0:00 All right, what's up everyone? Welcome 0:02 back to the Creative Juice podcast. 0:04 Today's episode is a special one. My 0:06 guests are Eddie and Joel from Team 0:08 Gauntlet, the UFN studio behind Kraken, 0:11 one of the most cinematic and ambitious 0:13 Fortnite experiences we have seen so 0:15 far. And their story goes way deeper 0:18 than just one successful map. These guys 0:20 have been building together since they 0:21 were kids, making little games, 0:24 animations, and edits long before 0:26 Fortnite or UFN even existed. That 0:28 creative partnership eventually turned 0:30 into Team Gauntlet and then into Kraken, 0:33 a game that didn't just launch and win 0:35 instantly. It struggled. [music] 0:38 It sat quietly and then everything 0:40 changed. 0:41 >> We had an okay launch and then it kind 0:42 of just went to zero and we were like, 0:43 "Okay, I guess that one's like dead on 0:45 to the next one." Just like overnight, 0:47 the algorithm like picked it up and we 0:50 just like skyrocketed to 70k players. 0:52 >> And then later there is a moment that 0:54 still feels unreal. A casual 0:56 conversation turns into Disney reaching 0:58 out, not because of hype, but because 1:01 they were already fans of the game. 1:03 >> Someone was like, "Oh, these like Disney 1:05 guys want to talk to you cuz they love 1:06 the Kraken." And I was like, "Oh, that 1:08 that's cool." Yeah. They were just like 1:10 huge Kraken fans and they were like, "We 1:12 just want like a similar thing for our 1:14 IP and we think that would be really 1:16 cool." 1:16 >> All right, let's jump into the episode. 1:19 >> This is Creative Juice. 1:21 >> I think we're live. How's it going, 1:23 fellas? 1:24 >> Hey, man. Thanks for having us. 1:25 >> Hello. How are you, man? 1:27 >> I'm doing well. I'm doing well, man. I 1:28 appreciate you guys coming on the 1:30 podcast. I know, you know, I met Joel 1:32 previously and I met you guys like back 1:34 at like Unreal Fest. We had talked for a 1:36 little bit. Um, but man, I loved what 1:38 you guys did with your game Kraken. And 1:40 we got some new news about uh you guys 1:42 be working with Disney on your new game 1:44 that we're going to get into. So, I'm 1:45 super excited to have you Eddie and 1:47 Joel. But yeah, let's just get into it 1:49 >> for sure. 1:50 >> All right. So before like we get into 1:52 the studio and and the success like I 1:55 want to start at the very beginning 1:56 because the origin story is honestly 1:59 great. Like I I actually kind of you 2:00 guys kind of gave me a nugget. I want I 2:02 want to hear more of this. So like you 2:03 told me you two were making a little 2:05 games and animations together when you 2:07 were 8 years old. I love that. Like can 2:10 you take me back to the moment of how 2:12 those early experiments turned into Team 2:14 Gauntlet today? 2:15 >> Yeah. Yeah. So, me and Eddie have kind 2:16 of known each other since we were like 2:19 three years old, I think. Uh, yes. Very 2:22 long time. Yeah, we're very good 2:24 friends. Um, and we've kind of we used 2:26 to get around to each other's houses and 2:28 kind of make little games with like Game 2:29 Maker Studio and just like mess around 2:31 with all these little programs. Like we 2:33 would make like music with FL Studio and 2:36 like kind of like make little edits of 2:37 us like doing like wizard battles with 2:39 like all these like cool effects and 2:41 stuff when we were super young. Um, and 2:44 yeah, we've kind of like always tried to 2:46 find ways to work together. Like we 2:48 started a few side hustles and um, yeah, 2:50 I think like UFN was just such an 2:52 awesome opportunity that finally like 2:54 brought us together cuz we always had 2:55 like kind of successful careers going 2:58 on. We were always trying to do stuff 2:59 together. Um, and yeah, it's kind of all 3:03 worked out and it's super fun. 3:05 >> Yeah. I think I think the thing that was 3:07 really hard for us is we've always 3:09 wanted to work together and we've had 3:11 sort of adjacent careers where Joel has 3:13 worked in visual effects and I've worked 3:15 in creative production, but it was 3:17 really hard to have a single moment 3:19 where we could sort of step away from 3:21 those careers and be like, "Okay, now is 3:23 the time." Because prior to this, we 3:25 would like 3D print something on Etsy 3:27 and try and sell that during co and and 3:30 stuff like that. And Joel was always 3:32 giving me little PowerPoint 3:33 presentations in our living room being 3:35 like, "This is going to be the thing." 3:37 And it was never the thing. And then 3:39 finally, yeah, one day we uh we lived 3:42 together in in London and we were sort 3:43 of working overseas on visas, so it was 3:45 like less flexible, but we came back to 3:46 Australia and UFN landed and and it all 3:49 kind of started from there. We had some 3:51 early success and we just kept going. 3:52 >> Dude, that that is wild, man. You guys 3:54 knew each other since you were three. So 3:56 you guys went to the same school. You 3:57 guys live near each other? 3:58 >> Yeah. Yeah, we did that. Still live near 4:01 each other. Still live together. Can can 4:03 never escape. I've tried many times to 4:06 keep ending up back together. 4:08 >> No, I I I think that is fascinating 4:10 though because 4:11 it's really hard to be a solo developer 4:14 and when you're like working with a 4:16 close friend and like can build together 4:18 and learn off each other and like know 4:20 what your skills, you know, each like 4:21 complement each other, that's like, you 4:24 know, a secret sauce almost like that. 4:26 So like that that's that's so wild. Like 4:28 I I want to dig a little more into that. 4:31 So like a lot of people mess around 4:33 creatively when they're young, but like 4:35 very few actually take a leap and build 4:38 something real. So like what pushed you 4:40 from messing around with ideas as kids 4:42 to actually building and shipping real 4:44 games inside of Fortnite? Like was there 4:46 this moment where you realized this 4:47 could be a studio and not just 4:48 [clears throat] like a hobby? 4:49 >> Yeah, so I guess like um like me and my 4:52 buddy Alex, we were working in London in 4:54 the VFX industry. So like working on 4:56 movies and TV shows like like stuff like 4:58 The Witcher, the Pokemon movie, that 5:00 kind of thing. 5:01 >> Wow. 5:02 >> Yeah. So So our background is actually 5:04 like film and TV. Um and we were all 5:06 kind of living in London, me, Alex, and 5:08 Eddie. And we kind of ended up moving 5:10 back to Australia all at the same time 5:11 and it was like exactly when UFN came 5:13 out. So like we all were kind of 5:16 unemployed. Well, Eddie was employed, 5:17 but me and Alex were unemployed and we 5:19 were kind of just like, let's just give 5:20 this thing a go. Like it's our skill 5:22 set. Like we we hadn't really played 5:24 much Fortnite before, so we thought like 5:26 I mean like I'd used Unreal Engine but 5:28 never really played much Fortnite or 5:30 tried like Fortnite creative and I was 5:31 like, "Oh man, they're like you can make 5:33 games and get paid for it. Like let's 5:34 just give this thing a go." Like we're 5:35 just sitting around. 5:37 >> Yeah. 5:37 >> Um Yeah. And then uh we made our first 5:39 game, Rocket Run, and we put like so 5:41 much effort into it. We spent like 3 5:43 months on it, like built all this custom 5:45 stuff and then like did this awesome 5:47 trailer and then we kind of like pushed 5:48 it live and it was like it just didn't 5:50 really like land with the players, but 5:52 like Tim Sweeney shared it and like it 5:54 was yeah like it did well on like 5:56 Twitter and in the community and I was 5:57 like oh yeah, we're going to we're going 5:59 to like take over this whole space and 6:01 then like it just kind of just flopped 6:03 and then we kind of just like had like 6:05 all these like games just like flopping 6:07 and we were just like maybe we don't 6:08 really understand the the like audience 6:11 and the community and And then I think 6:12 we kind of had like a hit with um one of 6:14 our tycoon games, Rapid Tycoon, and we 6:17 we kind of made a bit of money and then 6:18 I remember I like took Eddie on a walk 6:20 and I was like, "Dude, I think we can 6:22 actually like make money here and like 6:23 make games and just have fun and um like 6:25 tried to convince him to get involved." 6:27 And then when Eddie got involved, he's 6:28 got like that kind of analytical mind 6:30 that kind of helped us make like 6:32 consistent money cuz me and me and Alex 6:34 were like creatives and we're just like 6:36 jamming and like making these these 6:37 games, but Eddie's like, "Man, how can 6:39 we like turn this into a business?" when 6:40 we came together when it kind of started 6:42 working as Yeah. So that's 6:44 >> I think I think it's so funny that your 6:46 recollection is you were trying to 6:47 convince me cuz I feel like I was trying 6:48 to convince you cuz at that point you 6:50 had had some success and had gone from 6:52 like you guys were just playing with 6:54 games to you guys had made like quite a 6:56 lot of money and I was like all right 6:57 how do I get in on this and I remember 6:59 having this important moment where I was 7:01 kind of being like oh how can I get 7:03 involved and Joel said to me I don't 7:06 know if we like really need like a 7:08 marketing guy or something along those 7:09 lines and no offense to marketing people 7:12 but I was sort of like, hang on, I think 7:14 I can offer a bit more than that. And 7:16 that kind of motivated me to learn verse 7:18 and to really start to study like all 7:20 the Fortnite players and patterns and 7:22 what they enjoy and learning UFN and 7:24 stuff. And made some of my own maps. 7:26 There was a meta where there was like 7:27 kind of like box fights and meme maps. 7:29 And I had this moment where I was like 7:31 I'd never really made something. Um, I'd 7:34 kind of always been like a producer or 7:36 like an account manager or like a sales 7:38 or business development person. So, I'd 7:40 never been a creator and I was kind of 7:42 like unsure if I could actually do it. 7:44 And then I launched these sort of meme 7:46 maps at the start and immediately got 7:47 like 10,000 players on on one of them. 7:49 And I think Joel was a bit unhappy with 7:51 me because he had spent so long trying 7:52 to do well and I just did a meme map and 7:54 it did well straight away. And then I 7:56 just quit my job and then we were off 7:57 and running and we were like, "What's 7:58 next?" And that's kind of how we got 8:00 into Kraken. 8:01 >> Dang, that is that is wild. And 8:03 marketing is very important by the way. 8:05 [laughter] 8:06 >> It's a good skill set. 8:08 >> Yeah. 8:08 >> Yeah. I think like what what annoyed me 8:10 was like me and me and Alex were like 8:12 super like creative like trying to like 8:14 make these like triple game AAA games 8:16 and then like um Eddie just like came in 8:19 and he made this game called like 8:20 kitchen box fights where 8:23 >> we got to leak the name of the map. Hang 8:25 on. 8:25 >> All right. 