Interview With Arkhan of Aetherbyte Studios

Homebrew is the topic today. None of that fancy Atari Jaguar or NES homebrew, but Turbo Grafx 16 homebrew! Say what? Yes, the poor little system that has only gotten two homebrew releases since 2002. However, just before the coming of 2010, independent developers have managed to squeeze out one more title for the decade. The title is "Insanity", a remake of the classic arcade game Berzerk. And it's not made by MindRec, but a fresh new indie development team called Aetherbyte Studios. With my nerd paparazzi skillz, I was able to electronically track down the head honcho of Aetherbyte Studios, a young man simply known as "Arkhan", and conduct the following interview with him.

Keranu: How and when did Insanity start?

Arkhan: Sometime in maybe July, I happened across the PCE devkit stuff and messed with it when I wasn't busy. After awhile I stopped goofing with it and school started... Then, the one class said to do a project which showed good use of intellect. So I was like "Hmmmm. I think it's time to try that PCE dev again" and decided on a Berzerk clone since I like that game and it barely exists in the home console world.

Keranu: That's July of 2008, yes?

Arkhan: OH duh, the actual INSANITY coding/concept started in the middle of October 2008. The rest was just interesting backstory (I hope).

Keranu: Gotcha. What makes Insanity different from Berzerk?

Arkhan: Hopefully not too much since the idea was to make it faithful to Berzerk. The main differences are the graphical enhancements (no more stickmen!), music (both PSG and CD-ROM), and a boss battle, if you can make it that far into the game.

Keranu: Just how far are we talking here?

Arkhan: Well the level system is based off your current score just like the original. There are 7 levels of difficulty, so as long as you make it thru the last difficulty level. I did it a few times, so its doable! It certainly isn't a walk in the park though :) .

Keranu: We here at LaZer Dorks are vector graphic nerds. Have you ever played the Vectrex version of Berzerk?

Arkhan: Yep yep :) . It's the best home version of the game.

Keranu: We commend your opinion!

Will the "Evil Otto" be in Insanity? If not, who will?

Arkhan: Well, there is an "Evil Otto", but I chose to just call him the evil robot master. I couldn't think of a crafty name, I tried Toto.

Keranu: Is the evil robot master really evil?

Arkhan: He's pretty evil, he's a giant floating robot head.

Keranu: Does he have a big smile?

Arkhan: Not at all.

Keranu: Do big smiley faces intimidate you, Arkhan?

Arkhan: After playing tons of Berzerk, definitely not! As far as smiley faces go, you might run into them in Insanity.

Keranu: Okay I'll shut up about the Evil Otto.

Will Insanity be able to save your high scores onto the back up RAM of the system?

Arkhan: I thought about it but unfortunately, dead lines to get the game done by the show in October prevented it from happening. It came down to: working PSG music or implement BRAM. PSG music was definitely a higher priority, that's one thing PCE homebrew hasn't quite been graced with yet.

Keranu: Could you inform all three people reading this what show you are referring to?

Arkhan: In the local area there is a classic gaming show (CCagshow.com). It's a pretty cool show geared towards classic consoles/computers. I wanted to make sure the game was ready by then to have and demo!

Keranu: As you have mentioned, one of the most impressive features of Insanity is that it uses PSG music -- and it doesn't suck! Can you explain why PSG has been so weak in the independent scene and how you changed that?

Arkhan: Well, I'm not sure why PSG has been so weak. I have a few theories.

Keranu: Please explain your theories.

Arkhan: One is that most musicians are trackerfolk, and there is no tracker for the PCE. There are no real music tools for the PCE, and I think thats what's stopping the music from happening. The musicians don't code, and the coders don't write music, so it's a bit of a wall.

Keranu: Will Insanity feature lots and lots of lazer sounds?

Arkhan: There is a nice ADPCM lazer sound I made with an analog synth. ADPCM turned out to be pretty tricky to get going. The timing of the chip is emulated better than it really is, so retriggering the sfx on the hardware didn't turn out as perfect as I'd have liked. The only sound effect which was difficult to trigger perfectly was the enemies dying. Sometimes the explosion is perfectly fine and other times it cuts out early.

Keranu: Will all the sound effects be in ADPCM?

Arkhan: Yes, including the voices.

Keranu: Voices! What kind of voices?

Arkhan: There are robot taunts when you're playing, leaving rooms, or getting killed.

Keranu: I like my SUPER CD games to have a cool System Card error screen. Will Insanity's error screen please me?

Arkhan: If you're a fan of Tron, I think you will appreciate the error screen greatly.

Keranu: I'm excited!

If I put Insanity in my CD player to listen to the sweet redbook audio, will the computer data damage my player?

Arkhan: Only if you fail to heed the warnings of my sarcastic coding partner and leave the disc in too long. It's ok though, preorderers get a soundtrack too so, you can listen to the redbook, and the PSG stuff off that instead :) .

Keranu: Oh thank god!

