Fighting games are, to a certain degree, a known quality at the moment. While some of the big hitters have added their fair share of interesting quirks and twists, the core gameplay loop has largely remained the same over the past few decades. As such, players looking for something a bit out-there have had to turn to indie developers for boundary-pushers. For truly innovative spins on the genre.
One such game, which aims to bridge the gap between fighting games and other genres, is Longjuice Squeeze. Developed by a “Micro-studio” composed of one core developer and various collaborators, you can sign up to playtests for it right now. But if you want to learn more, developer Jeremy Boniface was willing to answer a few questions about the game, what inspired him to make it, its inspirations, and the distinct art style it champions.
VG247: Where did the idea of blending fighting game and rogue-like deck building mechanics stem from?
Boniface: Basically, to solve my own issues with a genre I love, I wanted to make a fighting game with,
- Meaningful character progression
- Permadeath
- PvP loot
- Low execution
I’m not personally motivated by the stakes of the fight being “can I pull off this combo” or “can I get to platinum” — I like unlocking stuff and customizing my dude. Ultimately, I wanted a fighting game multiplayer loop that kind of feels like playing an extraction shooter (like Tarkov). Roguelite deckbuilding is sort of the scaffolding for these other concepts, where your build is going to be as relevant as your moment-by-moment play.
VG247: How do you strike that balance so that fans of both genres can find something to enjoy here?
Boniface: Ultimately, I’m making a game for myself to some extent, as someone who loves both genres, and I’m hoping that resonates with other people.
I’ve never been great at learning long combos, but I love the way a fighting game feels once you get to higher level play. I love the strategic, tactical, and interpersonal layers (like mindgames) that come about when you’re able to stop mashing and understand the systems. so one of the major motivations in our design is reducing the execution barrier of entry that blocks a lot of newer players from the high-level play experience.
The main theme of the game is “1v1 fights with high stakes” – you’re either gaining or losing an item when you queue for a match. Your items gain in value as you use them, and that value gets transferred when you win an item from your opponent. So you can lose your prized items and even your entire character if you lose a match. I wanted to have that Pog or old school marbles dynamic, where you can lose your favorite item and then fight to win it back. Or your opponent could decline to rematch and juice the item to extract all that value you imbued into it during previous fights.
VG247: I’m a fan of the art style! What’s the artistic inspiration for that? What sort of vibe are you trying to get across?
Boniface: Thanks! It’s evolved a bit over time but our original inspirations were Samurai Champloo (and that mid-00’s era of adult swim in general), Alejandro Jodorowsky’s Holy Mountain (which is a wild and just super trippy movie from the 70’s), and japanese tokusatsu shows (you can see the sentai influence in some of the gear). I also just like adding a sheen of static and wobble to things.
VG247: In terms of fighting games and rogue-likes this plays like, what is Longjuice Squeeze’s the closest to?
Boniface: It’s sort of like…. Rounds by landfall meets Escape from Tarkov? I would say that the moment-by-moment is somewhere between Street Fighter and Nidhogg.
VG247: I looked at your website. Tell me what it’s like working as what you describe as a “Micro Studio”. What are the pros and cons of working as a solo dev with rotating collaborators?
Boniface: The main pro is probably just running lean. I don’t have a full-time team working on this, so my monthly burn is really low.
The main con is that there’s no shield between the outcome of this project and my own ego, I guess, ha. There are a lot of decisions that I have to make unilaterally because I don’t have another designer to bounce my ideas off of. That’s why the upcoming playtests are going to be invaluable to the project.