8:26 >> Cut that out. Cut that out. [laughter] 8:28 >> No. No. 8:28 >> But it was like it was like your 8:29 superpower was like oven and it was like 8:32 [laughter] 8:33 >> oh man like half of the powers didn't 8:35 even work. It was like you get a spatula 8:37 and it teleports you and it just like 8:38 broke the map. And then I watched people 8:41 on YouTube playing it and I was like, 8:43 man, the UI is like at the total wrong 8:45 place and none of this works. But they 8:47 were into it. I think it's Yeah, that 8:48 definitely taught us a lot about like 8:50 how people actually interact with the 8:52 content. Yeah. 8:53 >> Yeah. Well, I think you made more money 8:55 than we had made in like an entire year 8:57 on this one. 8:59 >> Man, what is this space, man? 9:01 >> Honestly, there's so many creators 9:02 listening right now that are feeling 9:03 that too, right? There was just those 9:06 games and especially at the box PVP meme 9:09 time like a few months after UFN came 9:11 out like a year they were just there was 9:13 one after another were coming out. It 9:14 was but again that's like good market 9:16 analysis like you're checking out what's 9:18 what's popular. Not to mention like when 9:21 you're learning this space like box 9:22 fights those those kind of maps are 9:24 really good to start off with because 9:26 you like especially if you don't know 9:27 Fortnite as well because it forces you 9:30 to learn Fortnite and building and 9:32 learning what the weapons people players 9:33 like. Plus, it's just a little easier to 9:35 create. 9:36 >> Yeah. And I think what I think what a 9:38 lot of creators, especially some of the 9:40 newer creators, might not sort of 9:42 appreciate as much as we've both come 9:44 from backgrounds where production has a 9:45 really really long lead time. Like 9:47 you're taking months to build something 9:49 and then there's multiple levels of 9:51 stakeholders and and agencies and people 9:53 shipping it and then you don't even have 9:55 any connection to the people using it 9:57 other than maybe some analytics. And 9:59 then you jump into Fortnite Creative and 10:01 you're making something, shipping 10:03 something. And it's cool because the 10:04 sort of audience likes to record 10:06 themselves on YouTube playing it. So, 10:07 you're seeing people hands-on playing 10:09 the game in like you can almost do the 10:11 whole thing in like a week. And that was 10:12 just insane at the start. We just like 10:14 couldn't believe that level of sort of 10:17 turnaround to actually seeing hands-on 10:19 experience and getting that feedback. 10:20 And I think that really was a big moment 10:22 of like, wow, we can really make 10:24 something good with this level of 10:26 understanding. 10:27 >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I mean that that's the 10:29 big draw, right, of UGC and and Fortnite 10:32 uh UFN. It's just like you can make a 10:34 game really quick and stand it up and 10:35 and get it in front of players. I mean, 10:38 it's a lot easier to say that out loud. 10:40 >> Yeah. I think back then it was like 10:42 definitely easier. Now even like we've 10:45 got like tons of followers and community 10:47 and we're still like, man, imagine 10:48 launching a new game. This is 10:49 terrifying. 10:50 >> Yeah. [laughter] 10:51 Every everyone has that, right? And it 10:53 it that's just it. some of the biggest 10:55 teams they try and and they don't go 10:57 well, but hey, you never know. You got 10:59 you got to try and and just learn from 11:01 it, right? So, no. Okay, that that was 11:03 that was awesome. Thank you for sharing 11:04 those like those founder stories. That's 11:06 that's incredible. So, let's get into 11:08 the Kraken. So, like it did not just 11:10 like perform well, it exploded in ways 11:13 most teams like never experience. Like, 11:15 when Kraken blew up the way it did, like 11:17 hitting numbers that a lot of full 11:18 studios dream about, what was your first 11:20 reaction? Like did it feel unreal or did 11:23 you kind of know this one had something 11:25 special? 11:26 >> Uh I don't think we we were kind of I 11:28 don't think we knew it was special like 11:30 it was kind of more of a passion project 11:31 like we'd kind of rode the tycoon wave 11:33 for a bit and made like a bit of money 11:35 to keep us going and we were like okay 11:36 let's let's try and make a game that 11:37 we're actually like really passionate 11:38 about and like like the kind of RPG 11:41 genre and like try and play around with 11:43 there. And then we kind of launched and 11:44 it was a bit flat for a few months. Like 11:47 it just it we had an okay launch and 11:48 then it kind of just went to zero and we 11:50 were like, "Okay, I guess that one's 11:51 like dead. On to the next one." And then 11:53 just like overnight the algorithm like 11:55 picked it up and we just like 11:57 skyrocketed to 70k players and I and 12:00 like I think at the time I was out out 12:02 with my girlfriend's friends and I it 12:04 was like 3:00 a.m. cuz we're in 12:05 Australia so it's like the time 12:06 difference. It was like um I was like in 12:09 the bathroom like refreshing like just 12:11 watching it go up and up and up and up 12:12 and up and I was like man this is 12:14 insane. Like I think we have 12:16 >> Yeah. 12:18 >> Yeah. 12:18 >> I mean I think we we did launch the 12:20 launch was okay but one of the 12:21 differences on Kraken that maybe we'll 12:23 get into is we really pushed to actually 12:24 build a community off platform and we 12:26 built out a Discord community and we had 12:28 consistent feedback of players there. So 12:30 we only maybe had between like 20 and 50 12:33 concurrent users for quite a while, but 12:35 they were giving us really powerful 12:36 feedback. And so when it did take off, 12:38 we knew that we'd implemented some 12:39 really important features to help push 12:41 some. I guess there were some metrics 12:43 that just got us over like a threshold 12:45 of like, okay, if you just get this sort 12:47 of play time and and this level of 12:49 engagement or response or clickthrough, 12:50 you finally got to this level that puts 12:52 you in this sort of like big discovery 12:54 trending row. But um I think ultimately 12:57 there isn't sort of like a big like wow 12:59 this this is special and this is going 13:01 to be the future. At the time I was on 13:03 holiday in like far north Queensland in 13:04 the rainforests in Australia and had 13:06 like terrible internet and I had like 13:08 one refresh of the browser was like 10 13:11 seconds and you're like so you just 13:13 don't know what's going to come of it. 13:14 It's really exciting in the moment but I 13:15 think it kind of adds an additional 13:17 anxiety of like what is this going to be 13:18 tomorrow and the day after and the day 13:20 after and so now we've had this moment 13:22 of excitement. And the question now 13:24 becomes what could this become? And we 13:25 were so lucky that it just kept going 13:28 and even now. Yeah. 13:30 >> What I thought was pretty important is 13:32 even though you were getting 10, 20, 30 13:34 CCUs, you still were pushing people to a 13:37 discord off platform and garnering a 13:40 small community. Even with this small 13:41 community, they were giving you valuable 13:43 feedback how to improve it, which you 13:45 listened and acted upon, which then 13:47 drove the metrics and boom. So, like I 13:50 think that's really that's very valuable 13:52 to share that because I think a lot of 13:54 people they just make their game and 13:56 they see what happens and if it doesn't 13:57 do well, you know, that's it, right? 13:59 Like I'm not going to make a Discord 14:00 unless my game takes off. Like I've done 14:01 that. I've said that before, right? So I 14:04 I you know, I think that's pretty 14:06 important to share that like you know 14:08 how important that is. 14:09 >> We could see that our game was 14:11 resonating extremely strongly with a 14:14 certain type of player base. And maybe 14:16 that isn't like the whole player base, 14:18 but it's not a game that's necessarily 14:20 going to appeal to everyone, but the 14:21 players it does appeal to. It really 14:24 appeals to them. And I think that's 14:26 where we thought we were on to something 14:28 because we could just see how passionate 14:30 these players were and how much they 14:31 were into the creative and the world. 14:33 And I think that really drove us to keep 14:35 going. And I'm not I'm not sure we 14:37 expected the mainstream appeal it has, 14:39 but we could definitely tell that this 14:41 wasn't just like another box fight and 14:43 another tycoon that people are playing 14:45 because of the game loop. There was 14:46 actually something Yeah. special that 14:48 was resonating. And we only had that 14:49 because we could straight we could just 14:51 talk to the people and ask them. Yeah. 14:53 >> Yeah. Communities. We need we need a 14:55 little the communities are great. They 14:56 just added those. That's going to be 14:58 kind of a nice add. I don't know if you 14:59 guys have seen any jump from from them. 15:01 You guys got anything? I I didn't even 15:03 plan to talk about this. Do you have 15:05 anything to add on about communities? 15:06 Have you noticed anything like 15:08 >> Well, we've we've set it up. I think 15:09 we're really excited about the idea. 15:11 We've sort of I think since we started 15:14 getting a Discord, talking to people on 15:15 Kraken, it was a real game changer in 15:18 the UFN space for us. And so, I think 15:20 anything related to building a retained 15:23 audience is super important because just 15:26 the longer you're in UFN, the more you 15:27 see, you can't count on this like 15:29 discovery algorithm and this one thing 15:30 blowing up. Like, it's just not it 15:32 doesn't seem to be how it is. you need 15:33 to sort of foster your own thing and the 15:35 fact that they're doing it on platform 15:36 is really exciting. But yeah, we're 15:38 waiting to see. 15:39 >> Yeah. No, for sure. For sure. I know it 15:40 just it just literally came out. So, but 15:42 but very exciting. And that doesn't mean 15:45 you don't still need to do a Discord. 15:47 Don't take that away. I I still still 15:49 push your Discords. Anyone listening? 15:52 >> Yeah. 15:52 >> And some days the Discord is like more 15:54 work than the map. Like we have some 15:56 really passionate people which is like 15:58 so amazing but it's also like a totally 16:00 open community that anyone can join at 16:02 any time with any sorts of opinions and 16:04 so we put in a lot of effort to try to 16:06 make that a really welcoming space and 16:08 can be it can be really hard but we we 16:10 do our best and the fact that people 16:11 care I think means a lot to us. 16:12 >> Yeah is mods are worth their weight and 16:15 gold for sure in Discord. 