--- title: "How kicking a ball around drove authenticity in Despelote" url: https://daily.dev/posts/how-kicking-a-ball-around-drove-authenticity-in-despelote-kq8k6xxup source_url: https://www.gamedeveloper.com/design/how-improvisation-and-kicking-a-ball-around-drove-authenticity-in-despelote type: article source: "Game Developer" published: 2026-03-18T19:55:25.040Z updated: 2026-03-18T19:55:49.500Z tags: ["gaming", "game-design"] reading_time: 7 upvotes: 0 comments: 0 language: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # How kicking a ball around drove authenticity in Despelote **[Game Developer](https://daily.dev/sources/gamedeveloper)** · 7 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary At GDC Festival of Gaming 2026, Despelote creator Julián Cordero discussed how improvisation and personal memory shaped the game's neorealist aesthetic. Inspired by the idea that kicking a football is a universal language, Cordero initially avoided NPC dialogue entirely. After encouragement from producer Gabe Cuzzillo, he introduced fully improvised voice recordings from friends and family chatting about soccer, politics, and daily life. This approach led to unexpected but authentic moments — such as kids teasing the player about a girlfriend — that then required new game assets to match. Cordero also cited game designer Robert Yang's blog post on video game neorealism as a key influence, framing realism as documentation rather than photorealism, allowing personal memories of 2001 Ecuador to be embedded organically into the game. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [Dev Showed How Adding Details to Gameplay Changes “Game Feel”](https://daily.dev/posts/dev-showed-how-adding-details-to-gameplay-changes-game-feel--uih7larmo) · 80 LEVEL · 13 upvotes · 0 comments - [Creating a Horror Game Mixing a 2D Retro Style & Live-Action Cutscenes](https://daily.dev/posts/creating-a-horror-game-mixing-a-2d-retro-style-live-action-cutscenes-df1binkr6) · 80 LEVEL · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [This Godot Indie Game is Like Dark Messiah With Low-Poly Graphics](https://daily.dev/posts/this-godot-indie-game-is-like-dark-messiah-with-low-poly-graphics-mcsynitvg) · 80 LEVEL · 0 upvotes · 1 comments --- Tags: [#gaming](https://daily.dev/tags/gaming), [#game-design](https://daily.dev/tags/game-design) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/how-kicking-a-ball-around-drove-authenticity-in-despelote-kq8k6xxup)