It’s no secret that storytelling has been the driving force behind our most recent games, Lily’s Garden (2019), Penny & Flo (2020), and Makeover Match (2023). Our goal has always been to captivate players and create unforgettable gaming experiences. Behind every narrative in mobile gaming, you’ll discover an incredible group effort from artists, writers, and animators.
At Tactile, the creative powerhouses who bring it all together, are our awesome Cinematic Artists (CAs). Their magic lies in weaving all the essential elements of a great story into a seamless and engaging experience. That’s why we sat down with three of our CAs – Kiran, Maiko, and Jon – to dive deep into the art of storytelling at Tactile. In this article, we’ll explore their creative process, the tools they use, the challenges they face, and their commitment to delivering cinematic excellence.
The Role of Cinematic Artists
CAs play a pivotal role in shaping the visual aspects of story-driven mobile games. If you’ve played our games, you’ll know that our gameplay not only consists of match-3 puzzle levels and customization features but it’s all tied into a cohesive story, in our case through cutscenes that players watch in order to complete tasks.
To construct these scenes, CAs make use of assets that are crafted by our teams of artists and animators. Think of them as digital camera people, responsible for framing and timing every scene, with a keen eye for detail. Maiko explains, “The end product is just a cutscene, you point the camera at something, and of course, me pointing the camera at this cup, it had a lot of decisions made prior to that. Right? What is it exactly and how is it that I want to show this cup and for what reason?” Hence, being a CA is all about asking: What do I want to show, how should I show it and for what purpose?
Tools
CAs create scenes in Unity, but it’s not the standard version they use. The team relies heavily on customized tools built by our Content Tools team, such as the Map Editor (check out this article to learn more about our in-house storytelling tools). This tool enables them to weave all the pieces together: Positioning the items and characters, picking facial expressions, importing the dialogue, moving the cameras, adding animations to characters, giving everything timing – basically everything necessary to tell the story.
Our in-house tools are essential for maintaining an efficient workflow, enabling the team to seamlessly integrate information from multiple softwares. It goes like this: The “instruction guide” for creating a scene is outlined in the flowchart, created by Story Directors. The assets are mainly produced in Photoshop or Maya and the dialogues are stored in Google spreadsheets. CAs then take all those storytelling pieces and put them together in Unity.
Timelines
Given that most of our story-driven games have weekly releases, it’s a flow they repeat week after week. Achieving weekly releases is no small feat, with each release typically involving around 20 scenes, each representing a task essential for the storyline’s progression. For example, whenever there’s an area in Lily’s Garden that needs to be renovated, there needs to be a story tying that into the overall narrative and gameplay experience.
Workflows
Collaboration is at the core of their workflow. They closely follow production cycles, dividing tasks among team members, ideally in accordance with the abilities and interests of each team member. For instance, if someone is skilled in animating or would like to upskill, the team always tries to give them space to do some animating.
A while ago, they also started working in rotations so CAs could learn each step of the pipeline. As Kiran describes: “Project responsibilities rotate amongst all team members where one person is responsible for receiving all the 2D character expressions in a timely manner, another for getting the environmental assets and so on”. With this type of shared ownership they make sure that all assets are in accordance with release schedules. Kiran continues: “Everyone learns to do all the tasks required, which ends up being very important when someone is out sick for a week, since our players are always waiting for the next chapter to be released.“
Balancing Creativity and Practicality
One of the primary challenges for CAs is balancing creativity with the demands of a weekly release schedule and limited options. They understand that while they aim for excellence, compromises may be necessary. One limitation is the camera angle for Lily’s Garden and Penny & Flo as it’s locked into a top-down view which limits cinematographic options as you don’t get to do normal movie shots like close-ups or over-the-shoulder shots. But the good sports that they are, they take it as a fun challenge and constantly find innovative and creative ways to work around that, always aiming for their ultimate goal of cinematic excellence. As Jon describes it:
“We want Tactile to tell the best stories in the mobile market, and we’ve been trying to push the cinematics to do just that. But there’s so many things that have to come together. It needs both good writing and pretty visuals. But even more importantly, we have to nail it for our target audience, and not end up being too vague in our delivery. There are so many things that we’re constantly trying to do better”.
The joy of creating memorable scenes is evident in their work. Maiko remembers one particular scene for Penny & Flo that was super fun for the team and at the same time it showed the possibilities you have, even with limited options:
“We had this whole arc about a ship, an airship, and it was actually entertaining as hell. And in retrospect, you look at it as sort of a top down view movie, right? And you’re like, well, this is legitimately fun and well paced. And it had a bunch of effects, characters and moving pieces – super complex. At that point, it must have been like, what, three, four months [for me] at Tactile? I was like, yeah, I didn’t really imagine coming in that you could do this much with such a limited sort of platform to build cinematics on.”
