After a long period of silence, Kyiv studio VG Entertainment, formerly Vostok Games, has finally announced a new project Forest Reigns and is ready to talk about it. So we decided to ask the studio management a few questions, but let's start from afar... with the first STALKER. VG Entertainment Business Director Oleg Yavorsky answers the questions of Mezha.
The conversation has been shortened and edited for better comprehension.
On the development and PR of the first STALKER
Oleg Danylov: Good afternoon, Oleg, it's nice to hear from you after so many years.
Oleg Yavorsky: By the way, Oleg, we haven't talked for a long time.
Oleg Danylov: We will definitely talk about your new game, Forest Reigns, but let's start with STALKER, because you played an important role in the creation of this project, and it means a lot to you. Since the 2000s, you have been considered "guilty" of creating an atmosphere of hype around STALKER. At first, almost alone, and then with the help of the GSC Game World PR department, which you managed, you promoted the game so much that people were waiting for it like manna from heaven. And when the release began to be postponed, they started to hate it. A stream of sarcasm, even malice, poured from the players at the developers and at you personally. How did you manage to promote the game so much at a time when many modern PR tools, such as social networks, did not exist at all?
Oleg Yavorsky: I think the project itself helped, because it was interesting to people. A lot of cool things were implemented or planned to be implemented in STALKER. Firstly, the graphics were very cool for that time. Secondly, it had a very unusual and interesting theme, because Chernobyl is something mystical. We went to the Zone, saw it all with our own eyes, and tried to convey that atmosphere and, in fact, that spirit of the post-Soviet space. Let's remember that at that time it was the first such large-scale game that showed the world in which our childhood was spent.
It was easy for us as developers to implement it, but everyone else was interested, because, again, it was the first game of its kind that realistically showed how we live. And although it is supposedly about Chernobyl, these events could be transferred to any, relatively speaking, Ukrainian or post-Soviet place, and everything would look the same. The same garages, the same concrete houses, all this was so familiar that it aroused great interest among the players, as if this game was a little about themselves. That is, STALKER was in the spotlight from the very beginning.
STALKER itself inspired us to talk about it. That is, in the West, even then, we were already used to keeping everything under wraps until the last moment, and then, right before the release, actively promoting the project. On the contrary, from the first day we started talking about the game, about our ambitious plans, and showing what we already had.
There were plans to release the game in three years, then in four. But the team had no experience in implementing projects of this scale, so everything was postponed. And indeed, love gradually turned to hate, we were already enemies for the fans. We promised, but did not fulfill our promises. By the time the game was finally released, almost seven years had passed since the start of development. This is a very long period for those times. When we released STALKER, there was a feeling that either everything would be very cool, or it would be an epic failure. We ourselves did not fully understand what to expect. But it turned out to be quite good.
I repeat, the game itself was interesting both for us, the developers, and for the players. And when a project is interesting, it is not difficult to PR it, everything happens easily and proactively. Everyone wants to learn something new about the game, to write about something. Back then, as you remember, the main source of information was the printed press, magazines. That was our main emphasis.
It was interesting, by the way, to watch how the media segment changes over time, because a lot has happened in seven years, online publications and digital press have begun to gain strength. But we still found ourselves in the classic magazine period, it was important to maintain ties with the printed press. I liked that.
Closer to the release, GSC had a whole PR department, five or six people, and with the help of the publisher, we were already talking about the game all over the world. But it seems to me that the main audience that accepted STALKER and picked it up was our audience, players from what was then called the CIS. STALKER was mentally, morally closer to us, to our players. It took STALKER several years after its release to become a cult in the West.
Oleg Danylov: Looking back at those times with modern experience, with modern tools, and a modern approach to marketing, do you think that such an early start to promoting STALKER and the big promises that the developers made were a mistake or not?
Oleg Yavorsky: In terms of STALKER, I think not. There was a lot to talk about, but we didn't have the resources to do big expensive media campaigns. This was our standard approach, so to speak, "guerrilla marketing", where we told and showed the game on our own, with the help of the developers and a small department. This approach takes time, so this strategy was justified.
