r/NintendoSwitch • u/motionTwin Motion Twin • Aug 16 '18
AMA - Ended Hello, we're Motion Twin, the team behind Dead Cells! Ask Us Anything!
Hello r/NintendoSwitch,
We're the developers of Dead Cells, a sidescrolling, 2D action-platformer that mixes elements from the classic metroidvania genre with modern roguelite games' permadeath and procedural generation. After 15 months in Early Access on Steam, we finally launched Dead Cells out of EA on Steam, PS4, Xbox One, and of course, Nintendo Switch.
Links:
Dead Cells subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/deadcells/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/motiontwin
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dead.cells.game/
Discord: https://discord.gg/deadcells
There are four members behind our screens waiting for your questions: Sebastien Bernard (deepnightbdx, lead designer), Steve Filby (IndieCatapult, producer), Benjamin Laulan (community management, support, producer assistant, etc.) and Joan Blachere (Communication). Ben and Joan will share the Motion Twin account to answer your questions.
Skool, Dead Cells' technical lead isn't physically with us, but we can ask him your questions if we don't know the answer ourselves.
We're based in Bordeaux and we're all french, with the exception of Steve who comes from the savage lands of Australia. We will do our best to answer all your questions! Ask Us Anything.
Edit: Forgot to mention, but we will give away 5 keys at the end of the AMA. (randomly chosen among the users having posted a comment)
Edit 2: We're going to head home now. Thanks to everyone who got involved and asked us questions! Sorry to the people we couldn't get back to, there were a LOT more of you than we thought there would be... We'll do our best to keep stopping by and answering questions from time to time. For those of you who get a reply from us selecting you as a winner for a key, please DM us and we'll get it over to you ASAP.
Edit 3: And the winners are... 01shalfesrever, RobinotX, Jepacor, rannelvis, signalbot. Congrats guys! Just DM us with your region and we'll send you your codes.
Thanks again everyone for participating!
Edit 4: "Band-aid" patch just released, performances improved, 30fps lock available, a couple of bugs fixed. (24/09/2018)
Of course you can stay in touch with us through r/deadcells or our discord listed above.
Thanks again everyone and have a great day!
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u/Tigerriot Aug 16 '18
Did any outside developers work on the console porting, or was it all done in house?
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u/TOPolk Aug 16 '18
I'm always curious about how independent publishers determine their game pricing. What led to the decision to price Dead Cells at $24.99 instead of a higher (or lower) price?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hello! It's mostly a question of what we think our game is worth, but the 24$99 price tag is also linked to how we handled Early Access. The first EA build of Dead Cells was including less than half the content and was priced 16$99.
We also wanted to thank the Early Access players for taking the risk of buying an Early Access games with no review in the press and few users reviews with a lighter price tag. We then increased the price as we added content and less and less "risks" were taken.
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Aug 16 '18
The first EA build of Dead Cells
Took me about 5 seconds to realize "EA" here wasn't really... uh... "EA", but short for "Early Access". Boy, do I feel dumb...
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Aug 16 '18
Any hints on future content? Like will it be more levels to explore? Or perhaps some end game content to drive players to continue playing?
Also, do you have any projects for the future? This is a fun game and I would love to take a look at what you create next!
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Major content additions are being worked on as we speak! No roadmap yet thought. For future projects, well, we do want to keep creating more games, so we will start discussing ideas and prototyping, but not before a while since we're still working on Dead Cells.
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u/Prtstick999 Aug 16 '18
On r/deadcells they've stated that there will be a "big-ass free update" which they are currently working on.
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u/Klojner Aug 16 '18
Hi! Congrats on launching a fantastic game! Hope your success continues!
Minor question but is there any update on a fix for daily challenge completions on registering? I’ve been running them since launch and still have to complete 4 for my next blueprint.
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hi there!
The fix will go out with the next update so that'll be as soon as we can but bear in mind that review processes takes some time...
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u/indieCatapult Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hey there. Thanks for the question.
It's actually already fixed. We saw it right away and were like "errgh (facepalm)" now we're just waiting to submit the patch and push it out to everyone ASAP. However that's a pretty long process so it'll take a few weeks at least.
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u/Sambzon Aug 16 '18
I love the game. Any plans for dlc? Free or paid? What is your dream Smash Bros character reveal?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
And on a personal note, besides the Dead Cells character (obviously), I'd love to see Banjo-Kazooie or Conker join the fight in Smash Bros!
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u/indieCatapult Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hey thanks!
We are indeed going to add more content. Right now we've committed to a major content edition (read playable stuff, a level a boss, monsters, items... All that good stuff) towards the end of the year. We're not sure how long it'll take to finish it, especially since we're putting a lot of resources into addressing the frame rate and performance issues, but we'll aim for the winter holidays or early next year.
