We Could Be Heros (Interview)
WE COULD BE HEROS INTERVIEW
1. WHAT WAS THE FIRST BEAT EM GAME THAT YOU PLAYED THAT MADE YOU WANT TO START
CREATING YOUR GAMES?
The first one was Double Dragon, at a local fairground visiting the town I lived in. I remember instantly loving the game, but at the same time thinking I wish I could go in the doors the bad guys come from. Then when I played more Beat ‘em up’s I found they also had little details, drain pipes I wanted to pull off the wall’s. By the time Streets of Rage 1 hit the scenes I had pretty came up with my own Beat ‘em up I wanted to create, but it was very complex and way beyond what was possible for one guy at the time.
2. HOW DID YOU GET INTO GAME DEVELOPMENT?
In around late 1984 my brother got a ZX Spectrum from Christmas, games where so expensive but there was a magazine called ZX Spectrum that included source code for single level games, they were short games you could play for 5 minutes. The magazine came out once a month, so between editions we took to modifying the games.
3. TELL US ABOUT HOW YOUR GAME STUDIO CAME ABOUT.
Before Covid I worked as a contractor for large corporations running the IT side of their events and sometimes developing small games that customers could play onsite to capture their contact details. Then Covid hit and the events industry dried up, I decided now was the right time to create that Beat ‘em up I always wanted to, and so set up CebCode.
4. WHAT WAS THE INSPIRATION BEHIND THE NAME OF WE COULD BE HEROS?
This came about because I wanted the enemies in the game to be real criminals and have innocent people mixed into the stages. I never understood why most beat ‘em ups only had bad guys, do the heroes live in a town where every person is a bad guy? So, if you have innocents and criminals, it makes sense that the criminals would rob or attack the innocents. I came up with the opening scene Aunt Doris gets robbed by Needles, but then I started thinking what if… The player might decide not to save the old lady, he might beat her up, or beat them both up. On the one hand you would end up being the villain of the story on the other the hero… And so the players are given a choice, We Could Be Heroes… or not, and the story of the game adapts based on those choices.
5. WHAT ENGINE ARE YOU USING AND WHY?
Unity3D, I needed something pretty powerful and after trying both Unity and Unreal, I decided Unity suited my needs better. It’s basic production speed, you can create 4 times more content in Unity in the same time frame as Unreal. Unreal basically gives you better visuals out of the box on their default scene, but I had already decided I would be creating my own rendering and shader code from the start because I wanted something unique. So the productivity was really the main selling point and as a solo dev, a very important one.
6. WHERE DOES WE COULD BE HEROES TAKE PLACE?
A fictious place called Ultra City, the first privately owned city sold off by the government to benefit it’s citizens, or so they claim. Ultimately it’s become a place where money buys power. But in actual fact Ultra City is loosely based on the small town of Wellingborough in the UK, not so much all the crime, that was inspired by all the 80’s action movies I watched growing up.
7. WHO IS THE MAIN CHARACTERS IN THE GAME?
There are 4 main characters at the start of the game, but you unlock many more as you play.
Simon works in the mailroom of a large corporation, in his spare time Simon studies Jeet Kune Do.
Mina has a 4th degree black belt in ITF Taekwondo and works as a full-time nurse.
Byron a hulk of a man who works as a labourer at a building site. He has trained in BJJ, Shuai Jiao and Sambo wrestling.
Penelope works as a waitress at Ultrabucks Coffee, she has studied Karate from the age of 5 and has recently started learning Wing Chun.
8. WHAT TYPE OF AREAS IN THIS GAME COULD WE EXPECT TO PLAY IN?
Unlike your regular beat ‘em ups the locations have a huge effect on gameplay, so the first stage is the town centre, much like most beat ‘em ups, it’s kind of the typical streets stage. But, you can enter every single building as you walk through the street, pubs, supermarkets and a DIY shop. Later in the stage there’s a gun shop, and so many other stores. Other stages include an office building, strip bar and a military base. The demo includes 3 different stages, but there will be around 48 stages in total.
