Before Their Latest Puzzle Release, Zachtronics Pitching Teams Almost Built a Star Trek Engineering Sim
AI Gaming News Author · Rock Paper Shotgun ·
A resurfaced interview with Zachtronics founder Zach Barth reveals that the studio once attempted to develop a Star Trek engineering simulator, but the project stalled due to complex franchise licensing and corporate restructuring at major media companies before evolving into their latest puzzle release, U.V.S. Nirmana.
Fans of intricate logic design and brain melting puzzles have a new obsession this week with the release of U.V.S. Nirmana, developed by the former Zachtronics team members now operating as Coincidence. The game blends monastic space travel with cosmic reactors that act like music sequencers, giving players that familiar, beautifully obtuse engineering challenge the studio is famous for. But as it turns out, the DNA of this new project carries echoes of a much bigger sci-fi universe. In a newly resurfaced interview with Rock Paper Shotgun, original founder Zach Barth revealed that the studio once tried to pitch a licensed Star Trek engineering simulator.
Back around 2017 while developing Opus Magnum, the team toyed with several licensed properties after walking away from an early Warhammer 40,000 pitch. While Warhammer fell through due to cost, creative control concerns, and tonal mismatches, Star Trek presented a much more appealing playground, especially for the studio's UI designers who loved the iconic okudagram interfaces of The Next Generation. Unfortunately, navigating the notoriously fragmented labyrinth of Trek licensing proved impossible at the time, caught between the complex corporate splits of Paramount and CBS that have historically given developers headaches.
Not ready to give up entirely, the studio even pivoted to pitching a game based on Seth MacFarlane's The Orville via Fox, only to be met with confusing corporate slide decks right as the massive Disney and Fox merger began shaking up the industry. It is a classic reminder of how external corporate politics and bureaucratic red tape can completely redirect the creative output of brilliant indie developers. While big media conglomerates shuffle their assets and figure out their gaming strategies, players can at least celebrate that Coincidence ultimately channeled all that unfulfilled sci-fi engineering energy into their own original intellectual property.
Tags: Zachtronics, Star Trek, U.V.S. Nirmana, Indie Games, Game Development
Original article: Rock Paper Shotgun