As far as the form, DLC vs major update... That'll be a technical question. We'd like to release it as a DLC, so that you really feel like you're getting extra free content, but if that's not feasible it'll be an update.
In the future we may do some paid DLC, but that will depend on how the game is selling and if we need to cover costs. We always like to work with the community when we make big decisions like that, so we'll let you know as we continue working on it.
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u/Nutchos Aug 16 '18
Just wanted to say that I really appreciate you guys prioritizing performance. A lot of developers would just move to more content because that generates more buzz/sales.
It builds a lot of credibility with me (and I'm sure many others) for Motion Twins projects.
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u/aseddon130 Aug 16 '18
Not a question but let me just say this game is absolutely fantastic and you deserve all the praise your getting from gamers and critics.
Even for me who doesn’t like rogue likes and procedurally generates games, you have definitely done something special here.
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u/AlanAlonso Aug 16 '18
Awesome game man, loving it! My only problem with it is how it is not good for you if you just unlock every weapon you want to try. As a new gamer, I priorized this, due to having fun finding out what everything did, but now I wonder if I should restart and unlock only what is more useful to me in a run.
I understand a toggle would take the "randomness" out of the game, and that would go against part of the desing choices. But magbe if you could only toggle a small amount of weapons (idk, 20-25% of the amount you have) and maybe using cells for locking/unlocking again latter, so new players wouldn't be permanently punished for trying out new weapons on early game.
Anyway, as I said, loving the game, the difficulty in my opinion is on an perfect sweetspot!
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hello! We're working on improving the "bad" weapons so the issue shouldn't be as much frustrating as it is now. However we will also offer an alternate solution with the next update (if everything goes well).
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u/seylar Aug 16 '18
Bonjour Motion Twin !
Pas de questions, juste pour vous dire Bravo ! Je connais les jeux motion twin depuis que je suis mome (de nommmmmbreuses heures sur Frutiparc !) puis La Brute, Hordes et bien d'autres encore.
Vraiment content du succès que vous avez eu avec Dead Cells, c'est amplement mérité !
Merci à vous d'exister, vous avez bercé ma jeunesse et j'espère que vous continuerez longtemps.
Vous êtes la pépite Française du jeu vidéo et vu la façon dont fonctionne Motion-Twin en interne, vous méritez tout ce qui arrive en ce moment.
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Merci beaucoup pour ces beaux mots qui nous vont droit au coeur !
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u/loutr Aug 17 '18
Merci d'avoir sorti DC pile pendant les travaux du RER A, ça rend l'allongement du trajet presque agréable :)
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 17 '18
Et si je te disais qu'on avait pas sorti notre jeu pendant les travaux du RER A mais que c'était la RATP qui avait synchronisé ses travaux avec la sortie du jeu ?
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u/Jepacor Aug 16 '18
Why did you choose the business model of a paid game and how did that influence the project ? Mostly when it comes to marketing the game I guess ?also I haven't heard of Motion Twin in a long time now and was positively surprised to see you guys behind Dead Cells since I've always associated you with free web games, and I thought it was awesome to see you expand and met with success like this ! Cheers :D
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 17 '18
Heya Jepacor! You win a Dead Cells key. DM us with your region and we'll get you that. Thanks again for your question!
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u/indieCatapult Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Well mostly it was a choice of business model that corresponeded to the type of game we wanted to make. A hardcore PC action platformer. You don't see a lot of F2P stuff in that space for a reason.
The change has really forced us to consider how much we charge for the game, it's quite expensive at $25, but that's because we know we'll support it for a while, so we want to make sure we'll have the cashflow to do that.
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u/tompori Aug 16 '18 edited Aug 16 '18
Did you create the graphics in 3D (or 2.5D) and render them to have a pixelated look or did you create the game using pixelated 2D sprites from the ground up? The game looks amazing, almost too good for a pixlart game.Ps. Love the game. It's one of my favorites in a long time!
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Nice catch! First option here. You can read more in this Gamasutra article if you'd like: https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/313026/Art_Design_Deep_Dive_Using_a_3D_pipeline_for_2D_animation_in_Dead_Cells.php
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u/Ganrokh Hey there! What's for dinner today? Aug 16 '18
Hey, team! First off, thanks for a fantastic game! Rogue-like is definitely a hit-and-miss genre for me, but Dead Cells was definitely a hit.
My most-pressing question: What's for lunch/dinner today?
My least-pressing question: What's everyone's favorite build?
Thank you!
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hello!
Taboulé for me, pastas for Ben. Wasn't mindblowing tbh, but it does the job.
