Tech & Tonic for game dev
The Art of Optimization: Environment Art between Creativity and Performance

Wednesday, January 21, 2026 | 6.30 PM
Speakers' Corner | OGR Torino

An event in collaboration with IGDA

Free admission
Reservations available

The next Tech & Tonic for game dev event, at the Speakers’ Corner of OGR Torino, will focus on environment art, exploring how to balance creative vision, technical constraints and production sustainability within modern Unreal Engine based pipelines.

Guest speaker Jessica Marrubini, Senior 3D Environment Artist with solid experience in videogame environment development. In her work, she combines artistic sensitivity and technical expertise, dealing daily with the delicate balance between visual quality, performance and production feasibility.

In the talk titled The Art of Optimization: Environment Art between Creativity and Performance, Jessica Marrubini will trace the evolution of working methods, from the handcrafted care typical of linear games to managing complexity in next gen Open Worlds, showing how the intelligent use of procedural systems in Unreal Engine is now essential for production sustainability.

Through several case studies, the talk will examine how spatial structure contributes to environmental storytelling in P.T., before moving on to ARC Raiders as an example of asset prioritization and image clarity. The session will conclude with a comparison of the methodologies adopted by some of the leading Italian studios in the sector (Milestone, Reply Game Studios, Nacon Studio Milan), to understand how pipelines and team size influence approaches, roles and career paths.