DJ HAMSTARZ — “rhythmic bullet-hell”
Developer interviews on what it took to build this crazy game with sweet tunes in one weekend
After spending the weekend at PegJam 2017, I really got a better understanding of what it takes to make a video game.
“Does it have a win condition? It’s a game”, says Matt Woelk, one of the developers of DJ HAMSTARZ: Aspiring Mix-Lord.
Woelk emphasized that building a game requires collaboration from people with a wide-range of talents, and that when you’re racing against the clock to create a game in a single weekend during a game jam, simpler is better.
PegJam has developers team up, or go solo, and over the course of a single weekend, complete a game that’s playable.
It’s a challenge that Matt Woelk has taken on several times. He’s participated in many of the game jams in Winnipeg, and has released a collection of games that you can find on Itch.io.
For PegJam 2017, Woelk and his team decided to make a game a little more complicated, as they raced to make a “rhythmic bullet-hell shooter”.
“A flying hamster DJ trying to make it big faces an army of robots, sent by the evil DJ Gerbillionaire, who only believes in crushing rodent remix dreams.” — DJ HAMSTARZ itch.io page
The game, now available for download on Windows, turns the instruments into weapons that blast 3D enemies of floating robot lobsters, foxes and more.
Players have to dodge projectiles and obstacles in the environment as their rainbow trailing hamster spins sick mixes.
“I’ve always wanted to make a rhythm-based game, and as we worked together it…morphed…into this!”
Our first interview takes place on Saturday, as they’ve put together a few of their assets and have a framework for the game and basic mechanics.
One of the main challenges of making the game work was getting the weapons to fire too the lead instruments of the music, and having weapon changes “remix” the music to change the lead instrument to match the weapon.
To do this, one of the tools they used was FMOD Studio, which can add interactive audio to a game.
They created triggers with FMOD for every bar of music, and for all the notes of the main instrument line.
“I think we really pushed FMOD to the limit, there are just over 1,000 triggers.”
The result of all their hard work is a fun game that has a killer track that you don’t mind listening to over and over.
“DJ HAMSTARS: Aspiring Mix-Lord” is available for a name-your-own-price download on Itch.io.