About the STALKER media brand and various activities around the game
Oleg Danylov: You're talking about "guerrilla marketing." But on the other hand, STALKER is both a huge series of books and STALKER Fest, an event of such a scale that no one had ever held in Ukraine or even in the West at that time. I know of few events for one game, a clothing line, and much more. There was even an attempt to create a series. That is, you can't say that this is "guerrilla marketing," in my opinion, it's a very large marketing project.
Oleg Yavorsky: What I said above concerns the first part, STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl. The first game was the main one, festivals, books and everything else were already on the wave of success. But yes, it is quite an interesting experience, because we were able to try ourselves in various public projects and related industries, such as the book industry.
When the first part was released, there were only four books - a collection of fan stories from a contest we held on the site, and three books written by professional authors. We already had some experience with books on strategies, namely Heroes of Annihilated Empires (2006). The books on this game were created by the writer Ilya Novak ( real name - Andriy Levitsky - ed. note ), they sold well, but not nearly as well as the books on STALKER. I don't remember exactly how many books were released, but probably over a hundred ( according to Wikipedia , the official STALKER series has 89 books - ed. note ).
Oleg Danylov: As Sergiy Grygorovych told me, the Russians are still publishing books under the brand "STALKER" (without the periods) and "S T A L K E R", and they don't care about copyright. There are 122 books in the first series, 124 books in the second. The publication dates of the latter are January 2025, and something else is being prepared for release.
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, these were the Russian publishing houses "EKSMO" and "AST" and it was also a commercially successful project. This confirms that the game itself had a cult status precisely in the post-Soviet territories. Because in the West we also had attempts to publish translations of these books into German by the Panini publishing house. Three or four books were published by the German publisher STALKER, but the circulations were not at all the same as those of the "EKSMO" and "AST" publishing houses.
On the success of the first game, we tried many cool directions. We printed a magazine, and we had souvenirs, we opened a whole store. Plus clothes. That is, we went to exhibitions in Europe, in China, bought fabrics. We had a designer sewing shop right in the office. Girls-designers sat, developed a clothing line. It was fun and it was a really cool experience. And the apogee of it all was, of course, the STALKER Fest on Independence Square in 2009.
In addition, we also had role-playing military airsoft games at the training grounds, we played five or six games, I think. That is, we tried ourselves in different projects, and all of it was interesting. Even the first episode of the series was filmed in 2010. The pilot exists, we tried to offer the series to some TV channel, but for some reason it didn't work out.
On Ukrainian television, I think it was the ICTV channel, we were even offered to create a reality show based on the game. Something like "Fort Boyar", but with Chernobyl and stalkers. But the cost of this project was too high, and Serhiy Grigorovich said that we wouldn't be able to pull it off with our own resources. He didn't want to take it on, and somehow it didn't go any further. But such projects were also discussed.
Oleg Danylov: Of course, I've heard about everything else, but not about magazines and reality shows yet, that's interesting.
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, there was a paper magazine and the idea was to publish it regularly. Plus comics, calendars, figures of stalkers and monsters. That is, it was already a full-fledged franchise, a brand, and we tried to develop it in many directions. And it was really cool.
Plus, we were also involved in product placement. This was also quite an innovative thing in Ukraine and the world at that time, if we talk about games, so no one understood how to promote it. We talked with Samsung about the implementation and branding of the player's PDA in the game, but that didn't work out either. And of course, the energy drinker Non Stop, who is in the game.
Oleg Danylov: Non Stop is sacred. I'm surprised you didn't dare to release vodka.
Oleg Yavorsky: You need a license for that, so it was more complicated. But we gave journalists, by special order, "Kozaky" vodka as a gift, which was in the game.
Oleg Danylov: I once had such a bottle during the DPK.
Oleg Yavorsky: And I still have somewhere the same mock-ups of condensed milk, stew and vodka labels that we printed there for PR. We gave it all to journalists, including Western ones, in military duffel bags, and even with bags with gas masks. They tried to take it through the airport, and the customs officers were, let's say, a little surprised. So yes, STALKER's PR was interesting.
