React Games Talking Super Dungeon Bros

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I was lucky enough to get the chance to talk with Chad Lee, CEO of React! Games regarding their upcoming dungeon crawler: Super Dungeon Bros. Now if you haven’t heard of React! Games it is because Super Dungeon Bros is their first foray into the console market. React! Games have, up until now, been predominantly a mobile developer who have worked with some of the biggest names around including Warner Brothers, Disney and EA.

I spoke with Chad about some of the things we can expect in the Rougelike/RPG inspired game. We were also joined by Kevin and Adam, both with Wired Productions, who are also working on the game.

React! Games have predominantly been in the Mobile market and you have had a fair amount of success, why choose now to venture into the Console scene?

CHAD

For the company it is the perfect time because we have a good client base, we have worked for Hasbro, Disney, EA and Microsoft, we have worked for all the big players. We have seen what they have done really well and we have also seen what they have missed. We have taken some of the knowledge that we have gained as a service provider and Super Dungeon Bros has been percolating within our company for over a year now. We have got to a point as a company where we needed to start doing our own titles and this just fit a cross play type of platform with the current generation of consoles, also a lot of our team came from a console background so it just fit right now for the company. Were there any unique challenges that you have found trying to make a console game rather than one for the mobile market?

CHAD

Money is a big one of course, we self-funded this for the first little while. The hardest part for me personally, as an independent developer, is that when you are working for clients, they are the ones making decisions and you just basically do what they say, for better or for worse. Our strength as a company is the design element that we are able to give companies but this one is like a blank sheet of paper, we can go any direction and there are maybe four or five directions that are the right choice. It’s just “what is the best choice”? It’s a lot harder developing something for yourself so as a team we have really had to come together and even though there might be a feature that people internally, for example the programmers, really like, if it didn’t fit the tenants of the game then we have to cut it and that is always painful. Can you tell me a little bit about the Super Dungeon Bros? The goals that are involved and maybe some of the features we can expect?

KEVIN

 

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Super Dungeon Bros is kind of a cult action game, which borrows some bits from Rougelike and RPG style games. The core features is a co-op action game where it’s about working together, working as a team, it’s about using the correct tag for solving the puzzles rather than trying to play the game individually.

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CHAD

 

You can pick up your Bro, you can throw him over the edge if you want. You can use him to make combos, you can do a Totem Stack or a Bro Stack and so when you fight tall enemies you can all stack up together and run at them and slice it all up, you will have to throw each other across chasms to solve puzzles. So it is just a lot of fun to just to be funny and quirky with these characters.

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KEVIN

 

The game also features procedurally generated levels {roughly 32 million combinations} where the game will never be the same no matter how many times you play it. There will be over 20 weapons for you to craft and collect during the course of the game: you will be able to do this by collecting shards as you play. Depending on what kind of shards you find and how rare they are, will determine what kind of weapon you craft. We are looking to add quite a few other things though, like daily and weekly challenges to be played by everyone in order to get the highest points on the leader board to win an in-game prize.

ADAM

 

There will be regional and global leader boards and as Kevin said, there will be daily and weekly challenges to keep the players engaged with updates and new content and new missions to challenge yourself and you’re Bros.

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Will the game have any kind of focus on story or plot? Or is this all about the game play and loot?

CHAD

 

Yeah we always have stories beneath our games. The storyline is in development right now so I can’t go too far into it but it will have an engaging story line. The game is meant to be kind of quirky and funny. As you are play it and defeat these creatures we have what is called “Bro Banter”, it is really based on the characters interacting with each other with these really funny one-liners. It’s nothing like anybody has ever seen before. One person starts a conversation by hitting a button and the rest of the Bros can contribute to that same line or that same thread and can continue it for a couple of lines of dialogue so it is really funny. It’s fun to be with your friends. It’s one of those perfect couch games that you’re sitting next to your friends and kidding each other because one guy is a jerk and he is collecting all the health. The uniqueness of the game is the interaction between Bros.

ADAM

 

The game is primarily driven as a four player co-op multiplayer game, there is also a single player campaign and there will be things you can unlock in the single player that will feed into the multiplayer version. The single player campaign will optimize itself for a single player, it may reduce the amount of enemies and puzzles accordingly.

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Super Dungeon Bros came from very humble beginnings, it was made in 10 days for a competition and it was built on from there, how did that come to pass?

CHAD

 

In our company, during downtime, we have different challenges for team: What kind of game can you create in two weeks or sometimes just to let of some steam, we say ok let’s do it. This game started out as an Ouya game so in its first iteration it is nothing like the game we have now. We entered an Ouya competition and it won second place and we thought “hey there is something here!” We fleshed it out some more and we did some prototyping on it and realised very quickly that there is a really fun gem here that actually makes sense for a larger console. We realised that going with the Ouya is kind of like a mobile game because of the processing power. We wanted to put a lot more in to it and our artists and programmers were always constrained by the mobile limitations so we said “OK, let’s shoot for the PS4, what can we do if we have absolutely no limitations at all?” That is kind of where the game came from. It’s a labour of love within the company.

Will there be any kind of progress or levelling up system in Super Dungeon Bros?

CHAD

 

Yes! Primarily it is a Rougelike so most of the levelling up or progression that you experience will be during the gameplay itself when you are running through the dungeon, but there are some persistent things beyond the game like collecting gold, shards and the ability to craft weapons is outside the main loop of the dungeon running. There are also customisations that you will be able to buy with your gold; you can buy different outfits for your guys, things like that. Also we are going to have daily and weekly challenges that will really engage the player, keep them vying for that top spot. During those challenges they will be able to earn a rare item or rare shard that they need for a super powerful weapon.

Is there any information you can share regarding your demo?

ADAM

 

Yes! GDC is the first playable hands on demo and we are currently mulling over the idea of having a demo at pre-launch stage but this is still to be confirmed.

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Can you give away any details on a release date?

ADAM

 

We can, yes, we are looking at Autumn/Fall 2015 but we can’t be any more specific than that at this stage.

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Is there anything that you would like to share with us?

ADAM

 

We have some amazing things that we would love to tell you but we can’t at this point. The key points of the game are that it is a four player co-op game, does not necessarily have to be played with four players the game will scale itself accordingly. It’s an endless co-op action game. It borrows from Rougelike genres Dungeoneering genres, RPG genres. We very much look at the game as it is very easy to pick up and play and doesn’t necessarily have to be a “core typical” gamer to be able to enjoy it. Like an onion once you start to pull back some of the layers there is a bit more depth to the game that will satisfy the hardcore dungeoneering gamer. We are looking to bring it out on Xbox One, PS4 and PC. We are going to be extensively supporting the game post launch with a plethora of DLC content which could be anything from new dungeons, costumes, challenges, whole host of new weapons and upgrades. There’s a hell of a lot to come!

And so ends my time with React! Games and Wired Productions. I personally think that Super Dungeon Bros looks to be shaping up very nicely and will bring us some much needed humour and co-op action later this year when it is launched. We also would like to thank the guys for answering our questions.

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