Hello hello everybody!
In the last devblog we delved a lot into what all the historical setting of the game meant, as well as the inspirations behind the title, today it's time to talk once again with our favorite creator, Danilo Barbosa, to know a little bit more about where all this passion for fighting games comes from, let's go for it!
Hey there, Danilo! Tell us, when did your interest in fighting games start?
Danilo: My interest in fighting games started way back in the times of the arcade bars. My first fighting game love was Samurai Shodown II. It had so much style, with incredible characters, I can’t remember how many coins I’ve spent in that arcade machine playing Genjuro.
How much time have you invested in fighting games?
Danilo: Well, after that initial phase I’ve continued to spend my lunch money in many fighting game arcades, from Darkerstalkers, to Megaman Power Battle (big blue bomber fan here), Street Fighter Alpha 2 until I discovered King of Fighters 97 and 98. I used to go play everyday after school, beating up everybody that wanted to challenge me. In the console era, I’ve played many games but not for long, for me the true experience comes from beating other players.
Have you ever taken part in a fighting game tournament? How did it go?
Danilo: Never took part in gaming tournaments, which now thinking about it, makes me think why. I imagine that the reason is because I never saw them happening around me. Maybe they did and I didn’t know. And later when we finally could play online, I never really had good internet, and everytime I tried, I got my ass kicked so hard that I basically stuck with playing single player modes with game like Smash Bros, Soul Calibur, Tekken and a lot of Mortal Kombat.
What games were your main inspiration and what aspects of Two Strikes were inspired by them?
Danilo: We have two games that we drew a lot of inspiration from. The first one is Darkerstalker in the art department, not the style of the game but the settings: monsters fighting each other. For Two Strikes, it helped us create a darker gritty environment where all the characters are already dead in the beginning of the game. For game play, my main inspiration was definitely Samurai Shodown II. The fact that combos weren’t that common and spacing and mind games were more important always drew me into the franchise.
What is something you find lacking or don’t like in the most classic fighting games? Did you get to fix it on Two Strikes?
Danilo: Never really liked combos. But I always loved the basic aspects of fighting games, which take their inspirations from real martial arts and boxing. Spacing, understanding patterns, creating situations to capitalize on them, like feints and canceling motions. So I wanted to go back to basics without the things I always thought were very frustrating, like making a mistake and being punished for 10 seconds while the combo lasts. In the end I didn’t even remember what the mistake was. So with a game where one or two hits ends a match, you know exactly what you did wrong if you lost, so right away you can come back and test new strategies and I believe that for me, that is more satisfying than finally pulling off a combo.
What is your favorite character from any fighting game?
Danilo: Ryu, Eddie, Hanzo and Smoke
And your favorite character from Two Strikes?
Danilo: Hozoin has been my favorite for a while, but I am trying to get better with Yasuke and Miyo, the latest characters released.
Did you get inspiration for any character playability from any other game?
Danilo: For the first game, One Strike, I used to see a lot of fighting games to understand better movesets and what would work or not, so for example, Tomoe is based in Genjuro from Samurai Shodown II. But for Two Strikes, since we went back to the main inspiration which are samurai movies, I’ve been taking most of the character moves from real martial arts and movies. I think that it was the right thing to do because it helped me create the unique experience that is Two Strikes. Moves from movies are much more realistic than the ones you see in most fighting games and this means that the moves are also a lot slower. This is quite crucial to the animations in the game because we need to communicate to the players that attacks are coming. So, every move has anticipation frames, a lot of them.
Do you prefer 2D or 3D games? Why?
Danilo: 2D. By far. The reason is that they have much more style than most 3D fighting games. Of course, this has been changing with games like Guilty Gear and SF6, but in general that’s my idea. Or well, it could also be nostalgia talking here, haha. I can say that the change of a game to 3D made me basically forget about Street Fighter, a game that I loved until Alpha 3, and then, when Capcom decided to jump to 3D with Street Fighter IV, it simply didn’t click with me, just making me return to it now with SF6.
What do you think is the main difference between developing a fighting game and any other genre?
Danilo: I would say the community. When you develop for example a platformer, the relationship you have with the players are more normal. What I mean with that is that there isn’t any other community more passionate about the type of games they play and that also comes with a lot of knowledge. Sometimes, people on the communities and discord use terms that are known in the Fighting Game Community but I need to google to get what they are talking about. I don’t think that happens very often with other types of games.
What is lacking/you would like to expand on Two Strikes?
Danilo: Online game modes and more characters, because who doesn’t love a huge roster?
Apart from the mechanics of One Strike/Two Strike, what would the next Retro Reactor game's main dynamic revolve around?
Danilo: I’ll take a long vacation from Fighting Games, but of course, only after finishing all the DLCs we are planning on releasing if the game goes well. I’ve been really loving playing casual strategy games, like FLT and Into the Breach. I believe my next game will be something like that.
That was absolutely fantastic, thank you so much Danilo for taking care of us again, and as always, be sure to follow us on our social networks (
@EntaltoStudios and
@dmbarbosa1) to keep up with all the news related to Two Strikes, and we'll see you soon for the next installment of
Road to Release: The DevLog Series; Part 5 - Eight Vengeful Killers.
