Ratalaika Games Interview - Porting, Partnerships, Vita & the Future - Article
by Adam Cartwright , posted on 03 August 2018 / 4,674 Views
At the start of 2017, indie porting studio/publisher Ratalaika Games revealed on Twitter that it had received a Vita dev kit and was working on porting its titles to the console. Fast forward to the current day and the team has built up an impressive portfolio of more than 10 games for the Vita, with plenty more on the way too. These tend to be shorter experiences that provide a fun dose of portable gameplay, but with the studio expanding into genres such as text adventures, the developer seems to be an interesting variable in the future of Vita in its twilight years.
With the team being active on Twitter and regularly engaging with the Vita fanbase, I took the opportunity to contact them to ask all about their mantra, their future projects, as well as personal thoughts on the Vita as a piece of hardware and the buyers who still purchase games for it. What I got in response was one of the most enthusiastic replies I'd ever seen and a wonderful set of answers (including a few surprise reveals too!), making it quite possibly my favourite interview yet.
First off, tell me a little bit about yourselves; who makes up Ratalaika and what do you all do?
We're a team of two people! We work in porting & publishing games to consoles. I code and work on marketing / promotion duties and my partner does testing and product management, submitting everything to the platforms holders!
What is the company's history? When were you founded and what was your first project?
It was founded by myself a few years ago back in 2013. Back then I was working on mobile only projects as most indie developers. Also worked for OUYA and some other Android consoles, then after a few failed games I moved on to porting because it was easier as I suck as a game designer!
How did you first get into contact with Sony? Was it an easy process to get hold of a Vita Dev kit?
We pitched a self-developed game a loooooong time ago, it was never released but it was how we got into all consoles actually! We got our PSVita devkit to port a few games - initially we had only PS4.
How has Sony been as a partner? Have your contacts in the company been encouraging in bringing your titles to the Vita?
Pretty good! We're really happy with working with them and the promotion they do. We caught PSVita a bit late so they never asked us to port anything to it or encouraged it in any way.
Has Sony's public withdrawal of support for the handheld discouraged you at all from future development?
Meh, not really, I think it's still a good niche for indies to work on! As long as the games run on it we will keep targeting it for sure.
Vita's fanbase tends to be very vocal on social media - have you found this encouraging to continue bringing titles to the platform?
Yeah! Actually it's one of the reasons that we keep making Vita ports! All the fans love them, which is great.
In general, how is Vita to develop for? Do you run into regular difficulties in porting games across?
Quite hard actually, the CPU is pretty power-less so it's not easy to optimize for, also it has some downsides like the save system or the special resolution.
How is the submission process for Sony compared to Nintendo? Do you find one more onerous than the other?
It's easier and faster, also more predictable, which is great. As an indie dev there is nothing worse than not knowing when your game will be out of QA!
How do your partnerships with independent developers to port their titles usually happen? Do you approach them or do they come to you?
It really depends, initially we approached many devs, Like Twin Robots, Squareboy vs Bullies or League of Evil. After a few releases some devs started to approach us! Like Petite Games or TETRA's Escape's creators. Devious Dungeon was actually a recommendation from League of Evil's developer.
Do you have a favourite game (past or future) that you've worked on/are working on?
I think Devious Dungeon! I played it back when it released on mobile years ago, so I loved playing it all over again as a DEVELOPER/PORTER! I never thought that could ever happen, not even in my wildest dreams!
What engines do the games you port run in? Do they require a lot of effort to adapt to consoles?
Normally Unity3D or native code, like C or C++. We also do Java, Haxe, Lua... Depending on the game and the possible revenue we can adjust.
What genre do you have most fun working with?
I think adventure games - I really love a good story! So they are by far the best I think.
Are there any dream Vita ports you'd love to work on?
Hmmmm, I think not really at this time, we love working on small/unknown games so they can have a second chance on consoles; the one that they never had on Steam.
Let's talk about specific games - how is the porting of Devious Dungeon 2 coming along? Will it include something new?
At the moment we're not working on it yet! We're working on Random Heroes 1 first =). It should release later this year hopefully.
Similarly, what is this new adventure game you have been teasing - and what can we expect from the title?
Well, as you may have heard/seen on some social media and trophy hunter channels we frequent, we're working on an adventure game port.
It's a bit longer than usual, it would need ~100-140 hours for the platinum according to the game developer. Also it's most probably PEGI 18.
Can you tell us a little bit about your upcoming game TETRA's Escape?
Well TETRA's Escape is a puzzle platformer where you have to control a bunch of characters that can change shapes to solve the levels. It's a bit hard sometimes but we've prepared a guide for those who get stuck, like me lol...
You've teamed up with eastasiasoft for a physical release of One More Dungeon and Signature Edition Games for The Count Lucanor. Do you think initiatives like these are important for preserving titles into the future?
The Count Lucanor was published by Merge Games digitally too, that's why they did the physical edition. At the moment we prefer to keep the digital publishing in house too when possible so, we will probably reach to eastasiasoft for physical releases - probably all of the titles they want!
Can we expect physical releases for any of your future Vita titles? Is the decision on a physical release made by you or the game's developer?
Probably yes ;) The call is up to eastasiasoft haha - they do Asia for all our games so they pick the ones they like the most!
Is there a chance we may see some of your Switch-only ports like Vaccine or I and Me come to Vita?
I doubt it to be honest... I was contracted for Vaccine for Switch, I didn't even publish it, so there's not much for me to do there anymore...
I and Me is a bit so so. Maybe yes, maybe no, only time will tell...
Do future Ratalaika projects still have a chance of landing on Vita? Any unannounced ones that you can give us some hints on?
I think we will keep making Vita titles all through 2018 and 2019! As long as the game runs it will land there. Some may not if they don't run well enough, but we will be doing our best to launch as many games as possible. I think we could have ~10/12? We have more games for 2018 and 2019 already registered with Sony =D
Finally, two questions I'm asking everyone - what are some of your favourite games that you've played on Vita?
I think Day of The Tentacle Remastered! I always loved that game.
Which of the Vita models is your favourite (LCD or OLED)?
I like the OLED more, but I think that's just because I play more on it. My dev unit is LCD and my retail ones are OLED :)
I’d like to thank the guys at Ratalaika for taking the time to talk to me. You can follow updates on the developer's future projects via the official website - but the team is most active on Twitter.