I heard there is hidden content in Insanity... okay so you told me there was on IRC before. Without spoiling anything, though you're welcome to, could you fill everyone in with some clues as to what these secrets are?

Arkhan: There's a way to get to a few hidden modes in the game, two of which might make the entire community hate me. Hopefully in a good way. One's called hyper mode and one's called predator mode. Draw your own conclusions :) .

Keranu: I'm getting visions of Street Fighter II Hyper Fighting and Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Arkhan: HAHAH. No Dutch in the game, unfortunately.

Keranu: What has been the hardest challenge in making a game for the Turbo Grafx 16/PC Engine?

Arkhan: The hardest challenge? Figuring out the hardware and keeping the framerate steady :) . That and getting a good PSG music setup going.

Keranu: What has been your favorite part about working on the Turbo Grafx 16/PC Engine?

Arkhan: Getting a good PSG music setup going :) .

Keranu: Amen!

As of today (October 2nd, 2009), how many pre-orders have been sold?

Arkhan: 23 so far.

Keranu: Have you sold enough to cover the production costs?

Arkhan: Yes production costs are covered!

Keranu: Are there any plans to port Insanity over to other systems?

Arkhan: We're planning a 10 hour stunt at this show to try porting it to Playstation 1 by the time the show ends at 8pm. And then there was talk of moving it to the Sega Genesis, or the Dreamcast.

Keranu: What, no PC-FX port? I'm sure even that Frog Feast game has a PC-FX port!

Arkhan: A PC-FX port would be great! First I need to get the right hardware to try out PCFX dev though :) . I was just complaining about that earlier today actually. Soon I hope to get the devkit and hardware for the PC-FX and see what happens.

Keranu: The bitch that's known as PC-FX development!

Arkhan: I like bitches.

Keranu: How many people work for Surreal Soft, uh I mean, Aetherbyte Studios?

Arkhan: Technically it's just me doing coding and music, and my girlfriend does artwork. The rest of the help came from the old dude at Hurgle Studios and another friend who has a knack for production artwork, as you could see by the sweet box design.

Keranu: I loved the box design!

Arkhan: I hope everyone does.

Keranu: Were you in charge of the in-game graphics as well?

Arkhan: I did all the sprites, and then the same friend who did the boxart design did most of the background tiling, if not all of it. I basically just messed with the palettes and touched stuff up.

Keranu: Some people have complained in the early demo video you released for Insanity, AKA the "Mr. Roboto video", that the player speed was a little slow. Will this be different in the final release?

Arkhan: Well if you've played Berzerk, you don't move super fast. We tried to match that speed. If it's too slow, there is hyper mode.... so.... :) .

Keranu: Aha!

Arkhan: The problem with speed is that you only get 1 shot, so if the game is moving faster, you have to be way more precise with your shots, which leads to frustration. See: Hyper mode :) .

Keranu: You have announced that the next project you're working on is "PCE Arcade", a classic arcade compilation for the TG16/PCE. What kind of classics can we expect in this compilation?

Arkhan: A souped up Pac-Man remake is already being worked on. There's a prototype floating around that has some corny graphics, but is smooth scrolling. Jungle hunt, Joust... Joust is the one I'm psyched for. I'm sure you've heard about Joustaroo.

Keranu: I have, but could you elaborate more on it?

Arkhan: It involves kangaroos, and jetpacks. Birds are too 1980s for me.

Keranu: Did I hear that right? Kangaroos... and jetpacks?

Arkhan: Yes, kangaroos and jetpacks.

Keranu: That sounds incredible.

Arkhan: I hope it's as comical as I envision it. We're hoping to have a demo of at least Pac-Man and Jungle Hunt out by Christmas time.

Keranu: Has any real production began on PCE Arcade?

Arkhan: Yes, the Pac-Man demo is pretty good and written. After Insanity here, we're going to take a break and then dive into getting Pac-Man finished. It is not your standard 1 screen Pac-Man. It's multiscreen, with scrolling maps.

Keranu: Any wild guess on when PCE Arcade will be completed?

Arkhan: Hopefully Xmas of 2010.

Keranu: Are there any other projects Aetherbyte Studios has planned?

Arkhan: The hope is that Insanity is received well, and the arcade pack goes smoothly enough to give us enough resources to make my Ys-style RPG I have had storyboarded out for years. PCE needs more homebrew, and I hope to do as much as I can to fix it :) .

Keranu: Sounds like an exciting future for Aetherbyte Studios!

To conclude this interview, do you have anything you'd like to say to the Commodore 64 community?

Arkhan: "Your loss", maybe.

Keranu: Mr. Arkhan, thank you for your time.

Arkhan: Back at you :) .

Insanity is slated to be released on or before October 24th, 2009 and can be preordered directly from Aetherbyte Studios' website. Preordered copies will come signed and numbered and include a bonus CD soundtrack, so preorder now while it lasts!

- Keranu, October 3rd, 2009 1:53am USA Central Time