I sat down with Jake and Edan, the developers behind HYPER PRIMATE, a blisteringly fast action-platformer that throws you into a wild world of wall-jumping, smashing, and all-out mayhem. We talked about the challenges of building the game solo, the inspiration behind its over-the-top style, and what players can expect when they dive into the chaos.
Tell us a little about yourself and how you got started in game development.
Jake: I’ve been trying to make games since I was little, it’s something I grew up with and have always pursued from the first time I had access to a computer. The first projects I made were when I was 10 (25 now) starting in Game Maker with 2D games and then moving on to Unity, where i made some terrible prototypes around age 12-14, things like Slender clones and stuff like that which was trending at the time.
I picked up Unreal 4 in 2015 – 16 and started trying to learn the engine, but honestly it was a lot to process and I ended up giving up on it a number of times. Eventually, with enough attempts at trying to understand the engine it finally clicked in 2018 and I started making a bunch of prototypes. From there, I scaled up my prototypes and made them more complicated but never released anything commercially, until 2022 when we started developing HYPER PRIMATE. That’s how I got started – if you can call me started considering I haven’t released anything publicly yet!
Edan: I have spent many years being a gamer, but not actually seriously pursuing anything in the field. With many hours spent playing around with different software, I’ve slowly built up a skillset which can actually be used in this niche. Hours spent playing Minecraft and other sandbox games have been invaluable in learning world design and aesthetics. Many hours in FL Studio have taught me the skills to produce music for the game. I picked up Blender to learn 3D modelling in the initial stages of development of HYPER PRIMATE… It all sort of came together by accident.
What inspired your latest game, and what was the initial vision behind it?
Jake: HYPER PRIMATE definitely didn’t start out in the direction we’ve taken it now. Honestly, it was originally meant to have a small development cycle and just be a cheap but fun multiplayer meme shooter to play with friends, just to put something out there as a first release. There is one core tenant which has stuck since the very beginning of development though: “No anti-fun mechanics” which we define as introducing any restriction, mechanic or limitation onto the player that doesn’t improve the player’s enjoyment of the game, we consider everything pretty carefully in that regard and don’t want to introduce mechanics as if they are some sort of checklist. For example: It’s an FPS game and therefore needs Aim down sights and sprint.
With that in mind we experimented with free flowing movement for a while to try and develop something that felt great to control and unique at the same time for a multiplayer shooter. Eventually, the movement became too complicated of a system and difficult from a networking perspective. On top of that, gun fights felt awkward when everyone was moving a so fast but the movement itself was becoming something special, so we decided to completely rework the concept and focus entirely on the movement fantasy. We started to draw more from indie games like ‘Ultrakill’ and ‘Neon White’, which are amazing indie titles and then threw in a bit of retro platformer (Think Donkey Kong and Crash Bandicoot) and that’s the inspiration and genre blend we have now.
Edan: This game started life as a goofy multiplayer arena shooter with monkeys, and without really knowing which direction it would go, we just got started. I invested lots of time in learning how to model and animate in blender, and started cooking up the soundtrack. We toyed with different gameplay ideas, fleshing out how the world would look. Before long there was a coherent gameplay theme of jungle parkour. Jake cooked up some pretty fun movement mechanics, which didn’t translate easily into multiplayer so we doubled down on the singleplayer side of the game. Before long there was a half decent campaign with several different environments. Drawing inspiration from classics from our childhood, such as Donkey Kong Country, Crash Bandicoot and DOOM, and blending them with the modern gameplay we’ve come to love from titles such as ULTRAKILL and Neon White, we watched something new unfold before our eyes.
What were some of the biggest challenges you faced during development?
Jake: Definitely implementing such a robust ghost system and getting it to perform well / represent the player accurately and smoothly. There were a lot of nights spent until 4am trying to set it up and now we’re pretty proud of it. Handling all the data and ensuring it’s saved properly and plays back well definitely took days and days of tweaking.
I guess the other thing I’d mention is purely size and scope. We’ve scope crept this game a lot and new things just keep getting introduced. To give you an example, in terms of levels we have a pretty high target for level count (around 100 across 9 biomes) and we mostly make everything ourselves which is a lot of assets to create!
Edan: Learning was a huge hurdle for me. I basically started with zero skill in 3D modelling, so the learning curve was sharp. All the skills needed to put together game ready assets took a while to acquire, however we had the luxury of time, given we were still under lockdown during covid. I guess one thing that has taken the longest is improving the original assets I produced while still learning. It can feel like backtracking sometimes, but it pays off once done.
Is there a particular moment or feature in your game that you’re especially proud of?
Jake: On my end for sure the movement system and from Edan’s side of things I gotta give him major props for making such an awesome soundtrack, there’s already almost 30 tracks and they all sound great.
In terms of the movement system though, we genuinely think it’s one of a kind. It might not be perfect but we’re really happy with how different it is from other titles and the shear amount of freedom and options you have for simply moving around the game. There’s also so many hidden interactions and techniques you can pull off if you experiment, it’s really deep and if you master the system the amount of things you can pull off is genuinely insane.
Edan: Pushing the first built version out to the world and watching people actually play it was a pretty special moment. We’ve had moments of doubt that there was anything that people would actually enjoy in the game, however the small community we’ve watched grow around the game has been quite amazing!
How do you approach balancing creativity with the realities of budget, time, and resources?
Jake: The only solution to that conundrum for me is that it’s my hobby, which really helps alleviate time constraints. I essentially spend all my spare time on development because I enjoy it so much, which leads to me finding a lot of extra hours to put into it. Luckily, since there’s only the two of us working on the title, creativity can really flourish, we have no-one watching over us and trying to force us to hit deadlines or restrict budget, we can really make anything we wish which is really liberating.
On the flip side of things we don’t have a lot of resources and budget to channel into the game as it’s all out of pocket but we do what we can and we definitely wouldn’t change the way we’re making the title, that’s for sure.
Edan: Creativity doesn’t happen on a schedule, so it can be a real challenge to get things done within a planned timeframe. Myself and Jake both work fulltime, and find moments of spare time to work on this project. It is entirely funded out of pocket.
What advice would you give to aspiring indie developers just starting out?
Jake: There’s a couple of things but foremost: Just start a project with the intention of releasing it no matter how good or bad it is. Don’t do it for any kind of monetary reasoning and place some constraints on yourself to make sure that you release it. Maybe give yourself 3-6 months and whatever you have, release it. The whole process of getting setup on steam, getting people to playtest the game teaches you so much. There’s so many aspects to game dev you don’t even think about until you release a title and trust me you will thank yourself for going through with releasing something because of just how much knowledge you’ll gain about the process.
Edan: Keep moving forward. Iteration is part of the process, just cause something didn’t work the first time, doesn’t mean you can improve it in future. Sometimes you find out what you are supposed to do by doing what you’re not supposed to do.
What’s next for you — any future projects or updates in the works?
Jake: Currently I’m prototyping something pretty unique with my Partner when we have time, I can’t speak much about it because nothing is set in stone yet but I’m excited to share more. Beyond that Edan and I will be following up with a second title regardless of how well this one does, we’ve got something horror based in the works.
Edan: We are looking into a couple different ideas for horror titles. It’s pretty early in the process, but as the saying goes… “let him cook”.
Where can people follow your work or support your game?
Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@TotemSoftproducts/featured
Discord: https://discord.gg/X8JGKZy5m5
Twitter: https://x.com/TotemSoft