Oleg Danylov: As far as I know, you weren't just doing PR for STALKER. You're the one playing the guitar by the STALKER campfire, right?
Oleg Yavorsky: True. Music has been my hobby since I was a student. We have our own band Firelake, we play metal. In terms of format, it doesn't really fit STALKER, but when these bonfires and stalkers gatherings around them with sausage and vodka appeared in the game, the idea arose that it would be nice for one of them to also play the guitar. At that time, the GSC office already had a studio with a microphone where they recorded voice acting, and one of the developers brought in an old guitar. I wanted it to be an authentic old, battered tourist guitar, so that it would play out of tune. And I just sat down, strummed some melodies. Then it went into the game. Those guitar melodies that I played were in STALKER: Shadow of Chernobyl, later, while working on the add-ons, our second guitarist came in to help with the recordings.
Oleg Danylov: Besides, as far as I remember, you yourself wrote the monster voices for the game.
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, many of the developers did the rough voice acting for monsters and NPCs. But some of that stuff ended up in the release version. For example, I left the voice of Prof (Andriy Prokhorov) when the NPCs are talking to each other somewhere on the bases, and something else. The whole development of STALKER was a very interesting, very fun experience. Game development is generally a creative process, especially when you have some kind of creative talent, it's just great. I think I was very lucky to get into the gaming industry.
About the closure of STALKER 2 in 2012 and the new STALKER 2
Oleg Danylov: Let's move on to STALKER 2 on this note. Have you played the second part yet? How do you like it?
Oleg Yavorsky: I saw STALKER 2 even before its release at the gamescom exhibition in Cologne. We have been organizing the Ukrainian pavilion Games from Ukraine for the second year in a row and there was an opportunity to play. We talked to the developers. It's a slightly different game, because for me, of course, the first part is iconic, but a lot of work has been done. I saw that the team tried very, very hard. And judging by the fact that it basically "went" to the fans at the release, I think the developers are doing well.
In principle, I am very glad that the game finally came out. Because releasing a game of this scale and also meeting some expectations of players is extremely difficult. It is good that it is more widely, so to speak, perceived in the Western market. Because, as I said, the first STALKER was not so popular in the West. The release and popularity of STALKER 2 is good for the entire Ukrainian gaming industry, such projects strengthen the industry, improve the attitude towards it, including from publishers, and this has a good effect on all studios.
I hope there will be a sequel and good ratings. There were a lot of bugs at the start, we know that, but that's just the nature of STALKER. These aren't bugs, they're anomalies.
Oleg Danylov: Okay. Then one more question about STALKER 2, but not a very pleasant one. Let's go back to the events of December 9, 2011, when Sergey Grigorovich gathered all of you in the office and said that the development of STALKER 2 was completed, because GSC Game World was closing. What were your feelings and thoughts at that moment, were you shocked, confused, did not understand this decision, or maybe on the contrary, did you already feel that it was coming to that? Did you try to persuade Sergey? How quickly did you recover and start deciding what to do next?
Oleg Yavorsky: To be honest, I was a little aware that Serhiy was thinking about stepping away from business, because we had some conversations about it. But until the last moment I hoped that he would change his mind and not do it. But he decided to go, as he said, "to retire," and gathered everyone to announce the closure.
At that time it was a shock, because for others it all happened very suddenly. The team was actively working on a new game, a new engine, everything was okay, but suddenly there was such an unpleasant surprise. And indeed, there was confusion, no one understood what to do next. But we recovered quite quickly.
You can think about the reasons for Sergey's decision for a long time, but I think the main one is that we were trying to find a publisher, financing for STALKER 2, and it somehow didn't work out, let me remind you, at that time the world was just recovering from the great financial crisis. Everything was dragging on, and perhaps Sergey decided that it would be easier for him to cancel everything than to continue spending money that he probably didn't really want to spend. And secondly, at that moment, perhaps there was already a certain fatigue, fatigue from routine work on games. Managing a large company takes a lot of time, effort, energy, and perhaps Sergey wanted to switch to something else. He explained it as a personal decision, and I think it was true.
