The Developers of Dead as Disco Used Over 10,000 Feedbacks to Design the Game, and They're Onto Something
Dead as Disco's developers at Brain Jar Games built their near-perfect combat system in under two years by incorporating massive amounts of player feedback from early access, with four new bosses planned before the 1.0 release.
The disco is so here
We can't stop thinking about Dead as Disco. One of the best games we've played this year by far, with a combat system and rhythm matching that's nothing short of perfect. In a fascinating and headline-filled interview I had with one of the developers, I can say plainly that disco isn't dead - it's here to stay until its 1.0 release, and will only keep on living from there.
I'll start with an explanation of the game's development process, because I find it fascinating. Development officially began only in early 2023, when the founder of Brain Jar Games started recruiting developers to brainstorm some ideas for the studio's first game. Once they had a few ideas, the developers shared them with people and saw that the concept for Dead as Disco was the most successful - and chose to pursue that direction.
From there, they only increased the amount of consultation with their audience, and decided to try to get the game out to the public as quickly as possible. Already in 2024 they started giving people access to it, and developed the game's unique combat system together with that feedback. There are games that struggle for years trying to find the right way to do combat - and I think Brain Jar Games hit upon the method here. Building such an impressive system in less than two years is quite an achievement, and I hope more developers will take inspiration from them and develop with as much external feedback as possible.
But I didn't only ask him about the past - but also about the future. The game is set to receive about 4 more new bosses before its final release, the first of which will arrive at the end of September and was described by the developer I interviewed as "very spicy." Each of the bosses will be a former bandmate of Charlie Disco in a different music style, with a jazz boss stage and a reggae boss hinted to us as coming soon. I suggested they do a classical music stage with a Mozart skin, we'll see if that happens.
Of course the question of questions was about the console release, and the developer answered with the same response several times: "We currently really want to bring the game to consoles, to Switch and to Xbox." He then said there will probably be something to reveal about that in about two months. Could they appear in a Direct? I really think so.
Even in its current version this is simply a tremendous game, and we can't wait to see what they plan to do with the rest of the bosses in the near future. Thanks to Adam Gershowitz for the interview.