Game developers Megan Ralph and Joel Herber known for their work on Fall Guys, Alto’s Odyssey, Hellblade II, and Summerhill are here with their own studio: Kindred Spirit Games.
They announced the studio on June 5 and I felt it necessary to chat with them about their previous experiences in game development, why they decided to start their own studio, the video game industry layoffs, Summer Game Fest, Stumble Guys imitating the success of Fall Guys, and life in the UK.
Here’s my interview with Joel Herber and Megan Ralph. If you’d rather prefer to watch the interview in a video format, click here.
Keep in mind any “quotations” in the interview are paraphrases.
Pingal Pratyush: Hey guys! This is Pingal and I run Spiel Times, which is like an SEO-based gaming website, but we’re slowly focusing on interviews, talking to people, and getting to know how the world of video games really works. Sitting on the other side and writing about games, criticizing them, is easy, but then knowing about the people behind these games, and how things really work, is the actual deal. So, [we are] trying to jump right into it.
Joel Herber: Sounds perfect! It’s interesting. I feel like the games industry is generally quite secretive, and people don’t usually reveal how the inner workings work outside of interviews. But usually, if you work in games media, then you just get the PR and press side of things, which is like, “Hey, we have this new thing to sell.”
Pingal Pratyush: I’m glad that you guys actually agreed to the interview. I think we tried contacting PLAYDEAD several times, [and the response] they always give, firstly, very little response, and whenever they respond, it’s like we are working on something, and we’ll let you know when it’s ready. So that’s the entire conversation. But anyway.
Joel Herber: I think they go dark a little bit while they work on a new thing.
Pingal Pratyush: Game 3 is going to be something. We were expecting to see it on the Xbox Showcase, but no signs of it yet. So let’s see. Alright. How involved were you guys with Fall Guys?
The Fall Guys Experience
Joel Herber: I joined Fall Guys when it was [a] very early stage prototype. We were a team of 10 people, and I joined as the sort of Head of the Programming Team. It was Pre-E3 before we showed the demo there and stuff like that. So I was [there in] pretty, pretty early stages and stuff like that [and Fall Guys had] just been signed with Devolver Digital. We took that through to prototype and then as we were scaling. I remember we sort of needed [someone from] a Level Design background. So then Megan Ralph joined the team as the Lead Level Designer.
We worked together on several prototypes running up to PAX and a few others as well. Then the team started scaling quite exponentially as we were getting towards release. I think by that time, there were tens and tens of programmers on the team, and there was a lot of management structure, but sort of Meg’s role within that was the Lead of Level Design, and I was the Lead of Programming. So pretty involved.
Pingal Pratyush: Do you have anything to say, Meg?
Megan Ralph: Not really, uh, Joel kind of summed it up really nicely. It was a pretty small, scrappy team and I don’t think people really realized that when they heard about Fall Guys because it was such a big success and obviously has quite complicated mechanics. It’s a big, massive multiplayer game, right? So you think it’s a big team, but really it was just like, what was it? 30 of us, Joel? I think maybe less than that.
Joel Herber: Yeah, [during the] prototype [phase, it] was like 10 to 12, and then suddenly, in the run-up to launch, we expanded to 30 or 40, and then when it came up to the initial launch, I did a headcount, [and] we were, like 130, 140 or something like that. We expanded quickly, particularly after we started getting sort of features on Twitch and stuff like that. But yeah, it grew from a very small thing into a very big thing very quickly.
Megan Ralph: We had so much fun in that sort of development stage because, you know, there wasn’t any expectation, or there wasn’t that pressure of success on us. It was really just sort of pure development, and we had a really good team together. We all worked pretty well, at least me and Joel, and, you know, the sort of handful of leads on that project, I think, were pretty cohesive. It was just a really joyous time of pure creation, just sort of seeing what we could do and working together to get things out. Yeah, it was great.
