How InstaLOD was an invaluable asset for Phoenix Labs and their rapidly growing hunting action RPG: Dauntless.
Dauntless, a free-to-play hunting action RPG, has rapidly gained popularity, notably for its full cross-play capabilities across PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch. Developing a game with such a significant amount of content that needs to be performant on multiple platforms presented a substantial challenge for Phoenix Labs. InstaLOD emerged as the essential tool that revolutionized their content production and optimization process, dramatically accelerating their development pipeline and enabling scalable asset creation without requiring additional resources.
¶ A Massively Multi-Console Challenge
Developing and maintaining a game like Dauntless, with its extensive content and cross-platform compatibility, presented several key challenges:
- Multi-Platform Performance: Ensuring optimal performance of a vast amount of game content on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch, each with varying hardware capabilities.
- Scalable Asset Production: The need for a development pipeline that could efficiently produce high-quality, optimized assets without requiring significant additional human resources or time.
- Manual Optimization Inefficiency: The traditional manual process of optimizing meshes, especially for reducing triangle counts while maintaining visual fidelity, was time-consuming and often yielded suboptimal results.
- Skeletal Mesh Optimization: Optimizing complex skeletal meshes for different platforms while preserving detail and animation quality posed a unique challenge.
¶ InstaLOD: The Secret Weapon to Scalability
InstaLOD provided Phoenix Labs with a powerful and flexible solution that addressed their core challenges. Key aspects of InstaLOD's implementation included:
- Automated Content Production and Optimization: InstaLOD's tools automated the process of producing and optimizing game content, significantly speeding up the development pipeline.
- Scalable Development: It allowed Phoenix Labs to develop in a scalable way, preventing the need for additional resources even with expanding content.
- Efficient Static Mesh Remeshing: InstaLOD's remeshing capabilities allowed them to combine multiple static meshes into a single, optimized mesh with one material. This drastically reduced triangle counts (e.g., 30,000 to 5,000 or less) while maintaining visual quality, a process that manually took hours but was completed in minutes with InstaLOD.
- Advanced Skeletal Mesh Optimization: InstaLOD's algorithms for skeletal mesh optimization and skinning provided extensive control and flexibility. This saved a tremendous amount of time and allowed for precise polishing, with command-line support for batch processing of skeletal mesh FBXs.
- Granular Control: The abundance of settings within InstaLOD provided deep control over the optimization process, allowing artists to prioritize areas of importance, whether it be silhouette preservation, boundary protection, or overall skinning quality.
¶ The Results: Leveled Up Performance and Efficiency
The integration of InstaLOD into Phoenix Labs' development workflow yielded significant positive outcomes:
- Dramatic Time and Cost Savings: InstaLOD automated tasks that previously took hours or even days, freeing up valuable developer time and reducing production costs.
- Accelerated Development Pipeline: The ability to automatically produce and optimize content significantly sped up the overall development process for Dauntless.
- Enhanced Cross-Platform Performance: InstaLOD enabled Dauntless to be performant across all target platforms (PC, PS4, Xbox One, Switch) by efficiently optimizing content without compromising visual quality.
- Improved Asset Quality and Efficiency: InstaLOD's remeshing capabilities allowed for the creation of highly optimized assets that looked "virtually identical" to their original, high-polygon versions.
- Increased Development Scalability: Phoenix Labs could expand Dauntless's content without needing to scale up their team or resources proportionally, ensuring sustainable growth.
- Custom Tool Integration: Phoenix Labs built custom tools around InstaLOD to further maximize production for cross-platform development, demonstrating its adaptability.
¶ Conquering the Content Behemoth: Dauntless's Ongoing Success
InstaLOD has been an invaluable asset for Phoenix Labs in the development and continued expansion of Dauntless. Its powerful optimization tools, particularly for static and skeletal meshes, have not only saved significant time and capital but have also enabled the game to achieve high performance across a wide range of platforms. As Dauntless continues to grow, InstaLOD remains a necessary part of its future development, providing the critical foundation for efficient and scalable content creation.
"InstaLOD allows us to develop in a scalable way that doesn't require additional resources. From a cost-benefit standpoint, we save tons of time and capital on scalable asset production." - Dustin, Director of Content Accelerators
https://youtu.be/Ibi0GS_yJ4k?si=mCVJS9ySjJjKtmsX
First published: 26th May 2025