Author Archives: Shaun Roopra

About Shaun Roopra

My mission is to eradicate the life form you humans call pizza. I'm also an artist and writer at The Dangerous Kitchen.

From Premier Inn to Somerset House

DeMambo-Banner

It was the night before EGX Rezzed 2015 and the frigid, cold air was strangely inside rather than hanging outside in its natural habitat. We couldn’t get our TV to work, felt intimidated by everyone else being more prepared and of course we were dead tired (yes, this is a Commando reference) from a general lack of well-being.

Our EGX build had some crazy graphical errors such as strange artefacts appearing, some translucent textures and washed-out colours, yet we didn’t care! The game played fine and that was something we were proud of.

The response at EGX was simply remarkable for us. No, we’re not bragging—well, not that much—but in all honesty, it’s remarkable considering our circumstances. As you may already know, De Mambo was built in a public place (Premier Inn) and yet the EGX attendees responded through smiling, immense laughter and the odd profane grunt. It felt good because it was a huge validation for a years worth of hard work and—more importantly—for a life playing videogames.

We spent a week recovering after EGX (as it was our first exhibition) only to be offered three months at Playhubs, a London workspace for game development located in Somerset House, London!

To go from working in a public place where you have to hide your food from the staff in fear of being kicked out and where shady, multi-level marketing folk bustle like cockroaches to working in the prestigious Somerset House is highly peculiar to say the least.

Currently, we are in Playhubs, absorbing all the free coffee we can, meeting new people and trying not to quit game development and become professional whiteboard artists.

See you on the other side.

Good news everyone!

And yet, it’s come to this. After some hard and not-so-hard work, amazing people believing in us, and a bucket-load of blackmail attempts, The Dangerous Kitchen is going to EGX Rezzed!

Our smashing first game, De Mambo, is currently being worked on all hours of the day (mostly subconsciously as we sleep). We’re putting in our all, since this will be the first public showing, something that scares us more than a cheese-less pizza.

So please come down to EGX on 12-14th March and support us! We need you! And remember to give us a violent pat on the back if you happen to enjoy the game…

Yours terribly,

The Dangerous Kitchen

Good things are coming.

It’s been a long while hasn’t it? Oh really, that long? It seemed like only a hot minute ago that we last spoke.

We’ve been busy I suppose. The product’s coming along just fine thanks, slowly but surely. The obscene lengths to which the ‘coder’ has gone to is something I daren’t even mention on these… public channels. All is well.

Good things are coming, I can assure you. Heck, I’m going to go on a limb here and just tell you. We are waiting for them to get back to us. The organisation that we mentioned in the last communication—the make or break guys—we’re waiting on their answer. No not ACN.

The thought of them allowing us to showcase our product is driving us profusely. I think this is really it. It’s about time! Next time we speak, the product may have broken into the public zeitgeist, god help them. You may even see it console you at some point in the future, if you get what I’m saying.

We’ve smuggled a little extract for you, which you can access below, anyhow, keep communication flowing and remember to watch your back. Godbless.

[su_youtube_advanced url=”https://youtu.be/czskqr29-t4″]

De Mambo First Look Gameplay Trailer from The Dangerous Kitchen on Youtube.

De Mambo!!!!!

Super Smash Bros for 3DS was our goal.

[su_quote]“Lets make a game before Smash—we so won’t be able to concentrate on making games once it’s out!”[/su_quote]

Yooksin, currently on hold, seemed like it would not be allowed to exist before October 3rd. No matter how hard we tried to get it made, something always appeared to hinder its progress. It was too soon and so to fulfil our desire to have a game out by the release of Smash, De Mambo was born.

Although merely a demo, with a full release hopefully down the line, De Mambo was a phenomenal experience that increased our understanding of game development ten fold.

