It’s safe to say that the gaming industry is spending a lot of time between layoffs, studio closures and fundraising. Enrique Fuentes, CEO and co-founder of Teravision Games, experienced that turbulence too closely for comfort when he released Killer Klowns, an asymmetric horror game based on an ’80s film of the same name, from space. The game was well received (Passthecontroller gives it a 7, calling it “as stupid and funny as the film that produced it”), and the trailer for the title won hundreds of thousands of views online. However, the team found themselves in a difficult location after launch. It’s the same difficult place that many people in the gaming industry are themselves.
“You know, 2024 was a very tough year for the industry as a whole, so it was a bit late to close the next project,” Fuentes said. Despite working with companies like Disney, Nickelodeon and Xbox, Teravision has had difficulty finding a follow-up project to Killer Klowns. When time runs out, the studio and its veteran developers have 20 years of experience in the industry. Less than a year later, Teravision released three unrealistic engines for Fortnite (UEFN) games. The fourth game released today utilizes the official The Walking Dead content pack released on UEFN.
Created in collaboration with Skybound, co-founded by The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman, Teravision’s latest UEFN game is the King of the Hill Style Multiplayer Pvpve project.
The Walking Dead associated with Courtyard King is made using official assets released for UEFN, including character models based on Rick Grimes, Negan and Daryl Dixon. However, the project goes further than mere assets. Teravision worked with Skybound authors to create the game’s story and dialogue.
“We’ve worked with big brands in the past…and UEFN was something we were experimenting with, but we never imagined it would be a route to be involved with companies like Skybound,” says Fuentes. “But I’m UGC, that’s one of the biggest things about the game right now.”
UGC, or user-generated content, is currently driving one of the biggest trends in the gaming, thanks to platforms like Fortnite. While this kind of playground style game maker has already discovered large audiences with services like Roblox, UGC’s “U” usually refers to the homes of end users, aka players. UGC developed by Professional Studios is a new concept, and Fortnite’s Unreal Engine 5-based tools were perfect for experienced developments like Teravision.
“We came from an engineering background and it was a platform where we could experiment and assume some of the risks, so that makes sense,” explains Fuentes. “Because instead of multi-year projects like Killer Clown from Space, these are projects that can be put together in weeks or months.”
Teravision’s experiments have led to the launch of Havoc Hotel, a Roguelike shooter that fights through the hotel’s level. The first chaotic hotel was a modest hit and was enough to continue working on the series. In the end we reached Havoc Hotel 3. This is currently one of the most popular games in Fortnite.
Not only is the jump to UEFN (a modified version of Unreal Engine 5, a UEFN, also useful, given that Studio had previously made Killer Klowns on Unreal Engine, but also experienced Devs lifted his legs when creating games with UEFN. As Rodriguez says, the system is streamlined and the process is a little more “drag and drop”. “For us, it removes some of the work we would have done otherwise, allowing us to focus on making better games and explore a variety of new and creative ideas.”
While the engineering side had no problems adapting to UEFN’s unrealistic tools, the game design team had unique challenges. Games like Havoc Hotel started out as experiments in contrast to full-fledged games, but soon became their own. Teravision’s creative director, LD Zambrano, quickly learned that UEFN games are different from traditional games in many ways.
“The traditional experiences we have designed other (non-EFN) games are where players are involved through goals that seduce cooperation and competition, right?” Zambrano says. “In the case (of uefn), these goals are still relevant and can be brought there using that sensibility of game design, but I have discovered that there are a lot of very popular experiences within the Fortnite ecosystem, which is like a context.
Zambrano compares UEFN games with school yards. “I discovered there’s this way of approaching each other. It brings me back to the break. It creates a kind of game where you meet someone and may not make sense, but you’re still creating charm and friendship.
In that way, one of the unique things I learned about Courtyard King from Terravision is that it is an endless game. That means there is no final winner at the end of the round. Instead, the match continues forever, with players popping out and switching teams. And while there are always teams that are winning, there is never a final round where a true winner will crown them.
“Players can stop by and drop out at any time. They can even change teams whenever they want.
Is this the future for game developers? On the one hand, place them in sandboxes of other big players like Epics and Roblox. But Enrique Fuentes says there are many benefits for studios trying to experiment without burning their entire funds while accessing large player bases and large IP assets like the Walking Dead.
“You can actually assume risk as an indie developer for (UEFN) because last year, you couldn’t even think about starting a three-year project. You can do something with a small team in a few weeks and completely change the paradigm of new developers. “It’s because if you have the right idea, the right creativity around it, if you fully understand the market and you have the right thinking, it won’t take years, in fact, weeks, maybe months.”
Matt Kim is Passthecontroller’s senior feature editor.
