Set in the medieval era, zombie shooter TwinBlades stands out with its unique manga-like graphics. Playing as a rather unorthodox nun, you must defeat the undead in various environments, from a ruined chapel to the city market, and of course, the cemetery. Released over a year ago on iOS and the 360, the title was an instant hit, and has now joined the ever-growing library of PlayStation minis.
To learn about the game, its X-Rated adult film inspiration and the differences between iOS and PS minis, we chatted to Philippe Rapin Co-founder, Marketing & Business development at Press Start Studio, as part of our PSN Preview Week 2011.
Why did you decide to port Twin Blades from the iPhone, to the PSP minis?
Because we could, as a game developer our primary objective is to bring our games to as many people as possible. After the iPhone, iPad, Xbox 360, Bada, Windows Phones 7 and PC it felt like PSP was the most logical move, we believe people who play on PlayStation’s handheld are prone to enjoy the game. The minis version was developed in collaboration with Sanuk Games which has a good experience of the console and a certain level of expertise with PlayStation’s processes (and that’s probably half of the work). In the end we were satisfied with the port so we were confident in releasing it to the market.
Twin Blades released on the iPhone and 360 over a year ago, why did it take so long to bring it to the minis platform?
Because we’re a small team, and there are so many platforms! We’ve also been hard at work bringing additional content to the game and enhance the gameplay by adding new levels, enemies, bosses etc. The PSP minis version of the game sports all this new stuff right out of the box so it’ll be worth the wait.
Was it difficult porting a touch screen game to a handheld that did not have a touch screen?
Actually the PSP controls are particularly fit to Twin Blades‘ gameplay, and the nun is very responsive to the button controls so the PSP minis really is a platform of choice to play the game.
The protagonist is a curvaceous, weapon wielding nun, why did you decide to go with a nun?
I came across an old Italian porn movie while watching some recorded VHS tapes. It featured nuns doing unorthodox stuff, which albeit bizarre had this exciting forbidden fruit taste which imprinted in my mind more profoundly than I would have liked. I pitched the idea to the team and they unanimously liked it. It really happened as simply as that, and because there wasn’t anyone to tell us not to do it, voila.
The zombie craze is seemingly everywhere these days, even infiltrating WWII shooters, and westerns. Is this trend the reason you went with zombies in Twin Blades, and do you see this trend dying off anytime soon?
Oh zombies are the new black alright. The market wasn’t that crowded with zombie titles when we first decided to make Twin Blades so it seemed like a good idea – but by the time we released the game every man and his dog was packing undeads in their titles so it didn’t feel as original as we would have liked. Fortunately the peculiar graphics of our game contributed to its success and somehow Twin Blades managed to emerge from the flood of zombie games.
Twin Blades has already received DLC on both the iPhone and 360, will this also make its way to the minis version?
Yes they will! All the DLCs that have been released on other platforms will be featured out of the box in the PSP minis version.
Since Twin Blades is finally making its way to the minis platform, does this mean future Press Start Studios games will be releasing closer across all platforms.
In theory yes, though we haven’t made plans for the release of our next game, “Butterfly” yet.
Do you have any ambitions to make any full-fledged PSN games, or even a PSP game?
We do have projects but we aren’t ready to share anything just yet 😉