16:17 >> Yeah. Oh yeah. So moving on like so one 16:19 thing your games consistently do well is 16:21 keep players invested for a long haul. 16:24 So, like your maps always lean into 16:25 progression and long-term play. How do 16:27 you decide what players should grind 16:29 for? And how do you keep that loop fun 16:32 like without turning it into like a 16:33 chore? 16:34 >> Yeah. So, in terms of game design, we 16:36 have a really interesting dynamic in the 16:37 team because between Joel and myself, we 16:40 have really different philosophies about 16:41 how we think games should be designed at 16:43 least. So, it's kind of a bit of a 16:45 pushpull. I think 16:46 >> I [clears throat] don't want to speak 16:47 for him too much, but from my 16:48 understanding, Joel's design is a bit 16:50 more sort of like fun and playful and 16:53 just the pure sort of creativity side 16:55 when it comes to more like a traditional 16:57 single player RPG. You know, you start 16:59 off as a small town guy and you just 17:01 have a sword and you go on these epic 17:02 adventures and it it's very sort of pure 17:05 and story driven. Whereas on my side, I 17:08 tend to design a bit more towards like 17:10 mobile game design in terms of their 17:12 economies and their game loops and it's 17:15 a bit more like optimization focused. 17:17 And I think what makes it really good 17:19 for us is we we have this kind of 17:21 balance where it goes down the middle 17:22 where we're both fighting for our cause 17:24 and so we kind of land somewhere in the 17:26 middle. It does lead to some pretty 17:28 spicy arguments on some days. But as we 17:31 said at the start, we've known each 17:32 other for so long, which I think it 17:34 means we can kind of overcome a lot of 17:35 that. 17:36 >> Even if we can kind of get into these 17:38 things, it generally ends up 17:39 >> it's like a sibling. Yeah. Yeah. 17:42 >> Yeah. And I And I think ultimately 17:43 there's also like a ton of guesswork. 17:45 Like a lot of the stuff on Kraken, 17:47 especially when we designed it, there 17:48 was no blueprint for how the stuff 17:50 should be balanced, for how the stuff 17:51 should progress. So we have some 17:52 decisions we made really early on that 17:54 are kind of still with us today. like we 17:56 have like an infinite scaling leveling 17:58 system that we didn't really think 17:59 about. I remember one small conversation 18:01 where it was like should we add like 18:03 more experience per level indefinitely 18:05 so it's like constantly exponential or 18:08 should we just cap it at a flat amount 18:09 and we capped it at a flat amount and 18:11 now people are level like 20,000 and 18:13 we're like oh we didn't [laughter] 18:14 didn't really expect this to happen but 18:16 now we're sort of this is I guess how it 18:18 is. 18:19 >> New season. 18:21 >> Yeah. Oh, there's a lot of ideas kicking 18:23 around. But yeah, I think I think 18:25 ultimately we sort of try and balance 18:26 between just like that classical sort of 18:28 game progression as well as trying to do 18:30 some like interesting game loops to get 18:31 people hooked. 18:32 >> Oh, great answer. 18:33 >> Yeah, I think yeah, for me it's just 18:35 kind of I've always pushed for like kind 18:37 of really like strong progression 18:39 systems and like you start with like a 18:40 sword and then you like work your way up 18:42 and you feel more powerful. and Eddie's 18:44 kind of like yeah pushing for that kind 18:46 those kind of like loops where it's just 18:47 like instantly fun and you just jump in 18:49 and it's more like arcade games and um 18:51 it's just like this constant like push 18:52 pull of like trying to get that um yeah 18:54 just the fun for the which which is more 18:56 fun for the audience and I think we 18:57 learned a lot on like when we made a 18:59 bunch of tycoons and it's kind of like 19:01 we learned what was fun about those like 19:03 we we weren't necessarily into making 19:04 tycoons but we always wanted to make 19:06 like more RPG type games but we kind of 19:08 learned those like the stepping on the 19:10 triggers and the like the gratification 19:13 and the rewards and like how can we like 19:15 build that into the RPG systems and kind 19:17 of keep players interested and like make 19:19 it feel really rewarding and and fun. 19:22 >> I feel like Joel I feel like your your 19:24 stuff is like 19:25 >> you're playing Runescape and you fish up 19:27 a level one fish or whatever and then 19:29 you fish again for a level two fish and 19:31 you're fishing two days later but you're 19:33 making progression and my stuff is like 19:35 Raid Shadow Legends join now and get one 19:38 free legendary roll today. So, it's like 19:41 it's like combine those two philosophies 19:43 and that's what our team is. 19:44 >> But honestly, that's might have been the 19:47 like your secret sauce because you have 19:50 different types of game loops, different 19:52 kind of things for everyone. Some people 19:55 may not want to do that long grind but 19:56 just want that instant dopamine hit or 19:58 vice versa. So, it worked. 20:00 >> Yeah, it seems like that to be honest. 20:02 Yeah. 20:02 >> Yeah. Yeah, it worked. So like Kraken 20:06 feels closer to like a playable 20:08 adventure than like a typical creative 20:10 map. At least for me, like especially 20:12 when it comes to those like big moments. 20:14 So Kraken had some incredible boss 20:17 fights and cinematic moments. I would 20:19 love to hear the story behind those 20:20 designing like those worlds and like the 20:23 big Kraken encounter like like how did 20:26 you pull that off, those scripted 20:27 moments inside Fortnite? Like how did 20:28 you do that? 20:29 >> Yeah. Yeah. So, I think um like me and 20:30 Alex especially, we come from like the 20:32 film and TV backgrounds and like 20:34 everything's about those big moments, 20:35 like the big cinematic moments, like the 20:37 coolest shots. When we first designed 20:39 Kraken, it was like it was just this 20:40 empty landscape with like this platform 20:42 in the middle and the Kraken. And I was 20:43 like, I just want everyone to like be 20:44 able to see the Kraken. It's it always 20:46 feels like it's it's like invading the 20:48 land and you can see from all angles. 20:50 And then in terms of kind of designing 20:51 it, it was like we just kind of built it 20:54 out of like gray boxes and damage 20:56 volumes and we were just fighting these 20:57 like gray cubes. And then we kind of the 20:59 Kraken was like this different monster 21:01 at first like it was this kind of like 21:03 weird like dinosaur type thing and then 21:05 it it kind of I was like no it has to be 21:07 like piratey like a Kraken. It should be 21:09 like an octopus. But yeah, we always try 21:10 to add these like huge kind of cinematic 21:13 moments. It's like my favorite quest in 21:14 the game is like you you build this 21:17 sword over like a few quests and you 21:18 like kind of go to the blacksmith and he 21:20 gets you he tells you to get all these 21:21 materials and then you kind of and the 21:23 final quest in the game is like this 21:25 epic like take down of the Kraken and 21:27 like everyone gets to watch you like 21:29 defeat the Kraken and it's like this big 21:31 cinematic moment that only happens once 21:33 every time in the quest line 21:35 >> and and we just love that like and 21:37 everyone like is going crazy in the 21:38 Discord like oh that's so cool like I 21:40 want to do it again and but like they 21:42 like kind of like do the whole quest 21:44 line to like feel that moment. But it's 21:46 like it's cool that that that's like 21:48 enough of a reward like that cinematic 21:50 moment is like just feels awesome enough 21:52 that they want to like keep playing and 21:54 so we try and try and add more moments 21:56 like that and 21:57 >> Yeah. 21:57 >> Yeah. 21:57 >> I want people to watch me play. 21:59 >> Yeah. 22:00 >> So [laughter] that that that makes total 22:01 sense and I want to be the hero too. So 22:04 like that's perfect. 22:06 >> Yeah. I think I think there's some good 22:07 uh references that we pull from like AAA 22:10 games. Like one of them being the God of 22:12 War boss fights where you kind of 22:13 naturally transition between the 22:14 cinematics and the encounter is very 22:17 cool design. Like instead of you're 22:19 watching this big movie scene and then 22:21 suddenly you're just put there. We sort 22:22 of try and make it all feel like flowing 22:24 in between the two. Um and then also 22:26 like Assassin's Creed another good game 22:28 has some really good sort of designs of 22:30 how they present all their locations and 22:32 stuff like that. So we try we try and 22:33 look at elements from those sorts of 22:35 games that really resonate with us 22:36 particularly when we're trying to make 22:38 like a open world game which isn't 22:40 really a typical Fortnite game. We try 22:41 and look at other games like that. 22:43 >> Yeah. Makes perfect sense. No, great 22:46 great answers. I think you also like 22:48 were right you guys were right on the 22:49 time too of like the boss fight like 22:52 like and this was what I mean when did 22:54 this this game come out? I mean we're 22:55 talking about a year and a half two two 22:57 years. 22:57 >> Year and a half. Yes. 22:58 >> Year and a half. Yeah. 23:00 >> So this was right. This was be No, not 23:02 everyone has like the boss fight tag in 23:04 their their their thumb. So you guys 23:06 were just like at the right place, right 23:07 time too as well. Um and not only that, 23:10 you just had a great great boss fight 23:12 and a great thumbnail. 23:14 >> That thumbnail was amazing. 23:16 >> I think at the time we should definitely 23:18 give a shout out to Valhalla and the 23:20 Bifrost team because they kind of really 23:22 paved the way on the on the boss fight 23:23 stuff and really inspired so many of the 23:26 things that we made. Um, and we really 23:28 tried to kind of like look at what 23:30 they've done and what was working so 23:32 well for them and try and put our own 23:34 spin on it with our own theme. 23:36 >> Yeah. 23:36 >> And and since then it's been kind of 23:37 funny seeing all these other boss 23:38 fights. A lot of them will copy like one 23:40 for one decisions we've made. And there 23:42 was no rhyme or reason why we put 23:43 something there or made that decision 23:45 and then they'll do the exact same 23:46 thing. And it was like you guys could 23:48 probably do it much better if you 23:50 thought about it instead of copying our 23:52 random thing. 23:53 >> But yeah, shout out to those guys for 23:54 sure cuz like they were there first. 