How Hi-Fi Rush made fighting to the beat fun for those without rhythm

All my life I have experienced a crucial block to fully enjoy rhythm games: I have no rhythm. That didn’t stop me from trying the old college though. For years I suffered from subpar Guitar Hero performances and B rank results on Dance Dance Revolution games. Input Hi-Fi Rusha game that combines the hacking and smashing of a 3D action game with rhythmic combat. Hi-Fi Rush fun no matter how well your inner metronome is tuned. I sat down Hi-Fi Rush Director John Johanas to ask him: How exactly do you make a rhythm game for those who don’t have rhythm?

Johanas told me that the Tango Gameworks team was always imagining something Hi-Fi Rush as a rhythm game. In the game you play as Chai, a brave young man who dreams of becoming a rock star. After a lab accident, he has an iPod implanted in his chest and is attuned to the rhythm of the world around him. It’s up to Chai to fight his way out of the surrounding world of Vandelay Technologies. As he hacks and slashes, the fights pulse to the beat of rock tracks from the likes of Nine Inch Nails, The Black Keys and The Prodigy.

When I asked Johanas how the idea came about, he said: “Surprisingly, it was relatively unchanged from the original pitch. And while many of the team members said, Will this really work? They helped us to at least try.”

Image: Tango Gameworks/Bethesda Softworks via Polygon

The challenge was to mix the two genres – rhythm game and action-adventure – and keep it playable. “First we developed a system where everything is synchronized so that it ends up in time,” says Johanas. From there, the team implemented a system where you don’t get penalized for not hitting everything perfectly – even if you don’t time your attacks right, Chai will still make the moves on the beat – but landing hits on the song’s beat gives you an extra bonus.

“You’re not limited by the music, you know, you can do whatever you want. You can do any combination you want,” he said. “The enemies will move like in a normal game. It’s just that everything is dubbed like a music video.”

The developers carefully implemented the rhythm mechanics. The game includes a small visualizer that shows the beat very clearly if you’re having trouble tuning into a particular song. The game’s world is also full of other visual cues, like the puffing of steam around Chai or the pace at which he’s snapping his fingers.

As development progressed, the team trimmed certain features to keep it simple and playable. In Hi-Fi Rush, you can summon partners to come into the field and attack enemies for you. During development, the team tested a feature that would allow you to completely switch characters mid-battle and play the game at a different pace.

Image: Tango Gameworks/Bethesda Softworks

“Nobody could understand it because it was so complicated to switch from one character with a certain rhythmic style to another, like in the blink of an eye in the chaos of combat. So we are like OK, we’ll make it as easy as possible. So now it’s literally a push of a button that you don’t have to worry about when to call your partners, they do it for you.”

Hi-Fi Rush is not just an accessible rhythm game. Tango Gameworks was also a great entry point for those looking to try the 3D action genre. The moment you step into a game, say, bayonetyou get a relatively large repertoire of combos to practice with. In Hi-Fi Rushtakes you through the game hit by hit, button by button.

“The game was designed with accessibility in mind, with the idea that these are typically genres that people tend to steer away from because it’s not their type of genre, and we wanted to create something that’s accessible and fun, and that even people who have difficulties with it [it] can probably play to the end.”