Knockout City Interview with Velan Studios' Guha Bala
We recently had the chance to ask some important questions and even a few silly ones of Velan Studios’ Guha Bala, co-founder of the company. Knockout City is their second title under the Velan Studios name, but many of the folks have long histories in game development.
Knockout City is a team based game, where players take to the streets, rooftops and elsewhere, in competitive dodgeball, but this is not your average game, with power ups, special ball types and the ability to look fly, this is dodgebrawl. If you haven’t seen anything on the game yet, check out this gameplay trailer below, to get the lowdown on what to expect.
Maxi-Geek: Where did the initial concept come from? Was the team playing dodgeball in the parking lot or something?
Guha Bala: A small group of us were thinking about how to make a new kind of action game. It occurred to us that while shooters were common, and some were really good, no one had fully explored how throwing and catching could be done in an action setting. It was a simple concept: throwing and catching. Maybe the world's first multiplayer game? Around that time, one of our children had a birthday party at a trampoline park - with a game of dodgeball. It was super fun, and easy to learn just by watching. But the good players were really good. From there, we tried all sorts of experiments as our team riffed on each others’ ideas. It took us about 18 months to go from that initial idea to a core set of mechanics and a game build where we were comfortable to hand over someone outside the team. Our test was whether they would stop playing, or try to get “just one more round.”
MG: Given how large some games of dodgeball can be, what made you choose a 3v3 approach?
GB: Something that became apparent early on in development was that throwing and catching enabled a totally different kind of team play. Because you can pass! We build on this concept for all sorts of team mechanics that could result in emergent play when put together. 4v4, 3v3, and 2v2 each offered a different flavor of teamplay, keeping the team small enough where teammates would constantly communicate and coordinate in a fast paced setting.
MG: Multiplayer games are hugely dependent on their player base, was ensuring there were always people to play with, a big reason for the inclusion of cross-play?
GB: The main reason we had for cross play was to enable friends to play together whatever their game system. Teamwork is most fun with friends! Cross play also helps with keeping a healthy community for skill-based matchmaking and ranked play, since the player base is unified across systems. Our inclusion of the game at launch on EA Play and XBox Game Pass Ultimate is also a great way for us to strengthen the player base with a healthy user flow that will benefit all cross platform players.
MG: You have included some unique balls and locations, how crazy were some of the early concepts and might we see them appear in the game?
GB: Well, let me just say that the range of ideas we tried were pretty wild. We created Knockout City to be a world where we can really stretch our creativity. You’ll see a number of new ball types and locations pop up over the course of the live updates to the game. Each variant is designed to give rise to new strategies and play variety in the game.
MG: It has been said that the game will offer seasons for players to take part in, but what about players who don’t have time to invest in those events, will they still get to enjoy some of the content from them?
GB: We have strong content plans that every player can enjoy in the base game, and constantly updated new content throughout each season. We want to reward players who are able to make it to each event with unique rewards. But if a player misses an event, we’ll have lots of exciting material for later ones.
MG: Crossovers with over video games or brands has been a big thing in the past few years, Ford cars in Rocket League, everyone in Fortnite, have you considered what or who you would want to appear in the game? Can we expect a map based on the Mass Effect Citadel for example?
GB: Our first focus is to have a great start with Knockout City and evolve it with our community. In the future, there may be some opportunities for brand crossovers, but that is not our primary focus at this point.
MG: When the game was revealed, Switch being included was a shock to me, as most companies tend to exclude it. Were there many challenges in bringing a game like Knockout City to a platform like the Switch?
GB: Interestingly, our earliest prototypes for Knockout City were on Switch. It was super fun for us to be around a sofa playing together as a team against others, each on our Switches. We’ve worked hard to make Switch a beautiful experience on Quality Mode, and a super competitive one on Performance Mode with 60 Hz frame rate. The Switch version is full featured as all of the other platforms, and of course, fully cross play/cross progression.
MG: Were there any times during development, when someone pitched something so crazy, that not including it, would have felt wrong?
GB: Actually, the idea of the players turning into balls themselves was exactly like that. It was a brainstorm idea. Sounded a little nuts, and would have a profound effect on our character art style as well as the personality of the game. For example, the art style could not be photoreal and needed to have some whimsy. But it also seemed like just the thing to make this a surprising experience: players would be physical objects, they could be thrown, caught, and supercharged. Players could also be thrown to places in the map, and be used as surprise weapons for one-hit knockouts. So many creative possibilities from just this one crazy idea. We had to try it!
MG: Velan Studios is new, but already has one game out the door. Was the plan to always release games this frequently, or is this just a matter of interesting time?
GB: Producing games frequently is not a goal of ours by design. We started Velan Studios in 2016, and it took three years to develop Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit, and about four years for Knockout City. Much of that is in experimentation: finding the fun and figuring out how to build it. And we are really just getting started. The final step of our four-step business plan is to “Build it, ship it, and evolve it with the community.” We really look forward to how players receive the game, and look forward to supporting it live.
MG: If you had to choose, what would be your favourite part of Knockout City?
GB: My favorite part is how surprisingly frequent “clutch” moments are in matches, and even when the odds seem stacked against you, a quick move as a team can even up the odds. It keeps the matches continually exciting.
A big thanks to Guha for taking the time to answer my questions. Knockout City is launching on May 21st for Switch, PC, Xbox One and PlayStation 4 and will offer full cross-play from day one, as well as a unique trial, so you can sample the full game first.
