Don’t look at me like you don’t know what I mean.
Yes, you, with the funny hat. If you’ve been playing Battleblock Theater over the last week or so, chances are you’ve murdered your share of cats, adversaries and accomplices, all the while cackling your demented butt off.
If you haven’t yet gotten down on The Behemoth’s brutally cute ode to friendship and bloodshed, then for serious: hold on your butts (yes, both of them) and head to the XBLA while you still have butts to hold.
In the meantime, check the HIM chat with The Behemoth’s own Production Coordinator, Ian Moreno after the jump.
Battleblock Theater was in development for something like six years, which is way longer than I normally wait before I set out to murder things en masse. Could you talk a bit about the grand vision behind BBT?
IM: It was definitely a very intuitive process, but one of the things we really felt we had to get right was creating a platform that made jumping fun, and then move on from there. After that, we added the competition, the arena, and lastly the story, which is something we hadn’t done in such a grand manner before. There really isn’t a “Day 1 Development Log” kind of thing, since the process was so organic from the beginning.
Like most people, I enjoy beating up my friends just as much as I enjoy beating up evil cats, and you guys seem to understand me pretty well. How did your relationship with your fans affect the development of BBT?
On Castle Crashers, we noticed players would start a game just to trade things, and then leave the game. So we said, “okay, let’s add a trading booth.” We also noticed players would save the princess, and then beat the crap out of each other, so we created the beat up mode, and competition modes. Basically, we took hints from what people were already doing and integrated those things into the game.
How much of your older titles’ DNA (Castle Crashers, Alien Hominid) has carried over into BBT?
Well, the Dan Paladin artwork, obviously. But also, if you were to go back, and play some of of the Alien Hominid PDA Games, you would find a ton of influences.
Last question, and this one is more general: Indie developers are having a huge moment right now, as it relates to fan engagement and loyalty. Where does The giant chicken Behemoth fit in the changing landscape of the gaming industry as a whole?
The industry has changed a lot over the last 10 years, and it will continue to do so. Soon enough, the games industry will be more like the music industry, where you have major artists, (AAA titles) independent artists (indie developers), and something in the middle, like mid indies. I think that’s where we’ll sit. It’s really exciting time for the industry, though. There will be books written about what’s happening right now, and we’re all lucky we get to experience it.
There you have it! Straight from the bird’s beak.
By the way, if you feel like taking a stab at hopping through some BBT levels with certain writer you know, you should fire up your Xbox 360, and look for gamertag “Geybryl.”
May the best inmate win!