23:56 >> Yeah. No, byrost is awesome. A good 23:59 friend of Sven and he's he's been 24:01 creating in 1.0. He's he's been in our 24:03 community for a long long time. 24:05 >> Yeah. 24:05 >> Very very talented. He was actually one 24:07 of the top you he was a huge YouTuber. 24:09 Like I don't know a lot of people know 24:11 this about Sven. Go look. But he was he 24:13 was doing like other games and then he 24:15 would come and like he wouldn't like 24:16 publish maps. He just make crazy things 24:18 and just for his YouTube in Fortnite. 24:20 That that's all he did. That's how he 24:22 started. It's pretty crazy. 24:23 >> That's funny. But anyway, so let's like 24:26 let's move on to the next question. So 24:28 like from the outside, your update 24:30 cadence looks incredibly ambitious for 24:32 such a small team you guys have. So like 24:34 your uploads feel more like seasons, new 24:37 zones, new characters, farm areas, 24:39 quests. How do you plan that out and 24:42 like that much content in such such a 24:44 small team? How do you decide what to 24:46 add next? 24:46 >> Yeah, I think a lot of it is isn't 24:49 necessarily planned. It's more like sort 24:51 of vision based like Joel will come up 24:54 with the sort of vision of the idea in 24:55 terms of something thematic around a new 24:57 area or new monsters or a highle story 25:00 and then from there you kind of 25:01 recognize that working with a small team 25:04 is so powerful cuz you can just move so 25:06 fast if you effectively allocate like 25:08 the lanes of who's doing what and you 25:10 don't get in each other's way too much 25:11 other than recognizing like where you're 25:13 passionate in the same domains and then 25:15 you actually work out who's doing what 25:17 and why. You can just go incredibly 25:19 fast. So, we kind of try and do more 25:21 like a a vision based system where we 25:23 all have this northstar that we're 25:25 working towards and then we sort of 25:26 divvy up um like like Joel will sort of 25:29 build out a lot of like the geography 25:30 and the exciting quest and cinematic 25:32 moments. I'll do a lot of like the 25:33 quests and the conversation and the 25:35 characters. Alex will do like sort of 25:37 like the system, the boss fight updates. 25:38 And we've just sort of got this cadence 25:40 from working together for so long that 25:42 we can just work like really fast at 25:44 this point, which is super cool. You 25:45 >> guys are like twins or something. 25:48 >> Same brain. 25:49 the same. Exactly. No, that that's 25:51 that's why 25:53 >> but yeah. Yeah. Just on that. 25:54 >> Go ahead. Yeah. Perfect. 25:55 >> Yeah. Yeah. We just kind of I think like 25:57 every new update we try to do like a new 25:59 Kraken, a new biome, like a new island 26:01 and and the kind of pirate theme where 26:03 it's like islands. You can kind of just 26:04 add these islands and they're all spaced 26:06 out so it's works well for memory. Um, 26:08 but like each new update like we kind of 26:10 fill the memory and then it's like a 26:12 couple weeks of like trying to get that 26:13 down so we can like squeeze in something 26:15 into like the 10 megabytes at the end 26:17 like like the new update and just we're 26:19 just trying to see how much we could 26:20 like squeeze in and like just more 26:22 content for all the people in the 26:23 Discord and the community and stuff. 26:25 >> Yeah. Every update is I'm like I'm like, 26:27 "Okay, we're locked. I'm testing then 26:28 we're shipping." And Joel's like, "Wait, 26:29 wait, one more thing." And I'm like, 26:30 "Okay, now we're locked." And I'm 26:31 testing and then we're shipping. He's 26:32 like, "One more thing." And I'm like, 26:33 "Okay, now we're It's just like that for 26:35 the final week." 26:36 >> Yeah. Me me me me me me me me me me me 26:37 me me me me me me me me me me me me me 26:37 me me me me me me me me me me me me me 26:37 me me me memory has always been a 26:38 problem in Fortnite and especially when 26:40 you build open world game big games like 26:42 yourself. Yeah, that that definitely 26:43 comes into play. I thought and something 26:45 you said too about just like small teams 26:47 there like a lot of people look at like 26:49 and scared of AAA these big teams coming 26:51 in and and small teams are actually a 26:54 superpower. Look at Roblox, look at 26:56 Fortnite like AAA big studios come in. 26:59 Some have had success. I'm not going to 27:01 say that there's no one has ever had 27:03 success. Sure. But like you can't move 27:04 at that speed as a small team. You got I 27:08 got to wait till AM till for Joe to come 27:10 on or I gotta wait till Monday, you 27:13 know? And and UGC, you can't move at 27:16 those speeds and compete with two 27:18 16-year-olds in their mom's basement 27:20 that work 24 hours a day, you know what 27:22 I mean? So, and and then also you guys 27:24 are just like, you know, not those 27:26 corporate, all those structures, they 27:27 just really bog down what really can 27:29 make a successful team studio, which 27:32 which I don't know. I would be want to 27:35 think about it, but that's just like the 27:36 truth. You know what I mean? I know I'm 27:37 sure someone's scoffing right now, but 27:38 it it that's my what I've seen. I I 27:41 don't know if you guys have anything to 27:42 add to that, but 27:43 >> yeah, having having worked at a fair 27:45 amount of sort of like agencies and 27:46 studios, how it often works is you have 27:48 the founders are like two or three or 27:49 four people who just like do amazing 27:51 work and then they want to expand and 27:52 then they hire people out and it gets 27:54 like slowly less and less efficient over 27:56 time because they're trying to like 27:57 manage each project yada yada yada. So 28:00 there is this sort of golden period 28:02 where you just have those initial 28:04 people. And I think we try not to 28:06 overreach. Might touch on this later, 28:08 but we don't really do a whole lot of 28:09 brand work integrations. We don't do 28:11 tons of maps. We try and work really 28:13 really hard at the thing we're focused 28:14 on and not spread ourselves too thin. 28:17 >> Smart. Moving on to the next question. 28:18 So like success at that scale usually 28:20 comes with some unforgettable community 28:22 moments. I know we mentioned community a 28:24 little bit, but like I know the 28:25 community means a lot to you guys. like 28:27 what has been the coolest or most 28:29 surprising reaction from players since 28:31 Kraken launched? 28:32 >> You want to take them? 28:33 >> You want to take? Well, okay. So, for me 28:35 first, I would say that when we created 28:37 the Discord, the very first person to 28:41 join the Discord was this guy called 28:43 Vault Clone. And he was such a big 28:45 supporter of what we did and just was 28:47 like a massive fan. And he is still one 28:50 of our most active people on the Discord 28:52 even now. He's essentially a moderator. 28:55 just really contributes to what we do, 28:57 gives us so much feedback, is really 28:59 passionate about the project, and I I'm 29:01 not even cherry-picking like the second 29:03 or third person to make this story work. 29:05 He was actually the first person, I 29:07 think, and there's a few other people 29:08 from really early on who've been 29:11 passionate about the project all the way 29:12 through. And that means so much to us. 29:14 And I think we don't feel like we have 29:17 to design for tens of thousands of 29:19 people. We know that there are certain 29:21 people that this really resonates with. 29:22 that if it resonates with them, it's 29:24 going to resonate with other people. So, 29:25 for me, it's kind of like shout out to 29:27 Vault Clone, the very first person in 29:28 our Discord and is still with us today. 29:30 >> Let's go. 29:31 >> Yeah. And for me, I think like when we 29:33 when we started the community, like 29:34 Eddie was pushing really hard for it, 29:36 and he's like, "This is so important." I 29:37 was like, "Dude, I don't think this is 29:38 going to help with our success in UFN, 29:40 man. Like, it's just the algorithm. 29:42 Like, don't worry about that. That's 29:43 waste of time. We just got to keep 29:44 making games and like just learn the 29:46 algorithm." And then, like, it just 29:47 turned out to be so valuable. Like once 29:49 once we kind of got that instant 29:51 feedback and kind of all that like the 29:53 super fans like telling us like what 29:55 they love, what they didn't like. I 29:56 guess like a surprising thing was like 29:58 how fun and motivating it is to work 30:00 with with like people around you like 30:02 like giving you ideas, telling you what 30:03 they liked and like even like like say 30:06 on my birthday like they all like took 30:07 photos in the map and like spelt out 30:09 like happy birthday and like sent it to 30:11 me and I was like man this is so like 30:13 >> this is so like rewarding and nice and 30:15 like I was like I want to just keep 30:16 building like fun stuff for these people 30:18 and like 30:19 >> Yeah. 30:19 >> Yeah. I feel I I feel so grateful. It's 30:21 like you guys didn't have to do this. 30:23 Like it's so kind of them. Yeah. No, 30:25 that's that's wild and that's just I 30:27 don't know like communities they're just 30:30 invaluable and and yeah, you do have you 30:32 the good bad comes with the good 30:34 sometimes too. I'm sure you get some 30:36 people who are hot or an update you 30:38 didn't have. 30:38 >> I'm pretty sure we've been threatened to 30:40 be like sued by multiple people cuz we 30:42 tried to like moderate people and I will 30:45 take them out. 30:47 >> Good luck with that lawsuit. No, but but 30:49 just that like it's it's still worth it. 30:51 And you have those people those like I 30:52 still have people to this day like and a 30:55 lot of my maps they were 1.0 so they're 30:57 not they don't even they're not even 30:58 live anymore. Where's this map? They're 31:00 like this is my this and that. You get 31:01 get all those feedback still to this 31:03 day. And it just it's crazy cuz gaming 31:06 is like an emotion feeling, nostalgia, 31:10 like all those things that like you know 31:12 you you remember probably playing Mar 31:14 whatever those first games when you play 31:15 that you were addicted to 31:17 >> you know like we still have those 31:18 feelings and like players are doing that 31:20 in your game today. So it's it's w it's 31:23 just wild to think about that. 31:24 >> Yeah. Heads up for us that was World of 31:26 Warcraft which might be influencing some 31:28 of the so a lot of World of Warcraft 31:31 especially like sort of classic early 31:32 stage World of Warcraft is design 31:36 [laughter] 31:37 >> I still play today. 31:38 >> Yeah, that's Dude, that's insane. Like 31:41 there's people who who miss their like 31:43 child being born for World [laughter] of 31:45 Warcraft. 