Door Simulator teaches you the secrets of opening and closing doors 

Have you ever wondered how to open a door properly? It’s something you do every day but are you doing it right? Developed by the appropriately-named The Doorman, Door Simulator is a free-to-play game coming to PC (Steam) in Q2 of 2024.  

Announced on February 8, Door Simulator is what it says on the tin- a custom physics-based simulation to teach you the basics of opening (and closing) doors. Sounds dull, right? Well, the game’s description hints at danger, suggesting that there might be more to this game than meets the eye. Apparently, you will open doors until you reach “secrets the government doesn’t want you to know about.” However, this intriguing description could be part of the game’s satirical interpretation of simulations. 

Screenshots show a lonely wooden door in a dark empty space, illuminated by a single lightbulb above it. It has a thick black handle and a small spyhole, perhaps inspired by a house door. The game description may be satirical, but it promises realistic-feeling door opening physics that can be customized at “your own risk” (presumably it might be possible to make the door super heavy and hard to wrench open).  

Door Simulator also promises Steam Achievements, so it will be interesting to see what kind of feats can be accomplished by opening and closing doors. At the time of writing, screenshots only show a single wooden door. Perhaps you will be able to progress to different types of doors when playing the game?  

Incidentally, doors are a difficult object to control in game development. For example, there are multiple ways in which a door can be opened in real life (e.g. You could slowly turn the handle and push it open, or you could go charging in). Depending on how you opened it, the door might slowly close behind you, remain open or slam shut.  

The size and weight of a working door in games is also an important consideration. If multiple people are passing through a door, developers must make sure the door and the other people don’t clip through each other. The sound a door makes also varies depending on its material and how it was opened (or closed). With all these issues to think about, it can be hard to implement doors in a game so that they behave like their real-life counterparts and don’t feel “odd” or immersion breaking to the player. 

Door Simulator dares to focus solely on this tricky element of game design. It may be that this upcoming game, although free to play, has been made with a lot of attention to detail.  

Door Simulator is scheduled to be released on PC (Steam) in Q2 of 2024. 

Written by. Verity Townsend based on the original Japanese article (original article’s publication date: 2024-02-09 09:47 JST)