Joel Herber: It was a pretty cool time. I remember we were in the Mediatonic offices in London, and I think they probably had about 150 people in that studio. There were a lot of times when before we went and hosted it on servers and stuff like that, we were sort of playing locally in the office. We had to ask everyone like, “Okay, can everyone down tools on whatever project you’re working on, [and] come help us test out this bad game that we’re making.” We’d have like, 60-player local games of Fall Guys with the whole office playing. So then, when people were eliminated, you could hear in the distance someone going, “Ahhhhh!” Everyone [started] cheering as someone started to win, and things like that. It was a pretty cool time.
Pingal Pratyush: When and why did you decide to leave Mediatonic?
Joel Herber: I sort of left after a couple of updates to Fall Guys. I think making Fall Guys sort of became this huge thing, and it sort of took over my life a little bit. I think I was looking to try and make games that sort of meant something to me. So I moved off to Land & Sea Games, which was a tiny little studio with three or four people.
I feel like when a team expands to a certain size, it’s quite hard to have those personal relationships with people, particularly compounded with Covid, where there were so many people that joined the team remotely that we hadn’t met in person and stuff like that. It was sort of hard to have those relationships that really thrive on developing games. So, I went to go work for a little studio called Land & Sea, and then Meg went away to go work on Hellblade II with Ninja Theory, and then I slowly poached her to come work with me. (laughs)
Megan Ralph: Yeah, it was similar for me. I think success is a double-edged sword in a lot of ways, because it’s so fantastic to see people enjoying what you’ve made, and it’s such a boon for whoever you’re working for to see them not have to worry about the things that they were worrying about before. But at the same time, with something like Fall Guys, at least, it locks you into that project for the foreseeable [future] and we would have been working on Fall Guys for years after that. That wasn’t really something that I wanted to do at that point in my career. I wanted to sort of move on to another project.
The way I like working in development is sort of the variety of changing [things around]. The thought of working on a live-ops game permanently was a bit much for me, plus also, the team was scaling up, and I would have been able to get higher in the company, but I wouldn’t have been able to do as much creative work and that’s kind of what I enjoy, really. So yeah, it was a mixture of things for me. When I moved over to Ninja Theory on Hellblade II, I just fell pregnant actually, so I was on maternity leave not long after that experience anyway. So yeah, there was a lot going on in my life around the Fall Guys launch and stuff.
Pingal Pratyush: So, we’d be right to say that when a game expands, like Fortnite, things start to get repetitive and like, not really interesting?
Joel Herber: Not so much because some people do thrive on working on those sorts of projects where they’re getting to work on interesting features, and also you have the security of knowing like, “Oh, okay. This is a stable thing because this game is a success, so we can just focus on our one little thing.” But I think I’ve often thrived when you’re thrown a very difficult challenge like, “We don’t know if we can make this thing, let’s see if we can make it come together.” That sort of thing. And I think that’s sort of my skill set.
I think once you have something that’s already in motion and is successful, it just becomes a case of iterating on that existing thing. And there are people that are really good at doing that, but I think I got into making games to try and create new things and challenge myself and I think it was also a little bit of… like when Fall Guys came out and it was a success, it sort of afforded me at least, and Meg as well, I imagine, the opportunity to move to different studios so we could sort of pick the studios that we enjoyed working at, and stuff like that.
Pingal Pratyush: During the time that you guys left Mediatonic, did you also see your peers or colleagues leave the company as well?
Joel Herber: Um, I think people stayed. A lot of people stayed when Epic Games took over as well, and they were excited to see the direction that that company was going to take as well. I think you find that there are several types of people in the games industry. There are some people who like to wait and see what happens, and there are some people who like the variety. I think me and Meg have always been drawn to working together because we are both people that enjoy that variety as well.
I also think it’s nice to get experience in making things in lots of different ways because every game company has its own procedures and processes in place, and I feel that I personally advance as a developer when I’m seeing a lot of different ways of doing the same thing and then picking and choosing [from them]. When it comes to form your own studio, [it] is like, “Okay, I love the way they did this thing in this studio. I love the things they did in this studio. If we can bring the best bits to form our own studio, then that’s a winning situation for me.”
