OC5 Speaker Spotlight: Mike Daly, Insomniac Games

In today’s OC5 Speaker Spotlight, we chat with Insomniac Games Lead Designer Mike Daly, who will join Principal Designer Duncan Moore for a behind-the-scenes look with “Evolving Stormland: How Insomniac Draws from the Past to Create an Open-World Structure in VR.”

Mike Daly: I had a VR close-call around ’95 when a school trip to EPCOT Center got a behind-the-curtain peek at a flying carpet VR prototype. The setup had you sitting on what looked like a motorcycle, grabbing what looked like a wide clipboard, and a long cone suspended via cables was moved in place to cover your eyes. Sadly, there was only one station, and I wasn’t one of the lucky few selected to try it. I just had to jealously watch a classmate, Jason, fly through the streets of Agrabah. Regardless, I was enchanted by the idea of feeling like I was really there.

Over 20 years later, a VR enthusiast in the office brought in their DK2 and asked if I wanted to try it. The demo was crude, but in the following days, that enchantment started creeping back to get me excited by the possibilities. Now that I’ve been able to realize not just feeling like I’m really there but feeling like I’m really there in a world I helped create? Well, looks like I got the last laugh, Jason!

MD: Insomniac has a long history of developing new IP—creating Spyro for PS1, Ratchet & Clank for the PS2, Resistance for the PS3, Sunset Overdrive for Xbox One, to name a few. Starting with a blank creative canvas and working it into a new, broadly appealing world is both very difficult and very rewarding—we love it. Working with Oculus meant that we had the chance to create more new IP that, thanks to the capabilities afforded by the platform, could push design boundaries in exciting ways. It seemed like a perfect match between Insomniac’s strengths and what was in demand from the VR audience. It helped that several people in the office were VR enthusiasts, giving demos on their early dev kits to get people excited.

We keep coming back for more. There’s still a ton of opportunity to create and push boundaries in VR, and we’ve built an awesome partnership over several projects thanks to Oculus’s strong and consistent support.

MD: Part of the way through development on The Unspoken, we added a feature in which players were placed in a pre-match lobby where they could see their opponent’s full-body avatars up close. Everyone just started dancing! The body language was shockingly expressive. We could already put players in a world in which they suspended disbelief about their surroundings, but now players could suspend disbelief about the presence of another person. It’s a game-changer—it’s not a feeling you can get in traditional games.

Once the game went live and we started weekly “Play with the Devs” sessions, I ended up spending a lot of time in the post-match lobby talking with folks from the community. It felt a lot more like talking with someone after playing them in an arcade than it did like talking over the phone (as it often does when playing traditional games online). Seeing their body language made these discussions fun, easy, and comfortable, and I think it was a contributing factor to such a tight-knit community forming around the game.

MD: I respect Sid Meier as a trailblazer and a source of game design wisdom that has had a broad effect on a generation of designers. Sid came up with game concepts that were completely novel, creating foundational titles for multiple genres we know today—tycoon games, civilization games, and, arguably open-world adventure. Sid has a talent for player-focused thinking and rapid prototyping. He’s shared this experience by mentoring several prominent designers and can distill design lessons into easy-to-understand anecdotes. I’ve often been faced with a game design challenge and then realize that one of Sid’s lessons could help solve it.

MD: Hardware and software advancements should facilitate longer, more comfortable sessions. Conventions and toolkits for 3D interactions will be established, enabling a much broader palette of apps to be created quickly and easily. Advancements to the platform will enable more cross-app and within-app capabilities, removing the need to go in and out of the headset in more situations. Content creation apps will begin introducing VR modes for enhanced functionality.

High-end games will grow in scope and vision, breaking down today’s design constraints and bringing new innovations. Improvements in fidelity and world crafting will result in a new level of immersion, one that skilled designers can leverage to provoke much stronger emotional responses in players. These are the ambitions that we’re targeting with Stormland—making a large, satisfyingly complex game that blows the lid off VR traversal and lets you bask in an exotic new world. With how much exciting progress we’ve already made, following that trajectory out five years leads to something truly incredible!