Accelerating game development using BespokeCI with Second Dinner

Game development can present unique build challenges that other software industries rarely face. Large asset libraries, complex dependencies, and frequent iteration cycles can push conventional CI/CD solutions to their limits. Second Dinner initially used a one-size-fits-all solution but couldn’t customize it to meet evolving requirements.

As the studio’s game grew, build times stretched to 3 hours for incremental builds and up to 14 hours for clean builds that started from scratch. Compiler errors wouldn’t surface until 2–3 hours into the build process. For Second Dinner’s remote-first team, this created coordination challenges, leading to 5 or more hours of lost productivity.

Second Dinner first explored building a custom, in-house solution to overcome these bottlenecks. But this would require specialized build engineering expertise—a departure from the studio’s core mission. Second Dinner needed a solution that could deliver quick wins without demanding extensive investment.

To accelerate development, Second Dinner turned to Gamebreaking Studios, which specializes in build-optimization challenges for game developers. BespokeCI hosts its build artifacts behind Amazon CloudFront to securely deliver content and high transfer speeds—making it possible for teams from across the globe to quickly and securely download and test builds. After conducting a proof of concept, Second Dinner chose to implement BespokeCI directly within its existing AWS infrastructure. The two companies collaborated to optimize performance for specific workflows and address evolving needs. “Nearly all our infrastructure for the game and our tools already run on AWS, so the incorporation of BespokeCI was easy,” says Ricardo Sisnett, lead engineer, tools and client platform at Second Dinner. “We have as much control as with physical infrastructure, but without maintenance.”

Rather than spinning up fresh compute instances for each build and transferring data repeatedly, BespokeCI chose to use dedicated runners: permanently allocated machines that maintain workspace state between builds. Powered by Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2), which offers secure and resizable compute capacity, this approach facilitates sophisticated caching strategies that reduce redundant processing.

BespokeCI uses Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3), an object storage service built to retrieve virtually any amount of data from anywhere. To automate storage cost savings by moving data when access patterns change, Second Dinner uses the Amazon S3 Intelligent-Tiering storage class and Amazon S3 Lifecycle rules. This also creates a common integration point across the company’s tooling environment. The solution stores application configuration in Amazon Elastic Container Registry (Amazon ECR), a fully managed container registry. BespokeCI provides granular access controls through AWS Identity and Access Management (AWS IAM), a service that manages and scales workload and workforce access.

The solution generates Windows, iOS, and Android builds and offers engine-agnostic compatibility. BespokeCI also includes centrally managed Prometheus for metrics collection and Grafana for monitoring. The solution maintains strict security boundaries for sensitive data by defining and launching AWS resources in a logically isolated virtual network through Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (Amazon VPC). To help Second Dinner manage access to applications, services, and IT resources, BespokeCI uses AWS Secrets Manager.

Second Dinner reduced average incremental build times by 75 percent and development cycles by 10 percent. Compiler errors now surface within 5 minutes instead of 2–3 hours, empowering developers to address issues more quickly.

BespokeCI has also unlocked new capabilities: Second Dinner is now building automated testing pipelines for client-side code, integrating unit and functional tests into the development workflow. “BespokeCI has changed how our team works,” says Sisnett. “We interact with our quality assurance partners more closely during testing because we can speed up our builds.”

Looking ahead, the studio plans to expand its automated testing capabilities and enhance its development infrastructure. The common language that AWS provides helps Second Dinner and Gamebreaking Studios collaborate seamlessly, positioning the studio to evolve its development practices while focusing on game creation.