ZootFly

ZootFly

Type	Defunct (acquisition)
Industry	Computer and video games
Founded	Ljubljana, Slovenia (2002)
Headquarters	Ljubljana, Slovenia
Key people	Bostjan Troha, Founder/CEO Denis Rozaj, Founder/COO Tibor Klajnscek, Technical Director
Number of employees	50+
Website	www.zootfly.com

Coordinates: 46°1′25″N 14°32′12″E / 46.02361°N 14.53667°E / 46.02361; 14.53667

ZootFly is a Slovenian video game developer specializing in the development of action adventure games for the Xbox, Xbox 360, PS3 and PC. ZootFly is a member studio of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA).

ZootFly was acquired in 2013 by a casino equipment manufacturer Interblock.

ZootFly was founded in December 2002 in Ljubljana, Slovenia by industry veterans Boštjan Troha, Denis Rožaj and David Pangerl.

In 2003 Horizonte, an independent Central European venture capital firm (founded in 1985) bought 40% of the company.

ZootFly experimented extensively with the possibilities of reading and interpreting players' inputs and adapting the gameplay experience accordingly based on specific psychological profiles extrapolated via psychometrics. According to ZootFly, users' inputs reveal comprehensive information about them—reactions in tight situations, how they use resources, how they interact and communicate, how they deal with challenges, keypress sequences, mouse movement jerkiness, actions performed when entering a new space: i.e. whether they go in the middle of the room and look around or explore details first, the average speed of their movements, etc. Zoofly researched building psychological profiles of players using their inputs and adapting the game accordingly. For example, a game could have three distinctively different conclusions and the psychometrics engine would pick the right one for the player. The goal was to avoid unwanted endings, as the game would hopefully have enough feedback to deliver what the player wanted. The immediate reactions of the game would work on positive feedback. If the player were cerebral, they would receive more cerebral challenges; if violent, more violence. Immediate responses could improve the usability/learning curves as well. For example, if the player were to quick-save often, the game might be too difficult, and if they were to not discover many rooms in a time period, they might be lost and need additional stimuli to proceed. If they were too fast and the game was not fun any-more, they might require more interesting obstacles.