely try to approach the the round that way um I think whether that's like looking at you know bringing in uh a blue chip investment firm like Lightspeed that has

like real Global presence that can help us um kind of scale the company um from you know advice from like a corporate governance angle um that'll be there like doing the Nitty Gritty with us day to day um to someone like Grafton who has you know experience launching one of the biggest games in the world live Ops experience go to market support um even things like localization or large-scale play testing things like that dream Haven you know who will do everything from help us like scaling the company hiring to providing design feedback fun plus who will help with you know play testing similarly like to someone like Crafton you know the other BC firms like transcend and tiered up who bring both like real industry experience understanding how games get made how you know can provide industry insights there but also how to scale a company

um just down the line to our cross-media partners things like that we we want this to be a global franchise we have a lot of aspirations for for things that we can do with this title and with the world that we're creating um so finding you know partners that have done it before that know how to do the things that we don't know how to do yet and that can help lend their support there as well as like our you know our advisory team like just even starting to build relationships with the different major platforms um um or have insight into how they operate and things like it's all it's extremely useful and really really valuable and uh when it came to deciding who to bring in it really comes down to you know not only the you know can they provide capital or what kind of complimentaries value can they bring but like do they understand the vision do they see not only what we want the game to be but how we want to grow the studio how we want to build you know we talk a lot about like

sustainable Collective growth we want to build ambitious games in a healthy way um and you know we brought in partners that really keyed into that and really uh embraced that that um that Vision so um now we're just constantly asking them for help I guess that'll just be what we do every day um but so far you know they've been more than willing to jump in there with us and lend their expertise that makes a lot of sense and that's a great position to be in Chris is there anything else you want to add to that I think that was well put um you know it's really just been about coming you know bringing together a set of partners that bring complimentary value that can help us whether it's with you know running a live service game at scale to publishing to grow it to growing a team to managing maintaining and managing culture to platform relations like oh These Are all uh things that that are really important critical to A Game's success and so to

have um to have people in our camp that um have been through these gauntlets before that have that have that have dealt with these problems before have been come and have come out successful on the other side of it um is really is it's just a great um uh gift and uh we we have already gotten a lot of help from from our partners in terms of getting the company on his feet and getting to where we are with this raise great final fundraising question from me I I imagine that we have many listeners who you know might who might one day start a company for themselves you know are going to be excited about you know building a team around a new game that they're excited about but we'll also have to go through a bunch of you know fundraising you know figuring out documents all of those you know starting a company details for the first time uh like like you guys have uh so I'm just curious like over whether it's fundraising related or just something

else related to the the nitty-gritty details of of starting a business um what have you learned or wish you knew um two years ago that might be helpful for someone else listening um I don't know if there's one piece of advice that like I or one thing that I learned um there's so many things that I've learned over the course of the last two years um I think one you know understanding the deal making process uh is something that I wish I was more versed in um you kind of just feel like or at least we felt like we were just stumbling our way through it kind of fumbling the ball forward again and again and again um you know I read Venture deals like 10 times and but you can only that only helps so much you know it's helpful but you know and like you can Google as much as you want but until you're in it like there's a lot of things that happen very quickly you know to go negotiation tactics that you're not necessarily

keyed into or like lingo that's thrown around so uh it's just kind of a trial by fire thing um so you learn a lot just going through the process um starting a company there's just like so much to do all the time um the only advice I have is like I constantly just ask stupid questions like even if I think I know the answer I'm constantly asking it as just just making sure that I am buttoned up on everything um and you know that I do it all the time but it's it's why we pull together like the partners that we wanted to get right it was something that we knew like we're new to starting a company we like that would be the one knock against us right where that would like the The Experience side of things um so you know leaning on people that you can trust that um have been there before or that understand it and I can just ask as many questions as possible

um you're gonna make mistakes but you know if you have a team around you that like is willing to like you know lend a hand they'll uh you'll get through it it's just the funding side of things is is I think it's changed a lot too over the last couple years um you know we raised seed with like a PowerPoint presentation uh I think like fortunately we had worked on a number of titles that brought some credibility and stuff um we definitely took our time before like I said before we raised um we had a full vision for the thing that we wanted to build um so that we could lean on both like the games that we had made before and then a picture of the thing that we wanted to make and be able to answer you know what are our what's our picture for modernization how does this thing expand what is like what is five years ten years down the line look like for this thing um rather than just going like hey we want to make a game you know can you

give us money um we made sure that we were at least buttoned up on that aspect from the design angle you know so forth so that we could um at least you know get people to buy into the vision of it and then when it came time to to do series a as we saw the kind of like environment shifting and the market getting a lot tougher um we could you know we realized like we really need to be able to put something in people's hands that they could jump into and play you know so we we built a you know uh a prototype demo we were still in prototyping but we built like a playable prototype that we just brought to potential investors at GDC and just sat down with them behind closed doors and then we just let them jump into it um being able to just let them experience it and get a glimpse of what you're making even if it's not the whole thing but to get the feeling of what the thing is um I think can be very powerful um because if we didn't have that you know