It’s all about finding the ideal mix of scene framing, dialogue timing and content amount, as you want players to not feel overwhelmed and center players’ attention on the most relevant narrative aspects.
Cinematic Excellence = Know your Audience
In the fast-paced world of mobile gaming, Cinematic Artists are committed to delivering storytelling experiences that are enjoyable and relevant to players. They understand the need to balance creativity with profitability and engage players with captivating narratives. Through A/B testing, qualitative user research, and analysis of successful competitor games, they continually seek to understand player preferences. As they highlight, it’s a fun challenge to think about what a player, who plays for 30 seconds on the subway, wants to see. You’ll want to start out very strong because you want to immediately catch someone’s attention. As Jon puts it, “We need to get the ball rolling very quickly, so we spend a lot of time thinking about the beginning of any new story – because that beginning has to make you thirsty for more!”.
Seasons in games
Have you ever thought about seasons in games as a tool that can make a game more attractive and interactive for players?
We believe that in order to succeed, a game needs to feel familiar and comfortable, but also fresh and exciting! In our daily lives, events, celebrations and seasons make life more interesting and diverse. We have a change of colours in the seasons of the year, as well as festive decorations and gifts during holidays. Why not give players the same experiences whilst playing our games?
We wanted to share how our teams come up with fresh ideas and bring them to life, season after season. We sat down with Alberto Dal Corso, one of our talented Product Managers, to talk about his role at Tactile and how this creative process works.
Hi Alberto, can you tell us a little bit more about your role at Tactile?
Hi there! I am a Product Manager on the Lily’s Garden team. My role is focused on the LiveOps (live operations) part, which relates to any changes or improvements made to the game, such as optimising all the events and tournaments that run within it.
I am also responsible for the monetization of Lily’s Garden, which means planning and scheduling sales, offers and pricing, as well as trying to optimise them as best as possible. Furthermore, I am responsible for the planning and managing of the seasons or themes that run monthly in Lily’s Garden.
Who else is involved in the process of creating seasons in our games?
The creation of these themes involves a wide range of roles. We have specialists who help with contributing new ideas and feedback on upcoming seasons. We then have talented graphic designers, who create all the graphics you see in the game – everything from the Start Screen, which pops up when you open the game, to the Season Pass. After that, the UI artists and game programmers join the process to finish up the work and implement the graphics in Unity, in order to make it a reality within the game.
What does the process look like from start to finish?
We typically plan the seasons out roughly at the beginning of each year, but we then go into more detail at the start of each quarter. We have discussions and brainstorm with Product Managers and other teams about trends and key topics for the upcoming months and make decisions accordingly. Fun fact, the theme for January was decided by our community through a poll on our Facebook page, so stay tuned to see what’s coming!
After the theme is chosen, we have a chat with the graphic designers and go through several rounds of feedback until we achieve the look and feel that we want. After that, our UI artists implement the graphics in Unity and finally, our game programmers integrate it into the game.
How do you keep the creative juices flowing to come up with new ideas?
It is actually a pretty fun process! Besides the themes that are already set in stone, such as Halloween and Christmas, it is very exciting to come up with new ideas for themes and seasons. One of the most important things that we always keep in mind is being relevant to that period of the year, so we try to look at particular events or fun recurrences happening in that particular month and start the creative process from there. For example, last year we ran a Gala Theme during the month of the Academy Awards, and that was very well received by our players.
What event have you been working on most recently?
Last month, all the excitement and preparation was focused on Christmas. The Christmas season is one of the best seasons, because we can do so much in the game to fit this festive season in and theme everything to the extreme! There’s Christmas trees, lights, decorations and so much more! This Christmas in particular, we have been working on something super exciting and new for all our players. You can check out the event and how incredible it turned out by playing Lily’s Garden right now.
So there you have it, this is one of the ways in which we’ve been keeping our players engaged since we first released Lily’s Garden in early 2019! A strong storyline is important, but it’s the little touches of familiarity and comfort that stand out in a player’s mind and keep bringing them back to the game, season after season.
Since 2019, we have been offering free Danish lessons to all Tactilers coming from outside of Denmark. We are proud to have two amazing teachers on board, Anja Kobbernagel Krusbæk and Andreas Frydensberg Olsen, who have so far taken over 100 Tactilers on the Danish language and culture learning journey. In honour of the international day of education, which is recognized by the UN on the 24th January, we chatted to Anja and Andreas about why we teach Danish at Tactile and why learning the local language and culture of the country you live in is so important.
👋🏻 Hi Anja and Andreas, what led you to a career in education, and why did you pick teaching Danish as a second language?