Oleg Danylov: Serhiy later told me many times that he had proven that he could make money developing games, that Ukrainians could make big and beautiful games, and that he had nothing more to prove, so he didn't want to go through all this again.
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, I think that's an honest answer. The development of the new STALKER again required many years of intensive work, a lot of expenses, including emotional ones. We are all human, so Serhiy might have wanted to switch to something else. That's why this decision was made. STALKER was never simple, no matter how you look at it.
Oleg Danylov: Did you try to somehow persuade Serhiy to give the brand to the team, or to continue development somehow without him? That is, to leave, and the team to continue developing STALKER 2. There were no such proposals?
Oleg Yavorsky: We tried, it was our first idea, which arose literally the second day after all this happened. We had a team left, people were ready and wanted to continue, because the project was already at an active stage of development. There were two issues: first, financing; second, to agree with Serhiy on the rights to use the brand.
We had no experience in finding investments. I was involved in PR, marketing, there were developers, artists. We had to quickly understand the realities of our market, who to go to, we tried to look for investors among some of our acquaintances. We went to offices, talked to someone, and there were even some specific offers, but in the end we were unable to agree with Serhiy that he would transfer the rights to us.
Oleg Danylov: So Serhiy was against it, or you didn't find enough money?
Oleg Yavorsky: Actually, later we found a source of financing. But we couldn't agree with Serhiy about the rights. I don't remember exactly, but there were some difficulties with how it was all formalized on paper. And, perhaps, there was also Serhiy's reluctance to go along with this issue. So we simply didn't agree and we had to look for other options.
Later we had this discussion again, when we found support from the French publisher Focus Entertainment. They were ready to finance the new part of STALKER. It was probably... 2017. In short, almost before GSC independently resumed development of STALKER 2.
We even had paper agreements with Sergey that if we found an offer and brought it to him, he would grant us the rights. But in the end, he decided that such agreements meant nothing, changed his mind and at the last moment announced that he was going to develop the game on his own, although we found a real offer and, as agreed, brought it. Therefore, let's say, we historically did not have the rights to STALKER
About the creation of Vostok Games and Survarium
Oleg Danylov: So let's move on to what you started doing next. Vostok Games was officially founded on March 1, 2012. How many people left GSC Game World for Vostok? And where did you find funding for the new studio?
Oleg Yavorsky: At the start, we had twenty-six people from GSC Game World. It was a good core team that could fully develop its own project. We spent a long time on the market, looking for investments, first for STALKER, and then for our own project, which later became Survarium . And we found financing from private Ukrainian investors for the idea of a multiplayer online game in 2012. It was the Vostok Ventures fund.
Oleg Danylov: At that time, there were not many investors in Ukraine who were willing to invest money in game development, so you could say you were lucky.
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, it was a very unconventional story for investors. But the STALKER example was inspiring, so there were actually those who wanted to. These were, of course, non-core investors, because there were simply no core investors in our market. There were people who had made money somewhere, in some other areas, and wanted to try themselves in this market, even understanding that this was venture investment, that this was a high-risk story, but still wanted to at least try.
But it was difficult. We agreed at the last moment, when we already had a team, everyone had some needs, families, and no money. It was, let's say, on the verge of breaking up, when everyone was ready to run away, look for another job. But we were lucky to find an opportunity to leave the team and start our own project.
Oleg Danylov: Let's move on to this project itself, to Survarium. Many believe that Survarium is a development of the ideas of the STALKER multiplayer mode. It has a lot in common with STALKER, similar locations, almost similar setting, shooting... So how much does Survarium have from STALKER?
Oleg Yavorsky: In Survarium, everything was created from scratch, there are no STALKER parts. It is a purely online game, so the engine is primarily aimed at online, which was not the case in STALKER. We had to develop the engine ourselves from scratch, because although we considered the idea of purchasing a license, Unreal Engine was still too expensive at that time. We also considered CryEngine, but our programmers didn’t like it, so we decided to write our own. As always. We wrote our own engines for all games, as if it were a tradition. However, although everything was written from scratch, we already had the relevant experience from previous projects, so there is probably this feeling of similarity.
