Jeff Minter is a highly respected video game developer who has earned a reputation for creating a brand of colorful, whimsical, irreverent, and challenging games over his 40+ year career. He is credited with more than 75 games, and we would not be surprised to find some unpublished nuggets hidden on his computer.
Jeff has been publishing games on PlayStation devices for a decade, including PlayStation Vita, PlayStation VR, PlayStation 4 and, with Akka Arrh, now both PS4 and PS5. Akka Arrh is dripping with Jeff’s sense of humor, his love of psychedelic colors and light, and his ability to create games that are a joy to play.
With the release of Akka Arrh, we had the chance to speak with Jeff and learn more about the new game.
Q. Why Akka Arrh?
I’ve been interested in Akka Arrh ever since I first heard the story of this incredibly rare arcade game held in secret for 30 years by a collector and how the ROM was “released” for all to see. everyone can try.
When I had the chance to play the game, I liked its abstract nature, the flower-like shape of the platforms. I also thought the distribution of levels between top and bottom was interesting, as was the lighting of the upstairs level sections to “electrify” incoming enemies. The original has some interesting ideas, but it doesn’t quite fit in a way that I found satisfying. So when Atari asked me which of their IP games I was most interested in working with, I saw it as a chance to explore the ideas of the original and make them work.
Q. Despite the ROM controversy, Akka Arrh is still not a household name. How would you describe the new game?
The original felt almost like a real-time strategy game to me, so I pushed in that direction a bit and made the levels almost like a series of puzzles. You can quite easily explode with bombs and pass a level easily, but to get the most points out of it you need to study the attack patterns and learn how to be effective.
It’s almost like a cross between a shooter and a puzzle game. A friend described it as “cerebral”, which no one would normally say about my explosive things.
Q. How did you approach the design of the game?
For me, the design process isn’t something you do at first and then code to a spec, it’s something that continually evolves as you create the thing. There was a lot of evolution and a few dead ends before I found myself where I thought it should be. There were times when I was pretty desperate because I thought I would never get the game to run properly. So it’s a very iterative process.
Q. You noted that the original was cool, but the gameplay ended up not being so satisfying. What do you think about this new version that will satisfy PlayStation gamers?
I changed more things from the original design than if I had worked with a better known classic. I had to change it from “interesting but kinda meh” to “interesting and fun”, which took me longer than expected.
I wanted to introduce a chain scoring mechanic where nailing successive enemies would increase a bonus multiplier, and for that I wanted something that would work over a period of time rather than instantly. Thus creates distance field “shockwaves” on surfaces that expand over time, so once you shoot an enemy, the impact creates a shockwave that spreads to other enemies. These chain reactions are really nice when you pull them off. Each level has its own unique shapes and patterns, and if you learn to work with them, you can trigger a massive extinction of sound and color.
Q. What else did you introduce to the gameplay?
I wanted the enemies to have a more visible mission than just “go down and do some damage then run away”, so I invented “energy pods” for them to steal. You lose the game by losing all the pods. Enemies go down there, tear off the pods and come up with them to take them away; you can intercept them and retrieve the pods. Later on there are enemies who will just come down and sit there eating pods unless you intervene. There are others who can ascend pods via traction beams without descending at all.
Q. Do you have any tips for players?
It’s basically a tower defense game where “you” are the tower. Swarms of enemies attack your tower; and you try to destroy them before they get too close. If they manage to reach you, they descend and deal damage. it’s up to you to go there and sort them out before they run away.
You have two types of shots: bombs and bullets. Bombs create a very destructive shockwave, but using one resets the score multiplier to zero. But for each enemy you destroy with the shockware, the bonus multiplier increases. You can shoot bullets and they don’t reset the multiplier, but they are a limited resource – you get more bullets to destroy enemies with shockwaves.
So ideally you want to start by dropping a bomb to start a chain to increase the bonus multiplier and rack up bullets, then use as few bullets as possible to pass the level with the highest possible score.
Some levels can be fully conquered with just one bomb and enough expression as a destructive chain reaction consumes the entire level and awards the highest bonus scores.
Q. The original Akka Arrh used a trackball, which is not a common controller in most homes. How did you adapt the gameplay to work with modern controllers?
The game works well with an analog stick. I expanded the armament so you can fire shots from your cursor itself as well as the turret, which opens up the gameplay and matches well with how the analog sticks work on the controller. But you can use the touchpad on PlayStation controllers.
Q. Many of your games are known for their music. What can players expect with Akka Arrh?
I wasn’t sure what kind of music I was going to put in the game. I was interested in creating some sort of semi-generative music. So I rummaged through a big bag of audio samples that I’ve been accumulating for decades now… things that interested me and clung to, including snippets from my own previous games and an old voice off of a lady saying various things. Then I built a very simple little sequencer that plays instrument samples and this bag of sounds based on what’s happening in the game. It creates a tonal sequence generated by enemies and your actions when firing on enemies. Each level has its own tonal “theme” which helps make each level distinct. In the end, I think “music” is too big a word, but I quite like the result.
Fans of amazing psychedelic arcade games can rejoice when Akka Arrh releases on February 21!