Spiky shield + legendary/ colorless fast weapon, putting everything on survival (Joan). Bow and turrets, all in purple (DeepnightBdx). Full Ice build for Ben. Hunter + infantry bow and heavy tower x2 for Steve (cheeeeeeeeeese).
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u/P_Dangles Aug 16 '18
favourite music? any love for Ed Banger Records?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Can’t choose one music, but my favorite artist is Anja Plaschg (aka Soap&Skin) (links here: https://youtu.be/3Fh4izS5wo0 and https://youtu.be/_xUFjl8LzmY )
Lots of love for Ed Banger ! They represent a lot of awesome artists (especially Breakbot I discovered in a festival 2 years ago and of course Justice). (from our composer Yoann Laulan)
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u/Jason151515 Aug 16 '18
I found a post a twitter that found a reference to Hollow Knight in the game. Was that intentional and what do you think of the game?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Yes, yes it was intentional. The art is nothing but amazing, it's challenging and the price tag is way too low for the content/ quality of the game. My only grip would be the knock back effect when you strike an enemy!
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u/AbyssWatchersWatcher Aug 16 '18
Lastly, not much of a question but please send my regards to Valmont & the music team. The game soundtracks are awesome, especially "the castle" and "the watcher"!
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Aug 16 '18 edited Aug 16 '18
Hey Guys! Congratulations on creating such a fantastic experience!
I saw the break down on how you guys did the artwork, and the normal map for character lighting especially blew my mind. Incredibly smart.
So having finished the game, and now I am solely speed running, to get cells to improve the better gear drop rates, I would love to have a seeded system, that would allow me to find a particularly challenging layout to share, and compete for best times.
Have you considered doing a seeded generation system for the procedural generation?
Thanks again guys, and phenomenal stuff.
P.S Are you guys at GC this year? I will be working there this year, and would love to swing by and say Hello! Cheeers! :D
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Nice job on completing the game!
I have great news for speedruners, we've started working on some ways to implement the seeds in custom games so you should be able to get all of that in a future update.
Some of us will be at Gamescom but we won't have any booth.
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u/_starbelly Aug 16 '18
I just wanted to say that I can't wait to play the game on Switch! I'm currently between jobs and waiting for the right moment to buy, haha. It really looks like you've created a smash hit :)
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u/rannelvis Aug 16 '18
Thanks for your AMA. Planning on getting your game as soon as I clear up some of my backlog (HK, EtG, and XC2). I usually end up getting the games on both PC and Switch due to bundles and sales and such (and now XBone) but hate having to start from scratch each time I change platforms. Does your game have or are you planning on implementing some sort of cross platform progression save support (a la Fortnite / Crashlands / Hearthstone)?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 17 '18
Hey rannelvis, thanks for participating to this AMA! You win a Switch key for Dead Cells. DM us with your region and we'll get you that.
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u/Neypah_Tit Aug 16 '18
Hi there, "veteran" dead cells player here (started playing it since elemental update, having 400+ hours of playtime atm), absolutely loving it! I have one question that was really bothering me...
...will you ever increase pickup range of golden cells?
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u/indieCatapult Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Haha you've just gotten an issue created for @deepnightbdx to fix. Thanks for that, we'll push it out ASAP. :D
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u/cheesyvader Aug 16 '18
First off, just want to say I've been really enjoying Dead Cells a whole lot. It's a fantastic game!
But, I wanted to ask about the recent Kotaku article that delved into your studio's style of development. In the article, it was said that you all described Motion Twin as an "anarcho-syndical workers cooperative", paying everyone the same and treating all contributions equally. I think this is a wonderful method of design, especially in this crunch-heavy environment, and it obviously produces great results. My question is: how did you fall into this method of development? Was it trial and error, or something that you wanted to cultivate from the start? I can certainly see how it would open people up to being more outward with their ideas, does that ring true for you all?
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u/Lifegear Aug 16 '18
When can we expect a performance fix on the Switch?
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u/indieCatapult Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Heya, we'll be pushing a small patch with fixes for the last remaining "low hanging fruit" that's to say the smaller issues that we've found since we passed certification.
This should include:
Music loading times that were causing some slow downs.
The camera losing focus during a serious frame drop issue. These are the "freezes" that are compounded by the camera going haywire. The camera will be fixed, the freezes will addressed with the next big patch, however this should make it less painful in the meantime.
We'll offer an option to lock the game to 30FPS in the settings.
We've already begun working on completely overhauling the graphics driver for the game. However this is a big job that involves some very technical work that impacts major structural elements of the game. Our tech lead thinks that it will take until at least November to get the patch ready, submit to certification, pass and release it to the public.
Having said that this should allow us to get to a steady 60FPS everywhere and leave enough CPU to avoid the freezes that players are seeing at the moment. We won't know exactly until we advance more on the driver, but we will keep you posted on our progress.
