SoKrispyMedia is turning its viral chalk-drawing videos into a multiplayer shooter called Chalk Warfare. This move matters because it introduces a novel control scheme where players draw weapons in real time rather than selecting from a static menu. The studio aims to bridge the gap between its popular short films and interactive gaming.
SoKrispyMedia converts viral chalk art into a multiplayer shooter with custom AI recognition
The game is built on the Unreal Engine and showcases a custom recognition algorithm. Sam Wickert, one of the creators, explained that early versions using third-person views or pre-set weapon templates were "not good enough." The team discarded those approaches to build a system that directly interprets player sketches into functional in-game items.
Chalk Warfare features a real-time drawing recognition system that converts player sketches into functional in-game weapons. The architecture is custom-built and trained on proprietary data, ensuring the game does not rely on generic templates. During its showcase at Unreal Fest, the studio displayed a live debug view of this AI recognition process to prove the technology works.
The original YouTube series by Sam Wickert and Eric Uys has accumulated over 350 million views across four installments since 2012. The development team worked through three all-nighters to fix bugs discovered during playtesting just before the public demo. This intense final push ensures the game meets the studio's standards before release.
Sam Wickert stated, "We always wanted it to be a game, but knew we had to do it right." He also noted, "It was once in third person. Fun, but not good enough. At one point, you picked from weapon templates. Not good enough. So we built our own recognition algorithm that sees what you draw." These quotes confirm the studio's commitment to a unique, player-driven experience rather than a standard shooter formula.
Source: DEXERTO
