The Two-Person Team Behind IRON NEST
IRON NEST: Heavy Turret Simulator is the work of just two people — Nick Nieuwoudt and Dominik Latos. A look at the small studio behind the ambitious dieselpunk sim.
It’s easy to assume a game this systems-rich came from a mid-sized studio. It didn’t. IRON NEST: Heavy Turret Simulator is the work of just two people — Nick Nieuwoudt and Dominik Latos.
A focused partnership
Small teams succeed by being ruthless about scope, and IRON NEST shows it. Rather than spreading thin, the game commits entirely to one idea — operating a single colossal turret through its instruments — and polishes that idea hard. The result feels deliberate rather than under-built.
Punching above its weight
The clearest evidence the approach is working: the project crossed 10,000 wishlists with no marketing budget and shipped a well-received Next Fest demo. Those are outcomes plenty of larger teams would envy, achieved through concept clarity and word of mouth rather than spend.
Why the setting fits
The grim, alternate-history Spanish backdrop and dieselpunk texture aren’t just decoration — they’re a small team’s smart way to build atmosphere and stakes cheaply but convincingly. The newspaper reports and bleak tone do narrative work that would otherwise need expensive cutscenes.
Worth rooting for
There’s something appealing about two people building a strange, specific, confident game and finding an audience for it. With a launch expected in Q3 2026, IRON NEST is the kind of indie project worth watching — and we’ll keep covering it as it heads to release.