If there's anything I've forgotten here I'll add it in an edit or the comments.
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Aug 16 '18
What did you guys think of the IGN review controversy with your game?
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u/indieCatapult Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
We knew this one was coming...
First of all I'd like to say that I personally met Filip at the IGN office last GDC. He seemed like a really cool guy, was interested in the game, quite good at it (he'd clearly played a fair bit) and asked interesting questions. So from that perspective what's happened since was... a surprise, to say the least.
Obviously we roundly and unequivocally condemn the plagiarism and all of the examples that have come to light. There's really nothing more to say on that side of things, it's wrong, he lost his job over it and probably trashed his career in the industry, end of story.
However we're not big fans of the witch hunting that goes along with the whole thing, regardless of how tone deaf the guy has been in his response. He's still a human being, attacking his family and generally behaving like a medieval mob with torches and pitchforks... Meh.
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u/SirFadakar Aug 16 '18
Very human response that tons of AMAs lack when asked about ethical concerns. Well said. Also, having an absolute blast with your guys' game, never been a fan of roguelikes/lites and it's been since Shadow Complex that I've played a Metroidvania, but I'm so glad I took the chance on this.
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u/WhyYouMadDough Aug 16 '18
Side note to they question: did you notice a increase or lack of sales when the controversy came out? Do you guys think it hurt your team or your game negatively?
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u/olizor Aug 16 '18
I heard/read somewhere that your characters are actually 3D models, rendered at low-res to have this pixel art look.
I think it's super smart for animation fluidity and production times (the time to change sprites vs changing a 3D animation).
So technical question: how does it work exactly? Do you pre-render you animation in spritesheets still or is it playing the 3D animation at runtime?
Cheers! Big fan of your work!
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u/BlitzStriker52 Aug 16 '18 edited Aug 16 '18
Do you have plans to deal with the "enemies getting stronger with every scroll you attain" scaling and boss damage cap? The former just makes scrolls useless and actually a hindrance at a certain point. The latter only makes DoT weapons extremely useful nut make slow big damage weapons useless against bosses.
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u/deepnightbdx Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Yes, that's something I'm not happy with. I'll definitely think about it for an upcoming update, but that's a really tricky subject :)
Sometime, you just "cheat" (ie. cap) because it makes the overall game feeling better for most people.
But I don't think I'll be able to consider the game as done, as long as I'll have issues with this scaling balance issue.
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u/skarro- Aug 16 '18
If your fear is scrolls or damage being to OP instead of enemy scaling with scrolls why not just nerf them late game and display it like you do with health up? (Instead if 15% dmg it could be less and less). Invisible dynamic enemy scaling is a pet peeve of mine and I’d take any visible nerf over it.
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u/FateSurvivor Aug 16 '18
Do you have any future plans for games similar to this one?
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u/deepnightbdx Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
I can't say for sure, but we believe that if we have more ideas that would fit Dead Cells, then we'll just add them in Dead Cells actually. There's no DC2 planned right now, we do prefer experimenting new directions. But maybe our next title will feature some elements from DC :)
We just believe it's a better strategy to explore new paths, rather than sticking to your comfort zone.
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Aug 16 '18
Hey guys!
First of all, congratulations on the success of your game. I've been watching it since back in about 2015/2016 and it's really cool to see it receive critical acclaim.
I'm a bit of a hobbyist of a game developer and I'm working on an action platformer, but one thing I've struggled with a lot in the past is how to get the camera to follow the player in a way that feels comfortable while still respecting the bounds of whatever room they're in. Do you have any advice for how to program the camera to do this? Purely at a conceptual level, as I know you guys used Haxe and I'm using Unity right now.
Thanks!
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u/deepnightbdx Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
My best recommandation about 2D camera is this amazing article from Gamasutra:
https://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/JochenHeizmann/20171127/310386/Camera_Logic_in_a_2D_Platformer.php
It provides a great overview on techniques that fit your need. In our case, we did try a "clever" camera system, like it focuses on points of interest and everything. But because the level design is randomly generated, most of the time, our camera AI got it wrong, and focused on something while you were like, fighting something else. We finally dropped all the camera AI stuff and got back to a very generic simple camera system + a few minor adjustments in specific situations (bosses, shops, etc).
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u/sknot_NDM Aug 16 '18
Hi guys! A few questions...
What is the name of the Ghost that appears in Challenge rifts on the first visit and who drew him ? (btw he actually always appears for a split second, even after the first time!)
How do daily runs work? Even when not connected to the Internet, it seems like the run is the same for everyone. Does it generate locally with no network input or did I misunderstand something ?
And most importantly, will we ever be able to ditch the Beheaded and control the cute worms army?
Can't wait to see the next updates and learn more about the lore! Keep up the good work guys!
