On December 2, Twisted Pixel Games announced Ms.Splosion Man. They gave me the opportunity to ask a few questions about the game. Unfortunately, at that time my questions could really not be answered. It was too early in the game development to answer most of them. I was sent a promise of a complete interview when they could answer all of my questions. Today, I am happy to be able to publish all of my questions answered by Art Director, Dave Leung.
Why did you decide to do a spin off instead of a straight forward sequel?
We never want to just do a sequel unless we feel can bring something new to the table and for a long time we were writing off Splosion Man as a one hit wonder. Then one tired late night during comic Jumper CCO Josh Bear just blurted out “Ms. Splosion Man” and that was it. We had to make it.
Will Ms. Splosion man include multiplayer as Splosion Man did?
Yes, just as before in Splosion Man, Ms. Splosion Man will include 50 single player levels and 50 completely separate multiplayer levels. We also decided against having any Boss battles in multiplayer and replaced them with 3 standard levels.
Are we going to see Ms.Splosion Man with any different abilities than Splosion man had?
The core mechanics remain the same simple 1 button sploding, but we came up with quite a few new objects for Ms. interact with. The designers have done a great job taking the new and old elements and crafted some seriously crazy sequences and puzzles.
Can we expect any more DLC for Splosion Man besides the content included in Comic Jumper?
We may or may not have a few surprises up our sleeve.
Will we see the very familiar level design or will we see new environments this time around?
The environments were something we really wanted to address this time around. Even though we didn’t add an environment artist to the team, the combination of great outsourcing, a TON of work by our lead concept artist Brandon Ford ( who modeled, textured and animated almost all of the background elements himself ), and an amazing job of content placement in the levels by the entire team, the levels of Ms. Splosion Man have made huge leaps from the previous game. I’m really happy how they turned out.
Are there plans to have Ms. Splosion Man support Avatar Awards?
The plan is yes, but we really aren’t discussing what those are at this time. Guess you’ll have to be surprised!
I realize it’s early on, but what can we expect from the game in the terms of length and difficulty?
It’s actually a bit longer than Splosion Man overall I believe. There are 100 levels in all, and we added a TON of unlockables that you can buy with money earned by completing levels, hidden shoes in each level to find, and some secret exits. As for difficulty, we have added a world map that allows players to walk around clearly marked more difficult levels and implemented a much more forgiving checkpoint system. But don’t worry, there are plenty of challenges for sadists as hardcore mode still exists along with a new unlockable game mode that I will not spoil the surprise on.
A bit off-topic, but can we expect any DLC for Comic Jumper?
We are just way too busy on both games right now to even start seriously thinking about it, though a few funny ideas have been brought up.
Thanks for the opportunity and I just feel the need to say you guys ROCK!
Thanks to you and all the Twisted Pixel fans out there. We have a lot of fun doing what we do and are really excited people are having fun with us.
