Turbo Games’ lead designer shares the secrets of the games creation process

Ukrainian studio’s success down to many things, among them its ‘bold and bright’ outlook.

What types of games does Turbo Games’ portfolio include?

Turbo Games offers so-called provably fair games. This kind of game is based on technology that allows the player to make sure that the results are genuine and honest – it is simple mathematics in the wrapper of an entertaining game.

Playing such games gives a player a chance to touch pure luck or ‘environmentally friendly luck’ as I call it. At Turbo Games, we have created several games based on very popular and familiar mechanics, like Mines, Crash, Limbo and so on. At the same time our portfolio has games for every taste.

With so many games out there, what differentiates Turbo Games from the rest?

As a designer, I would say that we are different because we have a special visual character.

We are bold, bright, we are like a fresh breeze. We are assertive and even a bit aggressive. But this is our point. We are not afraid to be misunderstood because our players are thinking people who want to be on the wave and are open to new things. And, I’ll tell you a secret: luck loves such people.

What are the key guidelines that you follow when designing a new game? Do real-life events influence your choice of elements or the general idea of the game? 

When designing, we try to adhere to certain algorithms and not go beyond the given UI/UX design, as we have earned a good audience on our first games and we try not to change the UX much from game to game. It should be comfortable in each of our games, so that our players can quickly figure out familiar features.

At the same time, we try to use more and more new ideas and embody them graphically.

Here we work as a team. We generate ideas, discuss, look for references, and come up with a plot. We have a great team, everyone from project managers to programmers and testers are super creative people. Therefore, we get such cool games.

Sometimes ideas are just in the air, sometimes we get inspired by something… it’s always a creative process.

How do you manage to create exciting games for the players? Where do you get inspiration from?

I have a whole collection of completely different pictures on Pinterest, none of which are united by a common idea at all at first glance. But this is my ‘chest of ideas’ for Turbo Games.

I like to start with history. For example, when we came up with our game Hamsta, at first it was a hamster which runs around a wooden wardrobe with supplies and steals jam. At the end, this idea had grown into a radioactive cyber-hamster that digs holes in a post-apocalypse and collects various items.

Could you tell us a bit more about current trends? What makes a game successful nowadays?

I think it’s definitely important to keep up with new design trends or marketing or… just keep up with the news.

Games are a very emotional thing, so in order to do something that will cause a response from the user, it must correspond to his/her thoughts today. This is not easy to follow. But we do our best.

At the same time, many factors must be taken into account – to make the design not only beautiful for today, but so that it does not become outdated quickly. At the same time, it is necessary to respond to the demands of the public. 

Which of your games do you consider the most successful from a designer’s point of view?

I really love Mines. We decided to make them in neomorphism style – that’s why the game looks very modern, tactile and as clear as possible. A player wants to play it because the effect of soft buttons and pleasant clicks is created. In fact, Mines is practically an anti-stress game.

I also love Neko. There is a very cute cat and a very delicious environment.

How much time does it take to draw one instant game? Do you do it alone?

For over a year I had been drawing the game alone. Now we have two designers in our team. As we have an age gap this helps us to cover trends and preferences of different generations. Furthermore, the basis for the development of any game is collective expertise of all the team.

As for development, all games are born in different ways, from a month to three. Depends on the working load.  

Finally, what can we expect in the future from TurboGames?

We have extensive plans. But you can be sure they will be very nicely implemented and it will be a pleasure to play them!