Fuelled by what scientists call ‘Pre-Smash Brothers Hypeitis’ we desperately laboured like the hardworking dogs we naturally are, to birth De Mambo.

imageScreened-shot of in-game De Mambo

We took the legendary teachings of Masahiro Sakurai himself and used them to deconstruct and rebuild to what we consider the essence of Smash Bros is. Like modern day video-game alchemists clad in un-ironed clothes and who take food prepared from home to places where they clearly sell food, we embarked on this outlandish journey.

Smash Brothers is something we dearly love. To see the people who make you happy, the friends you’ve worked hard to keep, the family who love you deeply, beaten to pulp and sent flying off the stage like the economic girly men they truly are, is heavenly.

Nothing compares to Smash Bros and the love Masahiro Sakurai uses to glue the game together. De Mambo is a homage to Super Smash Bros, to Masahiro Sakurai and to the love of video-games.

Please enjoy playing it… and try not to forget this game after Smash Bros for 3DS releases, unlike us who will be playing it constantly for the foreseeable future!

You can play the game online via our website and Unity Web Player HERE!

Please also enjoy some animated gifs of two of our team members Mambo-ing the hell out of each other.

More stages playable in-game!

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Farewell…

The Smashpocalypse Cometh


Image courtesy of the almighty Google and its omniscient reach.

Today, as a bearer of bad news, sadness fills my mouth with a phantom taste that resembles something… not so nice.

Yooksin is on hold dear readers. Repent! Repent your sins I tell you! The end is nigh!

Instead, we are hanging up the usual game development routine for a new life south of the border—and no, this has nothing to do with that armed robbery we may or may not have been involved in…

A short hiatus if you will, to brush up on certain code-like game development duties, gather funds and to rest (well, some of us) the brained, jellylike forms we’ve recently become.

In this short, mind development hiatal period and as a result of the oncoming Smashpocalypse, it has been prophesised that we must mark this occasion with our own Smash Bros like game. It seems this game has a mind of its own like some kind of spoiled brat that carelessly dreams of being all the Power Rangers at once. Not just picking one, like us normal folk.

Currently, it has no name and unlike the no-name archetypal character in Hollywood cinema, it is not purposeful—we just haven’t had that marvellous gut-punch of inspiration as of yet.

Yooksin will return; the tides of fate are too strong to disallow it not to.

Farewell dear reader and bless you (if you miraculously managed to sneeze as you read this).

//Disclaimer 

Yooksin will never return and the creatively bankrupt Dangerous Kitchen are dead forever.

Let us Yook the Sin!

So, considering that life is a curious movement of monolithic structures, it was inevitable that our lovely game would be revealed.

Announcing our game.

Yooksim! No, wait. Yucksin! Oh. Yooksin. Yes, Yooksin! Yooksin, the great and mighty.

Yooksin: The Hospitable Sea.

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All the hard work that was bloodied by our… blood and stuff, has finally been announced!

Rejoice!

Wait. What is Yooksin you ask!? Well, it’s a game. A game of deception and treachery where you put your life on the line for—oh, sorry, that’s just a description of the life I lead. Yooksin is loosely defined as a delivery fish-avoidance billow system that will be available on iOS.

Working on Yooksin has been everything from fun, to annoying, to spiritually cleansing. Assets have been created, music coined and writing penned, although we still have loads more to do. We are still working our butts off to perfect the ideas, gameplay and quality of everything we do, because if Yooksin isn’t the best game ever, then why bother!

We hope you look forward to our first game and obviously buy everything we offer in the future… it is your destiny.

Here is an exclusive peek at some things we’ve toiled away on. Enjoy!

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Developer Diary #2: Subsequent Shenanigans

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The key to functioning as an expert member of The Dangerous Kitchen—as judged from the strenuous research I have undertaken as an undercover alien intelligence à la Under the Skin—is: to think approximately half of what the average human-being does and pray to some unknown deity that everything works out.