31:45 >> Yeah. Yeah. People in our community will 31:47 be like, "Come on, come on, Zebs. We 31:48 have to go play Kraken." And I'm like, 31:50 "I got to go raiding." Wow, man. They're 31:52 waiting for me. Yeah. 31:54 Leroy Jenkins, right? 31:56 >> Yeah. We would we would like log on like 31:57 after school like there was maybe like 31:59 30 people at our school that would just 32:00 log on. Wow. And like that was like our 32:02 kind of social life. So to see these 32:04 people like doing that with Kraken. I'm 32:05 like that is so cool. Like 32:08 >> it is it is funny when I'm like how are 32:10 they still playing Kraken? We haven't 32:11 changed any content in 6 months. And 32:12 then I go and log on vanilla World of 32:14 Warcraft which is the same as like 20 32:16 years ago and I'm like okay man fair 32:18 enough 32:18 >> man. No awesome man. You guys are 32:20 crushing it man. Thank you guys for 32:21 sharing all this. So, let's kind of talk 32:23 about some I guess numbers a little bit. 32:26 So, like when you saw the game hitting 32:29 50inute average session and a massive 32:31 CCU numbers, like did that change how 32:34 you think about retention and long form 32:36 design inside of Fortnite? 32:37 >> I think Joel and I have slightly 32:38 different takes on this because we've 32:40 often debated how we think we should go 32:41 about it. For me personally, I never 32:44 really obsessed too much about any 32:45 specific metric. It kind of felt like 32:47 you just make a really fun game and that 32:50 ultimately is what wins. You naturally 32:52 should pay attention to a series of 32:54 important metrics around like, you know, 32:56 your good click-through rate, your 32:57 retention, stuff like that. But there 32:59 was it didn't feel like there was ever a 33:02 breaking point. Way back in the day, I 33:03 used to work in Facebook ads and like 33:05 Facebook ad buying and stuff, and 33:06 everyone used to be like, "What is what 33:08 is the perfect thing for the Facebook 33:09 algorithm? What is the one thing?" And 33:11 Facebook was always just trying to work 33:12 towards like it's just good content 33:14 basically. you can't over optimize for 33:16 that. And so I always just kind of tried 33:18 to come back to like let's not get too 33:20 focused on any single metric. Let's 33:22 obviously do the things that we think 33:24 should be done. But for us, I think or 33:26 for me at least, I think the biggest 33:28 sort of game changer or big moment was 33:30 what we said before. It was about the 33:31 community and actually having a a sort 33:34 of external community giving us the 33:36 feedback and helping us like build for 33:38 them. I think that was more important to 33:40 me than any specific metric. 33:43 >> Yeah. Yeah. And for me is I think it's 33:45 kind of like I kind of latched on to 33:46 playtime and like making these huge 33:47 worlds because like we were kind of we 33:50 had that kind of year where we really 33:51 struggled and didn't have many players 33:53 and then we were just trying to compete 33:55 with like combat maps with like really 33:56 short play times. And I think like 33:58 playtime was the one thing that I 33:59 latched on that I was like with our 34:01 skill sets with like doing like 3D and 34:03 film and TV, I can like optimize 34:04 everything really well. I can like build 34:06 these huge worlds that people can 34:07 explore and like get those like really 34:09 long play times that maybe other 34:11 creators can't because they don't know 34:12 like how to like really take advantage 34:14 of UFN and like kind of optimize 34:16 everything and just yeah just build 34:18 these huge worlds that people can just 34:20 run around for hours and do like 34:21 hundreds of quests and 34:23 >> just like fill like all this content 34:25 into one map. 34:26 >> I feel like this leads to me getting a 34:27 Discord message every day being like, 34:28 "What if we just add another quest?" And 34:31 I'm like, [laughter] "Yeah, that'll be a 34:33 bit more play time." And he's like, "And 34:35 then another one." And it's like, 34:37 [laughter] 34:37 >> "Uh-huh." 34:39 >> You got that lever anytime you increase 34:41 play time. 34:42 >> I mean, it it it's important though. I 34:44 mean, you guys are paying attention to 34:45 it, right? And and and I'm sure like, 34:48 but do you guys recall anything that you 34:50 added and it like it it jumped your play 34:52 time or anything like that or a metric? 34:54 >> I think when they introduced the 34:55 thumbnail testing that was really good 34:56 because it felt like that like it it 34:59 would be quite hard to Sorry, I know you 35:02 asked about the play time. It was quite 35:03 hard to move the play time metric 35:06 because of just like the amount of wash 35:08 of all sorts of players jumping in and 35:10 out of stuff like that. 35:11 >> That's crazy. So that's very hard. Yeah. 35:14 >> So it felt like that was always just 35:15 like a big thing. If I was going to say 35:17 if you're trying to incrementally move 35:19 one metric, the thumbnail and the 35:21 thumbnail testing is was probably a bit 35:23 more meaningful cuz you could kind of 35:24 just go in and out and see a meaningful 35:26 difference between the two. 35:28 >> Yeah, 35:28 >> it tested the the play time is just like 35:30 everything combined, right? Yeah, 35:33 >> it's hard to find out, you know, but 35:34 like like maybe if you added a new 35:35 feature or something, you saw it go a 35:37 minute or 35:38 >> I mean I guess if there was one thing I 35:39 would say that our game is d designed 35:42 around like progression and you save 35:44 your load out and you save your level 35:45 and you save your gold and everything is 35:47 saved and we felt that like that was a 35:49 big part of being able to kind of come 35:51 back and be wanting to invest a lot of 35:53 time because unlike a lot of other maps 35:55 >> where you just kind of cleared every 35:57 time that design I think has contributed 35:59 to like some long-term success cuz 36:01 people keep all stuff. 36:02 >> Yeah. Brings them back. They want to 36:04 continue the grind. 36:06 >> Yeah. I think people kind of they play 36:07 like a few quests at a time in in like a 36:10 session and then they'll come back 36:11 tomorrow and kind of play some more and 36:12 try try and like get through the whole 36:14 content kind of thing. 36:16 >> Yeah. 36:16 >> Yeah. 36:16 >> Yeah. No, makes sense. No, it's just 36:18 it's just interesting. I mean that that 36:20 play time is so like very few maps, you 36:22 know, besides like the t even the tycoon 36:24 genres sometimes struggle to get there. 36:27 Um, I think Havoc Hotel was one that 36:28 would get over um an hour play time, 36:32 which is crazy for like a rogue like and 36:34 then like I think Phil of Brain Raw I 36:36 think they have like an hour and a half 36:37 or something right now. 36:38 >> Oh wow. 36:39 >> Yeah. I mean I came from a world of like 36:40 websites where if someone didn't leave 36:42 in like 3 seconds it was considered 36:44 success and so starting to even when it 36:46 was like wow people play for 10 minutes 36:47 that seems like a long time. So, yeah, 36:50 >> people from Roblox have that same 36:52 experience when they come over here 36:53 because they're because people are on 36:55 mobile. People are just like real quick 36:56 to pick it up and put it down. Their 36:58 play time is a lot lower. So, people are 37:00 always very surprised about the average 37:01 play time for games. They're like, 37:02 "What?" 37:02 >> Yeah. I still remember when we did like 37:04 the tycoons back in the day. You would 37:06 like start and you'd jump in the map and 37:07 be like, "All right, let's stand here 37:08 and maybe we'll increase the play time 37:10 cuz we're the first player." And then 37:11 like Spider-Man would join for 5 seconds 37:13 and leave. And you'd be like, "Ah, damn 37:14 it. They left. Why did they leave? 37:16 [laughter] They're ruining our numbers." 37:18 Yeah, don't leave just yet. You got to 37:20 wait 20 minutes. 37:22 >> Yeah, I love I love like following those 37:24 first players and then you kind of see 37:25 where they go and then they just leave 37:27 and you're like, "No, why did they leave 37:28 that?" 37:28 >> Hey, wait. I thought we were friends. 37:30 You got to do that though. Follow 37:31 alongs. I would be in my maps like up in 37:34 a corner just like a creeper just like, 37:36 >> "Yeah, you're like you're trying to 37:37 pretend. You're trying to pretend you're 37:38 a normal player." You're like, "Yeah, 37:40 it's totally me." [laughter] 37:41 >> Yeah. 37:42 >> Nothing to see over here. I'm just 37:43 stalking you right now, seeing what 37:45 you're doing. 37:46 >> Yeah. 37:46 >> Too funny. So, moving on to the next 37:49 question, like your work really 37:50 showcases what is possible when creators 37:52 fully lean into UEFN. Like you both go 37:55 deep into the UEFN tools, like what 37:58 features or systems open the door for 38:01 the kind of games you build now. 38:03 Anything that completely changed the way 38:05 you work? I think for me like when we 38:06 started there was it was still like 38:08 pretty limited like not not as limited 38:09 as creative obviously but still like 38:11 stuff was kind of like rolling out and I 38:14 think when we first released Kraken like 38:16 dialogue and conversations is such a 38:18 huge part of our maps and I think we had 38:20 like we're using like pop-up dialogue 38:22 devices like to try and I think we had 38:24 like 15 per like conversation and it 38:27 would like go to the like cuz we 38:29 >> we didn't really know Verse UI2L so we 38:31 just had like thousands of pop-up 38:32 devices so when they released like the 38:33 conversation device we just kind went 38:35 crazy with that and we could like make 38:37 all these characters and and like stuff 38:39 like that. And then another huge one 38:40 recently was uh it's a bit like of a 38:42 secret. I don't know if many people know 38:44 about it, but it's place playsets. 38:46 >> There's like so if you take like the if 38:48 you take like a Fortnite prefab and you 38:51 put it you drop it in the scene, you can 38:53 kind of you see like the parent actor is 38:55 like a playet root actor. And I I only 38:58 learned this recently, but you can kind 38:59 of make sub levels in the map and build 39:02 like POIs in the level and then kind of 39:06 save that level as a play set and drop 39:07 that into your main build as a prefab. 