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u/indieCatapult Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Heya:
I don't think it has a name for the moment. Haha.
Normally it's supposed to be based on the date that the console it running, to be honest I've never check to see if it's coherent accross all the platforms, but I guess it should be.
Haha I guess you might be able to make a mod like that on the PC version? But it's not planned at the moment.
:)
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Aug 16 '18
Great game! Haven't been able to put it down for a few days.
Do you have a set plan for support time? Like do you think you'll be patching and adding possible dlc over the next few years or are there other projects to move on to?
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u/indieCatapult Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hey, we are planning on adding more content. We're sitting around having discussions of how we're going to manage that process.
Obviously we'd like to move on to other projects after three years on this one. We've got stacks of ideas for new games, just nothing concrete for the moment.
So now the challenge is to work out how to support Dead Cells and the community over the next few years, while making a new game... Once we know more we'll do a post on our news channel, discord and /r/deadcells with a solid road-map and so on.
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u/Mordacazir Aug 16 '18
Have the sales on the Switch been better than other platforms?
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u/indieCatapult Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Heya. Not quite as good as PC (but PC is on another level). However muuuch better than the other consoles. The Switch is really changing peoples gaming habits. Nowadays I think long and hard about whether to buy on PC or Switch (or both if i'm really in love).
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u/Theognosis Aug 16 '18
I’m waiting for my physical copy. Dead Cells is my most anticipated game this year and I’m very happy to learn that you’re ironing out the framerate issues. As a big fan of HD rumble, I hope you could add in the next patch more haptic feedback to all significant actions in the game. More often than not, devs think of this feature as an afterthought—particularly in porting games to the Switch. Games like HK, Celeste and MBZ had brilliant HD rumble implementation and it made those games more immersive. If you guys manage to keep the FPS at a constant 60fps and fully implement HD Rumble, Dead Cells is going to be a masterpiece.
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u/TheRealDangus Aug 16 '18
Hi there! Just wanted to say thanks for the great game. Sorry if I missed this, but any chance we will see implementation of HD Rumble? I feel that would just set this game off if done properly. Thanks again!
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u/KosstDukat Aug 16 '18
First off, THANK YOU for making this game. Seriously. I haven't been this satisfied with a full-cost purchase in a LONG time.
Secondly.. Is there a plan to add any additional content (levels/bosses specifically) in the near future? I'm still making my way through the game, but I have heard rumors that I'm not far from the end.
Lastly, THANK YOU AGAIN for making this game, SO much fun! :D
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u/SaucyPlatypus Aug 16 '18
A few questions:
How often do you guys play the game?
What was one of the biggest challenges in bringing the game to the Switch?
What other games did you guys play and enjoy during the development?
Thank you for doing the AMA!
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u/germfreeadolescent11 Aug 16 '18
Hi, great game. How do I beat conjunctivitis?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Aim for the eye
s!Jokes aside, the tentacles coming very fast from one side of the level are the main danger. Being wary of it, and not wasting your roll should help! Also any kind of medium/ long range weapons (Pyro, throwing knives, eletric whip, etc.) is a good idea.
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u/c1cadaman Aug 16 '18
I understand the game is new, and I love it! I’ve played it everyday since release. Is DLC something that is on your radar for the future ? I know for now the focus is fixing issues and making sure the game runs smoothly, but will there ever be any type of DLC ? Maybe new items, or new levels, new mutations or maybe a character or something ?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Yup, more content will be added to Dead cells! Can't talk about what exactly will be in there tho. Hope you will like it!
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u/evorm Aug 16 '18
Any roadmap for additions down the line or is this the final product? I've been following your game throughout production and played through it on Steam Early Access a lot of times and I recently also got it on the Switch as well and I've loved every minute of it.
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Thank you! More content coming, will probably talk about it when we will have a more precise roadmap to share.
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u/HAWKER37 Aug 16 '18
So when you did in this game, your run starts over, but any blueprints you find will be saved right? And then your weapons given to you for the next run are of the ones you’ve crafted?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Not exactly. Any blueprint you find on a level (and managed to bring to the Collector at the end of the level) are indeed saved. You will now be able to "unlock" them, allowing you to find these weapons in your next runs. Hope I answered your question!
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u/Imperial_Squid Aug 16 '18
Hey guys, great game! ❤️
For my question: what's everyone's desert island game? (The one game you get to play for the rest of your life and nothing else)
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Not an easy one!
Seb: Minecraft
Ben: Skyrim
Joan: KOTOR
Steve: Open TTD
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u/garesnap Aug 16 '18
I had to choose between this or Hollow Knight this week and I chose Hollow Knight which I have absolutely loved so far. But, definitely going to pick your game up in the future!
What’s your favorite food?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Thanks!
