The Walking Dead Game's Mirror Reflection Trick Is Next-Level Creativity

Game development crutches are forever fascinating, and it's such a delight to get a behind-the-scenes look at these clever tricks. Derek Forte, better known as Shesez, recently went viral for revealing how Telltale Games' The Walking Dead faked its rearview mirror reflection by duplicating the police officer and environment inside a literal cone.

Well, that's how things were done before ray tracing came along. In response to this post, some other cool game development tricks were shared, so enjoy checking them out below:

Shesez actually has a whole YouTube series called Boundary Break, where he explores normally inaccessible locations in video games using virtual camera mods:

If you're interested in learning why true reflections in video games are challenging to achieve, we have a detailed breakdown article on the subject, as well as another on the role of ray-traced reflections in Remedy's games.

Animators also know best that whatever the audience sees is what truly matters, and they trick the camera every day:

Join our 80 Level Talent platform and our new Discord server, follow us on Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, Telegram, TikTok, and Threads, where we share breakdowns, the latest news, awesome artworks, and more.