Every game we've made at Moon so far started from a somewhat weird angle: I look at some of the greatest games ever made and ask myself one simple question: What's wrong with them? Figuring out what's great about a masterpiece is easy. You don't need to think particularly hard to understand why Super Mario Bros. 3, Super Metroid, Symphony of the Night, Diablo II or Mario 64 are incredible games. But figuring out what's wrong with them? That's where you really have to start to think! You have to really dissect these games. Figure out which design elements didn't quite come together, which core pillars were weaker than others, where the developers might have settled for something that was merely good when it could've been extraordinary. And once you start asking those questions, you inevitably arrive at another: What if we could do better? With Ori, our original goal was to make Metroidvanias popular again. I loved Super Metroid and Symphony of the Night, but one thing always bothered me: Why was the actual platforming so simplistic compared to something like Mario? These were games where you spent an enormous amount of time running and jumping, yet the act of running and jumping wasn't nearly as satisfying as it could've been, so that seemed like an obvious opportunity. What if we took the exploration, progression, and interconnected worlds of a Metroidvania, but combined them with the kind of precise and super satisfying movement you'd expect from a great Mario game? Where would that take us? There was another ambition hiding in there, too: We wanted to tell a story. I had just failed at creating my own shortfilm in artschool, so I wanted to prove to myself that I wouldn't fail this time. Back in 2010, the idea to put story into a 2d Platformer seemed almost preposterous to some people. We were literally told that "Even Miyamoto doesn't do that. Why do you think you should?" I didn't have a particularly sophisticated answer other than: "It FEELS like we should!" Looking back, I think those two ambitions ultimately defined Ori: Bringing genuinely great platforming into a Metroidvania and proving that a 2D Platformer could deliver a deeply emotional story. With No Rest for the Wicked, the opportunity seemed even more obvious. We were looking at a genre that - in my opinion - had become creatively stagnant years before we even started development. The combat in Diablo and virtually every Diablo-inspired ARPG was still fundamentally rooted in the same point-and-click design philosophy from decades ago. Sure, controller support had been added over the years. But supporting a controller isn't the same thing as fundamentally rethinking how combat should feel when you're directly controlling a character. And then there was multiplayer. Ever since I was a kid, the dream was obvious: An ARPG where you and your friends could form your own little Fellowship of the Ring and go on an actual adventure together. Not just open a temporary session, have somebody jump in, kill a few monsters, grab some loot, and disappear again. I wanted a world that belonged to our group. A place where we'd build something together, make discoveries together, overcome challenges together, and actually feel like we were sharing an adventure. Instead, the genre largely went in a different direction: Random players being streamed into your experience, fairly meaningless interactions and multiplayer systems that often felt more like an elaborate in-game eBay than a genuine adventure with friends. Again, the question was simple: Why couldn't we do better? That's ultimately where Wicked came from. Now, as we're preparing for Wicked's 1.0 release, I find myself returning to that same thought process. Most of our team will continue working on No Rest for the Wicked, but we'll also start putting smaller teams together to explore entirely new projects. Which brings me to our next challenge: Lately, I've been thinking an awful lot about where Mario got it wrong. I think it'd be a lot of fun trying to directly compete with Nintendo next time! 👍