For the Love of the Horse (Games) — Dev Talks with Alice Ruppert

In a time far away, where landlines still roamed the Earth, horse games entered their first Golden Age. Around the late 1990s and early 2000s, titles like Starshine Legacy, Pippa Funnell, Riding Star and many more shaped the imagination of countless Horse Girls, before fading into general obscurity…until now! With the indie scene now thriving, a new community of digital equestrians has emerged from the fog. An unexpected resurgence for sure, due in no small part to the work of Alice Ruppert.

About Alice

A Game Designer by trade, Alice Ruppert graduated from the Zurich University of the Arts in 2015. Immediately afterwards, she began working at startup N-Dream AG, eventually becoming Head of Games and serving as executive producer on many of their flagship titles. Three years later, her gaming expertise and love of horses combined in The Mane Quest. Over time, she rallied together a significant community, before joining forces with Aesir Interactive. There, she played a significant role in developing their latest titles, Horse Tales: Emerald Valley Ranch and the upcoming Windstorm: The Legend of Khiimori, before shifting her focus towards freelance work.

I got in touch with Alice for the first time in 2021, through a very long letter containing twenty years or so of peak Horse GirlTM frustration. Three years later (how time flies!), she graciously accepted to sit down with me for another chat about her journey with The Mane Quest – and what the future may have in store for horse games.

Let’s start with a little trip down memory lane. In 2018, you gave a talk at GameZ about, your childhood game, Pferd & Pony: Mein Pferdehof. Six years later, at Gamescon, you held an entire panel on the history and untapped potential of Horse Games. In the meantime, The Mane Quest was featured on several platforms, both in Europe and abroad. Is the tide finally turning for horse games?

Things have definitely changed, although I don’t think there has been a complete 180 or anything. I don’t believe this is entirely my doing, as I’m pretty sure some of those changes would have happened without me. But I also think to have helped consolidate some of those efforts by gathering that community and drawing more attention to the subject. There has been more and more evidence over time that I’ve been able to point to in terms of target audience, thanks to the work of the people who have made games in the meantime. Star Stable is still going strong, of course, but Rival Stars has also been successful by leaning into the horse games fans.

There are also a handful of others, like Ranch of Rivershine, which is an interesting new avenue for horse games. The market has begun shifting in the last few years and it’s now entering some sort of turnover process. You mentioned my talk at the GameZ festival in 2018, but actually shortly thereafter I was invited to the Ludicious festival for a talk called  “All Horse Games Are Bad and Here’s Why You Should Care About It”. At the time it was slightly hyperbolic, but I think it rang a lot truer then than it does now. I would not submit a talk with this title today because enough has changed and that’s not so simple anymore. And I love that, I think that’s great! There’s lots of way to go, but I do think that things are changing, and tides are turning.

When in doubt, remember that “complaining until they put you in charge” is actually a valid career path!
© Alice Ruppert

Germany stands as the most decorated equestrian federation in regard to both Olympic and World Championship medals. Do you think that has played a part in the reception of both talks?

It’s kind of hard for me to judge the equestrian culture in Germany. I work with German studios a lot and I’ve been to a lot of German events, but I’m still involved mostly in the game dev bubble, which isn’t particularly influenced by the equestrian culture. A lot of people know someone who rides horses or is a “horse girl”, but it’s not really dominant […].

The same thing happens in Switzerland as well – there are many people who know someone who rides or has a passing interest in horses, but I couldn’t call Switzerland a horse country. However, some of the games I’ve worked on with Aesir Interactive have received public grants from the German government and the state of Bavaria, where the studio is located.

What’s interesting is that, when you’re applying for funding for the Bavarian grants, we’re basically representing, perpetuating and distributing German horse culture, so that can be made into a cultural argument. I’m not sure that would work as well in other countries, though. I think also the UK has some special funds for horse culture, so I’m not sure if people making horse games there also use that argument.

Famous riders like Lucinda Green, Pippa Funnell and Ludger Beerbaum were all featured in major equestrian franchises.
Lucinda Green’s Equestrian Challenge © Red Mile Entertainment, Pippa Funnell/Alexandra Ledermann © Ubisoft, Riding Star 3 © Sproing

The cultural argument may actually be a turning point for horse media. The movies establish Windstorm as a direct descendant of Halla, a prominent showjumper in the aftermath of World War II. Her story could actually make for an excellent horse movie!

Absolutely, and it would make for such a cool setting too! Halla’s pedigree is also super interesting, because her mother was a war horse that was actually stolen by the Germans. Halla herself became immensely popular as a “wonder horse”, but you could also dive deeper into that, like War Horse did. It could make for such cool content!

I think it’s super interesting to explore how media could tackle that. It’s also kinda funny how the true story is peak Horse Girl Drama […]. I think the same happens in some of the Windstorm movies, but it would be a lot more interesting if we began telling the story in its historical context rather than making another generic horse movie.

Speaking of history, since we’ve been mentioning it a lot, let’s talk about Windstorm for a moment. With Legend of Khiimori, Aesir is moving away from episodic storytelling into a fully-fledged open world. What can future Couriers expect once the game releases in Early Access in 2025?