Megan Ralph: I think Joel and I would have been the first ones to leave after the project. And yeah, it’s because we are quite similar in temperament, like that. Because I think a lot of people want a successful project and they’re happy to stick around because it is secure work, which isn’t that common in the industry. But yeah, we make a good team, especially with this new company, because we are very similar in the way that we look at new projects and new work.
Stumble Guys
Pingal Pratyush: Do you guys know about Stumble Guys?
Megan & Joel: (laughing) Yeah.
Pingal Pratyush: Any comments on that?
Joel Herber: It’s interesting. Ah, my comments on Stumble Guys…I don’t know. I think it’s the interesting thing of when we were making Fall Guys, one of the things that I kept saying was, “If we make this thing badly, then someone else can come and take this idea and make a better version of it.” I’m not saying that I think that (Stumble Guys) is a better version or anything like that, but I think there was this real thing of like, “We can’t put a half-baked version of this thing out there. It’s not about being first, it’s also about being the complete package.”
I think that games like Stumble Guys which are imitating Fall Guys, are more like a compliment to its success and the formula that it’s created. There’s also SEGA‘s Sonic Rumble, which is coming out recently, and is definitely inspired by Fall Guys as well. Not in our wildest dreams did we think that we’d be working on a game that SEGA would want to try and emulate.
But there is also something to be said. Within the games industry, we all do thrive because something new comes out, and then you’re just, like, “There’s some great ideas in this!” People can then pick and choose elements of that and run with it. So, as much as you can have situations where people do make something that is quite derivative of what you’re making, it also allows the freedom and creativity to take up ideas from existing properties and throw them into your own mix as well.
Megan Ralph: Yeah, that’s kind of been the history of game development, right? It’s like people copying what’s out there because, you know, it sort of opens up people’s ideas to what is possible, so they build on that. And that’s, you know, just the nature of our business. I don’t think you can really be that mad at it, you know, you can be flattered.
Pingal Pratyush: But not all copies of games get advertised on or partnered with a huge creator like MrBeast. Stumble Guys, when it was released, I felt it was a clone of Fall Guys, and that no one would bat an eye. Then suddenly it becomes immensely popular, [even] more than Fall Guys in many countries, I think. Now people also see Fall Guys as a PC version of Stumble Guys, instead of the other way around. Have you guys heard anything similar from people you know, maybe your younger siblings, or anyone who plays games?
Megan & Joel: (laughing) No, not necessarily.
Joel Herber: Again, it’s not necessarily about being first, but it’s also more of a case of, when you’re releasing something now, you can’t just be agnostic of any platforms, you know? I mean, like Fall Guys sticking to being console and PC. I think maybe not pursuing the other platforms as well, is how you ended up in a situation like this. But, yeah, I think it’s more of a question of, if you’re making something, you have to sort of target everything. I don’t really have anything else to say on it apart from that.
Alto’s Odyssey
Pingal Pratyush: Tell me more about Land & Sea. How did that come around for you guys?
Joel Herber: Yeah, so I joined Land & Sea, it’s founded by Harry Nesbitt, who’s like the artist and creative director. I started speaking with those guys, and just really liked the vibe at the studio. It felt like it was founded by some more mature devs as well. It felt like there was a great work-life balance, where it was like making gains around your life rather than the other way around.
I think there’s a culture within this industry of just like, you go work for a place, something happens, and then everyone ends up working crazy over time, and it becomes unsustainable, particularly the older you get. I think, if you’re younger, then maybe you’re happy to put all the time into working all of those hours and things like that. But I think if this industry wants to sustain hiring people from diverse backgrounds and also sustaining developers staying in this industry long term, then we have to improve the culture around work in this industry.
