Smudged Cat Games released The Tower: a Bomb's Climb on Xbox Live Indie Games last week so we sat down to talk about it and their upcoming titles.

Question: How did the idea for The Tower: a Bomb's Climb come about?

It came about as a result of an XBLA game I've been working on for the past few years called "The Adventures of Shuggy".  Shuggy has lots of levels with different game mechanics in them, one of them being where the main character moves left and right and the player can only perform a jump.  I thought the mechanic would make a good mini-game but the publisher at the time wasn't keen on the idea so it got pulled.  Since I had pretty much the full thing coded up I thought I'd reskin it and release it as a seperate game for the XBLIG marketplace.


Question: Could you describe The Tower: a Bomb's Climb for anyone who hasn’t seen it?

It's a mutliplayer 2D platform game using only one button.  Players hold down the jump button to charge up a jump and then release to leap into the air.  Timing is everything as you continually move back and forth across the screen and must pick your route up the platforms of the tower carefully.  Ascend the tower quicker than your friends to drop them into the fire below and win the game.

As well as mutliplayer the game features a single player score attack mode.  In this mode the screen continually scrolls upwards picking up pace the higher you climb.  Thankfully you can collect power ups to assist you that stop the screen from scrolling, boost your jump speed for a while, give you an extra life or just make you do a massive jump.  The game features peer-to-peer high score sharing so if you're playing at the same time as other people you'll share your high scores.


Question: How large was the team that created The Tower: a Bomb's Climb and how long did it take to develop?

There were 3 of us.  I came up with the idea and did all the programming, my friend Bennet at Fat Cat Comics (http://www.fatcatcomics.co.uk) provided all the artwork and Tim Aza composed the music.  It's hard to judge exactly how long it took because its development was intertwined with Shuggy but I'd say there was around 6 months work on and off.

It's an old-school 2D platformer set in a Scottish castle that Shuggy (the main character, a cartoon purple vampire) has just inherited.  Unfortunately it's haunted so he must go through all the rooms clearing them of evil spirits.  There are over 100 levels set across 5 areas of the castle - the dungeon, the boiler room, the gallery, the graveyard and the clocktower.  I've tried to make the game as varied as possible by including many different game mechanics whilst keeping the basic gameplay the same.  In some levels your jumping abilities change, you can rotate some levels around, in others you can teleport, some give you a rope that you can swing on and there are time slip levels where you encounter past echoes of yourself.

The game features a set of Co-Op levels in addition to the single player ones which feature the same diverse set of gameplay mechanics but also require some real co-operation between the two players.  There's also a challenge mode that pits two players against each other by taking turns to play through some of the single player levels to capture tiles on a board.  You can also play a head-to-head game where both players have to collect more gems than their opponent with some powerups providing temporary use of the interesting gameplay mechanics like rotating the map.

I entered the game into the Dream Build Play competition in 2007 and while it made it to the top 20 it sadly didn't get one of the top prizes.  Thankfully it gained enough visibility to be picked up by a publisher and things have moved on from there.  
We're now aiming for a release sometime in June.


Question: How has Shuggy changed since you entered it in DBP 2007?

It's gone through so many changes here and there, it's been hard to keep track.  None of the multiplayer options like Co-Op or head-to-head were in the build I entered into DBP.  The graphics have changed dramatically since then as well with a lot more special effects and decoration dotted around the levels.  The gameplay of the levels themselves hasn't changed much but the game now features a more intuitive level select screen where the levels are shown as doors in a hub that the player can jump around like any other level.  From what I remember the sound effects were pretty dodgy in the DBP build as well!


Question: Other than Shuggy are you working on any projects you can tell us about?

I entered another game into this year's DBP competition but sadly didn't make the top 20 this time.  The quality of entries into the competition has increased dramatically since I entered Shuggy so I shouldn't be too surprised.  I didn't have as much time to spend on the game as I would have liked and it does need a lot more refinement.  I still feel the game concept is a winner so I'll be spending more time on it and will release it as an Indie game when I feel it's ready.

The game is called Gateways and is another 2D platformer.  The main mechanic is a gateway gun that allows the player to attach two gateways to the walls which then connect up allowing the player to walk through one and come out the other.  Comparisons with Portal are inevitable but I can think of worse games to be compared to!  I was even contemplating called the game "Gateways: Don't mention the P word".

It does take the mechanic a stage further though and as the game progresses upgrades to the standard gateway gun are found that let you do some interesting moves.  You acquire a gun that puts down two gateways of different sizes and allows the player to walk through the large gateway and come out the small one at half their original size or go through the small gateway and come out of the large one at double their original size.  The next gun lets the player time travel.  The time between placing the two gateways becomes important because the second gateway to be placed connects up to the first at the time the first gateway was placed.  By walking through the gateway the player travels back in time and encounters a past version of themselves.  Here's a video that's probably easier to understand than my rambling explanation.