9. LETS TALK ABOUT SOME OF THE GAMEPLAY ASPECTS OF THIS GAME, SO TELL US ABOUT SOME
OF THE FIGHTING MACHINCS THAT WE CAN PLAY IN WE COULD BE HEROES?
You have a lot of combos. Just pressing Kick or Punch continuously does your main combos, but pressing up or down while pressing kick or punch will do a different combo, but you can for example press Punch, Punch, Down Kick, Up Punch and do a different combo, you can mix and match them with either punch or kick while pressing up or down. You also have back and punch and back and kick which will attack behind.
If you grab someone with the usual walk into them, you can also throw but pressing Up, Down, Back or Forward will do different throws and also allow you to choose where to throw the enemy.
This allows you to knock enemies into the background or foreground which give the player a lot of options for crowd control, especially if you knock an enemy through a shop window or down a subway as they will have to walk around before they can attack you.
You can also use link combos you throw people during attacks, and the throws will vary depending on the combo.
The main fighting is very grounded, you have jump kicks, but no real juggling. I want We Could Be Heroes to feel more real in the combat, all the moves are based on really moves, acted out by real martial artists, so every move in the game has been and can be recreated by a real person. I want the player to feel like they are in an 80s action movie, brutal and over the top.
10. WILL WE USE FINISHERS AGAINST THE ENEMIES IN THE GAME?
Yes, and it’s quite an important part of the game. Normally when you defeat an enemy you knock them unconscious, but you can continue you beat them while they are down until they die. So if you want to be a true hero, you have to not kill the enemies, but that’s up to the player. You can crush heads, break necks, decapitate enemies, cut them in half or even split them right down the middle with a chainsaw. There is also element of the scenery which will kill enemies, like wood chippers for example.
11. WHAT TYPE OF WEAPONS CAN WE USE AGAINST THE ENEMIES IN THE GAME?
There are so many, every item can be used as a weapon, for example the supermarket has products on the shelf, apples, beer bottles, breakfast cereal, etc which can all be picked up and used. Sure, a beer bottle will do more damage than an apple, but that’s down to the player to choose.
You can also throw enemies through the shop shelves destroying them, and then use the broken shelves as weapons. You can pull drain pipes off the walls to hit bad guys with, destroy cars and then use the wheels to hit enemies with.
But you also have more traditional weapons, swords, guns, chainsaws or wheelchairs. Did mention that you can also use the severed limbs of your victims as a weapon?
12. NOW WITHIN EACH STAGE TELL US ABOUT SOME OF THE BOSSES WE WILL FACE IN THE GAME.
Each stage is grouped into 8 areas, which each feature different gangs, the first one being the typical punk gang. You then have a gang leader which will appear at some point during the stage, they won’t always be the toughest guy in the stage, but each will have their own unique fight style and moves. But it’s more like the game will feature boss stages, because some of the bosses will feature huge amounts of enemies attacking the player all at once.
13. WILL THERE BE ANY DLC IN THE FUTURE?
Yes, I’ve already planned a major update for some time after launch as I came up with a bunch of new ideas, it will be a free update but I can’t talk about it until much later as it’s something quite special.
14. THE BILLION-DOLLAR QUESTION WHY SHOULD PEOPLE WANT TO PLAY THIS GAME DAY ONE?
Because I guarantee you will have never played anything quite like it, an old school beat ‘em up on the surface with insane amounts of environment destruction and a level of physics never seen in a brawler. And best of all, you can play 4 player co-op for the ultimate night in with your friends.
15. WHEN WILL WE COULD BE HEROS RELEASE AND WHAT PLATFORMS WILL IT BE ON?
We Could Be Heroes is planned for a late August 2024 release on Steam, Playstation and Xbox.
16. WHERE CAN THEY FIND YOU ON SOCIAL MEDIA?
I have all the major ones:
https://store.steampowered.
https://twitter.com/CebCode
https://www.tiktok.com/@
https://www.youtube.com/
https://www.facebook.com/
https://www.threads.net/@
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