Behind Massive Screens - a Game Development Podcast

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter and Dóri meet Brenda Bae, Lead Concept Artist on Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora and Océane Näsström, Associate Lead Character Artist on Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora. Hear about their roles, how they got to where they are today, and what went into designing the clans and characters in Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora – and making them come to life in the...

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter and Dóri meet Mikhail Greuli, Associate Art Director on Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora and Kunal Luthra, Lead Technical Artist on Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora. Hear about their roles, how they got to where they are today, and of course what it was like to create the immersive world of Pandora – as we deep-dive into the creation of biomes, scattering...

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter and Dóri meet Martin Jansén, Expert Game Designer at Massive Entertainment, to talk about the Game Design in Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora. Hear about Martin’s role, how he got to where he is today, and learn more about how Martin and the team worked with player movement, haptics, the three Cs (character, camera, controls) and much more.

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens Alex Riviere, Audio Director on Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora, joins Petter & Dóri to dive into the role of an Audio Director. Hear about how Alex got to where he is, and of course about some of the design, systems, and tech behind the audio in Avatar: Frontiers of Pandora now!

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter and Dóri meet Johan Flote, Live Producer in the Ubisoft Connect team at Massive Entertainment, to find out more about how his job works and to talk about the open beta. During the summer, Ubisoft Connect launched their open beta. But why did they choose to have an open beta? What sort of feedback has been implemented? Also, what is a Live Producer...

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter and Dóri meet Julia Stegemann, Lead Knowledge Manager in the Snowdrop team at Massive Entertainment and Ola Holmdahl, Snowdrop Operations Director, to find out more about how their job works, through a discussion that touches on Academia, table-top games, late medieval love songs and more! The Snowdrop engine, with its flexible and empowering tools...

In this 20th (!) episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter and Dóri meets Conny Bengtsson, Technical Artist for Tom Clancy’s The Division 2, to find out what makes “technical art” technical. The discussion turns into a journey of spinning backpack fans, how you make glasses fit on characters’ faces, helmet shaders and – believe it a not – a big pile of virtual shirts that needed fixing. We also ge...

Once a video game has been released, how do you keep track of all the discussions surrounding it? How do you gather actionable feedback to improve the game? How do you keep a conversation between developers and players going? And how do you make sure that a game’s community stays engaged and informed? In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter and Dóri meet Daria Ilyina, Community Developer...

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, we delve into the subject of online programming together with Senior Online Programmer Omar Elbehaedi to find out what makes online games tick. We also delve into the subject of why code is beautiful and discuss that most forbidden topic – netcode. You head into a Team Deathmatch, the Dark Zone, or a 4000-player battle in a space MMORPG. The players are l...

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter and Dóri meet Marthe Jonkers, Associate Art Director at Massive Entertainment, to learn about the role that art direction plays when creating a game – the impact it has on a game’s development, how it helps set a game’s style and tone early on, and how it together with concept art communicates ideas to developers. We also get insights into what it...

When designing a game, how do you make sure that the player gets the information they need while playing? Or navigate menus and button prompts in an intuitive way? In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, UI artist Anna Kuzminska takes our dynamic hosts on a journey through the fascinating world of user interface design – from fonts and art to colors and shapes. Resources: We Can Fix It In UI -...

Ever wondered how game developers create stunning visual effects in video games? How they make red barrels blow up and explosions look great? How cars in racing games kick up dirt, or how the energy crackles from magical potions? In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, we meet John Behrens, VFX Artist at Massive Entertainment, who tells us about visual effects design and what is going on behind...

How do you become a playtester for video games and how does a playtest work? And what are the User Researchers, that are running the tests, looking for? In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, we meet User Researcher Hanna Rosvall, who will give us a look behind the scenes. What tools do User Researchers use, how does a games lab look, and what’s going on behind those mysterious one-way mirrors...

Ever wondered how to start working on artificial intelligence in a video game and how the AI in The Division was put together? What do you need to keep in mind when creating AI for an NPC? And how do you get started in modding games and what can you create using the tools available? In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Associate Game Director Drew Rechner covers these subjects in detail, sin...

In this special episode of Behind Massive Screens, we meet Thomas Parrott, author of Compromised, the latest The Division novel! Learn about how Thomas immerses himself in the worlds he writes about, the research he does, what inspires him and how he has worked with the team at Massive on both Compromised and the previous book in the series, Recruited. And what is it with The Division universe and...

Join Petter and Dóri as they meet Keltic Vermeersch, Environment Artist at Massive Entertainment, to find out how environments in video games are created - from "simple" hallways to sprawling open worlds. They also learn brand new creative uses for lamps. Yes, lamps.

Welcome to the Behind Massive Screens podcast! But what is it? Let Petter and Dori explain it to you, and then join us as we dig deeper into the games industry, find out more about the people behind some of your favorite games, and learn about what life is like in the gaming industry.

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter and Dori sit down with Lead Game Designer Lau Korsgaard to talk about experimental game design, indie development versus AAA, what uses a regular controller can have beyond the norm, and how games without rules can encourage social interaction. From being a part of an indie development collective to working in AAA gaming, Lau has gone on quite the...

Join Petter and new co-host Dori as they sit down with Palle Hoffstein, Art Producer for The Division 2, and dive into his job and his long history in the games industry. What does an Art Producer do and how do they work with the artists? What was it like to work in the industry back in the 90s? How did you develop a fully fledged FPS with only 20 people? And how was the experience of moving from...

We sat down with Chella Ramanan, Narrative Designer at Massive Entertainment, to dig into the complicated subject of storytelling in video games – in everything from smaller indie projects to giant AAA games. Chella has had a long career, spanning over disciplines like literature, games journalism and indie games, before coming to Massive. How did all of them inform her current job? How does game...

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter meets Concept Artists Topi Pajunen and Marie Isacsson to talk about their job, concept art’s role in game development, and how art can inspire the development teams and communicate ideas. We also gain insights into how fashion can help design characters, the limitations and freedoms artists have, how to deal with feedback and how they keep the crea...

What goes into adapting a huge AAA video game to other languages and markets than simply English? How do localizers and translators work on the text, but also on voices and UI? How do you work with voice casting and actors, dialects, language differences, and any potential translation mistakes? And how many people are involved in localizing a giant AAA video game? Let Myriam Forbes, Localization P...

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Petter meets The Division 2’s Creative Director Yannick Banchereau to talk about his job, his background and the new content for The Division 2 that released last week. What does a Creative Director on a Live game such as The Division 2 do, what decisions do they make and how do they work with – and encourage – their team? How does the game’s smaller team...

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Technical Animator Rasmus Björk gives an insight into what technical animation is, how it works and its place in bringing characters to life in video games. How do you make sure that a human, or an orc, or even an animal move in a realistic way? How do you build a skeleton that animators can then use to work their magic?

In this episode of Behind Massive Screens, Cinematic Animator Soo Kang tells us how cutscenes in games are made – from script to motion capture, to ending up in a game. How do you plan for a recording, how do you use the motion capture data once it’s done, how do you go from a pair of moving dots to a complete scene? How do you create drama and how do you connect it to gameplay? How do you use a m...