Making a Monument Valley for the Netflix generation

Monument Valley 3 is releasing at this time, ten years after the collection debuted, and a mirror of developer Ustwo Video games’ evolution throughout that point.

Having dabbled in DLC, subscriptions providers, and video games championing communities and the pure world, Ustwo appears to have taken these experiences and poured them into the extremely awaited third opus of its star franchise.

Monument Valley 3 introduces new characters and mechanics (like crusing), a bigger world, and a model new standalone story, nevertheless it additionally introduces a reside service method, with Ustwo seeking to launch new content material with each real-life season. In between these large chapters, the developer will even repeatedly launch new actions and puzzles. All of this may happen solely on Netflix, with the firm’s video games department appearing as the cellular title’s writer.

For some folks, this step into reside service could seem shocking coming from Ustwo, nevertheless it’s a pure evolution from what it has been doing for the previous decade.

Each Monument Valley 1 and a couple of had DLC, 2019’s Assemble with Care was a pioneer of subscription providers as an (initially) Apple Arcade unique, and 2022’s Desta: The Recollections Between was already a Netflix title.

“At Ustwo, most of [our] video games have been about respecting gamers’ time – these smaller experiences which might be significant, issues that you simply keep in mind outdoors of that,” Monument Valley 3 director Jennifer Estaris tells GamesIndustry.biz.

“However for Monument Valley, [we’ve] at all times achieved downloadable content material. It is simply much less rhythmic, much less predictable, after they come out. And so for me, it was about: how will we make that a wholesome behavior for gamers, the place they’ll know that one thing is coming they usually get enthusiastic about it? But in addition tied to the themes of the sport about caring for the world, not simply being a one-and-done expertise.”

Estaris says that Ustwo needs to be very aware about managing gamers’ time, and is experimenting on the proper strategy to ship these content material updates so it feels passable and never exploitative – a pitfall that is frequent in cellular, however does not match the firm’s values.

“That is what we’re experimenting with,” she continues. “Individuals are anticipating all the things each day. What if we give it to them each week or each month? Will they nonetheless really feel that very same satisfaction? Will they nonetheless keep in mind to return again? That will probably be what we get to find,” she smiles.

Monument Valley 3’s lead designer Emily Brown describes the studio’s plans for the title’s updates as “Monument Valley snacks.”

“We’re simply hoping to search out that area the place folks like being on this world, and the feeling they get from being there”Emily Brown

“A few of the work has been achieved and is being finessed and polished, and we nonetheless nonetheless need that openness, to see how issues land, and adapt as we progress via these seasons,” Brown continues.

“However it’s been actually fascinating interested by [these] little Monument Valley snacks you possibly can have. Like, ‘Oh, I simply wish to return and have a little little bit of this factor I like’. After which come again once more one other time, and construct as much as these. We’re simply hoping to search out that area the place folks like being on this world, and the feeling they get from being there.”

Approaching Monument Valley 3 as an evolving sport meant adapting to a different kind of growth journey, lead producer John Lau tells us.

“The challenges are methodological however [also] sort of attitudinal,” he says. “You sort of should be in a totally different mindset from ‘there’s this excellent factor that we’re gonna change proper till the final minute’, and transferring into one thing a bit extra sustainable.

“But in addition, it is obtained a life after launch. And, in some senses, there’s a little bit of: let’s preserve stuff in the tank. You must cease altering issues earlier and begin interested by this different factor, and that is not been a simple transition for positive.

“That mentioned, that angle of regularly iterating, and perhaps iterating barely too late in the course of and making different issues, are good issues you possibly can take into a post-launch mannequin. And to be clear, I do not suppose we’re in a state of affairs the place we’ll be scrutinising knowledge and altering a factor to optimise participant engagement. That is not the combine.”

Lau shares that Ustwo has about the first season “and a bit” of content material just about able to go.

“I do not suppose Monument Valley 3 can be a Monument Valley sport if it needed to mould itself to the necessities of a free- to-play mannequin with the intention to survive”John Lau

We talk about how the studio traditionally was a poster little one for premium video games on cellular, and the way it appears to have efficiently transitioned into a little bit of a poster little one for video games on subscription platforms, with out compromising its imaginative and prescient in the course of.

“That is an fascinating statement as a result of, looking back, it does sort of make sense. For those who make your title on [creating] very honed, finely crafted, premium experiences after which free-to-play hits after which the subscription mannequin comes out… [If] you have made sufficient of a title for your self, then in fact you are going to gravitate in direction of a subscription service.

“Personally, I do not suppose Monument Valley 3 can be a Monument Valley sport if it needed to mould itself to the necessities of a free- to-play mannequin with the intention to survive. So it might solely have survived on a subscription service, no matter who that was with.”

Ustwo has labored with each Apple and Netflix in the previous, and traditionally had a sturdy bond with Apple. So we ask how the crew landed with Netflix as a accomplice for this specific undertaking.

“Monument Valley was recognized for being a pioneer in the cellular sport area when it first got here out, for these lovely, small display experiences,” Estaris begins, echoing our dialogue with Lau. “So what we’re at all times excited by is how we will be a pioneer in different areas, and I feel Netflix Video games – particularly with what the platform affords, the movies and reveals – was an thrilling alternative for us, [with] the larger stakes and cinematic components [of Monument Valley 3].

“We’re nonetheless working with Apple on totally different merchandise nevertheless it appeared like what this sport needed to be about match rather well with what Netflix is hoping to do.”