39:10 And you can put like verse devices like 39:12 Fortnite props and it just let us like 39:15 >> I didn't know about this. I want 39:18 >> Yeah, maybe I shouldn't be sharing this. 39:20 [laughter] 39:21 >> Too late. Too late about it now. Yeah, 39:25 yeah, you can kind of have levels within 39:27 your map that you build like so we could 39:29 build like oh the skull island and it's 39:30 like just the skull island and you can 39:32 work on that and launch sessions and 39:33 it's really fast and then you right when 39:35 you're done with it you kind of bring 39:37 that into your main build at the end and 39:39 that kind of helps us make these huge 39:40 maps because we have these like if you 39:42 publish Kraken as is the the whole map 39:46 it's like the push time's insane it's 39:48 like maybe like 30 minutes or something 39:50 but if you kind of strip out all these 39:51 POIs and have them in sub levels where 39:53 you 39:54 like test them within their own little 39:55 suble and then just save them as prefabs 39:57 and drop them in later. Yeah, maybe I 39:59 feel Yeah, I feel like I I could do a 40:01 video on this or something. [laughter] 40:03 >> Yeah, go to Joel's channel. 40:05 >> Yeah, there's a tutorial on YouTube that 40:07 I watched recently and I was like, damn, 40:09 this is crazy. This is what I this is 40:11 what I always wanted. 40:12 >> Yeah. I mean because so the prefabs are 40:15 things that are natively built in 40:16 Fortnite, they load instantly and you 40:19 don't like like custom meshes or 3D 40:21 models. It take can take a while 40:22 depending on the size. So you're 40:24 essentially taking the prefab tricking 40:26 it to to be something else, but it still 40:28 thinks it's for a Fortnite prop or asset 40:31 like prefab, right? Is that the kind of 40:33 the idea behind it? 40:35 >> Yeah, kind I think so. like it's there's 40:37 no like documentation on it or anything 40:39 but it works 40:41 >> well and that's just creative in 40:43 general. We've all found these crazy 40:44 workarounds 40:46 to be able you know people were doing 40:49 something with memory recently I 40:50 remember too like where they could like 40:51 kind of trick the memory and publish 40:54 even though it was double the size you 40:56 know all these things that come out but 40:58 then Fortnite catches up 41:00 >> or Epic catches up and then you're 41:01 screwed when they update it if you don't 41:03 hurry up and change it. Um, man, there 41:05 was something. 41:06 >> Yeah, for a while we were like 41:08 >> launch on mobile and it would like shave 41:10 off like 50 megabytes of the memory or 41:13 something like for the 41:14 >> There was there was there was like a big 41:16 one recently where they had the the 41:18 layers on the UI and you could like 41:20 paste into the UI layers to make your 41:22 own like amount of layers and then they 41:23 like patched that out and everyone was 41:24 like, are you serious? Like how can you 41:26 make a game with this amount of layers? 41:28 And then Epic kind of had to roll that 41:30 back or delay it or something. 41:32 >> Yeah. 41:33 >> Yeah, I know. There was something else, 41:34 too. I mean, I can't Oh, it was it was 41:36 the trick where you could if you did the 41:39 scroll bar on the numbers, you could go 41:41 up to whatever the max was, but if you 41:43 like enter, copy paste it, you could go 41:45 higher, you know, like explosive 41:47 devices, all those things for resets. 41:48 So, yeah, that was one recently, too, 41:50 that the community was kind of odd. This 41:52 is fun stuff. I I love talking about 41:54 these little like nuances wi within the 41:56 game. And I love people to like people 41:58 that have never built before, they can 42:00 kind of like these are the things we 42:02 have to go through every day just to 42:04 make some of these games. 42:05 >> I think if if you're into the stuff that 42:07 Joel just mentioned, you should 42:08 definitely reach out to Joel cuz Joel 42:10 sends me all this stuff and he's so 42:11 excited and it just goes over my head 42:13 and I get like 50 messages and I'm just 42:15 like, "Oh, that sounds good." And then 42:17 he's like, "That was not the response I 42:19 was looking for from someone and he has 42:20 to go and find someone else to tell the 42:22 basically." I didn't want to say it, but 42:24 >> yeah, 42:24 >> I'm like he doesn't get it. 42:26 Sorry, man. 42:27 >> He doesn't get it. These business 42:29 people, man, they don't get it. 42:31 [laughter] 42:32 >> Oh, yeah. This is fun. I don't know if 42:33 I've laughed this much in an episode 42:35 before. 42:36 >> It's like it's the cold medicine or 42:38 something or you guys are bugging 42:39 [laughter] me. 42:39 >> No. So, let's shift here. So, this like 42:42 you guys have had some really crazy news 42:44 that's come out recently. I want I want 42:45 to dive into that. So, like I want to 42:47 shift to something that like caught a 42:48 lot of people off guard like in the best 42:50 way possible. Like I want to talk about 42:52 the Disney collab because it's huge. 42:55 like how did that even start? What did 42:58 those early conversations look like? And 43:00 what was it like building an official 43:02 Percy Jackson experience with such a 43:04 small team? 43:05 >> Yeah. So, I think it started at um 43:07 Unreal Fest actually last year. I kind 43:10 of went over. I've been trying to 43:11 convince Eddie to go over for like a 43:13 couple years, but he's always been busy. 43:14 So, it's just been like 43:16 >> come this year. You're coming. You're 43:18 coming to Chicago this year. 43:19 >> People need to stop getting married. 43:21 That's all I have to say. Dune's a 43:22 pretty popular proing. 43:24 >> But but yeah, I was just kind of like 43:25 floating around and then um yeah, 43:27 someone was like, "Oh, these like Disney 43:29 guys want to talk to you cuz they love 43:31 the Kraken." And I was like, "Oh, that 43:33 that's cool." 43:34 >> Oh, really? 43:35 >> Okay. [laughter] 43:36 >> And and we Yeah, we ended up I talked to 43:38 them for ages and they were like, "Yeah, 43:40 we love the Kraken." I was like, "Oh, 43:41 they're just saying that. They haven't 43:42 actually played it." And then they 43:43 started like describing like all the 43:45 features and like the stuff that happens 43:46 and they're like, "Oh, we love this 43:48 part." And it was just like a kind of 43:49 fun chat. 43:50 >> Oh, yeah. and and I was like, "Oh, maybe 43:52 we could like I don't know, do 43:53 something." And we like ended up talking 43:55 to them afterwards. And uh yeah, they 43:57 were just like huge Kraken fans and they 43:59 were like, "We just want like a similar 44:01 thing for our IP and we think that'd be 44:03 really cool." And we've kind of always 44:05 said no to like brand work and collabs 44:07 cuz we we're like I mean in my in my 44:10 mind I'm like making the Kraken is like 44:11 my dream. It's like you just get to make 44:13 whatever you want. I love like pirates 44:15 and these piratey worlds and I was just 44:17 like man I don't really want to like 44:18 make something for someone else. 44:20 >> Yeah. like Disney and what they proposed 44:22 was like this is awesome. I want to I 44:24 want to do this. 44:25 >> Yeah. And I I remember like you did the 44:27 the Disney map and I was like man, how 44:28 did you get that? That's so that's so 44:30 cool. I want to make that. 44:32 >> Yeah. You got it, dude. You did it. 44:33 >> Yeah. 44:34 >> Ours was an integration. You got a full 44:36 map. So that's great. 44:37 >> Yeah. And it was it was cool cuz I was 44:39 like I studied animation at uni. So 44:41 Disney was always like the the top I I 44:43 always wanted to like move to LA and 44:45 work for Disney. Yeah. It was just a 44:47 really cool collab and we had so much 44:48 fun and it the launch was awesome. Yeah. 44:51 >> Yeah. I think 44:51 >> you can't say no to Disney. 44:53 >> You just can't. 44:55 >> Yeah. I mean, I think that being said, 44:57 we've always been really wary of sort of 44:59 brand and integration work because of 45:01 our backgrounds. We've worked on the 45:02 sort of service industry side and the 45:04 client agency sort of relationship. And 45:06 we know how tough and how draining that 45:09 can be. And so we're always been like 45:11 really wary, especially when the flip 45:12 side is just making our own thing 45:14 whenever we want and it's really popular 45:15 and we're just so lucky to be in that 45:17 position. But then sort of did the 45:18 Disney opportunity, we really had to 45:20 like kind of I remember talking to Joel 45:23 and being like, look, if we're saying no 45:25 to this, I'm like never talking to a 45:27 brand ever again because that is a waste 45:29 of time. But there's just between Percy 45:32 Jackson and Fortnite, there's just such 45:34 a sort of fantastic overlap between the 45:37 sort of target demographic being sort of 45:40 like adolescent and the second season of 45:44 the Percy Jackson show, Percy Jackson 45:46 and the Olympians that it's promoting on 45:48 Disney Plus. It's based on the second 45:49 book which is called The Sea of 45:51 Monsters. And so it's all about like the 45:53 sea monsters and stuff, right? Which is 45:55 just like a natural fit for the Kraken. 45:57 So there was so many overlaps and it was 45:59 just kind of like a perfect fit. So it 46:00 was like look if it's not this we're 46:02 never going to do it. And I think what 46:03 was was kind of interesting in the end 46:05 is when it went to market we felt like 46:07 we were getting judged like this was 46:09 some sort of AAA Disney big production. 46:12 >> Yeah. 46:14 >> Yeah. And we were like I guess this is a 46:15 good thing because it kind of almost 46:17 looks like it could be but in reality 46:18 it's like a thing made in Fortnite just 46:20 by our little team by a little Kraken 46:22 team. So the Disney team was so 46:24 fantastic. Like couldn't have picked a 46:26 better group of people to work with. We 46:28 were so lucky in that regard because 46:29 going in it's a bit harder to know who 46:31 you're going to land with, but they were 46:32 just phenomenal. So shout out to them. 46:35 >> Amazing. And just that we have platform 46:37 limitations. We also like can only like 46:40 look at the top games that are very 46:42 popular, not like super fleshed out AAA 46:45 Disney title games. Like that's just not 46:48 what sometimes the audience wants. But 46:49 like that you have the mix. Like I'm not 46:50 saying that like look what you guys did 46:52 was incredible. It looks amazing. We'll 46:53 definitely have a video up showing it. 46:55 You guys crushed it. But yeah, like it's 46:58 people I know what you I had that same 47:00 thing too. Like you think people like 47:02 think, oh, it's a Disney thing. It's 47:04 going to be this or that. But like you 47:05 know you it looks amazing. I think it 47:07 looks great. I mean especially within 47:09 within Fortnite and our limitations. So 47:11 you guys you guys crushed it, man. Yeah, 47:13 they definitely they definitely cared a 47:15 lot about how it looked, how the 47:16 characters were presented, like the 47:18 eyebrows, the hair, and there's a video 47:20 of the actors playing it, and they're 47:22 reacting to like, "Wow, you did my hair 47:23 right. Wow, this is cool." And that was 47:25 so nice and validating cuz we did so 47:27 many rounds on how the characters look 47:29 and we're trying to communicate like, 47:31 "Look, these sort of custom characters 47:32 is not really a thing in Fortnite 47:35 Creative. People don't really do this, 47:36 especially to this Fidelity." And we've 47:37 got the executive producer of the show 47:39 giving feedback on their facial 47:41 expressions and stuff. And we're out 47:42 here desperately trying to design game 47:44 loops in the background that people 47:45 actually play. And we're like, man, 47:46 we're trying to make these like mini 47:47 games back here that they're just like, 47:49 "Yeah, looks fine." And we're like, 47:50 "This is the actual game over there." 