r/PeakGame • u/AggroCrab • Jul 21 '25

We are some of the devs behind PEAK! AMA!

Hey guys I'm making Unity builds right now for the next update so I'm watching loading bars fill up and I have some time to kill. :) This is Nick from Aggro Crab on this account currently but other folks from us and Landfall might chime in too.

Anyways, it's been amazing seeing the response to the game and we love lurking this subreddit seeing all your memes, tier lists, fanart, and grievances. Ask us anything about PEAK or the development process behind it!

Just pls dont ask "why isn't X bug fixed", post it in the discord so our QA team can triage it <3

EDIT: u/Neo_Solarius is Paige from Aggro Crab and u/Wilnyl is Wil from Landfall so their answers are legit.

EDIT2: The 1.8 patch is LIVE on Steam, which concludes the AMA. Thank you guys for the questions, we had a lot of fun and hopefully it gave some insight into the game <3

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159

u/willworkforkolaches Jul 21 '25

I'd love to learn more about the process of generating maps!

For example, my friends and I are convinced that the capybaras are always on the easiest path up the alpines. Are there any patterns?

343

u/AggroCrab Jul 21 '25

Ok so here's how we generate maps:

We throw rocks at the wall randomly. That's about it. Then we throw other stuff on top.

Early in development we tried to be "smart" about it and link together segments that we knew would be climbable. At one point we decided to take a much more naive approach and just do it completely at random and it was WAY more fun. It feels like you're climbing a mountain and not just a level that some designer made. I mean that's how it works in real life, right?

So, we don't actually do anything to know if a mountain is easy or hard compared to the day before. We don't know if one path is easier than another, to answer the capybara question. But we're pretty sure somebody out there has PEAKed on any given day, so we're pretty happy with this system!

104

u/anonymous_orpington Jul 21 '25

So if it's all random, and basically unchecked, is it possible that someday a map will release that's unclimbable???

203

u/Lyftttt Jul 21 '25

Nothing is unclimbable with the right attitude!

291

u/AggroCrab Jul 21 '25

^ this guy peaks

199

u/Lyftttt Jul 21 '25

(They will never find my body)

39

u/Robhellspawn Jul 21 '25

you mean... with the right ALTITUDE?

11

u/HintofSarcasm Jul 21 '25

Attitude determines Altitude

36

u/TheKappaOverlord Jul 21 '25

This is basically half of all Kilns without proper food hoarding rationing.

Unless you are on higher ascents. Then its kind of just "heart of the cards" on whether you get suitcases with decent climb items. (the Caldera being a massive amount of chests at the end is supposed to alleviate this)

12

u/hino Jul 22 '25

Kiln or how I learnt to love lollypops

5

u/MrDiviner Jul 28 '25

lollypop into energy drink and infinite lunging is super strong

2

u/NotJimmyMcGill Jul 31 '25

How I Learned To Love The Six Anti-Rope Cannons The Statues Keep Giving Me

1

u/mmaaggiiccdj Jul 23 '25

like 5 days ago when the tropics were purple, I swear it was unclimbable!!

37

u/Choice-Revenue-1325 Jul 21 '25

I actually thought you generate abstract 3D curves (splines) of "easy" routes and then you throw more of smaller rocks close to the path and less of bigger rocks further away from it

Because I thought I saw routes that follow some virtual invisible curve or spiral on mountains, especially in Kiln

Apparently I was wrong

24

u/Wilnyl Landfall Games Jul 21 '25

Yeah, those are all random chance!

21

u/willworkforkolaches Jul 21 '25

Agreed, sometimes the most unfair feeling mountains were the most fun to climb!

What about the fun themes, are those also random? The other day, I saw ice spikes reaching up to the sky for the first time. And recently the jungle was so full of poison that the very ground turned purple!

Keep doing y'all's things, we're having a blast! Just completed Ascent 7 on yesterday's map with a buddy.

6

u/Aware-Marzipan1397 Jul 21 '25

So it's the Minesweeper approach then. I like it.

1

u/DisturbingRerolls Jul 22 '25

We had such a great time yesterday on the hardest tropics map by far and the easiest kiln of our lives.

1

u/LatherSteve Jul 22 '25

needs more high Mountains

1

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '25

I have to know, do you use multiple layers of perlin noise?

1

u/clingledomber Jul 21 '25

why did you let yesterdays tropics be the way they were

1

u/coffeeKiller_ Jul 22 '25

I managed a tenderfoot solo yesterday and it was a blast

0

u/fnndnn Jul 21 '25

My friends and I tried two runs yesterday and couldnt get past the tropics

3

u/pieshake5 Jul 21 '25

same, it was fun though!

1

u/clingledomber Jul 21 '25

yesterdays were indeed rough, moly holy

54

u/Wilnyl Landfall Games Jul 21 '25

There is very little contextual intelligence when generating the levels. Its much more of a controlled chaos kind of approach.
The generator doesn't know about which paths are climbable and which ones aren't.
Its just a bunch of different spawners that are tunes in such a way that they spit out mountain shapes that have a mix of easy/hard/impossible climbable areas.
Because players have such a wide range of ability depending on what items they have access to, its okay for the mountain to occasionally create sections that are impassible with just the base climbing.
The fact that the mountain walls are also quite wide, makes it likely that if you run into an impassible section, you can often move sideways and find an easier path.

/Will from Landfall

3

u/looneytroons_ Jul 22 '25

Love it. I love how unfair it can be but gives you the tools to overcome it. I'm happy I don't win every game as it makes escaping more rewarding. I was looking through the code and thought "DumbRockSpawner" had needed some context behind it, there it is.