IO Interactive's Quest for Faster Game Development

Ulas Karademir, IO Interactive's chief technology officer, has returned to the company after a decade away, during which he held senior roles at Unity and worked on a distributed development engine called RealityOS. Now, he's tasked with enhancing the developer's technology to improve team efficiency. Karademir's focus is on production-related matters, such as dev ops, infrastructure, and software development capabilities, with the goal of making production cheaper, faster, and better. He emphasizes the importance of rapid iteration, testing, and feedback in game development, citing the need to bring content to the end-user quickly and iterate faster in production. To achieve this, Karademir is creating tools that can speed up and automate parts of the process, drawing an analogy between a screwdriver and a drill machine to illustrate the benefits of investing in the right tools for the job. IO Interactive has been developing its own technology, including the Glacier engine, for 25 years, which allows the company to focus on building an engine and tools tailored to its specific needs. Karademir notes that using one's own technology has several advantages, including the ability to make quick decisions, change direction, and maintain a tight feedback cycle between users and developers. However, he acknowledges that building one's own technology and tools requires significant time and investment, and may not be suitable for all studios, particularly those in the early stages of their journey. Instead, Karademir recommends that studios should focus on creating their own technology when they are trying to do something unique or innovative, such as developing complex AI systems like those found in the Hitman series. The use of existing technologies like Unity and Unreal can be beneficial, but Karademir warns that this approach can lead to studios becoming stuck on older versions of the engine and having to make significant changes to the editor or engine. In contrast, IO Interactive's approach allows the company to update its engine daily based on its needs. The rise of live service games has also led to a shift in the way engineering teams need to think, with a greater emphasis on being user-centric, reactive, and adaptable to new tools and technologies, such as AI. Karademir sees significant opportunities for AI to remove unnecessary repetitive work from development, citing examples such as study analysis, code analysis, and automation testing. Ultimately, his goal is to reduce rework and focus on new, energizing tasks, recognizing that AI can be a valuable tool in achieving this objective.