VBlank Entertainment Founder and CEO Brian Provinciano has revealed Shakedown Hawaii, the studio’s latest game, will launch on the PlayStation 4 and Vita on May 7, 2019. Who’s ready to go old-school with some Grand Theft Auto-style shenanigans. Retro City Rampage fans, your time is almost here!
Shakedown Hawaii is a highly stylized, 16-bit, open world game in which you will focus on expanding your business by any means necessary. Every location in-game will be available to purchase, or you can put the shakedown in “Shakedown Hawaii” and take a slightly different approach to business acquisition. The tone of the game will be very lighthearted and is not meant to be taken seriously, so have some fun with it! There will be a wide variety of weaponry to eliminate your competition, side missions to complete, various vehicles like cars and boats, over 200 buildings to enter, and multiple different locations to explore, so it won’t just be the city you’ll be shaking down for that precious protection money.
Check out this trailer to get a better idea of what to expect when the game launches!
Provinciano went into detail about some of the challenges the studio faced over the course of the game’s development, including the extra work that was required when the tam chose to go with the game’s 16-bit art style. He said:
I didn’t quite realize what I was getting myself into! I began production with the line, “Let’s give the character a super smooth walk cycle, an almost rotoscoped look.” Ooof! I completely underestimated what I was asking for. I’d somehow forgotten that the characters would need both walk and run cycles for every direction and multiplied by every weapon—all hand-drawn. By the end, those little sprites literally boasted thousands of frames! However, now that all the work’s behind us, I’m glad my naivety made that decision!
He also spoke briefly about the differences between developing an 8-bit game like Retro City Rampage and a 16-bit one like Shakedown Hawaii:
Art of the 16-bit era was much more than just 8-bit with more colors. It was a total paradigm shift — and once you make the decision to boast the fidelity on one aspect, it often opens a can of worms (in a good way, but a daunting way). For example, Retro City Rampage’s vehicles sported 16 angles of rotation, which felt right in 8-bit, but felt stiff in 16, so for Shakedown: Hawaii, the vehicles needed to freely rotate. But, once they were freely rotating, the driving controls needed to be completely redone and retuned.
Will you be picking up Shakedown Hawaii on May 7th? Let us know in the comments below!
[Source: US PlayStation Blog]
