Interviews

Exclusive: Toy Studio on porting god game-turned-puzzler Squishy's Revenge from Nook to iPhone and Android

Electric slide

Exclusive: Toy Studio on porting god game-turned-puzzler Squishy's Revenge from Nook to iPhone and Android

There is a ridiculous number of puzzle games on the iPhone and, to a lesser extent, Android phones, so any title in this field has to be both original and fun to get our attention.

Toy Studio’s Squishy’s Revenge looks to take the best of tile-based gaming and blend it with Lemmings-inspired cuteness.

Already a hit on the Barnes & Noble Nook - yes, you read that right - under the name Monster Slider, Toy Studio's Squishy’s Revenge will benefit from updated graphics and new levels when it touches down on iOS and Android later this month.

We chatted with the developer's studio director Christian Arca and the game's designer Robert Lockhart about Squishy’s evolution.

Pocket Gamer: What was the inspiration for Squishy’s Revenge?

Robert Lockhart: I thought of the idea while at the Games Learning Society conference, which had a really inspiring group of people discussing games for learning and mechanics. I spent some time there thinking about the simplest possible god game.

In a god game, you’ve got agents that behave in a simple, predictable way. Your job as a god is to affect them somehow by influencing environments. Most are complicated, like deciding what kind of food they should eat, etc. With this, I thought the sliding-puzzle dynamic is simple: does the character have (literally!) ground to stand on?

Christian Arca: When Rob first came to me, he was thinking of it more like a Rubik’s Cube. It evolved into a character that moved, that you actual cared about, kind of like Ilo and Milo. It’s the reason why I liked that title. But, we wanted to take the god concept and not have the player worry about navigating a 3D space.

RL: We later shied away from the Rubik’s Cube mechanic and focussed more on the unintended consequences for everything you do. Like every puzzle game, there is one thing you want to happen, but there are other, unintended things that occur, too.

How long have you guys been working on Squishy’s Revenge?

CA: About two months. We spent a good half month doing the design and prototyping, and the rest of it was spent with level creation and polishing. When we first got it prototyped, we were very excited about Rob’s idea. Our programmer started prototyping it within a few days and we started playing the game.

But, we were so convinced it was going to be fun that we didn’t think about how the Rubik’s Cube-style interaction was going to play out as a gameplay mechanic. We kind of scrapped it…

RL: …and went to a card game-like concept. You know Zombies!!!, the card game? It just has square tiles that are moved.

CA: It started off like a simple slider puzzle and it started to feel more fun since we’d have the path to your objectives laid out - right before we scrambled it.

RL: You’d have to rearrange the tiles to see a path drawn out in arrows so your monster will destroy all the buildings.

How big is your team?

CA: One artist, one developer, and Rob. The whole company comprises 15 people.

This game kind of reminds me of The Adventures of Lolo, a puzzle classic on the original Nintendo system. What modern games are you enjoying right now?

RL: We were thinking about god games, like the greatest of those, Black and White, as well as The Sims. But more applicable to the puzzle gameplay, I think of Spirits on iOS. It’s a great game, and each spirit is just an agent that behaves predictably. You give them a path and let them go, kind of like Lemmings.

As far as the Nook is concerned, what is the most popular Toy Studio title right now?

RL: Right now, it’s Mahjong Solitaire.

How is the Nook audience different from the iOS one?

CA: The Nook audience is definitely more keen on word games. There are obviously more complex titles on the platform, like Angry Birds, but the Nook gamers look for polished titles that are sort of simple to play / hard to master.

Nook games are simpler. That’s why we wanted to publish Rocket Bunnies (on the Nook), since it’s about planning the timing to other rocks and avoiding obstacles.

Other iOS titles could be too overbearing for the Nook crowd, and since a lot of people naturally like to read on it, we’ve got a lot of success with word games. Word games are popular on iOS, too, but don't often reside at the top of the charts.

And Squishy’s plans on the NOOK?

CA: We actually released it first on the Nook! We released it (under the title Monster Slider) to get a sense of what people thought, almost like market research. We got good feedback and thought, “We could polish this up and put it out on Android and iOS”.

RL: We learned about the affinity people had for the Squishy character. It was originally called Monster Slider, but one of the main comments we got was how cute Squishy was, so we renamed it, gave it more of a storyline, and added more features.

Currently available on the Nook as Monster Slider, Squishy’s Revenge will be out on iOS and Android on September 29th.

Thanks to Christian and Robert for their time.
Damon Brown
Damon Brown
Damon Brown has been speaking the mobile game gospel since 2003 for Playboy, New York Post, and many other outlets. Damon writes books when he isn't busy gaming or Twittering. His most popular book is Porn & Pong: How Grand Theft Auto, Tomb Raider and Other Sexy Games Changed Our Culture.