Working this way is efficient I must admit, but the hardest aspect one will inarguably fall upon, is the clashing of art styles. Creating assets that will ultimately be a part of the same digital-body needs care and attention to make them work holistically. Using the artistic, automatic abilities these humans employ can be hazardous, yet strangely fun. Logic is a foul stench in the grand scheme of existence.

Before the prototype has been constructed by the cosmic-overseer they call the coder, aligning the brain waves of every team member to understand the mechanics of the game is necessary, but arduous. The system takes time to be absorbed into human brain tissue and once absorbed, digested. A design document is crafted to empower the team and overseer with the thinly veiled illusion of hope.

This hope’s success rate is almost directly correlated with that fiendish  bean-based brain accelerator known as coffee. It’s what drives the steady, forward movement they make and what the blame will fall upon when they ultimately fail.

– The Dangerous Kitchen

Wario 3DS XL

In honour of the extreme excellence of the 3DS, it has been decided that our true gaming overlord, Wario, is underrepresented on the console. Even after the immense financial woes that Nintendo face because they dedicated a whole year (and a bit) to that chump Luigi, there is no Wario XL (or year of Wario for that matter). Seeing the Yoshi XL was the last straw.

The Dangerous Kitchen, have taken it upon themselves to construct the unofficial Wario 3DS XL console—we must rectify this disgraceful lack of Wario.

Such a marvel of design and ingenuity must truly exist and thus this is no mere custom paintjob. The Wario XL does indeed boast a riveting purple and yellow colour scheme however it also houses many other significant features.

A beautiful Wario nose-moustache insignia is emblazoned upon its tender brow, whilst every button is rebranded a ‘W’ button. The Wario XL includes various Wario catchphrases such as “Have a rotten day!” and “Wah Wah!” on start-up.

The one drawback of this spectacular work is the complete lack of a stylus—thought to be because Wario himself designed and manufactured the XL and pocketed the money saved from not including a stylus.

The Wario XL is an appreciation for Wario and needs to become reality.

– The Dangerous Kitchen

Developer Diary #1: Beginning of the End

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Dear Diary,

So, it has begun, as they say in some parts of Outworld. Currently the sanity levels are stable and the subtle smell of coffee, breakfast and dread silently float around like a harrowing grim reaper-parrot on our shoulder.

Food time has ended—a foiled barrage of homely goods—consumed upon with mild Animal Crossing sound waves to punctuate the grotesque munching sounds.

The development of a game is scary and intriguing, devastating and explorative, depressing and delightful. A fake tree opposite gently sways with a striking grandeur that reminds one of the fragility of the human mind.

This project will be the end of us all.

– The Dangerous Kitchen

Drunk on Magic – Attack of the Friday Monsters: A Tokyo Tale

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There is a certain magic games possess. A lot of games abandon this magic, and a lot of games never even reach a level of exerting such a thing. Attack of the Friday Monsters on the 3DS eShop is very special. I’ve only played around 40 or so minutes, but I’m already drunk on the captivating atmosphere. The game is simply magical.

Essentially a small visual novel set in 70’s Japan, Attack of the Friday Monsters is not supposed to be an epic, or emotional to showcase the potential of the medium; it’s solely charming on a human level.

It’s like a small star in a sky full of larger stars, even though it may seem insignificant, without its smaller expanse of light, there would be a patch of emptiness in its place.

This magic is hard to discern, but something inherently tied to pure gameplay. Working on the project we are currently building, it’s hard to remember this magic when you’re toiling away like a cog in a machine. Playing Attack of the Friday Monsters reminded me of this virtue and I believe at least one person on a project should be focused on magic. I hereby decree that every games company needs a magician. This person should be someone who tinkers with ideas and makes them human, who funnels charm directly into the design and mechanics: a link between the human nature of the audience and the ideas of the game creators.

Honestly, I’ve reached a point where I don’t know what I’m talking about anymore and would like to implore you to buy Attack of the Friday Monsters so we can both be drunk on its charm.

– Shaun