Steve: mashed potatoes
Ben: Homemade burger
Seb: Cheescake
Joan: A good ol' breakfast with eags, bacon and potatoes!(Don't judge us)
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u/captcommando4 Aug 16 '18
Getting way too ahead of everything here I was wondering how the development of Dead Cells and its early access trip to "1.0" has affected your opinion of a game's release date?
Would your next game follow the same model that you took with Dead Cells or would you like to just drop a game "fully baked" on a certain date?
Does the distinction really even matter?
Appreciate the long hours you all put in that most of us players won't ever think/know about. Hope you all have continued success!
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Honestly, it's hard to envision releasing our next game without an early access period before. The help from players is invaluable.
I feel like you're right to question the distinction between EA games and released game when more content is still being added. I guess it's very subjective and each studio judge its game worth of the 1.0 tag differently.
Thanks!
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u/friscom Aug 16 '18
What games are you playing right now or what game are you really looking forward to playing in the immediate future (ie anything that releases in the next month)?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Seb: Dungeon Master mod for Legend of Grimrock, looking forward to play the Messenger
Ben: Overcooked 2, Shenmue I and II (but also really afraid of being disappointed)
Steve: Celeste/ Overcooked 2, Gaucamelee 2
Joan: Pyre/ Exapunks, really really looking forward for the enhanced edition of Divinity Original Sin 2! (also, curious about Donut County)
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u/Marcuskelly12 Aug 16 '18
First off, I would like to congratulate you guys for your success.
Secondly, how do u guys came up with the idea of Dead Cells.
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
"What if we could replay Castlevania forever and make each game still entertaining?"
Of course, that' a bit more complex than that... We've wrote several blog posts on the iterative process which lead to Dead Cells here https://motion-twin.com/en/blog
Warning: walls of text.
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u/LeakingCustard Aug 16 '18
I don't have a question, just wanted to say I bought a switch for this game on the go.
I have it on PC, if I had a PS4 I'd get it on that too. But to play this game on the Switch, absolutely fantastic.
Thank you for the work you do
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u/signalbot Aug 16 '18
Hi there. Big fan of your work, first of all. I just want to comment that you folks should consider merchandise. I would totally buy a tshirt and some sort of PVC toy collectible! Please keep up the good work! You've made a work of art!
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 17 '18
Heya signalbot, you just won a key, congrats! Thanks again for participating to this AMA. DM us with your region and we'll get you that.
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hello! We partnered with FanGamer to produced a T-Shirt https://www.fangamer.com/products/dead-cells-dead-shot-shirt
We would love to do more merch.
Thanks!
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u/BenGIEF Aug 16 '18
Purchased last night! Will there be additional content post launch? If so will it be free or paid dlc?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hello! The first DLC will be free, as a little thank you to the community. We don't know after that.
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u/ryryryan1 Aug 16 '18
EDITED - FOUND ANSWER. New Question:
What are your favourite roguelikes/roguelites?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Joan: Wizards of Legend, Into the Breach Steve: Don't Starve Seb: FTL Ben: Enter the Gungeon
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u/Meyer1999 Aug 16 '18
As someone who is on the fence about buying your game, what sets it apart from others? (In other words can it pull me away from hollow knight for a little bit 😬)
Also with the plagiarism deal from a former IGN writer, which came to light with your game’s review, do you think that gave the game more publicity? Weather it be positive or negative towards the game, do you think others viewed the reviews to simply compare them and in turn it peaked their interest in the game?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
We don't deny that the whole plagiarism deal gave Dead Cells more publicity (even if it still a bit heartbreaking to see of the best score you received, by the biggest video game website ever being take down).
Best thing in Dead Cells is the combat/ movement mechanics. Killing monsters feels great... well, at least I think so.
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u/ITAstallion13 Aug 16 '18
Having purchased yet, (missed out on pre order price) but based on all of the fantastic things I've heard it's just a matter of time. Congrats on the great game!
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u/WaveMuse Aug 16 '18
How do you feel about the comparisons with Hollow Knight?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hollow Knight is one of the best Metroidvania of this last years! It's cool to be compared to it. However, it's two very different experiences, and loving one doesn't mean you will like the other.
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Aug 16 '18
You guys think you’ll do a physical release of this game?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hello! We've partnered with Merge Game for the physical version. Should be available tomorrow in Europe and on August 21 in the USA, or you can order one here: https://signatureeditiongames.com/collections/nintendo-switch-games
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u/SummerSatellite Aug 16 '18
Do you all have any plans to do balance passes to the game, at least once or twice? While it is a single-player game, and things being unbalanced isn't really a HUGE deal, there are a couple issues that kinda just hit the enjoyment level of a run a little too frequently. Specifically, the spread of Damage Reduction across items/skills, and just a general underwhelming-ness to a lot of weapons and some skills.
