Hypa Hypa, platformers!
At 6 o'clock on a beautiful sunny Monday winter morning we sat in our bathrobes on the spacious terrace of the Sluggerfly mansion and had a few beers. Could have been a few more - I can't really remember. A typical meeting between developer and publisher. Nothing special. The theme of the meeting was, "How the hell do we market Hell Pie without busting our asses?".
Someone came up with the idea "Yo, let's just shamelessly exploit some known artist's notoriety!". And what can I say... Everyone liked the idea. But who would be the best choice to support Hell Pie with his fame? After all, you can't just let Hans and Franz do it! It takes a certain level to keep up with our duo from hell. Not everyone can stand this very special humor. You need really tough peeps for that. With joggers. And bowl cuts. Ey, they need to have the moves!
Well, okay. Maybe the whole thing might have happened a little different. There actually was a meeting with the Sluggerfly devs about some marketing possibilities, but we got off topic. As usual. Because that’s how typical meetings between developer and publisher really look like. That was back at the time when a music video was making its rounds on YouTube that nearly everyone had seen: Bowl cuts, weird glasses, nodding folks, and total escalation: Electric Callboy’s “We Got The Moves”. And that's exactly what became the topic of conversation.
That was when I thought: "Ey, a collaboration between those guys and Hell Pie would be fire!". All their songs are so pumped with energy, they are catchy as fuck and - which I personally find very sympatico - they take their music seriously, but themselves not that much, because they just want to have a good time. And that’s exactly our approach for Hell Pie: A colorful platformer with totally over the top humor, but a serious approach on catchy gameplay mechanics. I threw the idea around - and it was well received: "If that worked out, that would be damn awesome!". Idea accepted!
I then tried to get in touch with Electric Callboy, which finally worked after a few detours. And luckily they were totally up for a collaboration for Hell Pie. The following weeks we juggled ideas of what would be feasible, because Hell Pie was no longer infinitely far away from the release, and the Callboys had video shoots and finally a packed schedule of concerts and festivals on the agenda. Since the music videos for "Hypa Hypa", "We Got The Moves", "Pump It", and "Spaceman" have a very unique style (and very unique costumes), we came up with the idea: why don't we do a costume combo for Nate and Nugget per song?
No sooner said than done. Aren’t those real pumped-up beauties? To round off the total package, Nico and Kevin did an awesome performance in front of the camera so that we could prepare this banger of an announcement video:
Oh, and in case that you might have asked yourself this question: NO! No, the four Electric Callboy costumes are not an additional DLC. And no, the costumes are not associated with any additional costs. We want you ALL to swing with style. The costumes are part of the game from the beginning - no updates, no paid DLCs, no bullshit! Two suitcases are parked in each of the four hub worlds, which contain the Electric Callboy dresses for Nate and Nugget.
And that's the whole story. Mission complete, friends!
Tim & The Sluggerfly Team
https://store.steampowered.com/app/889910/Hell_Pie/