So lenity, for me, was really that. Also, I really loved Alto’s Odyssey and the Alto’s Adventure series and we got to work on Summerhill. I went to interview with them, and they showed me the initial prototype for Summerhill, and I was just like, “Okay, this seems completely different from what I’ve been working on, and it has a bunch of cool technical challenges to solve it.” So, yeah, I was immediately hooked.
Megan Ralph: Yeah, and Joel put me in contact with Land & Sea when they were looking for a Level Designer and I jumped over and it was wonderful. They are such a nice studio of really good people, and they’re working on something that’s absolutely gorgeous, you know, something that’s a piece of art, basically. So it was really an honor to work with them.
Video Game Industry Layoffs
Pingal Pratyush: Have you guys noticed that Wikipedia now has a separate page for the 2023-24 video game industry layoffs?
Megan Ralph: I didn’t know they had a page up, but it doesn’t surprise me.
Pingal Pratyush: Yeah, and very recently many studios got shut down, many people got laid off, like in huge numbers. Have any of your friends, or any of your colleagues been affected?
Megan Ralph: I think everybody who’s a dev in the industry at the moment knows someone who’s been laid off. It’s just the way it is. I mean, throughout my career, I think I’ve been made redundant three times. It’s not a new phenomenon. That’s not to say it’s like a good one, and it’s particularly been terrible over the past year, year and a half. But, yeah, it’s horrible to see so many studios falling, and so many creatives suffer when you’re also seeing such big profits from these companies, you know?
I think a big part of what’s really angering people is that these big companies are sort of making these decisions, and it’s really affecting the creatives at the ground, but it’s also the fact that so many companies got swallowed up by these sort of larger umbrellas, and that hasn’t really worked out.
Everybody’s sort of really wanting those to be success stories. We want to see those companies get better from those mergers, but unfortunately, I think a lot of them haven’t. That’s one of the big tragic things about all this, and it makes you think about the development landscape in the future and whether people are going to think twice about like selling their companies or merging, or the priorities within those teams.
Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II
Pingal Pratyush: You guys also worked on Senua II right?
Megan Ralph: I did, yup.
Pingal Pratyush: You know how the marketing was for Senua, right? Still people on ResetEra, on Reddit, they were really excited about the game. But during the same time, there have been conversations about how the game does not appeal to a lot of people, and not a very lot of people who started the game ended up finishing it, even though it was not a very long game. Do you have an opinion of why that turned out like that, because for some reason I think even after the game was released, the game did not find the success it was meant to.
Megan Ralph: Not really. I mean, I don’t know how development was. I was on that project years ago now during the initial prototyping phase. So I’m not really sure what direction it took, or, you know, how things went, but, yeah, I’m sad that it hasn’t done better in that sense, of people finishing it because I read an article about that the other day as well. But I haven’t played it yet. I haven’t had the time to, having a toddler and running this business. But, yeah, I can’t see why it wouldn’t be doing those numbers, and it makes me sad that it’s not.
Joel Herber: At the same time, I think a lot of people who work in the games industry see that it’s a minor miracle that most games get released at all. So, it’s just a celebration that something comes out and that they manage to get something up the door, something that looks as incredible as it does. You put something out there, but it’s sort of out of your hands, how it’s received and how it’s marketed and things like that. But, yeah, I think it (Hellblade II) looks incredible. I think that everyone’s really proud and also it’s nice to see that sort of stuff coming up in the UK game scene as well.
Summer Game Fest
Pingal Pratyush: Talking about UK games, did you guys see Summer Game Fest?
Joel Herber: Yeah, I watched a little bit of it. Some of our friends announced some stuff as well, which was pretty cool. It was nice to see because, like a lot of the big names bowed out, and it was like a little bit more independent games-focused this year. But yeah, a lot of cool trailers and a lot of cool stuff being shown.
Pingal Pratyush: Regarding Summer Game Fest, this was leaked that for a very small teaser kind of a thing for indie games, Geoff Keighley charges around $250,000, and for longer trailers, they charge more than $500,000. Being an independent studio, what do you think about the amount of money that you are paying and the amount of traction you’re getting? Is it justified? Would you be willing to do that in the future with your game?
