France-based game developer Little Combo began an Ulule crowdfunding campaign for their upcoming four player couch versus platform fighting game, Versus in the Dark, on November 6. With just under two weeks left for the campaign before its end, Little Combo has achieved its initial asking price of ~$23,000, exceeding their initial asking price by just 8% as of today with only one stretch goal of four total being reached. This being said, it is clear fans online are liking what Little Combo has shared so far in terms of early gameplay, but what kind of game exactly is Versus in the Dark?
While the era of the four player couch experience has largely died out in the gaming industry, the few edge cases that act as the genre’s saving grace, namely Nintendo and indie developers alone, where the original blueprint for what is now considered “friendslop”. While Nintendo perfected the medium in a number of respects with its invention of Mario Kart, Mario Party, Super Smash Bros., and many more, indie developers like Landfall games with Stick Fight, Boneloaf with the prolific physics based brawler Gang Beasts, and most recently Cranky Watermelon with their arena projectile combat party game Boomerang Fu, have trail blazed a path for more indie developers to take up an interest in four player local versus centered experiences. Little Combo’s entrance into this undersaturated genre is a refreshing twist on the formula, incorporating the versatility of a platform fighter with the one shot kill nature of something like the previously mentioned Boomerang Fu for quick, intense, and most importantly simple to pick up and play but rewarding to master group oriented fun.
Versus in the Dark sees up to four and as little as two players enter a cyberpunk themed neon-lit cityscape arena, each equipped only with an instantly killing light saber katana and the innate ability to vanish from sight whenever not actively using said weapon. In this way, players can choose to either be invisible or completely visible throughout an entire round by the simple act of swinging or not swinging their sword. The nuance here stems from the difficulty of maintaining said choice in both respects, as choosing to remain invisible leads to the possibility of falling to one’s death from losing track of their character’s position. The same can be said about a player who’s primary strategy stems from swinging their sword frequently to keep track of their character’s position. Due to the single screened nature of the four player versus genre, what one player can see on the screen, the other three players acting as their opponents can see as well, leading to a conflict of interest and hence a layer of depth that encourages a stealthy play style just as much as an aggressive, passive, or opportunistic one. This choice by the developers to leave the game’s seemingly simple central mechanics in a state that they are malleable to the individual player’s play style affords Versus in the Dark’s combat system far more per-player freedom. This fact in turn hints at a possible layer of emergent gameplay in its deceptively simple single hit kill battle system.
Be on the lookout for Versus in the Dark’s official release date announcement, however, as the game’s crowdfunding campaign was a success, its free-to-play demo is available for PC gamers via Steam as of December 2.