Retro Inspired: Battletoads
They’ve starred in infamously tough games, they’ve been cartoon heroes and they’ve even been the bane of Gamestop employees across America. Now Zitz, Rash and Pimple are back, so we found out how the developers approached their return
Discover why it was the right time to bring back Rare’s anthropomorphic amphibians
Gaming has had some unlikely comeback stories, but the
2020 revival of Battletoads is a particularly impressive one. When the game was announced at E3 two years prior, it was the first sign of new activity for the series in well over two decades – and while the series wasn’t forgotten, it had acquired a certain reputation. For most people under the age of
30, Rare’s brawler was most recognisable as a staple of prank calls and lists of obnoxiously hard games. While a residual fondness drove those things, could Rare and Dlala Studios get people to take a new Battletoads seriously?
Fortunately, that question never needed answering. After a triumphant brawl through the first stage, the second stage throws any pretence of seriousness out of the window as Pimple becomes a masseuse and Zitz sends repetitive emails – all under your control. “When we were writing things and decided that the toads were going to have to go back to basics, to go to a job agency and get jobs, we were like, ‘It would be funny if it was a story beat, but how much funnier would it be if you had to play these stupid jobs?’” says AJ Grand-scrutton of Dlala Studios, designer and director of 2020’s Battletoads. “When we spoke publicly we had these big pillars, but there was a hidden pillar. On a big blackboard in the middle of the office, we had, ‘Does this make you say stupid game?’ and that kind of embodied our approach to making the game. We wanted a game we took seriously [in terms of] making, but that was just a ridiculous game – and not for the sake of it, but so that it made sense in the story we were telling.”
That story sees Zitz, Rash and Pimple reduced to would-be heroes in search of the
fame they used to have, with their over-the-top Nineties attitude reimagined as an alarming capacity for poor decision-making and accidental mayhem. This cartoon attitude permeates everything, from the story presentation to the in-game graphics. “It was a real mixture of classic Tex Avery and Looney Tunes stuff, and then we wanted to combine in Nineties era, early Noughties Nicktoons and Cartoon Network – you know, when cartoons really started going weird,” AJ explains. “Also, that influence from the kind of games we grew up with – not just Battletoads but the amazing platformers of the Nineties that you used to get on the Genesis and the SNES. They still look beautiful, the animation is fantastic and they’re timeless. So that all just went into this blender and came out through the lens of our animation director Eric [Ciccone].” This went down well over at Rare, too. “What really sold it for us that first time is when we saw the eyes popping out of Rash, Pimple and Zitz,” says Paul Collins of Rare, who worked on the creative side of Battletoads. “That feeling of encapsulating all of this cool stuff inside of this Saturday morning cartoon just added that nostalgic feeling to it, that we were really keen to capture.”
Of course, cartoon animation without a game design won’t get you very far, and this was what came up when we asked about the key characteristics of Battletoads that the team wanted to preserve. “The big one for me was the genre mash-up side of things,” says AJ. “When I think of what Battletoads means to me as a game and a franchise, I always swing towards that first Battletoads and Battletoads/ Double Dragon more than any of the others, so when we were approaching this I really wanted to make sure we nailed home the erratic, permanently changing game genres.” At the same time, the team needed to think of how to improve upon the old formula. “I think some of the stuff that stood out for us was just amplifying all of those existing genres, but at the same time allowing Dlala to just go crazy and really staple some new genres into it,” says Paul. “One of the things I like to look at is combat, that feeling of the smash hits happening at certain moments, but we really wanted to let players feel like they were in control of all the moves this time, to feel like they have that feeling of mastery. I’ve really liked seeing all the different Twitch streams of people trying out the moves and trying out stuff that I didn’t even think of before.”
Difficulty is another key part of the Battletoads identity, but one where authenticity potentially creates a barrier to wide enjoyment of the product. “This is definitely one of the most interesting challenges we had throughout the project,” says AJ. “One of the advantages of working with Rare is that it gave us access to things that we don’t always get ourselves, such as user testing. But it’s definitely hard and you never really know how difficult something is as the creator, because you can never appreciate how much you’ve adjusted to the stuff you’ve made. I actually think the game’s a bit harder than I thought it was, seeing people play and their reactions.” Apart from including three difficulty levels, the developers chose to add some reactive aids and extra goals. “There are the invincibility flies – on Tadpole and Toad, if we’ve noticed that you’ve had to wipe a few times, then you have the ability to press up on the d-pad to activate it for that checkpoint,” says Paul. “Then with having the time bonuses, the score attack and the collectables you can look back at the end of a level and go, ‘Oh, can I go back in there and do a bit better?’”
Battletoads launched in August 2020 to a positive reception – you can read our review on page 88. “We wanted to make a stupid game, and the internet is telling me I’ve made a stupid game,” concludes AJ. What better accolade could you hope for?