How a Zelda developer helped Infinity Nikki become a multi-million fashion hit

Fashion-orientated live service game Infinity Nikki has millions of fans around the world but it was created with the aid of a former designer on Zelda: Breath Of The Wild.

The Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco is where the games industry traditionally comes to talk about the future, and this year everyone wanted news on Xbox’s new Project Helix console – and were disappointed when there wasn’t really much. But in between developers swapping war stories about AI pipelines and engine upgrades, I spoke to Infold Games art director Dodie Gong about their gatcha fashion success story Infinity Nikki.

If that name doesn’t immediately ring a bell it, along with 3D dating sim Love And Deepspace, have built enormous audiences over the last couple of years, becoming live service phenomena across mobile, PC, and console. They’re also part of a broader shift in the games industry, where stylish world-building, character relationships, and fashion mechanics are driving communities just as passionately as competitive shooters.

Infinity Nikki is one of the most charming and mechanically inventive games to emerge from the live service boom. Set in the whimsical fantasy world of Miraland, players explore lush landscapes solving environmental puzzles, platforming across floating islands, and discovering collectibles – all while unlocking outfits that double as tools.

Speaking with Dodie at GDC, they explained how each outfit is designed almost like a puzzle piece, something that alters how players read the landscape. Instead of designing abilities first and visuals later, the team builds mechanics directly into the clothing itself. It’s a strange idea until you see it working in motion, when a wardrobe change suddenly unlocks an entirely new route across the world.

One of the most interesting questions around Infinity Nikki is its audience. Dress-up games have historically been treated as a niche genre in the West, often assumed to appeal primarily to female players. But the Nikki series has quietly built a massive global audience, and the developers are keen to avoid thinking about the game in such narrow terms.

‘When we design for Nikki, we start from the IP itself rather than a specific demographic,’ Dodie explained. ‘Clothing is something very beautiful and very diverse, so we don’t want to limit it to a single group. Our goal is to create a dreamy experience that anyone can enjoy.’

Rather than asking who the game is for, the team focuses on what kind of feeling it should evoke. That said, the developers acknowledge that fashion-focused gameplay naturally attracts certain players first.

‘Some players may naturally have a stronger sensitivity to clothing and fashion,’ the art director said. ’So our style first attracted a lot of female players.’

Despite the nature of the game, developer Papergames brought on former Nintendo developer Kentaro Tomigawa, who was a designer on Zelda: Breath Of The Wild and a sub-director on a number of other Zelda titles, to work on Infinity Nikki.

‘Talking about working with Tomi-san, the first thing that comes to mind is actually something quite personal. We discovered that we both keep birds as pets and once we realised that it became something we talked about quite often in our spare time.

‘From a work perspective, when Tomigawa-san designed gameplay systems, I tried to understand the core focus of those mechanics. That helped me think about how Nikki’s outfits could support those abilities while still maintaining the artistic style we wanted for the game.

‘One thing I learned from working with him is how much he respects everyone’s strengths. Even if someone has less experience or is newer to the industry, he is very patient and willing to share his knowledge. Even though my background is not in art, he never looked down on my ideas. He respected them and was always open to discussion.

‘Tomigawa-san often shares lessons from traditional game development with us, including the logic behind certain design decisions and the advantages of established design principles. At the same time, he is very open to our ideas.

‘For example, he has said before that clothing design is not an area he understands deeply. Because of that, he listens very carefully when we offer suggestions from the perspective of costume design or fashion mechanics. Similarly, when we discuss interaction design or ideas related to the Nikki IP, he is open to those suggestions as long as they do not interfere with the core gameplay.

‘I think this approach has helped create a very strong collaborative culture within the team. Everyone contributes their strengths, and we combine those ideas to create the final result. For me, Tomigawa-san represents that spirit of cooperation very well.’

Since the clothes in Infinity Nikki are not purely cosmetic, it means fashion design has to work alongside gameplay systems, which creates some unusual creative challenges.

‘When we introduced the new mechanic Sticky Claw, the Spider-Man style movement ability in Version 2.0 Terra’s Call, we had to think about what kind of outfit would suit that ability,’ says Dodie.

‘The clothing becomes simpler and more comfortable, but we still try to make it playful and appealing. Some people think gameplay mechanics limit clothing design, but I don’t see it that way, because we already have strong lore, that gives us a foundation.’

As you’d imagine, making the more elaborate outfits work in a fully explorable 3D world is a technical headache. One of the biggest challenges is modularity. Players can mix and match hats, dresses, coats, and accessories, which means each piece must function independently while still looking coherent when combined. ‘Compatibility is one of the most important technical considerations, if clothing doesn’t move correctly, the sense of immersion drops immediately,’ says Dodie.

Realistic physics alone, it turns out, isn’t always enough. The team discovered that garments behaving exactly as they would in the real world sometimes felt visually dull, so they developed what they call ‘active clothing’ to create a more exaggerated effect.

Reflecting on her career, that has led her to speaking at GDC, Dodie gave hope to up and coming game artists feeling the chill of generative AI. ‘I actually didn’t have an art background. I came into the industry halfway through. My parents thought the company might be a scam as it was just a start up,’ she laughs.

Major patches over the last year have expanded Miraland with new regions, traversal abilities, and seasonal events that introduce limited outfits with unique gameplay properties. I especially enjoyed the one where Nikki is able to transform into a giant and stomp around the forests, shouting at huge animals to knock them out.

These updates also feed the game’s evolving meta, as players collect materials and build the most effective styling loadouts for challenges scattered across the world. Yes, there really is a competitive fashion meta.

What’s fascinating is how Infinity Nikki confidently sits outside the traditional expectations of blockbuster game design. For years the mainstream industry insisted that the biggest audiences wanted gritty realism and combat heavy power fantasies. Yet here is a title built around style, relationships, and storytelling that has attracted an enormous global community.

Walking back through the halls of GDC after the meeting, it was hard not to reflect on how much the industry has shifted over the last few years, whether it wants to or not. Infold’s titles are a reminder that not everybody plays games in order to fight or conquer. Sometimes the most powerful mechanic in the room isn’t a weapon or a skill tree, it’s a really nice outfit.

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