Joel Herber: I mean, I don’t think we’re necessarily on the scale where we’re going to be getting featured in Summer Game Fest and stuff like that. I think marketing is expensive. People don’t realize how expensive marketing is. The budgets for marketing are almost the same as, like, the budgets for games, essentially.
It’s like a cost-effectiveness balance that the publishers make, and obviously, it benefits some people, because people are signing up to do it. I do think that there are games that also do get featured without paying those fees as well. I’m not entirely sure how the process works, though. I think he (Geoff) came out and made comments, like, saying, “Oh, I featured some solo devs and we didn’t charge them or something like that.”
Kindred Spirit Games
Pingal Pratyush: Who’s managing the business side of your studio?
Megan Ralph: We’ve been both doing it. So, sharing those responsibilities. It’s just been us two up until quite recently. So yeah, we’ve been kind of doing it all.
Pingal Pratyush: I read in an interview, I think you talked to GameDeveloper or GamesIndustry.biz and you said that you’re not hiring anyone right now because your project does not require other people. Finally, coming to Kindred Spirit Games, can we talk about anything, any detail of what you guys have been up to without revealing anything specific?
Joel Herber: No, ah…so we’re sort of at the prototyping phase at the moment. We have been making some hires but we’ve been doing our hiring from our own personal networks. And honestly, I think just because of the state of the games industry and the amount of layoffs, like, as soon as you announce that you have a studio, you get flooded with applications, so it’s more just to try and stem some of that from happening a little bit, even though we have still had a lot of speculative applications coming in, but we’re working on our prototype, and we’re hoping to have some more information to share soon. But yeah, that’s pretty much it(laughs). We can talk a bit more about why we founded the studio and stuff like that if that helps.
Pingal Pratyush: I really want to ask that, but do we know what platforms can we expect?
Joel Herber: We don’t have anything to announce at this time.
Pingal Pratyush: Alright So, Kindred Spirit Games. I read your announcement post as well. It was very heartwarming. Could you talk more about that now?
Joel Herber: Yeah, of course, yeah. I sort of just wanted to put it out there because me and Meg have been working silently on this. So I was away traveling around Central and South America for 15 months, and the last six months of that, me and Meg started talking, and we started spitballing some ideas, and we had this idea that we’re working on, which is turning into the thing that we’re working on, and we were sort of just having fun doing it, sort of one day a week, sort of a thing.
Then as it was getting to the point where I was like, coming back to the UK, it sort of got into the situation where we thought we could go full-time into this. So we founded the studio around January this year, and it’s just been me and Meg working out for the last six months, but we’re slowly starting to open up and ramp up our production a little bit. Here we are and then we announced the studio this week. We’ve been sort of overwhelmed by the response. It’s been great.
We’ve also had a lot of friends that have started up their own studios and things like that in the past, and we’re sort of expecting to be on a similar level to them, but it felt like we got a much bigger response than we’re expecting, which was nice.
Pingal Pratyush: How are you funding your operations right now?
Joel Herber: No real comment on that at the moment. We can’t really share our information about how we’re funded at the moment, unfortunately(laughs). We’ll have more to announce soon.
Pingal Pratyush: So, that means you’re not using up your savings, right?
Joel Herber: We were bootstrapping for a while when we first started. But, yeah, nothing else to share at this point in time, unfortunately.
US vs UK
Pingal Pratyush: Alright. Have you guys ever thought of relocating to the US, or maybe where the majority of the game developers are? Why did you still choose to be in the UK?
Joel Herber: I mean, we’re quite lucky in the UK. There are loads of amazing organizations and if you look at a chart of where the UK ranks in worldwide rankings of game development hubs and stuff like that, London is fourth or something like that, and Guildford is not far below it. So we have a really big network of people to connect with here, particularly in London.
