Diego Leñero Perez Banuet is studying digital media at Fulda University of Applied Sciences when, in the middle of his studies, the US publisher Midwest Games shows interest in investing in the indie game "Duck Paradox", which he developed. He founded the video game studio Magic Games and even appointed himself to his own enterprise for a compulsory internship.
In this interview, he tells us how this initially absurd-sounding situation came about, how he became a video game developer and to what extent his Bachelor's programme in Digital Media at the Department of Applied Computer Science helped him.
DPCS (Department of Applied Computer Science): Hello Diego, tell us briefly about your university studies at Fulda University of Applied Sciences. What did you study?
Diego: Hello, I applied to Fulda University of Applied Sciences straight after my university entrance qualification - my brother Miguel Leñero studied here before me and it was through him that I found out about the university. I submitted parallel applications for Applied Computer Science and Digital Media and was accepted for both. So I had the choice. At that point, I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do with my life - only that I was creative and at the same time passionate about computer science. Digital media combined exactly these two sides, which is why I chose it.
DPCS: What did you deal with in detail during your university studies? What did you specialise in?
Diego: To be honest, I didn't specialise in the traditional sense within the study programme. The Digital Media program is intentionally broad - design, development, media theory - and it was precisely this breadth that I used to try out a lot of things instead of committing myself early on.
My actual specialisation was expired parallel to my university studies, in a series of my own projects: First, I co-founded an educational app called Urban Bees, a bee-themed app designed to reward environmentally friendly behaviour. I was mainly in charge of design, marketing and the gamification mechanics.
After that, I worked on an e-learning platform that was designed to make knowledge transfer playful. I realised that I wasn't so much interested in gamification as I was in real games. So I started watching Unity tutorials on YouTube and just started building. Many small games eventually turned into one that grew bigger - Duck Paradox. It became a studio that I had to found in the middle of my university studies, with responsibility for finances, marketing and a team of over ten people at times.
It was only towards the end of my university studies that my work came back into contact with the university - in my Bachelor's thesis with Professor Johannes Konert, in which I systematically brought together game design and learning theory.
Looking back, I would describe it like this: My actual specialisation didn't happen during my studies, but alongside them - and my studies gave me the space to do it.
DPCS: How did the idea of developing and realising video games come about?
Diego: I've loved games for as long as I can remember. I grew up mainly with Nintendo titles - the GameCube has a special place in my memory, with games like Pikmin 2 and The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess as absolute childhood highlights. Even as an adult, I've never stopped playing - perhaps a little too much League of Legends. A quick flex at this point: I won the League of Legends tournament at the Prometheus LAN party at Fulda University of Applied Sciences with my one-trick Azir.
But the path to game development itself was not direct. As already mentioned, I first worked on Urban Bees - an app that was supposed to reward environmentally friendly behaviour. The business model didn't work, and at some point we got tired of the niche. Then came the e-learning platform idea. It was only then that I realised that I was less fascinated by gamification than the actual medium behind it: the game itself. So I called up Unity, watched tutorials on YouTube and simply learnt by rebuilding. Everything else came out of this learning-by-doing.
DPCS: To what extent did your university studies help you?
Diego: The modules in which I was able to implement my own projects helped me the most. Specifically, for example, the Business Start-up module, in which I learnt a lot about German corporate structures - knowledge that I literally needed later for my own start-up. Or the Computer Game Development module, which I took when I had already mastered most of the content and in which I was simply allowed to build a game for fun. The Bachelor's project was particularly valuable: I developed a game called IQ vs. AI for the Kinder-Akademie Fulda(kaf.hs-fulda.de/iq-vs-ki/).
One particularly crucial point was that I was allowed to complete my internship in my own enterprise. On paper, it sounds absurd that you appoint yourself as an intern while you are a managing director - but in practice, it was exactly what I needed. This time was more intensive and more instructive than most traditional internships, where you end up making coffee. The fact that the university made this form of recognition possible was a huge gift.
I would like to mention two names among the people: Christian Fischer and Johannes Konert were real role models for me among the professors. And among the lecturers, I would like to mention Dominik Rupprecht, who was incredibly good at explaining things and had the patience to deal with students like me who didn't sit in every lecture.
DPCS: During your university studies, you founded the indie game studio "Magic Games". Tell us what's behind it, what have you already published?
Diego: Magic Games was founded in the middle of my university studies, yes. The US publisher Midwest Games showed serious interest in investing in Duck Paradox, and so my indie project, which had been quite free until then, was lifted into full production virtually overnight. I had to build up an enterprise capable of doing this very quickly.
At the moment, the team passes from me alone. My brother Miguel was involved in the early days of Duck Paradox, and Norman Lista - also a graduate of Fulda University of Applied Sciences and a close friend - joined in the most intensive production phase and played a key role in helping to organise the project and the company.
Duck Paradox has been published so far - the game has won several awards. There are also over ten smaller games and prototypes that I have uploaded to itch.io over the years(magicdylen.itch.io). F.R.O.G.S. was created as an experimental prototype as part of my Bachelor's thesis and is not a commercial release. I'm currently working on the next project in the background - it's going to be very different to everything I've done so far. I can't say any more about it yet, just this much: it's going to be great.
The vision: to make video games the most powerful medium for imparting knowledge that exists - because they already are. I want to build a brand that stands for rich learning experiences that feel like damn good games.
DPCS: What tips would you give to someone today who wants to start an indie studio out of university studies?
