Hey everyone!
We’re so excited we’ve finally been able to share more on Dungeons of Hinterberg with you all!
Now that we’ve talked a little about the game, we thought we’d introduce you to our “Micro” but mighty team here at Microbird Games! We’ll throw it over to our Community Manager, Luke, who we hear is going to take you on a virtual tour of our team.
That’s right! Hello! I’m Luke, Community Manager on Dungeons of Hinterberg, I get the privilege of showing all the amazing things the team here is working on! You may be surprised to find that Dungeons of Hinterberg is being developed by a team of just 10! Let’s find out who they are and what they’re up to!
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First up, our Co-Founders!
Regina - Art Director
Hey everyone, I'm Regina, co-Founder of Microbird and Art Director on Dungeons of Hinterberg. I've worked on games of all kinds for nearly 8 years as a 3D artist, before Philipp and I founded Microbird in 2020. I'm the one responsible for the look/dev of Dungeons of Hinterberg, which means I spent a lot of time defining and implementing our artstyle, choosing colours and creating unique moods for all our levels and settings. I also do some concept art and 3d models for characters and environments. Beyond all the fun art stuff, being a founder also entails some less creative things, like doing taxes, creating plans, or writing lots of emails. All in all, our journey so far has certainly been an adventure and a wild ride, and I wouldn't miss it for the world.
Philipp - Technical Director
Hi, I’m Philipp, co-founder and technical director at Microbird. I’m responsible for all kinds of gameplay mechanics, from character movement to enemy AI. I’ve also written most of our in-game dialogue, done a bit of level design, and Regina and I share responsibility for the game’s overall design. As you’ll see, most of our team wear different hats all the time, and that’s what I really love about this project - since we’re such a small company, everybody has to think about and can contribute to the game as a whole, not just their particular area of expertise.
Thanks, both! Being Co-Founders must keep you very busy, is there anything you can share on what you’ve been up to recently?
A few weeks ago, we went to Gamescom in Cologne to let the press get their hands on an early demo for the first time. It’s been an incredible experience to read all the coverage afterwards - we had been working on this game for years, and we had to stay silent about it for a lot of that time, so being able to finally share some of it and seeing all the reactions feels amazing!
Let’s see who else I can steal away from their busy dev work! Ah here we go, Clio!
Clio - Producer
I’m the producer here at Microbird! I used to work full time in music (and I still do it on the side), singing for opera, film and tv productions as well as for game soundtracks, composing, and doing arts management. My job at Microbird is to make plans for our team, and then make them happen. Sometimes I get to do other fun tasks, like working on short texts and helping implement some stories and audio. I grew up in Canada and moved to Austria for my master’s degree (and then stayed), so I can really relate to some of the characters in Hinterberg!
Thanks, Clio! I’ll try not to take much more of your busy Producer time, is there anything you can share that you’ve been up to recently?
I often use a digital whiteboard to prototype my planning before putting things into our production calendar. Here’s a simplified planning workflow to illustrate some of the priorities we might choose to focus on for a milestone. This provides me with a framework to start calculating productivity points!
Alright, let’s roll out and find another bird! Who do we have next? I spot a wild Tom, let’s see what he’s up to.
Tom - Senior 3D Artist
Hi! My name is Tom and I work as a Senior 3D Artist at Microbird. I create concepts, 3D models and rigs for characters and enemies. I also transition level blockouts to final art. I moved to Vienna to study Game Art & 3D Animation in 2014. Since then I have worked on several game productions from Indie to AAA. When I'm not looking at a screen I try to move my body in the form of hiking and enjoying the outdoors.
Thanks, Tom! Sounds like a lot of steps are involved in creating a character! Could you give us a sneak peek at some rigging?
A Hinterberg character is usually done by one artist, from concept to modelling and texturing to rigging and finally the Unity implementation. It is a lot of fun and variety to accompany the character from start to finish. Here you can see a short clip of one of our characters in the rigging process.
As I continue to prowl around the studio, I notice another developer, who do we have here? Oh, another Philipp!
Philipp - Gameplay Programmer
Hi, I’m another Philipp. I’m a general gameplay programmer working on various things like enemies, player attacks, puzzle logic, and basically anything else that needs doing. I mostly work on game logic, but since I have a background as a 2D/3D artist, I’m a bit more flexible with how much of any given gameplay element I can do myself without adding to an artist’s workload.
Before I run off to find our next dev, can you share a little on something you’ve recently or are currently working on?
Here I am working on some pretty butterflies that will help make the outdoors feel more alive. Currently we have nine different kinds, based on the most common butterflies in Austria.
Wow, already halfway through the team! Next up, we have Johannes!
Johannes - Programmer
Hi! I am one of the programmers behind Dungeons of Hinterberg!
I do quite a lot of different nerdy code things in the background you probably never have thought you’d need for a game, from making sure Luisa loses the correct HP numbers in combat to giving you an option to save the game (well, you probably thought about that before).
I am also heavily involved in the creation of the story of the game - again, the technical part. I wrote all the code that allows you to befriend our villagers and I made sure that collected loot stays in your inventory.
Another big aspect of my tasks is the user interface and implementing a great deal of the audio (created by our audio partners, Wobblersound). The latest addition to the task list is porting.
My non-programmer time is usually spent with my band (I am the drummer) or with a fun side project.
Thank you, Johannes! Is there anything you’d like to share with the community that you’re currently working on or have worked on?