I was previously based in the north, in Sheffield, but I relocated back to London. We also have organizations like Ukie in the UK, which have been a massive help getting us off the ground and there’s a bunch of incentives from the UK Government to start businesses, particularly games business in the UK as well. Also, Meg and I both have houses in London, so it’s easy for us to be based here.
But I think also there’s an element of like, it feels game development is getting more international post-COVID, where you can sort of work from anywhere, and we have events like Develop next month, which is like an international game development conference and stuff like that, which is just like an hour train ride away from where we live. So the UK is a pretty sweet spot to be in the games industry.
Megan Ralph: We’re also both British citizens, so you know, (laughs) we’d have to jump through a few hoops if we wanted to move it offshore.
Gamescom Plans?
Pingal Pratyush: Are you planning to attend, not to present your game, but in-person, attend any kind of gaming events this year outside of the UK? Let’s say, Gamescom in August?
Megan Ralph: Maybe. We haven’t really discussed that as of yet, but yeah, possibly, we’re just sort of looking at UK-based events at present. But yeah, there are always things like Gamescom in the future or in the backend of the year that we might jump over to. Not sure.
Pingal Pratyush: Are you guys still working remotely, or do you guys have a studio to be called the home of Kindred Spirit Games in the UK?
Joel Herber: We’re sort of like a hybrid studio. We do have an office that we’re working out of in London, because I’m in the northeast of London, and Meg’s in the southeast, so it’s easier if we just meet at Central. So in the beginning, we started off going to each other’s houses if we needed to be up in person, then we realized, okay, this takes quite a long time. So we sorted out an office in Central London, and it’s been great. Luckily, the people that we’re collaborating with are sort of based nearby. So it’s worked out to be a nice central hub for us to get this game made and get this studio founded.
Living in the UK
Pingal Pratyush: I talked to Nathan Grayson of Aftermath and he told me that the rent in New York is $2,500 for a very small apartment, which sounds way too much for me, actually. I also talked to Ben Henson, who said that because he lives in Minnesota, his operations become much easier to manage. So what’s life in London like? How expensive is your lifestyle?
Megan Ralph: I was just gonna say the same thing, really. London’s pretty expensive. Like, as far as cities go, I don’t think it’s one of the cheapest cities in the world, but it is kind of relative to the situation and what’s going on. We’re both lucky enough to be able to live in London and work, and I think a lot of people couldn’t say that in the UK games industry, so we understand that that’s a real benefit on our side. And yeah, that’s probably all I have to say about like, living costs?
Joel Herber: The rest of the UK is a lot cheaper than London. Like the UK does skew very London-heavy, and it’s great if you’re running a business, because it’s quite easy to do networking and things like that. But I do feel that there are opportunities for the games industry to branch out of London and Guildford and head to other parts of the UK, which are much more affordable places for people to live in.
Games They’re Excited About
Pingal Pratyush: Any games you’re excited about this year and any developers you want to give a shoutout to?
Joel Herber: My friends at Electric Saint just announced Crescent County, which I’m really excited about. I think it looks amazing. Their office is sort of two streets up from us, so we go for lunch all the time. We’ve been like, talking about information around founding teams and stuff like that. So we sort of feel like we’re really rooting for them, and they’re really rooting for us as well. So it was super exciting to see them announce their game finally and see it out in the wild.
Megan Ralph: I’m looking forward to the new Elden Ring expansion. That’s probably the next one on my list. I don’t know how much time I’ll have because it’s probably going to be a massive time sink, as they all are, but yeah, that’s probably the one I’m most excited about, and yeah, Electric Saint. Very, very happy to see them launch. I was thrilled to see their trailer.
Pingal Pratyush: Alright. I think that’s it for now. Any crowdfunding plans?
Megan Ralph: Nothing to announce at this time.
Pingal Pratyush: Thank you so much for your time and I am looking forward to talking to you more when you have more to announce when we can talk more about the game instead of all these, you know, industry questions. So yeah, thank you so much for your time.
Megan Ralph: Awesome, no worries.
Joel Herber: Cheers, Pingal!
