Yanki.Jp is the 1 person California-based team behind Unholy Robot War. This delightfully sacrilegious tongue-in-cheek arena shooter places you as a robo-Diablo protecting a non-descript tower against a swarm of robo-Jesuses (Jesii?).
Visually, it’s one of the most striking games we received and the premise was definitely entertaining. You can make up your own mind about it here, or watch the video of the game beneath.
TWD.com : What was your creative process for this game idea?
JR : “Unholy Robot War was my 10th game jam game I have created since my first game jam Molyjam in 2012. My creative process creating this game was to first set goals of what I wanted my entry to be.”
“When designing I usually go analog and sit down with sharpies and index cards writing down ideas for mechanics, themes, and any goals I wish to hit. Because the last game jam game I did “Return to Eden” for Molyjam/Boobjam was a purposely pretentious art game I knew I wanted to go the opposite direction and create an insane action game.”
“While mulling over the theme “All Out War” Kirkman’s “Battle Pope” kept coming to mind so I felt like I wanted to have my game be a nod to his previous work. To minimize hate mail and because shading metal is rather easy I went with Robot representations. The index cards begot Trello cards. Trello cards begot a prototype with stand in assets and additional tower defense mechanics.”
“Due to limited time and because I like to present as complete experience as possible I opted to kill the tower defense mechanics and just polish the Arena Shooter aspect of the game as much as possible. So Unholy Robot War was born!”
TWD.com : What kinds of games do you aim to make?
JR : “Still looking for my voice in indie games. Currently bootstrapping my game jam efforts by doing corporate freelance Unity work for the past 2 years. Due to my background from working on 10 feature films I really want to do a content story based game but I am not able to afford it. So will keep on jamming until I can figure out a suitable smaller project that I can do within my means.”
TWD.com : How do you think you will further develop this game and its concept in future?
JR : “During the 2 months that the game will be shown by the game jam I will update the game adding a boss fight and a proper ending along with other features that the public asks for.”
“Aside from that I have no plans at the moment to continue the game past that as I am not too sure I am ready to handle the hate mail I may receive due to the subject matter and I think most distribution channels may not accept it. Since I have to remodel the characters anyways to go to Ouya or any other channels I may re-skin the experience and rebrand the game while keeping my tech intact.”
TWD.com : Favorite comic?
JR : “Battle Pope!”
To follow the game’s development, visit Yanki.Jp’s official site here, or follow him on Twitter, here. And if you missed it the first time, you can play the game right now, on this very website!