Diego: That's a difficult question because there is a lot of standard advice that is good but has already been said everywhere. Nevertheless, two of them briefly, because they are really true: Don't make your first game too big. You learn a lot just by finishing and publishing something - and the bigger the scope, the less likely you are to get that degree. And secondly: secure your business before you put everything on the indie game card. Have a job, some source of income, something that gives you security. Developing a game that's supposed to be fun while you're in dire straits is extremely difficult.
But the real, less generic important thing is: make something that only you can make. A perspective, an obsession, an insight from your own life that no one else can have in the same way. And then find the best way to communicate that something to others. That's the point at which you become interesting to the world - not through the hundredth reskin of a well-known genre.
What has carried me is clear: my family. My parents, Antonio and Rosario, my brother Miguel and my sister Marisa. All my life, my parents have encouraged us to pursue what we love and pushed us to always be the best version of ourselves. Without them I wouldn't be here in Germany, without their support in hard times I wouldn't be able to work on my passion for another month. I wish my mum could witness what I still want to build in my life. I hope I build it fast enough for my father and my two siblings to see. There is a real urgency in life and in the work you want to do.
DPCS: With the title F.R.O.G.S. you have developed a so-called serious game. What makes a good serious game?
Diego: I have to admit: I have a real problem with the label "serious game". "Serious" implies that fun is absent somewhere. And it also implies that other games are not serious, although nobody should seriously question the size and importance of the video game industry anymore. So do we really take games seriously, or do we still think they're just silly stuff?
Either way, serious games means games that are created with a goal beyond pure maintenance - education, training, enlightenment. That sounds great. There are enterprises that use VR simulations to train employees in safety protocols for aircraft preparation. That's marvellous. But why do we call it a game? Shouldn't it just be a training simulation? Because "game" means fun. If something isn't fun, it's not a game - even if you put the word "serious" in front of it.
Most games that pursue educational goals end up in the "chocolate-covered broccoli" trap: learning content is superficially gamified, and players can smell it within seconds and drop out. Even children can instantly recognise the difference between Super Mario Galaxy and some bad edu-game.
I believe there is a better, largely unexplored path - although some games have already taken it rather unintentionally: Games that teach something intrinsic about their systems. Where it's part of the gameplay to understand the concept behind it, because otherwise you won't be successful. If you build redstone circuits in Minecraft, you learn about logic gates and basic programming principles - and nobody has to open a textbook for that. The system behaves like the real thing, embedded in a world that is a joy to explore. For me, this is the direction in which good "serious games" - or rather: good games with learning potential - should go.
DPCS: What was the appeal of developing a serious game for you?
Diego: This is going to sound cheesy, but: I believe life is a game, and the best way to play this game is to achieve the best you can. So I asked myself: What would that be for me? What would I want to do the most? And my answer was: to turn the medium I love the most into something that actually enriches people's lives - and make it better than it's been done before.
That sounds like a pretty damn good goal for a lifetime. So I set it for myself. There's mountains of evidence that this is hard - mountains of failed projects, boring edu-games, you name it. It's hard enough to make a successful indie game, and teaching something meaningful at the same time doesn't make it any easier. But that's what makes it a fun life for me.
DPCS: Please tell us something about F.R.O.G.S., what is the game about?
Diego: F.R.O.G.S. stands for Frog Roguelike Overclocked Genetic Simulator. It's the prototype of a game I created as part of my Bachelor's thesis, in which you learn evolution by literally evolving - without tutorials, without statements, without pop-up questions.
You start as a little tadpole in a paludarium, a mini-ecosystem of water and land where everything tries to eat you. You survive by avoiding threats and finding food. If you eat enough, you grow into a frog. As a frog, you look for a mate - yes, that direct - and reproduce. Before the next generation, you can choose one of three possible mutations. Then you die and the game starts again - this time as the next generation with the inherited characteristics. One run takes about 10 to 25 minutes. In this way, natural selection, ecosystem dynamics and sexual selection are all translated into game mechanics, simplified and exaggerated for playability.
The aim is not to "tell" knowledge, but to create an environment in which players intuitively grasp evolutionary biology principles through their own actions. The prototype from the Bachelor's thesis has shown that this approach works. The next step is a controlled study with a control group to empirically investigate the learning effects compared to classic methods. The game itself is currently not publicly available - it is still undergoing further development.
DPCS: When you think back to your time at Fulda University of Applied Sciences, what do you remember positively?
So many things. It wasn't that long ago, but I still get nostalgic every time I go to Fulda to visit friends. A typical day could look like this: going to the gym with a friend in the morning, then to the cafeteria - where the food was actually usually really good - and then to the library to study. In the middle of the study session, a call with the publisher to negotiate who gets what percentage of Duck Paradox. Out in the evenings, meeting friends, house parties with people from my university studies. It was a great time.
Fulda is a special city. You feel like you know everyone after a short time, you can't go to the supermarket without bumping into someone - that can be annoying if you want to be alone, but it's also wonderful. It creates this feeling of a close-knit, student-orientated community. The city itself is beautiful, clean, peaceful and yet lively, with regular courses and things happening.
The university itself is a really great environment. If you bring your own drive, you'll find a perfect sandbox here. Want to do a crazy film project? Talk to the professors - there's a good chance you'll find someone who can give you access to the green screen room. Do you want to build a prototype for a start-up? You can probably get your hands on a 3D printer if you ask the right people. Want to develop a transformative game about frogs? Maybe you'll meet a professor who happens to have written a book about digital learning games. If you bring your own initiative, you can really make something big out of it.
DPCS: What can we expect from you and Magic Games in the future?
Diego: I will continue to create.
DPCS: Thank you for your time and the interview!
Diego : With pleasure!
Diego regularly shares updates on the end of projects here: www.instagram.com/el_dylen/