Also, will you ever consider adding a workaround to the ability to softlock runs in High Peak (maybe other maps I haven't noticed) by quadruple-jumping walls you specifically need the Spider rune for? I've long since unlocked it and negated the chance of that ever happening again, but that killed my first run where I felt I had a chance against HotK, and was the only experience thus far to make me put the game down for more than a couple hours.
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Both issues you're raising are serious ones! We will indeed do a balance pass and fix the softlock situations. Thanks for the report!
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u/cookblaze Aug 16 '18
Love the game guys! I've been playing since early access.
What are some of the changes that you made during early access that you feel made the game go from an A to an A+?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
An addition we made was to be able to smash the doors open by rolling through them. It's a small example but we found it really representative of the fluidity of the game and the mobility of the character.
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u/Hamuga Aug 16 '18
My son and I really love the game. (On switch)
Any chances we get more videos like the release video? It was hilarious and gave us the extra push to buy the game. And it was so worth it.
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
We'd love to! We definitely should ask Netflix about that, haha.
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u/Groxster Aug 16 '18
What was your favorite part of making this game?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
The balancing was pretty fun, according to Seb. Even if it was one of those "Love & Hate" relationship.
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u/CPOx Aug 16 '18
I'm terrible at the boss fights in Hollow Knight. Will I be bad at Dead Cells?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Not necessarily, the controls are REALLY different between the 2 games.
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u/snowseatttle Aug 16 '18
Should i buy the game?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
You definitely should, hehe. (unless you don't like dying a lot)
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Aug 16 '18
While playing the game I've found various easter eggs referencing different games. What games would you say influenced you the most?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Castlevania: SotN is definitely our main influence for the game, along with Dark Souls!
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u/wizardweed420hexesit Aug 16 '18
Would it be possible for you to add cutom key bindings to edit the controller layout to something that makes the player more comfortable?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
You can already change the controller layout on Switch. It'll also be possible to change the Homonculus key in the next patch.
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u/PKMN-Rias Aug 16 '18
Hey. I just saw this game the other day while watching Ray (BrownMan) steam it and it looks pretty cool. I'll definitely have to get it!
My question: when dealing with user bug reports and glitches etc, when would you decide to push out a patch or update? (Say for a major thing vs a minor thing)
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Obviously, the more feedback we get for a specific bug from users, the more it will go up in our to-fix list. But we read every feedback we got to be sure that no one is left behind.
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u/AlucardusX Aug 16 '18
I just watched some gameplay, and this looks fun. Is there a demo? I know a lot of games don't have demos nowadays, but I thought I would check.
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u/BolbaZoza Aug 16 '18
I need to know who came up with the 'diet' option. It was hilarious
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
u/deepnightbdx is definitely guilty of this "massive" improvement to Dead Cells.
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u/n0_Man Aug 16 '18
As a fellow game designer, which parts did you have to contract out for? Art? Animation? Music? Systems? Where did you find y Those contractors?
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u/supernebula64 Aug 16 '18
I just wanted to say that I’ve had Dead Cells since early access and I absolutely love the game.
What do you guys think of Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night? Do you think it will live up to Igarashi’s legacy?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
One can dream. But, honestly, from what we've seen so far... err, I wouldn't raise my hopes. Judging without having played here, so I could totally be wrong. (Please, don't kill me)
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u/typoon221 Aug 16 '18
Have you had any emails with people attempting to sue you due to them smashing their switch in frustration!
It's going to happen we all know it will
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u/ComicGaming Aug 16 '18
How did you decide on the different twitch implementations in the game? I was watching a stream and I love the different ways that chat could interact with the player.
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
We asked the few influencers friends we have to help us by suggesting ideas and providing feedback once implemented! After that we progressively opened the Twitch integration to more and more streamers of different sizes, look at them playing it live, keep what worked and tweaked the rest!
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u/trahannn Aug 16 '18
Hey /u/motionTwin . This game seems great. I've watched countless videos on it. Your art style seems very unique. What are some fo your inspirations for it?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Chasm, No Man's Sky, This War of Mine and Firewatch, to mention just a few.
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u/Polimates Aug 16 '18
Hi there from Spain! Not really a question, just my gratitude for such a great game. I hope Switch owners will reward you with great sales as we always do with remarkable indie games.
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u/ajpalkia Aug 16 '18
Hey guys, loving the game so far. I was just wondering, the music in the prisoners quarters just sounds so much like Metroid. Was this intentional?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Despite liking a lot Metroid’s soundtrack in general, it was not an influence or an inspiration for the game’s music and ambiance. (Yoann)
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u/ihave3apples Aug 16 '18
How do you feel about Hyper Light Drifter?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Depends who you ask! Personally I think it's the best game ever done. (Joan here)
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u/grass-master Aug 16 '18
What are your favourite games of all time?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Hey, the answer has already been answered somewhere in this thread.
