 Goat Simulator started as a joke prototype from an internal one @-@ month game jam held by Coffee Stain Studios in January 2014 , after completing work for their game Sanctum 2 . The game was described by the lead developer Armin Ibrisagic as " an old school skating game , except instead of being a skater , you 're a goat , and instead of doing tricks , you wreck stuff " . The idea followed after originally pitching the game as a variation of QWOP , where the player would control the individual limbs of the goat separately with various keyboard keys ; this concept was rejected in favor of the more Tony Hawk 's Pro Skater @-@ type of gameplay the final game presents . Ibrisagic had focused on goats after jokingly trying to convince his coworkers that goats would achieve viral attention on the Internet in much the same way that cats presently do . 