I don't know how we would raise today we'll have two or three more final questions that we can kind of quickly hit on before we wrap up but Chris I want to give you a chance to answer that question too if you want to add anything yeah I mean Steven talked about uh asking a lot of stupid questions uh you know I think we've we uh It's a Small industry and uh you know we've been able to uh have uh formulations with um a number of great people uh that have been able to coach us through this so I would say lean on those networks uh that you're able to connect with put things in front of them in front of them even if they're not ready so that you can get feedback and you can iterate forward uh when you go to have those pitches uh maybe save the more precious what you know partners and whatnot that you're looking to pitch to uh for later so that you can get some trial tries at pitching with some of the other parties and and learn what kind of questions they have learn learn what sort of gaps are in

your presentation uh so that when it comes down to when it comes time to present to uh the people that you really care about uh you're all buttoned up so that's just the words of wisdom yeah build build more decks so that you can go oh I have have a deck for that and then pull it out when they ask a question they love that great advice lots of decks um so maybe a couple questions before we end um you mentioned earlier in the conversation how you want to build games in a sustainable way where you can create positive experiences for all types of players but also for all the people who are working with you too and so in the Press materials I think one of you says and I quote we are also named Gardens after the way that we make our games we believe in sustainable Collective growth that means sharing a responsibility to care for one another and crafting our ambitious games in a healthy way so could you maybe just share a bit more about how you're uniquely designing your company culture

and whether there's like any like experiences from the past that just kind of melded and shaped the way that you're thinking about building this business differently yeah I'll jump in first I I do I want to say like I don't think we are uniquely doing anything I think that there are a lot of really great Studios that are also trying to build things uh in a more sustainable Manner and we like constantly trying to learn from them um we are constantly like as Chris mentioned you know been fortunate to be building up a network of other founders of other Studios sharing ideas together like I think like if if a bunch of us succeed then you know things can be done differently um uh it's not just a competitive thing here um so sharing best practices um we we've a lot of the things that we've gotten credit for we were ideas that we incorporated from that other Studios were doing that we incorporated

and then kind of put our own spin on or what have you um and then are willing to you know share that with others because I think like if you're going to see change happen in the industry it has to be repeatable um and it has to be successful at scale um so so I would just say like we're not unique there I think like when it comes to how we're trying to do things it's it's an ever-evolving process we are trying to scale a globally distributed Studio there are challenges with that how you maintain you know collaboration and communication and so forth as you have people all around the world um you know we try to things that we do try to do you know we we really try to to make sure that the team is working like sustainable working hours gets time away from work because you know you're going to have deadlines you're you're you're you're you're working with people including yourself that like are passionate about the things that you're making you're gonna put the work in at times and like it's our job to make sure that you're getting rest you're getting you know you're going away from it so that you can be inspired again and come

back to it with fresh eyes um you know we we do things like practice pay transparency at the company like everybody in the studio knows what everybody else makes um I don't know why that is like considered to be like uh I don't know I don't know if controversial is the right word but like it it just seems obvious to me like people know unless you know they know that they're being treated fairly they know that they they have they they can chart their own paths for promotion and advocate for themselves we're trying to attract world-class talent and keep them here so that we can be successful um and so you know the more that we can just do to treat our teammates the way that we want to be treated I think like will put us in a position to succeed we've all experienced like crunch culture and burnout up close I've seen people that I love dearly leave the industry who are like massive talents um any you know and it's just like or just just wonderful people and and that

is a a real loss to the industry so anything that we can do to just continue to get better at you know how we treat one another um you know we're committed to doing love it final question for you Chris I know it's still early and you're you're all working hard hacking away at game number one but let's zoom into the future for a moment in 10 to 15 years or you can pick your time period what does Gardens look like what are you ultimately building towards here yeah so um you know the game that we're working on this this meant to be the forever game is meant to be the financial spine of the company and with that something that can continue to grow and expand over time uh for many many years down the road I mean you look at something like World of Warcraft or any you know these games that are that are upwards of a decade or two you know um it's possible and um I was just you know I just was playing World of Warcraft so a couple weeks ago um uh not to say that we're building

that game but um you know it's it's about having something uh the center this this one project that we're talking about you know this should be at this point in the future uh you know we would have many years behind it it would it would it would be uh bigger and bigger than how it it started we'd still continue to host events in that world and bring players into it and continue to remix and transform and use it as a place to try out new ideas and and have it be a place where we can experiment uh with a community of scale and then having other projects in parallel with that so uh you know after this project is out while we'll continue to grow it we'll probably spin up a second team maybe and then down the road maybe a third team and you know looking at have being a multi-project studio uh with you know two maybe three things in parallel um at any one time very cool final final question um for you guys um I imagine I know you're hiring you're going to be hiring and there's people out there who might want to work with you guys and also too just people who

have enjoyed games that you've helped make in the past are probably interested um and um staying aware of you know the updates here for those who want to stay in the know or get in touch in some kind of way how should they where should they go how should they reach out yeah so our website has our contact info it's www.gardens.dev Dev as in developer uh you can also go on Twitter where we're Gardens Gardens devs on Twitter um but that's those are the kind of the two places to to hit us up in the future we'll probably open up a Discord and and go that route but for now our Twitter or our hello email is uh to approach us yeah yeah we definitely will definitely be bringing out more in the near term I think like it was a lesson that we've learned from previous games you know baseball what have you um I want we want to be deving a bit more in public I don't really believe like going away for five to seven years and just developing

something in The Silo is really the future for development I think like you want to build your community pull people in make you know like do play tests just just kind of start to to get the game on its feet before you're even at like an alpha or an early access or what have you um so we will be bringing things out whether that's you know Discord or what have you just to start building it up more but for now yeah the website or the Twitter awesome well Chris Steven the shower has been an absolute Joy I can't wait to keep on following Gardens and what you're working on and learning more and and playing um eventually too so that's going to be a bunch of fun but for now thank you both so much for hopping on a play test yeah thank you thanks Aaron [Music] today's episode whether on YouTube or your favorite podcast app make sure to like subscribe comment or give a five star review and if you want to reach out

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