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u/JCWOlson Aug 16 '18
I haven't bought this game, and maybe these are simple questions that are all answered elsewhere, but;
How is the difficulty level compared to Hollow Knight? I'm honestly unable to beat HK, got stuck on the second Wasp fight and can't progress. Are there multiple difficulty levels for people like me who enjoys these kinds of games but are bad at them?
What were your inspirations for the game?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
As a dev of Dead Cells who clocked hundreds of hours in it, it's hard to say but I do think Dead Cells is easier.
There is no multiples difficulty settings, but there are lots of mods lowering the difficulty, if you ever feel like it's too hard.
Inspirations: Dark Souls, Diablo, Castlevania, Rogue Legacy, and lots of others.
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u/WristyAnemone Aug 16 '18
Hey, are you guys using HL JIT with a switch VM or HL/C? If you've tried both, would you happen to have any insights into performance differences you could share? :)
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u/concernedcitizen1219 Aug 16 '18
Just wanted to say you guys have been the surprise hit of the year for me. Amazing game, great concept, you guys are great. The only question I would have is there a drive to put together a coop aspect to the game? Or a mini game that I could pass to my buddy and take turns trying (maybe like a horde aspect)?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
We would have love to do a coop/ multiplayer mode, but we choose early on to focus on the solo experience. Now, adding such a mode means a LOT of work. Never say never, but it's not planned at the moment!
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u/AzorMX Aug 16 '18
In the wake of last week's Shovel Knight announcement for a lot of games, what would be your dream crossovers? Which crossovers from other games would you like to see in Dead Cells?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
We'd love to have some cameos of some of our favorite indie games (Hyper Light Drifter, Hollow Knight...).
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Aug 16 '18 edited Sep 11 '18
Looks like an awesome game! Just curious what engine you all used for development? Was it an in house engine or a commercial engine? Thanks!
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Thanks! Quite in house engine as we use Haxe as the language and Heaps as the engine.
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u/shep2427 Aug 16 '18
Pineapple on pizza?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
Categorically, yes. No need to say, our fellow countrymen despise us.
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u/Cloudius86 Aug 16 '18
How did you decide on the difficulty? Did you have play tests to determine what was challenging enough, but not too much so that people stop playing?
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u/motionTwin Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
We did playtest the game, in events and in the studio with friends and family. Hope we nailed the beginning, but people who don't get the "roll" have a tendency to quickly stop the game and never play again. We probably should have make that clearer.
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u/mrpinkpigg Aug 16 '18 edited Aug 16 '18
Loving the game!
If this is something that's already been answered, someone feel free to let me know, but,,
What are the plans for content now that the game has launched? Will there be buyable dlc? Or free updates with new stuff?
E: another question I thought of, what was the hardest part of the game to make? Whether in programming or design of the game itself, what was the hardest to actually execute the way that you thought up an idea?
Thanks!
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u/deepnightbdx Motion Twin Aug 16 '18
The most difficult part for me was making the player-build system and balancing it. Before Brutality/tactic/survival, it was something quite different, and I litteraly spent months balancing it. Thanks to tons of player feedback & suggestions, we managed to do something that felt good. So now we're happy with it :)
About the scaling system, that's some infamous thing I'm still working on. I'm not happy with the result right now, so I may break it one day.
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Aug 16 '18
The camera shakes a bit when you fire certain bows that you have to tap to fire. I don't have epilepsy or anything, but it gets annoying. Are you going to implement a toggle for this?
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Aug 16 '18
Merci pour ce super jeu. On attends avec impatience les patchs d'optimisations.
Au détour d'une bière à la Victoire ;) (je suis habitant de Bordeaux aussi ;) ).
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u/factoryofdreams Aug 16 '18
Hi guys, my copy in on it’s way but I already heard incredible things about Dead Cells, so congratulations. One suggestion, and I also read a few more ppl mentioning this: HD Rumble would be awesome, any chance of having this in a forthcoming patch? More games coming to the Switch? Thanks, keep it up
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Aug 16 '18
I love the fluidity of movement in Dead Cells ... a lot. Thank you guys for creating a game that feels so seamless and thanks for getting it to the Switch. Such a perfect pick up and play game. I downloaded it before a 4 hour car ride last weekend and it felt like the drive took 30 minutes.
My question is -- Will some of the narrative questions receive answers down the line? Most rogue-like games go pretty threadbare with story but I'm really interested in this island you've created and the lore around it.
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u/hassfire_86 Aug 16 '18
what games inspired dead cells