Monster Madness: Battle for Suburbia Q&A

Monster Madness is set for release today in the US on Xbox 360 and on June 22nd in Europe. We took the opportunity to talk about the game to Artificial Studios about the game and about a young team developing its first commercial title.

Unreal

Boomtown: To some extent Monster Madness looks ideal as an Xbox Live Arcade game, was this considered?

Dirk Hassinger: No is the short answer! We’ve always seen Monster Madness: Battle For Suburbia as a full price product. Even at the design stage, the game we had on paper was easily going to exceed the file size limit for Live Arcade. In terms of content, the adventure mode alone has around 30 large level maps, with around 70 different enemy types populating them. Monster Madness isn’t a ‘small’ game by any means!

Development of the game switched to the Unreal Engine, what benefits did this bring to the development process and what benefits for the gamer when they see the finished game?

We’re really proud with how the entire game has come together. When we switched to the Unreal 3 engine, it took just 11 months to re-write the game from the bottom up. Part of that is down to the U3 engine’s awesome tools and support, but also thanks to our team’s ability and commitment. As for the game itself, I’m really proud of the sense of deranged mayhem that Monster Madness regularly generates. Monster Madness is also one of the first U3 engine 360 games to support 16-player online gameplay, which we’re pretty proud of.

Style

Please tell us something of the game's backstory, how is this explained?

Well, the game’s about four suburban teenagers battling for survival, but we don’t want to give too much away. The story starts with our four heroes gathering at one of their houses, followed by a sudden invasion of monsters and the disappearance of everyone else. No parents, no adults, no friends except the four playable characters. Our guys then have to battle for survival whilst trying to find out what’s happened.

Third person games seem the standard for next-gen, why did you decide to make Monster Madness a top down game?

Actually, in single player, the camera can be switched to a third-person view if the player wishes. The default angle is more of a pseudo top-down view. It’ll shift and adjust as appropriate. We’ve found it’s the best fit for making sure players can keep on top of everything that’s going on, as well as being a nod to the old-school classics we’re drawing some inspiration from, such as Gauntlet, Smash TV, Powerstone and of course Zombies Ate My Neighbours!

Arsenal

Who are the characters in the game, what differentiates them?

The heroes fall into fairly obvious teenager archetypes. We’ve got Zack the geeky nerd, Carrie the icy, aloof Goth, Andy the skater-jock and Jennifer, who’s a classic valley-girl homecoming Queen. Each character has their own speciality melee weapon, but aside that we’ve kept them fairly similar for fairness and balance.

Tell us about some of the unique weaponry in the game, what are your favourites?

Now you’re talking! We’ve got some really awesome weapons in Monster Madness. Aside player defaults such as their melee choice, there are special weapons that the players have to build and upgrade as the game goes on. We’ve got classics such as gatling guns, flamethowers and grenade launchers as well as crazier weapons like a cellphone-based Tazer, a full railgun, a CD launcher that fires CDs like buzzsaw blades, a glue gun – the list goes on!

My personal favourite is the glue gun – it sticks enemies to the floor and also does relatively decent damage. This makes it great for laying down a first line of defence when a large wave attacks. With your buddies at the rear firing long-range weapons, the team-play dynamic really takes off.

Multiplayer

How many levels are featured and what differences in gameplay do they bring?

The full game will feature five environments, with each one containing six huge levels. They’re all either suburban or classic horror settings and each level has a variety of challenges. There are various monster-battling tasks to complete, some of which will demand some quite heavy strategy if playing in co-op.

Multiplayer is clearly a big part of the game, what modes will players be able to enjoy?

Monster Madness has four-player co-op for adventure mode, but that’s only offline. Online, there’s up to 16-player deathmatch, team deathmatch and capture the flag. The competitive multiplayer modes are still available offline, but again they’re only for up to four players. However, the offline modes allow players to join in at any time. We’ve also got a special ‘Dojo’ mode for online co-op, where up to four players can take on successive waves of monsters in Monster Madness’s version of a classic ‘survival’ mode, which will really test the players’ skills!

Mr Newton

In a packed market what do you see as Monster Madness' unique features to make it stand out from the crowd?

Well, we think it’s pretty unique as a complete package, which is more than enough to make it stand out. I can’t think of another game that looks the same or offers the same kind of gameplay. Specifically, I think Monster Madness’ great sense of humour and the level of mayhem it regularly generates really sets it apart from anything else on the market at the moment.

We're told that Ageia physics are involved, what use has been made of the system?

The Ageia library handles all of Monster Madness’s dynamics and does an awesome job. At times we’re throwing around a lot of objects and it keeps the framerate stable whilst all sorts of mayhem is erupting.

Tell us about some of the monsters, which are your favourites and why?

Monster Madness has around 70 different monsters, each one with their own attacks and strategies. The monsters will even pick up items like tires, 2x4s, explosive barrels, and trash cans and use them as weapons. It’s hard to pick favourites, but I think that the exploding zombies are the best. They like to work together, chase you down and then explode when they catch you.

Rookie

Artificial Studios is a pretty young team, how have you found developing your first commercial game? What been the major highs and lows?

It was work of passion; many people dream about making video games, but few have the commitment and talent to actually make it their career. Much of the team had gone to school and college with that dream in mind. They’re all dedicated gamers at heart and they certainly had the development talent we needed. Once our team had settled into the workflow, we felt a true sense of accomplishment to have a group of talented and like-minded individuals brainstorming ideas and working as a genuinely cohesive team. That kind of young enthusiasm can really bring things together, even if it was during many sleepless nights fuelled by energy drinks and candy!

In the end, we persevered through the standard production obstacles thanks to that youthful energy and the team’s unifying passion. We now have an experienced team that’s constantly striving to improve themselves and everyone’s really looking forward to working together on future games.