Oleg Danylov: A single-player project was not considered at all? So you wanted to ride this wave of interest in MO shooters?
Oleg Yavorsky: It was more of a compromise between the investor and us, because we needed an idea that had commercial potential, was less risky. At that time, we had the illusion that Free-to-Play was something simple and something that could guarantee us commercial success. There was an example of World of Tanks at the peak of its popularity, and everyone wanted to go in that direction. At that time, we didn’t understand all the challenges of such projects, how difficult it really was. And also the new engine that we were writing in parallel... All in all, it was a disaster, to be honest.
Oleg Danylov: Survarium was released ten years ago and was apparently well received by players at first. Online in April 2015 there were 4,400 players, quite positive reviews. And then the game started losing players. Why did this happen? How did Survarium exist for ten years with five hundred players online? Where did you get the money to support the project for so many years?
Oleg Yavorsky: The start was really good, there were a lot of players. We had our own audience, most of the players who were with STALKER followed us, and they supported the project. Therefore, our starting audience was really cool. The main difficulty was to maintain the regularity of game updates. But the number of bugs and problems that arose with the game itself... Programmers had to spend most of their time fixing critical bugs, instead of working on updates. And any Free-to-Play online game critically depends on the frequency of updates, on new content. This is exactly what we had problems with, the game could not develop effectively.
And our plans, as always, were ambitious, even about a full-fledged PvE mode. But in ten years we have not been able to implement PvE. We are still reminded of this. In fact, everything we earned was invested in supporting the project, but gradually, as online activity decreased, monetization also fell.
We had no experience in monetization and we didn't want to do some kind of Pay-to-Win. We tried, within our understanding, to tune it, to make updates in a way that would both make money and not squeeze money out of players. This is extremely difficult, and gradually the income we received from the game fell.
We had to reduce the team, look for some new projects, new opportunities, do something in parallel so that the company could still maintain its activities and develop. Everything was getting smaller, compressed, and gradually it got to the point that we had to simply close the servers. Although there are still players who remember the game and would like to continue playing. But so far there is no possibility to bring Survarium back to life.
Oleg Danylov: Do I understand correctly that in parallel with supporting Survarium, which was shrinking, you were engaged in outsourcing for other companies?
Oleg Yavorsky: We had outsourcing experience, but our own projects, like Fear the Wolves, were always our priority. The only outsourcing project we did was for PUBG Studios – Arena Mode for PUBG: Battlegrounds. It was an interesting and useful experience. Actually, we didn’t do outsourcing as such, it was never our goal.
On the closure of Survarium and Fear the Wolves
Oleg Danylov: Let's talk about Fear the Wolves then. It came out quite unexpectedly and it looked like an attempt to jump on the Battle Royale bandwagon. Such a bold attempt, because I think the project was unfinished at the time it was released in Early Access. How long did it take to develop Fear the Wolves? How quickly did you realize that the project wouldn't take off, and what do you think prevented it?
Oleg Yavorsky: The development went quickly, it seems that in ten months the first Early Assess version was ready. It was really an attempt to jump on the Battle Royale hype train. And this was, by the way, the first project that we did on the Unreal Engine, so for us the experience of releasing a project on a new technology was more valuable. Fear the Wolves had interesting ideas, especially in the final phase of the game. It received good feedback from players, but there was a problem with online and, accordingly, with matchmaking.
We, together with Focus Entertainment, who published this game, followed a model similar to PUBG's at the time, that is, it was Pay-to-Play, as they say. You had to buy the game and then play online. And this probably didn't help, but rather harmed the game. Then, analyzing the result, we decided that perhaps it would be worth making Fear the Wolves free, this would help fill the servers.
In addition, we came out at a very awkward time, along with other online games, in beta testing at the same time as SCUM, and then in early access at the same time as Apex: Legends. Plus, by that time there were already a lot of Battle Royale games, the competition in the segment had increased - it was a hot topic and many people wanted to jump in. We didn't have enough resources to continue developing Fear the Wolves, and Focus, as a publisher, didn't want to invest further in redesigning or developing the game, so we had to turn this project around.