47:51 And we're all talking about the face. 47:53 But yeah, it was it was really nice how 47:55 it went to market and seeing the actual 47:56 actors really like enjoy the depictions 47:59 cuz so much work went into that part. 48:00 Even though for the Fortnite playtime, 48:03 like that's not something that's going 48:04 to drive play time, but it actually 48:06 getting that polish really mattered to 48:07 us. So that was good. 48:08 >> Yeah. I mean, adds immersion and that's 48:10 what they care about. like they care 48:11 about the IP and that's all any not just 48:13 Disney most brands right they just care 48:14 about their IP how it's being 48:16 represented in game and you know it 48:18 doesn't look like some knockoff or 48:20 whatever right so no that that's not 48:23 easy too like modeling all those things 48:25 are not easy um and especially at the 48:27 fidelity it takes to make you know 48:29 Disney happy 48:30 >> yeah and in case you're wondering we 48:32 pulled in two extra people that Joel and 48:34 Alex used to work with we had a team of 48:36 five do that project so we're normally a 48:38 team of three but we expanded our team 48:39 to a team five. So that was the size of 48:41 the project team. 48:42 >> Terrific. All right. Well, I want to 48:44 dive a little more into that. So, like 48:45 working with a brand like Disney usually 48:48 comes with a lot of expectations and 48:50 surprises. Like what surprised you the 48:52 most about working with Disney? Like 48:54 either creatively, technically, or just 48:56 like the pace of the project. 48:58 >> Yeah. Joel, you take this. We're going 48:59 to say the same thing. 49:00 >> All right. Yeah. [laughter] Okay. Yeah. 49:02 Um, yeah. So, for me, it was just kind 49:04 of like how much they trusted us. Like 49:06 in my previous career, like for the 49:08 effects on movies and stuff, like you 49:09 just you kind of just do as you're told. 49:11 Like like everything is like decided 49:13 beforehand. You're just like the hands 49:15 that make the art and it's like there's 49:16 not much creativity and it's just how 49:18 much they kind of trusted us to just do 49:20 our own thing. Like they I think they 49:21 just they were like, "We love Kraken. 49:23 Like we we trust you guys to like make 49:25 something awesome." And like there was 49:26 just a lot more like creativity and fun 49:28 than I thought. Like I I really thought 49:30 it would be like really locked down and 49:32 structured, but it was like really Yeah. 49:34 fun and open. 49:35 >> Yeah. Like we have the show executive 49:37 producers, we have the author of the 49:39 series, we have all these creative 49:40 directors from Disney. We're like so 49:42 ready to be told what it's going to be 49:43 and then they're like, "Oh, you can just 49:45 write the whole story and like write all 49:47 the characters." And we're like, "Why 49:48 are we the ones doing this?" [laughter] 49:49 >> Like we're like by far the least 49:51 qualified to be doing this. Like so I 49:54 think just yeah, like Joel said, the 49:55 amount of trust, but also just Yeah. the 49:57 the amount of kind of like story and 50:00 world building and IPbased creative we 50:04 were doing. We were kind of surprised 50:06 with I mean it was really cool. We got 50:08 super involved with it. I could sort of 50:10 never see the IP in the same way ever 50:12 again now. [laughter] 50:13 >> Um but yeah, I think that was a bit of a 50:15 surprise because they would sort of say 50:17 to us like, "So, what's the story going 50:18 to be?" And we would be like, "God, you 50:19 going to tell us? Like, we're waiting." 50:21 And they're like, "We're waiting." And 50:22 we're like, "Oh, okay." So yeah, that 50:24 was um I think that was probably the 50:26 most surprising thing, but ultimately 50:28 like it wasn't a bad thing. 50:30 >> Yeah. No, so very smart. And a lot of 50:33 brands I think that's where they miss is 50:35 like you guys have created success, you 50:38 know what success looks like, what it 50:39 takes, and like why muddy that or them 50:44 try to add in their process that's just 50:46 going to make it that make it fail or 50:48 increase the chance of failing, right? 50:49 like all nothing's guaranteed in this 50:51 business. But like 100% that's super 50:54 smart and I I love hearing that and I 50:56 I've I've been hearing that from other 50:57 brands too who I talk to now. Like I 50:59 think a lot of people are getting smart 51:01 to that and lot like a lot of big brand 51:03 Disney like a lot of them have their own 51:05 gaming studio, right? Like why didn't 51:07 they just do it, right? But like there's 51:09 a reason that they're they're not they 51:11 want to go to developers that have 51:13 experience on that platform. um because 51:17 they're going to have a better way 51:18 better chance of su success than than 51:20 them just trying to take that shot. 51:22 >> Yeah, it's definitely such a nuance 51:24 platform within Fortnite Creative and as 51:26 a creator just recognizing that you 51:27 probably know way more than you realize 51:29 when you're when you're inside the 51:31 community. And I think even for us 51:33 having done it for so long, we sort of 51:34 still go on Twitter and we're like, man, 51:36 we have no idea what we're doing. But 51:38 maybe from other people's perspective, 51:40 we'd like really have it put together, 51:42 but it does not feel that way. So having 51:44 them being like, "Yeah, we really trust 51:45 you." It's like, "I guess we know what 51:47 we're doing because they said so. So we 51:48 now have to get it right." 51:50 >> That's That's just it. That's all this 51:52 business is, is failing as much as you 51:54 can. And And 51:55 >> until you can't. 51:56 >> Until you can't. Thankfully. 51:58 >> Yeah. Yeah. I mean, if if you can hold 52:01 on that long. 52:02 >> Yeah. We scrape by. That's our motto. 52:05 [laughter] 52:07 >> Gauntlet. [clears throat] 52:09 >> The new company tagline. 52:11 >> Driven by fear. 52:13 >> [laughter] 52:14 >> It's like that. Yeah. 52:16 >> Seriously, congrats on that. You guys 52:18 crushed it. Amazing job. My kids are 52:20 literally watching that season right 52:21 now. So, it's it's really cool. 52:23 >> That season's good. The second season is 52:25 good. Like, 52:25 >> yeah, 52:26 >> objectively like really enjoyed it. And 52:28 I mean, I have no like skin in the game 52:30 to promote it, but I feel like it's a 52:31 it's a fun season to watch for sure. 52:33 >> Definitely. Definitely. No, we're we're 52:34 we're we're watching right now. It's 52:36 it's awesome. 52:37 >> Awesome. 52:38 >> Yeah, you crushed it, guys. So, like 52:40 let's kind of talk about we're kind of 52:42 wrapping up here. We're almost at an 52:43 hour already. We've been we've been 52:44 smoking. Got a few more questions for 52:46 you guys before before you get out of 52:47 here. Like you have clearly pushed UFN 52:50 to its limits. So, like I'm curious from 52:53 like a builder's perspective, like if 52:55 you could change one thing or add one 52:57 thing in UFN to make lives easier, like 53:00 what would it be and why? 53:01 >> I guess for me it's like probably the 53:03 same answer as everyone is like the time 53:05 it takes to just get into a session. 53:06 Like if there was like local 53:08 >> time to test 53:09 >> like local sessions like just anything 53:12 that speeds that up like especially 53:13 making these huge maps and like the 53:15 public 53:15 >> how long did it take for you guys to 53:16 push an update 53:18 >> dude sometimes like with all like the 53:20 the false starts and failures like just 53:22 launching sessions it takes like an hour 53:24 like it's just there's so much stuff 53:26 >> I'll like I'll like allocate like two 53:28 hours of my morning just assuming it'll 53:30 take that long to get in sometimes and 53:31 like it often won't but you just kind of 53:33 have to bake into your day like an 53:35 enormous amount of time cuz if you phone 53:36 and then you I had all this other stuff 53:38 planned and it all goes down the toilet. 53:41 It's like you just have to bake that 53:42 into your to-dos and then you like go to 53:44 the coffee shop to get something while 53:45 it's pushing and you come back and it's 53:46 like do you want to save before pushing 53:48 and you're like oh my god [laughter] 53:49 waste 53:50 >> of but yeah I'll open like Unreal Engine 53:53 and and just like press go and it just 53:54 it's just like an instant session. I'm 53:56 like oh this is so nice like why why 53:58 can't we have this? 53:59 >> Yeah. 54:00 >> So hope hope something's coming soon. I 54:02 think that would just like explode our 54:05 productivity. Like it would be so 54:06 insane. 54:07 >> Yeah, I think I would slightly different 54:09 answer, but another super duper common 54:12 answer is just around discovery and new 54:14 maps and and that sort of thing. And I 54:16 mean there's so much said on this topic, 54:18 but for me, I would just say like look 54:19 at for me personally, look at YouTube as 54:21 an example. Every time you refresh 54:23 YouTube, you're getting like new 54:24 content, new videos. It's all super 54:26 personalized. You know, if you engage 54:27 with one creator or one type of content, 54:29 you're getting surfaced similar content. 54:31 Um, I feel like if we could have a 54:32 discover algorithm that was more like 54:34 that. Like I'm not going to get into all 54:36 the details about editorial and rows and 54:38 trending. Like don't have much to say, 54:39 but I just look at other platforms and 54:41 I'm like, why can't we just sort of base 54:43 it off a system like that? That seems 54:44 like a good system. So be cool if they 54:46 kind of did more of that. And they've 54:47 been saying they're hoping to do more 54:49 personalized stuff. So I hope it keeps 54:50 going in that direction. 54:51 >> Definitely. Definitely surfacing content 54:53 that we want to play for. For sure. For 54:55 sure. And I think communities, there was 54:57 something about within that communities 54:58 where they're going to look at like if 55:00 someone's interested in your community 55:02 and the people that play what other game 55:04 other games they play, they're going to 55:05 recommend to the other people that have 55:07 also like apparently interacted in your 55:09 community or something that that'll be 55:10 interesting, I guess. But yeah, there's 55:12 a lot of room for improvement there. 