Andreas: “I have always been interested in culture. Not just national culture, but also culture in the sense of how we behave and act in different situations. Some years ago, I went to China on an exchange programme and started working as an assistant teacher. This was my first experience with teaching and I loved it! I then decided to study cross-culture studies for my Master’s Degree and kept teaching Danish whilst I was studying. After graduation, I started working at a Danish language school. I love that as a teacher of a second language, I am teaching the whole world every day! It is interesting to see different people’s perspectives, not only on the Danish language, but also life in general. And this is where the whole culture aspect comes in. As Danish teachers, we are helping people to get a better, more wholesome view of the world and how Danish language can fit into that.“
Anja: “I have always had an interest in languages. I spent some time working in a language café where I had my first teaching experiences. Teaching a language has taught me a lot about communication, and not just the verbal stuff, but also body language and how it differs from culture to culture. This helped me to realize the importance of learning a language in order to fully understand certain aspects of a culture. The experience at the language café made me want to get into language teaching more, so I decided to get my master’s degree in Danish as a Second and Foreign Language and started working at a language center at the University of Copenhagen. As a language teacher, I have learned a lot about people from other countries, and also about myself, my country and my language.“
💡Why do you think learning the local language of the country you live in is so important? Why do we offer Danish lessons at Tactile?
Anja: “The benefit of learning the local language is understanding the little nuances, the details of language and culture, such as common courtesy, politeness, hospitality, customs and how to act in certain situations. Even as a beginner, being able to say small things like thank you or have a nice day puts people in a good mood, both as the person saying it or the person receiving it. It’s all about creating that good feeling around the language.“
Andreas: “Knowing the local language helps you to understand the context of the situation you are in and also teaches you how to navigate it. Language and culture are so intertwined, and language is so much more than just words!
From the company perspective – we don’t teach Danish because it is our corporate language, but because we want to help Tactilers coming from outside of Denmark to have a smooth integration into the Danish society. This gives people the feeling of belonging. Throughout learning the local language, we stop being just a visitor in the country, but become a real part of it. It’s being able to interact with people on the street, to understand road signs, what they’re saying in the metro, etc. It gives you a feeling of familiarity and it makes people stay. We relocate people from all over the world, so this is an important aspect of it.”
📚 How did you approach setting up a Danish language programme at Tactile? And how do you adapt the teaching to different students?
Anja: “The first and most basic thing we had to do was a needs analysis. This meant talking to people and asking them about what they want to lean, what are they curious about and what is fun and interesting for them. We then had to create the right combination of what people want to learn and what they need to learn. For example, how can we combine developing listening skills with someone’s interest in politics or sport? We want to capture people’s attention and through that maintain their motivation and drive for learning. Also having small classes makes it easier for us to manage and plan, so we group people based on their level and learning goals.”
Andreas: “The most important thing to note is that this is not a linguistics course. We want students to go out and use language from day 1. We want to change perspectives on how people think language can be learned. We spend some time on grammar, but not loads, and if someone is a grammar geek, then we also have loads of material for them! We do things outside of the classroom, such as go on city walks and visit museums. We want our students to be aware of the things around them and encourage them to start making small conversation in Danish, for example with the cashier in the supermarket.”
🌱 What are the most important basic skills that everyone should develop, which will provide them with a really good foundation for language learning?
Andreas: “I firmly believe that anyone can learn a new language and anyone can learn Danish, no matter where you’re from. But there are two things that will help to set you up for success – being curious and brave. You have to be curious to learn new things, and you also need to have the bravery to go out for the first time and for example, order a coffee in Danish, and also to keep doing it! This is especially important when you encounter setbacks in your learning journey.”
😎 What are the most useful words or phrases to know as a foreigner in Denmark?
Skål (Cheers!) – It’s a big part of the Danish culture 🍻
Nå (Well/Oh/So!) – Danes use this a lot and in many different situations, for example when you’ve just realized something, or when you meet a cute dog, when you’re showing interest, or even when you’re making a threat.
God weekend [ˈgoˀ viːˌgεnˀd] (Have a good weekend!) – The Danes are not telling you to go vegan, but just wishing you a very good weekend! 🙂🌿
Velbekomme (Bon appetit!) – When you see someone eating, you can wish them ‘let it serve you well / may it come well to you’ 😋
Det var så lidt (That was so little/That was nothing!) – This is very cultural. Instead of saying you’re welcome, Danes prefer to not mention it or make a fuss out of it!
Hvordan går det? (How are you?/How’s it going?) – It is a common misconception that this is just a greeting, but Danes actually see it as a proper question and will gladly tell you more about how they’re doing.
Hyggelig (Cozy/Pleasant/Homely) – A big part of the Danish culture is this feeling of coziness and warmth. Hyggelig is therefore used a lot and to describe anything or any situation that makes you feel this way – cozy, warm & good!