Oleg Danylov: Do I understand correctly that Fear the Wolves was entirely financed by Focus Entertainment?
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, it was a classic scheme of cooperation with a publisher. The publisher financed the development, was engaged in marketing, sales. Our task was to make a game.
Oleg Danylov: Moving on. In 2022, you shut down the Survarium servers and started working on a new game that you recently announced. How did the staff and community react to the game's closure, and who has been funding the studio and new development since 2022?
Oleg Yavorsky: Closing Survarium was a painful moment, because we had been working on this project and supporting it for ten years, which is a long period. But, unfortunately, we had to make such a strong-willed decision and close Survarium in order to switch the team's attention to a new game.
At the end of 2021, we found investment from Tencent. So we had the resources to fully launch the project, which is now called Forest Reigns , and we wanted to focus on it. Because it is still difficult to develop two games in parallel. At the same time, Survarium was already at a stage where it became clear that we did not have the opportunity to radically change it and fully support it further.
Oleg Danylov: You mentioned Tencent. Is this just funding one project, or did they buy the studio?
Oleg Yavorsky: They have a small share of the studio and for this share they allocated funding for the game. That is, this is a kind of entry into partial ownership of shares through project financing.
Oleg Danylov: This is a typical practice for the Chinese, they have been doing this all over the world for a long time, in fact.
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, they invest a lot in the gaming market. We talked for a while, but it was in 2021 that we managed to reach an agreement, and this launched the project, because we did not have our own resources for full-fledged development.
That is, there was a small internal funding - we made prototypes, demos, tested various experimental features, such as those related to how the environment around the player dynamically changes. We spent quite a lot of time on experiments and already had, let's say, a technodemo. There was already a certain concept of how it should all work. Then, of course, we redid a lot, but we already had a certain base with which we went to publishers and investors and tried to find a partner with whom we could move on. And so we agreed with Tencent.
Oleg Danylov: It turns out that after starting work on Forest Reigns, in July 2023, Vostok Games changed its name to VG Entertainment. I understand why, but still, why was it done? How did this affect brand recognition?
Oleg Yavorsky: Obviously, we no longer wanted to have any association with the Russian, Soviet word. At the beginning, in 2012, when we were creating the studio, we came up with such a leitmotif that "Vostok" is the first ship that lifted a person into space, took a step into the unknown, towards new discoveries and horizons. We wanted to associate ourselves with the search for new game worlds. And this idea is still preserved.
We were looking for a way to aptly replace Vostok Games with something else. We wrote down three sheets of different names, had a heated discussion, but in the end we decided to simply change the name to VG Entertainment. Especially since legally the company had been called that for a long time.
As for recognition, there may have been some downsides, but we're not such a well-known studio around the world that we wouldn't try. Of course, we wanted to do it earlier, it took a little while, but it's good that we finally did it.
About the idea of Forest Reigns
Oleg Danylov: Okay, let's move on to Forest Reigns. I wondered if the game world is a kind of continuation of the Survarium world, where nature has gotten out of control? Is it the same universe or are they different?
Oleg Yavorsky: These are different universes, but the concept is really a bit similar. According to the plot of Forest Reigns, we had a certain green apocalypse at one specific point, in this case in Paris. We can separately discuss why in Paris. The player survives in a universe that is hostile to him, where nature, the environment itself, the forest, is a full-fledged actor of the game. It somewhat resembles what was in Survarium, but still it is more of a story game with missions, with a different structure of the universe. There are certain groups here and they are different than in Survarium. That is, this is perhaps a kind of logical development of the idea of our previous games, but Forest Reigns will be different.
Oleg Danylov: I understand. Let's discuss why Paris?
Oleg Yavorsky: We consciously wanted to move away from the gray realities of the Chernobyl zone, from everything post-Soviet that we had been dealing with all these years. To be honest, we were already a little tired of it. We wanted something fresh, brighter and radically new. So we were looking for a location a little further from Chernobyl and we had different ideas – locations in America, in Asia. And gradually we came to the idea that it would be cool to make a game in Paris. Firstly, not so many games have been implemented in the setting of the French capital. Secondly, it is such a famous, so recognizable place that, in our opinion, this will help attract the attention and interest of players to the game, to the location, to its theme. And, thirdly, making a green apocalypse in Paris is just cool.