I am adding SFX to moving elements in one of our swamp levels. My job here is to make sure that all the rotating platforms have their proper sound playing whenever they are switched on and also stop their audio when being switched off.
Now Dungeons of Hinterberg has it’s plethora of Dungeons (25 in fact!) and other locations, as well as puzzles to conquer and much more, and we need someone who can curate that into something you, the player, has to overcome. Let’s check in with Oliver and see what he’s been up to.
Oliver - Designer
Allo Allo! I'm the main Designer of the team and known for the one in the office who drinks a lot of tea or the guy that always wears a beanie (even in summer) and much more.
Anyways, I do the majority of the level and puzzle designs in the game.
My job usually consists of:
- Adding a lot of gray cubes into a scene
- Thinking about how to fry the brains of players
- Convincing everyone why adding my favourite enemy to every encounter is a good design decision
When I'm not designing stuff, I like to play other video games, go hiking or place mediocrely in my local Smash or Guilty Gear Tournaments.
Thanks, Oliver! What is your process for working on a puzzle?
This is how I usually work on a puzzle. I prepare the layout of the puzzle with blockout shapes that I can edit very quickly. Afterwards I use existing elements and design the logic of the puzzle. (In this case, once the player hits the snowflake switch a wall rises from the ground.
As I continue my adventure through the office, I see bright beautiful colours on a screen, that can only mean one thing, an artist! Actually, no… TWO artists! Let’s see what Victoria and Khiet have been up to.
Victoria – 3D Artist
Heyo! I’m Victoria! I started as an intern at Microbird and continued working as a 3D Artist during my studies at the FH Salzburg. Since my focus lies on asset creation, I was responsible for building and set-dressing several locations in the village, but I also have the opportunity to delve into and improve my skills in other areas like characters, vehicles and more recently, dungeon environments. I like to spend my free time working on personal 3D projects, doing handicrafts and having eager conversations about video games and movies.
Thanks Victoria! Is there a place in particular you can share you recently worked on?
Here you can see a bit of my process for building the Souvenir Shop in Hinterberg. After brainstorming and collecting ideas, I start modelling and texturing the assets. Finally, I do the set dressing in Unity.
Khiet – Environment Artist
Hey hey! You can also call me Nessi (long story). I'm the environment artist here, supporting Regina and Tom with their work and turning gray blockout cubes into all sorts of things that one can imagine. I also get the chance to take my plant mom expertise, interior design and crafting interests to another scale and create lovely environments, in which players can immerse themselves. Apart from that, I'm just a quirky art-loving video game nerd who has too many interests.
Great stuff, thank you Nessi! Victoria showed us some of her work on the Souvenir Shop players will visit in Hinterberg, could you give us a sneak peek at how world environments are made?
Taking a blockout level to the finished look does take some time and revisions, but the overall process is roughly the same: importing the terrain of the blockout level with its grey cubes and rough Unity meshes into the 3D program Maya, modelling the terrain and needed puzzle elements, bringing them back to Unity, then breaking up the uniformness and emptiness with environment assets and adding final touches such as lighting or plants.
And now, as we come to our close on our team introductions, last but certainly not least, let’s check in with Hannah!
Hannah – QA Analyst
Hi, I’m Hannah. My job is all about catching bugs. I’m not an entomologist but the QA Analyst, so I am in charge of finding all the things in the game that don’t work as planned. I solve our levels in creative and alternative ways to make sure you can’t cheat your way around our Level Designer’s amazing ideas. As a computer science graduate I am also able to help with fixing bugs and various other areas such as implementing stories and the mechanics behind saving game elements. This position is my first job in the video game industry and it has been an absolute blast so far. I can’t wait to see what’s to come and am incredibly excited to share Dungeons of Hinterberg with the world.
Thanks, Hannah! Making sure quality is met across the board must be a challenge, given all of the intricacies of game development! Can you share a little on what the process would be for finding and reporting a bug?
Part of my job is to find places a player is not supposed to go. Here I found a leak in the fence where Luisa can go off road and potentially hurt herself. We don’t want that, so I used our in house bug-reporting tool to create a ticket and assign it to the person in charge of fixing this issue.
I LIED! We have one bonus team member to introduce to you, let me introduce you to our office su-paw-star, Barclay!
Barclay - The Dog Father
Hi, my name is Lieutenant Barclay, but everyone just calls me Barcles. My main roles in the company are Chief Morale Officer and Good Boy. I am very proud to be Employee of the Month every month. It’s hard work; that’s why I sleep a lot to keep my strength up. Apart from that I usually protect the office, but since the Human employees don’t seem to enjoy my barking, I have toned it down to a warning gurgle whenever someone rings the doorbell. This seems to be a good compromise for everyone. So far, none of the visitors have been hostile, so I think I’m doing a good job.
Thank you, Barclay, that’s a good boy!
And that’s a wrap! We hope you enjoyed meeting our team, we’d love to take this time to give a huge shoutout and thanks to you, our community, for all the supportive messages we’ve received. This truly has inspired and motivated us here in the studio, we can’t wait to share even more Dungeons of Hinterberg details very soon!
Stay tuned here by following us on Steam, we’ll be sharing more news more often! And for all things Dungeons of Hinterberg, follow us on Twitter (X), and join us on Discord.
If you like what you see, please consider wishlisting the game today!
What intrigued you most? Drop us a message in the comments below! Feel free to send us your questions, and what else you’d like to see in upcoming news!