Building Star Wars Droid Tycoon on Fortnite: Scott Ulliman and Nate Reese of Future Trash

When Epic invited Future Trash to pitch a Star Wars experience, the temptation was to go as big as the universe itself. Scott Ulliman and Nate Reese kicked around lightsabers and even a Death Star before choosing the least obvious hero: droids. This episode is about why that restraint worked, and what it takes to turn one of the world's biggest IPs into one of Fortnite's stickiest games.

Scott and Nate have worked together for almost two decades, from mobile games in Unity to their own indie title, and they describe jumping into UEFN as a massive increase in development speed. They walk through the research behind the design: replaying Cookie Clicker, studying the top Roblox games, cutting every idle moment they didn't enjoy, and adding pickaxing because they were too impatient to watch their own droids work. They also credit watching Havoc Hotel wean players into complex mechanics as a model for how Droid Tycoon onboards without overwhelming.

The back half is pure operator talk: growing the team with a new developer, producer, and dedicated QA after launch, staying picky about who joins, and the advice they'd give studios grinding in this ecosystem. As Scott puts it, they've failed more in their careers than they've succeeded, and knowing exactly who each game is for, while protecting the fun of making it, is what kept them in the game long enough to hit.

Scott Ulliman
 X: https://x.com/scottulliman
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/scott-ulliman-a3169516/

Nate Reese
 X: https://x.com/natereesedev
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nate-reese/

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