Legend of Khiimorii draws from all the previous horse games that Aesir has worked on. Horse Tales was a major influence in deciding what kind of game we wanted to make. The first two chapters in the Windstorm series were a lot more linear and closely tied to the franchise, not really offering a lot of system-driven gameplay by themselves.

Your horse sheet on Horse Tales: Emerald Valley Ranch (left) and Windstorm: Legend of Khiimori (right).
Horse Tales: Emerald Valley Ranch & Windstorm: Legend of Khiimori © Aesir Interactive

With Horse Tales, the story was really just a starting point for letting you play around in that world. So, Legend of Khiimori moved towards a system-driven game that thrives off gameplay. As a Courier, you can visit any camp or settlement and take on missions to deliver cargo. There’s going to be some inventory management, but the main point is to give the player something interesting to do while they play with their horses and explore the world.
Then you have the route planning. You’re not just going to be riding from A to B, you must also pay attention to the way you ride. Different ground types might influence which abilities your horse will train during the ride and its potential.

It’s also been confirmed that you’ll be able to breed your horses to improve them over the generations. Your horses will have different traits and abilities, some that you pick up as you play and teach them over time. This is all part of the plan to make horses feel more like individuals, not just numbers in your stable. It’s not about gathering as many horses as possible, but to give weight to each one of them […]. We’re actually going to have a Dev Diary up on Steam very soon where we’re going to explain a little bit more about horse training and horse care, so keep an eye out for that!

About the world, are there going to be some forms of interaction with other NPCs?

The world is not going to be densely populated. There will be NPCs, but we’re also not going to have sprawling cities with hundreds of people. I also want to add that Legend of Khiimori is entering Early Access in a very early state. Some developers employ this strategy when the game is almost finished, with only a couple of features left to flesh out and a fixed roadmap in place. We’ve decided to launch the game as soon as we have something we consider playable.

We want the community involved from early on, but also to be able to react to what people say. Otherwise the Early Access would just be a bug-fixing and polishing period, which is not the case.

We also want to make sure that we can adjust in terms of features […] and plan accordingly. That is not to say the community is in complete control. There are a lot of considerations regarding vision and technical possibilities we must keep in mind. The cool thing is that everybody gets to be a part of it and join us, but it also requires the understanding that the game won’t be finished once it goes live regarding polish, content and complexity. It’s important to emphasize that we’re launching very early on purpose because we want to develop alongside the community.

Great care went into recreating the feel of 13th century Mongolia.
 Windstorm: Legend of Khiimori © Aesir Interactive

Your name is heavily tied to Aesir, having played a pivotal role in developing both Horse Tales and Legend of Khiimori. Creating their own game is a dream for many horse lovers, but that often comes with lots of compromise. Are there some lessons you learned during your time at Aesir that you want to share with us?

Yeah, actually! I’m not actually employed at Aesir anymore, I’m on board just as a freelance consultant. What I have learned  is that I am happier to work in smaller teams. I still have plans about creating my own horse game, even after I’ve been in a lead position at Aesir. But I was also part of a bigger machine […], so it wasn’t necessarily the same. Hopefully soon, I will publish some insights about “looking back” at  Horse Tales and what  Legend of Khiimori will do differently on The Mane Quest, so stay tuned!

One last question. The Mane Quest proved there is a market for horse games beyond the usual staples of the genre. What can we do to increase its visibility, and is there room to expand to a bigger audience?

That’s pretty much what I try to do every time I get the opportunity, to talk to the industry about my work. The message is getting heard, but what sticks out the most is what I’m able to point to. Rather than just me believing there should be more horse games, it’s more likely that, because you’ve heard of The Mane Quest, you now know that Star Stable has 600.000 monthly active users and no competition. Money talks, essentially.

On one hand it’s kinda sad, because I wish we had more art for art’s sake. But the horse money is already talking pretty loudly, and if you look around you can see pretty quickly that there is an untapped market here.

I also believe that, for the market to capitalize on this, there needs to be another one or two projects that get a little more attention. Rival Stars is fantastic, because it proves the existence of the sports game audience. Then you have Star Stable, of course, but also The Ranch of Rivershine. It’s incredibly interesting, because it goes straight into the cozy game niche, which hasn’t been very horsey so far. I hope that Legend of Khiimori can also fill that role, because it’s not strictly a horse-riding simulator.

I don’t think we’re going to suddenly get a AAA horse game. However, if we get a handful of mostly successful projects every now and then that do well for their scope and foster that community, that can go a long way. We need more good games to inspire both artistically but also prove the business case and motivate investors and finance.

The social and simulation element remains prevalent in many horse games, but the market is changing.
>Star Stable Online © Star Stable Entertainment | Horse Club Adventures © Wild River Games | The Ranch of Rivershine © Cozy Bee Games | Rival Stars Horse Racing © PikPok

Windstorm: The Legend of Khiimori is available to be wishlisted on Steam. Don’t forget to follow the game’s official channels on Instagram, Threads, X, TikTok, YouTube, Discord and the official website to get further updates on development!

Thank you all for joining me and Alice Ruppert on The Bridle Paths today, and happy trails!