Oleg Danylov: Many interesting sights that can be explored...
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, there are a lot of landmarks that everyone knows well. So there will be no need to explain to the players three times what they are and where they are. And there will definitely be some kind of wow effect from how we transformed it all.
Oleg Danylov: By the way, about the green apocalypse. I don't know if you or your designers have seen the recent role-playing game Avowed by Obsidian. There is also a green apocalypse there, where nature also wakes up and tries to oppose people.
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, this topic itself is really not new, and many in this setting are experimenting. I heard from publishers that we are not the only ones trying to be creative in this direction. It would be cool if it were some kind of general industry trend. But in Forest Reigns we just wanted to add something new and unusual to the shooter genre, because it is a rather complex and saturated niche, and it is difficult to invent something really unusual here. We hope that this idea of interaction and survival in a dynamically changing environment will work. When you understand that everything around you can affect the gameplay, how you feel in the game, it is really something fresh. We wanted to add exactly this feeling.
Oleg Danylov: Who in your company is such a big fan of the Strugatskys' work? Because STALKER has "Roadside Picnic" as one of its sources of inspiration, and what you're talking about in Forest Reigns, about the forest as another character, is "Snail on the Slope" by the Strugatskys.
Oleg Yavorsky: Again, this idea is certainly not new, many have fantasized about this topic, but it seems to have not yet been implemented in games. Well, we were more looking for something new to build the game world...
Oleg Danylov: So those meanings that the Strugatskys have, that the forest is such an incomprehensible future of humanity, another character, the driving force of the plot, were not included in Forest Reigns?
Oleg Yavorsky: Maybe not like the Strugatskys, but this feeling of the forest as a protagonist is definitely inherent in us. This is one of the main features of the game.
About Viktor Antonov's work on Forest Reigns
Oleg Danylov: I understand, let's move on. Recently, I saw a message in which the VG Entertainment studio expressed condolences over the death of art designer Viktor Antonov. From this message, we learned that he was a visionary and art director of Forest Reigns and helped you form a unique style of the game. How did you meet Antonov and how were you able to attract such an experienced and famous art director to your project? How will you preserve his legacy in the game?
Oleg Yavorsky: We actually collaborated with Viktor for a long time, we met during our outsourcing experience, when we were making some prototypes for the company Darewise Entertainment, where he worked at the time. We met, he came to Kyiv, and somehow we established a business relationship. He was always supportive, always interested in Ukraine. I think he was also interested in collaborating, and for us, it was a very valuable experience for us, because Viktor is truly a world-class professional.
Since the idea of Forest Reigns came about, we have worked on many things with him, he has been involved in the project from the very beginning. He worked as an outside specialist, taking care of the general vision of the game world, helping us develop the visual style. We also have our own art director, who collaborated with Viktor fully, but Antonov's influence is very noticeable in the project.
It's a bit difficult for us to develop a game in the Paris setting, and Victor lived in Paris for many years and loved this city very much. For him, it was a personal challenge to implement Paris and its unique architecture in such a project. To make something memorable. I think he himself was very interested in working on this project.
We managed to build such a fruitful collaboration together, he gave a lot of valuable feedback in terms of concept art. He would change what we were doing and think that this was Paris. He would say that this was some kind of German concentration camp, or that you had drawn something incomprehensible. He helped us, in fact, to make our city look like Paris. And he also helped to organically weave mimicry into the Parisian atmosphere - the main property of the forest, which allows it to change, adapt and improve its environment.
His death is a great loss for the project and for the entire industry in general. Currently, we are already at the stage where we are developing content, that is, the stage of searching for a style has been passed. Of course, we will try to preserve, multiply and transmit the entire style, all our joint achievements so that the project will have a memory of our collaboration.
About the gameplay and features of Forest Reigns
Oleg Danylov: Thanks for the answer. Forest Reigns is, first and foremost, a single-player game. That is, there will be no online part at all, not even cooperative? Is it possible later?