55:13 >> I feel like their rhetoric is pretty 55:15 good when they say like we want to push 55:16 these maps and we want to show this and 55:17 I'm like this all sounds good. And then 55:18 you open up your client and it's like 55:20 for you and you're like for me this 55:22 stuff. 55:22 >> Yeah. Box fights. Yeah. Kitchen box 55:24 fights. What is this? 55:26 >> No, no, that's good. That should be 55:28 there. Yeah, 55:29 >> I'm going to go check out that game, 55:31 dude. I I want to I want to hit someone 55:32 with a spatula. 55:33 >> Oh my god. 55:34 >> This might be like the inflection point 55:35 where it it takes off, you know? Kitchen 55:37 box fights. 55:38 >> That's right. 55:39 >> I'll jump start it again, dude. And then 55:40 you're going to have to update that map. 55:42 >> I'm terrified. 55:43 >> Oh man, good times, guys. Good times, 55:45 man. Like we got two more questions here 55:47 before we get out of here, but like 55:48 before we wrap up, like I want to make 55:50 sure people know where to follow you and 55:52 support what you guys are doing. So like 55:54 where can people find you? Um and like 55:56 maybe guys have anything what you guys 55:58 are building next or what fans should 55:59 keep an eye out for? 56:00 >> For sure. I'll go first. So for me, 56:02 honestly, this is so this is so 56:05 corporate, but LinkedIn is the easiest 56:06 [laughter] place to reach me. What a 56:10 suit. Eddie Benson's my LinkedIn and 56:12 like have gauntlet stuff written all 56:13 over it or just Discord. My Discord is 56:16 Zebs FN. My gamertag I go by is Zebes. 56:18 So, um I don't that's the same on 56:21 Twitter, but I don't do too much 56:23 Twittering. Yeah, that's me. 56:25 >> Uh for me, probably just on Twitter, 56:27 Joel Bestart. I'm always like posting 56:29 like little videos of creative stuff 56:31 that I'm making. And uh yeah, I'm 56:33 excited to post that stuff again because 56:34 I've kind of we kind of been on lockdown 56:36 with the Disney thing. Like we can't we 56:37 couldn't really post much stuff. So 56:39 excited to share share some stuff. 56:41 >> Easy. And all those links will be in the 56:43 description so you guys can go check 56:44 them out. Um, all right. To close this 56:46 out, I want to zoom out and look at like 56:49 the big picture of Fortnite as a 56:51 platform. So, like looking ahead, what 56:54 do you think the next wave of Breakout 56:55 Fortnite games will look like and where 56:57 do you see Team Gauntlet fitting in into 56:59 that future? I always ask these like 57:01 really hard questions for the last one, 57:03 so I apologize. Yeah, 57:04 >> it's such a funny one right now cuz it's 57:06 like the brain rot meta and where does 57:09 it go from the brain rot meta? But I 57:11 mean, we've seen we've seen 57:13 >> brain rot here we come. 57:15 >> Boy, we've seen different sort of metas. 57:18 This one's particularly interesting cuz 57:19 it's like a theme from outside of 57:21 Fortnite as the meta as opposed to a 57:22 specific type of map. 57:24 >> Yeah. 57:25 >> So, really hard to know, but it feels 57:26 like some sort of remix from an existing 57:29 like indie game or Roblox or Minecraft 57:31 is quite likely. And if I'm totally 57:33 honest, in terms of Gauntlet, like 57:34 that's not really our strength. We're 57:36 not really the guys that ride the trends 57:37 and and and the waves and kind of pay 57:40 attention to exactly what the big 57:41 trending indie game is and try and 57:43 remake that. So for us, we're probably 57:45 just going to trying to keep doing what 57:46 we're doing and making like really cool 57:48 open world games and and yeah, just 57:51 working towards that niche of community 57:53 that we know loves our stuff and just 57:54 trying to build for them. 57:56 >> Yeah. Yeah. And for me, I think it's 57:58 like I think with Scene Graph and all 58:00 the cool stuff that's coming out, like 58:01 I'm hoping that more like AAA developers 58:03 will come in and like make these really 58:05 cool like polished games because that 58:07 that's the stuff I want to make like 58:08 these really polished like AAA games 58:11 like The Witcher, Skyrim, that kind of 58:12 thing. And like yeah, like I'm kind of 58:14 here for that. Like I kind of saw Unreal 58:16 Engine like starting to come into the 58:19 the VFX world and with like the 58:21 real-time rendering and I kind yeah that 58:23 that's when I kind of saw like Unreal 58:24 Engine was like man they're like they're 58:26 just updating so much. There's so many 58:28 cool features. I want to like try this 58:29 thing and I'm just here to like learn 58:30 Unreal Engine and make these kind of 58:32 really polished cool games. And I'm 58:34 hoping that like UFN kind of merges with 58:36 like Unreal Engine 6 which I think might 58:38 be happening. 58:39 >> It's happening. They announced it. Yeah. 58:40 I mean it's going to happen. I mean, we 58:42 all know how updates go, but yeah, 58:44 hopefully 2027 this year. 58:47 >> Yeah. [laughter] 58:48 >> Yeah. So, so maybe Gauntlet could be 58:50 making like actual like really cool 58:52 Unreal Engine games and like Yeah. If 58:54 they're just like if there's just like 58:55 less janky barriers of UF to like kind 58:58 of overcome. Yeah. But it's super 59:00 exciting like Yeah. 59:01 >> Great answer actually. 59:02 >> Yeah. Ellis, look, that's an episode. 59:04 This was super fun, man. You guys are a 59:06 great hang. I've hung out with Joel and 59:09 we had a lot of fun, brother. And you 59:10 didn't show up, Eddie. So, this year 59:13 >> Well, that's when it really gets 59:14 exciting. 59:15 >> Yes. No, you got you gotta show up, man. 59:17 It's a good time. And look, and I what I 59:19 love about that story is you came to 59:21 Unreal Fest and you met people from 59:22 Disney and it turned into something. And 59:25 I think they just announced Unreal Fest 59:27 like a few days ago is in Chicago like 59:30 and creators, if you can, I know like if 59:32 if you don't have the funds or 59:33 something, definitely submit for like um 59:35 to talk cuz then they'll I think they 59:37 they do pay for like your hotel and like 59:39 access to get in. So, it's a a lot much 59:41 more affordable, but if you can make it, 59:43 it really is if you're if you're serious 59:45 about this business, it's really smart 59:46 to go and meet people. So, 59:48 >> for sure. Yeah, I think I'll definitely 59:50 be there this time. We'll both be there 59:52 if come up and say hi if you recognize 59:54 us at all. I wouldn't expect anyone to 59:56 necessarily, but we'd be very flattered 59:58 and happy to talk to anyone. 1:00:00 >> Definitely. No, say hi. Everyone does it 1:00:02 like put their little logo on a shirt 1:00:03 and then do I'm It happened. And there's 1:00:05 a lot of people like, "Oh, you know, cuz 1:00:07 most devs don't put their face out 1:00:09 there, right? Or it's like a little PFP, 1:00:11 right? You can't like, you know, tell." 1:00:13 And I I have the same thing. Like I know 1:00:15 so many people in Fortnite Cra I even 1:00:17 even when I go, I'm like, you know, like 1:00:19 what was what's your Twitter name? It's 1:00:21 you. Hey, you know, right that So, no, 1:00:25 it's it's very true. But yeah, hope to 1:00:27 see you guys at uh Unreal Fest very 1:00:28 soon. Seriously, congrats on all of your 1:00:31 success from making hit maps to insane 1:00:35 IP collabs that people could only dream 1:00:37 of. You guys are crushing it. 1:00:38 >> Awesome. Yeah. Thanks for having us. And 1:00:40 also to anyone who's listening, thanks. 1:00:41 Thanks for listening to our story. We 1:00:43 really appreciate it. 1:00:44 >> Thank you so much, man. 1:00:46 >> Yeah. I just want to say like you were 1:00:48 the first guy I ever messaged in the UFN 1:00:51 community when I started and you 1:00:52 actually you're the only one to reply 1:00:55 >> and you were [laughter] like giving me 1:00:56 like you were like helping me out on 1:00:57 like my thumbnail and like giving me 1:00:59 tips and stuff and I was like oh this 1:01:01 guy's so nice. So 1:01:03 >> crazy cool man. Look I I try to respond 1:01:06 to as many people as I can. So 1:01:08 >> dude thank you for letting me know that 1:01:10 actually. That's crazy. 1:01:12 >> Thanks thanks for replying. Yeah 1:01:14 >> of course. Of course, I'm never if 1:01:16 someone better catch me if I'm ever in 1:01:17 that like, you know, ever think I'm too 1:01:19 cool for school, you know what I mean? I 1:01:21 hate I hate people that act like that in 1:01:24 in anything and especially in this 1:01:26 ecosystem because we all you know we all 1:01:29 need to kind of be together in some ways 1:01:31 and help each other out and everyone's 1:01:34 at different levels and I get that and I 1:01:36 have so we all just have we don't have 1:01:37 infinite time so it's really hard but 1:01:39 like you have to like I don't know like 1:01:42 I I'm didn't get here because like just 1:01:45 from myself like it's my community that 1:01:47 helped me get here you know what I mean 1:01:48 and so like I never understood the that 1:01:51 that type of behavior. So, no man, and 1:01:53 plus you guys are just like, look, not a 1:01:55 lot of people want to come out like 1:01:56 that, hit games and give advice and like 1:01:59 their little tricks and things. Not a 1:02:00 lot of people want to do that. So, like, 1:02:02 you know, thank you guys for coming on 1:02:04 and sharing that with with um the 1:02:06 community cuz I'm sure a lot of people 1:02:07 are going to pick up some things from 1:02:08 this episode. So, thank you guys. 1:02:10 >> Awesome. 1:02:11 >> Well, merry Christmas. I didn't want to 1:02:13 say it. I didn't I told I told Eddie 1:02:15 we're not going to do any, but it's 1:02:17 coming out on the 24th. Merry Christmas. 1:02:19 Happy holidays, you know, whatever you 1:02:21 celebrate. Uh, hope you have a good 1:02:23 holidays and same with you fellas. That 1:02:24 was such a fun conversation. Huge thanks 1:02:27 to Eddie and Joel for coming on and 1:02:28 being so open about the real story 1:02:30 behind Team Gauntlet, Kraken, [music] 1:02:32 and everything they have learned along 1:02:34 the way. If you are not already 1:02:36 following them, make sure to check out 1:02:37 Team Gauntlet. All their socials are 1:02:39 linked in the description. And if you 1:02:41 enjoyed this episode, please do me a 1:02:43 favor. all the podcast. Subscribe on 1:02:46 YouTube, hit that like button, and if 1:02:49 you are listening on audio, leave a 1:02:51 positive review on your favorite podcast 1:02:53 app. It generally helps out more than 1:02:55 you think. See you in a Fortnite, which 1:02:57 is in 2 weeks. And remember, don't hate, 1:03:00 create.