Finding Peter! A Q&A session with Evgeny Viitman, Art Director at Peter & Sons
About one year ago, we came across a new developer named Peter & Sons, at the time exclusive at brands from the Hero Gaming group such as Boom Casino and Casino Heroes. After signing vital partnerships with Oryx Gaming and Yggdrasil Gaming, their slots can now be found at an extensive number of reputable online casinos, with more being added every week.
Ever since we have been searching to find Peter, who is he, where is he from? Questions, questions. It turned more mysterious when we found a Petar on an online creative network where people can showcase their projects. Wait, so is it Petar or Peter? Confused but still in awe at the stunning art displayed on the page, we decided to go straight to the very friendly people at Peter & Sons to clear it all up.
They might have been new to iGaming, but that does not necessarily mean to have no experience in the field. On the contrary, Peter & Sons was founded by a team of professionals who combined their knowledge with fresh talent to develop some of the most entertaining slots on the market.
Bundling that bursting creativity is Art Director Evgeny Viitman, who himself looks back at 16+ years in game design, most recently at Casumo, before moving on to Peter & Sons. A big thank you for agreeing to sit down with us for an extended Q&A session.
GMBLRS: Thank you for giving us some time to find out more about Peter & Sons. Could you start by telling our readers a little about yourself and where Peter, or Petar, and his Sons fit in?
Evgeny Viitman:
Let me tell you a little about Petar Vasiljevic! In the year 1912, he and his sons organized a manufactory in Yerevan, Armenia, building their own analogue casino slot machines. They were growing, accumulating quality and traditions so that in the year 2020, they decided to go online! Petar is always sharp and watching his sons (and daughters).
I am a nuclear physicist on paper and started my career in gamedev as a 3D artist while I was a university student. Later on, I got pretty much bored of 3D and moved into a 2D niche. It was quite a smooth transfer. After a long journey through the gamedev industry, I ended up making slot games. And guess what, I found there was a lot to explore!
Making slot games untied my hands and allowed me to create stuff I couldn’t even think of while working for a casual/mobile dev corporation (except for the indie projects I was involved in – I’m super proud of them). Now I am piecing the universe together with a fresh and shiny startup, “Peter And Sons”, where we are truly investing all our souls into the games we produce.
GMBLRS: Peter & Sons have literally hit the ground running in 2021, bringing real artwork of outstanding quality and intense features to the reels. What makes the creative team so brilliant?
Evgeny Viitman:
Freedom! Trust, responsibility, competence. We know our frames of competence and we don’t infringe on them and truthfully appreciate each other’s experience and points of view. We have created a very good ecosystem so far – I am proud of it! This allows us to create with confidence, and the result is what you see: we are confident! And while we are spreading confidence, we are having lots of fun as well. NUKE!
GMBLRS: Having seen some concept work from Peter & Sons, it is evidently clear there is more than good graphic design and maybe some classical talent. Cauldron personally reminded me of a Hieronymus Bosch creation, were he alive and doing creative artwork for games. Could you tell us more about the design process and some of the inspiration?
Evgeny Viitman:
The secret is that we don’t have ONE HEAD dictating what to do and how to do, as you often see in big companies: there is always a person who knows better than the others, but de facto knows sh*t, yet possesses the power. And in the exhaust, we see lots of clones in the market; this is what we are trying to avoid. We have small teams working in parallel that decide which direction they want to go and what turn to take. We appreciate dark, geeky humour à la Rick And Morty, Monty Python, The Mighty Boosh etc., and of course, Mr Bosch, with his hilarious Butt Song, is always in the list of references.
GMBLRS: One of Peter & Sons triumphs is the continuity of creative quality and style, familiar throughout the range; great artwork and Super Bonus building mechanics, first seen on the YG Master program with Yggdrasil Gaming on Johnan Legendarian. What’s it been like working with Yggdrasil Gaming, and will Peter & Sons stamp this trademark style on the anticipated work with the Gigablox mechanic?
Evgeny Viitman:
We like them, and I hope they like us! It is going pretty well so far, and we are looking forward to continuing to collaborate with them in the long run.
We decided to escape from the accumulating feature and focus on some other cool features. Tho! I can only give a hint about the visuals: it’s gonna be as magical as Johnan and Cauldron are 😉
GMBLRS: Peter & Sons have recently been nominated in the Slot Studio Debut Category 2021 with Johnan the Legendarian in the CasinoBeats Game Developer Awards 2021. Congratulations! How will you and the team celebrate should you come away with the win?
Evgeny Viitman:
We are all pretty asocial people. We celebrate deep inside our hearts, which would appear different on the outside. (most likely you would see the team members trying to avoid eye contact).
Play Peter & Sons Slots Here
GMBLRS: Well, your studio has turned heads and hit the ground running, with slots more attractive than some developers’ efforts, who have been around for years. Aside from an obvious lean towards Yggdrasil Gaming, are there other developers or studios you admire for their art and creativity?
Evgeny Viitman:
Yggdrasil was setting up the quality standards for us, even before we started to work with them. Otherwise: PG Soft are cool!
GMBLRS: And what can we expect next from Peter & Sons? Could you maybe give us a sneak peek around the corner?
Evgeny Viitman:
Hehehe, soon we are going to release “Robin Nottingham Raiders” with cool mechanics and some good Easter eggs from “Monty Python: The Holy Grail” 😉 Launching it with YGG Masters.
And a crazy creation, a bit experimental I would say, from the gambling games perspective, “Kaiser”! Super cartoony – the game inspired by Jaroslav Hasek’s “The Good Soldier Schvek”, is going to be released together with Oryx.
GMBLRS: A fantastic book and a perfect match for dark, geeky humour, plus a great subject for a game, which leads nicely to the next question – with no creative limits, restriction on the theme and if money and time were no object, what would be your ultimate slot creation?
Evgeny Viitman:
The one which wouldn’t look like a slot game at all, with some real strong meta game that wouldn’t really affect the gameplay but would be super interesting and engaging. Thus, we could combine both sensations: gambling and casual gaming! woooh, that would be cool, maaan, im tellin ye.
GMBLRS: Lastly, just for fun, would you entertain us with some pop-quiz personal trivia:
- What was your first job? – Engineer-researcher in Joint Institute for Nuclear Research, Dubna, Russia
- What’s your favourite slot? – Lucky Neko
- Who was/is your childhood hero? – Zorro, the sneaky bastard
GMBLRS: Thank you so much Evgeny for the self-portrait and painting a picture of Peter & Sons – it’s been eye-opening to get some facts about the man himself – and good luck for the future, I’ll be digging for those Easter eggs in Robin Nottingham Raiders, as a fellow Monty Python fan.
So there you have it! New and old kids on the block with unbridled creativity, a penchant for dark, geeky humour and a dislike of clones. As a failed artist with a wild imagination growing up on Monty Python, it’s easy to admire the achievements of Peter & Sons.
As an online slot player – smooth gameplay, interesting mechanics and depth of characters with stand-out themes and comical touches make for more enjoyable spins, and now, there are some Easter eggs to look out for and clearly more than meets the eye with Peter & Sons games.
Let’s Play!
Team GMBLRS