Oleg Yavorsky: Then maybe. We consciously set our first goal to implement a single-player story adventure, because it helps build the game's world, tell the players about it. We really hope that we will have the opportunity to further develop this universe and make it larger than a single-player game.
Cooperative play is something that has been in our minds from the very beginning, it just makes development more difficult. We are deliberately not going in this direction yet in order to, perhaps, implement it sometime in the future in one of the updates. Multiplayer, of course, is also interesting, because we have the relevant experience, but for now the plans are to release a solid single-player, and then move on to something else. But such a desire is definitely there.
Oleg Danylov: What technologies does Forest Reigns use? It's Unreal Engine, as far as I understand.
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, the fifth version, we are still updating. At first we created the game on the fourth version of UE, and then switched to the fifth. We were waiting for the update, because Unreal did not implement the shading of a large amount of greenery, which we need in the game, very well, plus there were some issues related to optimization. But now everything is working quite well. By the way, at the Game Developers Conference (March 17–21, 2025), Epic Games will show our project as one of its technological showcases.
Oleg Danylov: Do you use AI in your development?
Oleg Yavorsky: We do temporary voiceovers with AI, it helps save time on iterations, because when you make story-based games, the texts often change, so AI is a good fit.
It's more difficult with graphics, because we've chosen a general direction of stylized realism. And when you're making some unique environments, it's difficult to use AI effectively, so we're trying it very cautiously for now. But we're watching how this technology develops and I think that in the future we'll use such tools more to speed up the work.
Oleg Danylov: Judging from the gameplay snippets, Forest Reigns is basically a shooter with cover and environmental use. Will it be a completely open world, or some kind of level system with a central hub?
Oleg Yavorsky: We are building an open world. Of course, there are streets, houses, which are a natural limitation, but the basic idea is to make it possible to freely explore the world. There are missions that are key to completing the plot, and there are many side quests that are optional. We do not impose on the player where to run, or in what sequence to complete the tasks. The formula is quite similar to the classic STALKER, but in Paris with a green apocalypse.
Oleg Danylov: How multi-level is the game, will there be a lot of parkour and running on rooftops?
Oleg Yavorsky: There will definitely be some parkour elements. It will be possible to enter houses. Not all of them, but some of them for sure, because resources are limited - you have to look for loot, survive. There will be certain fences where you have to think about how to get through them, including using nature and elements of changing the environment. The main task of the player is to adapt to the changed nature and use it to your own advantage.
Oleg Danylov: What projects inspired you, besides STALKER and Survarium? What influenced your vision of the world?
Oleg Yavorsky: First of all, yes, it's using a certain experience from all our previous projects. We've never made classic shooters, we've always had a mix of many genres or subgenres. Maybe there's some slight influence from Fallout, Dishonored, Dying Light. Stylistically, we liked The Last of Us.
I don't think we're going to come up with anything radically new in terms of role-playing, factions, or crafting. All of these elements are there and we're implementing them enough to make it comfortable to play. But the main focus is still on the story, world exploration, and, of course, the interactive environment. That's what we're working on the most, which will be something new compared to the games you've already seen.
Oleg Danylov: What other monetization mechanisms are planned, besides the actual sale of the game? Will Forest Reigns have an in-game store, microtransactions, and everything else that players "love" so much?
Oleg Yavorsky: Forest Reigns is being developed as a classic single-player story-driven game for PC and consoles. We plan a classic purchase model accordingly, without microtransactions, it will definitely not be Free-to-Play.
Oleg Danylov: Considering that you're already showing the game, it's no longer in the early stages of development. So what stage are you at now, when can we expect a release, and do you plan on releasing it on consoles?
Oleg Yavorsky: Yes, we have already gone through a long period of R&D, prototyping, etc. We are currently in the content production stage, moving towards Alpha, but there is still a lot of work ahead. It is too early to talk about the release date, but we will definitely keep you updated!
Oleg Danylov: Thanks for the answers, Oleg. It was nice to hear from you and we look forward to updates on the game.
Oleg Yavorsky: Again, thank you for the invitation, I hope the readers of "Border" will like Forest Reigns.