Past the enterprise mannequin concerns, the crew needed to face the added problem of following up on earlier Monument Valley video games, which have “forged such a lengthy shadow,” as Lau places it.

“One specific downside is that it is very troublesome to start out out with a very particular imaginative and prescient of how a Monument Valley sport units out,” he says.

“For those who set out making puzzles with a view to hitting particular story beats, they don’t seem to be excellent puzzles”John Lau

“With sport growth normally, it is a very squiggly base, and it is sort of writhing, and you must wrestle with, ‘Okay, that is what you might be. Cool. Proper.’ We had an thought of what the themes have been, however in the case of story and the most important beats, defining that upfront was very troublesome to do as a result of, if you happen to set out making puzzles with a view to hitting particular story beats, they don’t seem to be excellent puzzles.”

So the crew needed to work the different approach round, retroactively constructing the story round its puzzles, with Lau describing it as “reviewing a documentary’s rushes” and shaping the story from there.

Brown provides: “I feel the large problem with Monument Valley is discovering the stability between the story and the play expertise, and weaving via that. And generally you are leaning extra into ‘I am gonna actually hit this story beat’, and that is the focus, so it isn’t going to be a actually troublesome puzzle. After which transferring again into, ‘Now we’ll noodle your mind a little bit’ or ‘Now I will chill you out’. And there is this type of weaving that occurs between leaning into puzzles and impossibility, after which into story and so forth. So discovering that stability is a problem.”

Visually, the problem for lead artist Lili Ibrahim and her crew was to create one thing contemporary and new whereas retaining the DNA of what the Monument Valley video games appear like.

“Monument Valley has its roots in graphic design, and the first Monument Valley sport is nearly a time capsule of graphic design [circa] 2014 and what felt thrilling and contemporary then,” Ibrahim tells us. “So my purpose was to see if I might recreate a few of that feeling about 2024. So what does that imply?

“I used to be trying a lot at graphic design tendencies at this time, poster design, editorial remedies. And out of doors of video games, at all times. We at all times attempt to attract from outdoors of video games as a result of one other energy of the first Monument Valley is that it does not appear like a sport. And that was achieved by not drawing direct references from video games, however graphic design, structure, poetry.”

An enormous benefit that the crew had was having the ability to seek the advice of straight with a few of the folks behind the authentic Monument Valley video games, as a lot of them are nonetheless at Ustwo Video games to today.

“It is a actually great factor – with caveats! – to nonetheless be working at the studio [alongside] these individuals who made these video games, and you’ll ask them these questions… However it’s a blessing and a curse,” Lau laughs.

“It is a curse as a result of they’ve their very own issues they did not get to do on these video games, or the issues they choose up on are very small. And if you carry that lens to one thing which remains to be very nascent, that may be very troublesome and jarring. However [overall] having the individuals who labored on these video games round is simply nice to start with.”

With the ability to draw on that historic information feels like an asset then, however the crew very a lot made the sport their very own ultimately. In actual fact, after we talked to Ustwo Video games’ chief artistic officer Danny Grey earlier this 12 months, he was eager to level out that having a model new crew work on the studio’s beloved IP was very a lot an intentional alternative, to maintain issues contemporary and never it being “the similar group of six, eight [guys].”

“[It’s] that change from a previous life to a totally different life, and the way we kind a new group collectively”Jennifer Estaris

He additionally informed us at the time that Ustwo’s growth course of closely depends on ‘”making certain that creatives can inject some private tales and emotions into the issues that [they] make,” with every sport intrinsically linked to its crew’s lived experiences.

We ask the Monument Valley 3 crew what their imprint on the title is.

“I am feeling an hesitance to call it as a result of what I do not need is for that to be sort of a solution after which for [people] to play the sport and be like, ‘Wait, that is not in there in any respect!’,” Lau prefaces.

“As a result of inevitably what you do is you sort of imbue all of this richness and expertise into a sport like Monument Valley, the place the narrative framing is so delicate, and sometimes it is very arduous to select up on. However there being a lot selection in the backgrounds and the experiences of the crew clearly has [an impact].

“You might put up rationalise and interpret a sport which is about the formation of a group in circumstances that are averse, and the try and sort of get alongside. In our early conversations and relating our lived expertise, there was a lot specificity in that, and truly we needed to sort of strip away the element and simply concentrate on the core of it, which is about conserving group collectively and getting alongside. However the danger is that they grow to be so summary that they grow to be meaningless. You additionally wish to make it sufficiently common so that somebody who’s feeling that exact approach about group can latch onto it.”

Estaris shares that almost all of the Monument Valley 3 crew are immigrants or second generation immigrants, and that questioning the explanation why folks transfer was at the core of the early interrogations round the title.

“We had incubation sprints the place we have been like, ‘Let’s make some puzzles primarily based on a theme’,” Estaris remembers. “One among the themes was ‘created household’, one other theme was ‘motion collectively’. I feel it is these themes we then untangled and spun out into the most important pillars of our sport. So [it’s] that change from a previous life to a totally different life, and the way we kind a new group collectively.”

Forward of Monument Valley 3’s launch, the two earlier titles in the franchise additionally launched on Netflix, with Estaris telling us the writer is proud of their industrial performances. Between that and optimistic opinions of the sport, the hope is that Monument Valley 3 will carry out equally properly.

“I am most enthusiastic about the way forward for the Monument Valley world,” Estaris smiles. “What else might it imply? How far can we push that envelope? However that is to return, we’ve not made it but. There are many seeds for this…”