Games likeFinal Fantasy 14are, simply put, complex. Not only can they have a long lineage of experiences to draw from when creating combat and character class designs, but they’re comfortable with the idea that players will learn these patterns and rotations over a long time. A pick-up-and-play roguelike likeRabbit and Steeldistilling these complexities into a quick experience is a massive challenge.
Rabbit and Steelis something of a love letter toFinal Fantasy 14andthe genre of MMORPGs in general. Where roguelikes and bullet hells are hardly new,Rabbit and Steelinnovates on those genres by bringing in mechanics from some of the iconic raids inFinal Fantasy 14, as well as character classes based on the same tropes that the successful MMO employs in its own class design. Mino Dev, the creator ofRabbit and Steel,recently spoke with Game Rant while riding high on the game’s launch weekend being a hit among its fanbase. He discussed his love ofFinal Fantasyand how it informed the design of his games, in particular the blend ofMMOraiding and roguelike bullet dodges.
Pick-Up-And-Play MMO Raiding
The biggest challenge was trying to distill the complexity of endgame raiding in an MMO into something that could be played far more casually. Mino couldn’t rely on particularly complex mechanics like those found in some ofFinal Fantasy 14’s most demanding content, but it still needed to be evocative of that experience.
His solution was to place heavy emphasis on the “hokey-pokey” style of combatFinal Fantasy 14likes to employ, putting dodging and mobility at the forefront of his design. Fights as early asFF14’sA Realm Rebornre-release, like those in the World of Darkness, can require players to note specific debuffs and move to certain locations at specific times because of them, and that style of mechanic has grown more complex over the decade since.
I tried to avoid that stuff not because I don’t think it’s good design, because I do think it’s cool within the context ofFinal Fantasy 14, but because it’s a tiny indie game that is supposed to be pick-up-and-play. You can’t have any really complicated stuff like that inRabbit and Steel. You can’t do things that need to be puzzled out and understood quickly. It needs to be very obvious why you died.
That’s why Mino focuses more on things like crisscrossing or spinning attack patterns. Dodging a telegraphed area of effect attack is far, far simpler to communicate in a pick-up-and-play environment than complex debuff-related timed movement mechanics, while still allowing a high degree of difficulty evocative of endgame raid content.
This dovetailed nicely with another major influence seen in thebullet hell dynamicsof the game,Touhou. The two genres of combat have significant overlap, and it shows clearly in the wayRabbit and Steeltackles the instantly recognizable Stack mechanic common in MMORPGs. InRabbit and Steel, that mechanic draws from aTouhouboss, Suwako, whose Mishaguji-sama attack forms the template for the “Sun Priestess circles” Mino uses. These circles are rings of bullets that fire outward, thus requiring players to stack together in the center of the circle. He named them after a similar attack used by the Sun Priestess in his previous game,Maiden and Spell.
Though, he admitted, he did have to tone down the bullet hell patterns. When the game was featured at theSteam Next Fest, Mino watched a talented endgame raider he knew fromFinal Fantasy 14struggling to complete the game’s solo story mode on its normal difficulty thanks to complex bullet hell dynamics. This was an eye-opener for Mino, a bullet hell veteran. While the kind of dodges seen inFinal Fantasy 14have thematic overlap with bullet hell dynamics, Mino realized they aren’t the same kind of skill.
It’s very easy to make bullet hell patterns that are difficult–you just put more bullets on the screen and make the dodges more precise. You can have creative, pretty little patterns that are absolutely deadly. They’re all very easy to make, but making like a single-player “raid encounter,” with cleaves and teleports and circles you have to get into is a little bit more difficult, but I got used to it over time.
As a result, the final version of the game features a single-player mode that more closely reflects its multiplayer experience than the demo did.
Looking Forward and Back, Forward and Back
While it may be fair to say, as many have, thatRabbit and Steelis a fusion ofTouhouandFinal Fantasy 14, Mino thinks that’s somewhat reductive. He believes the game is actually a fusion of his original title,Maiden and Spell, withFinal Fantasy 14. Not only is theRabbit and Steelstack mechanic based on an attack pattern from the previous game, but a number of attacks share visual and thematic elements with the previous game. Characters fromMaiden and Spelleven make passing appearances inRabbit and Steeldepending on the character classes players choose.
This creates strong visual language and thematic links between his games without needing to place them in a shared setting,something theFinal Fantasyfranchise is well-known for. He even used theFinal Fantasyseries inspirations of the two titles as a way to explain the distinction between them.
In a way,Maiden and Spellis about as linked toRabbit and SteelasFinal Fantasy Dissidiais toFinal Fantasy 14. The world isn’t shared, but there are certain elements that are common between them because they’re in the same series, that sort of give them this link…I’ve done the same in both games, but they are both very different games, as one is a fighting game and one is a roguelike.
When asked if this meant his next title will be aFinal Fantasy Tacticspastiche with a name fitting the pattern he’s established, he agreed that he’ll probably continue along those lines. Right now, he’s focused on the more immediate future–both for his own game and forFinal Fantasy 14.He raced to get Rabbit and Steel launched far enough ahead ofDawntrailthat he could focus on the latest MMO expansion, describing it as “self-crunch.”
In Square-Enix’s industry-leading MMO, Mino plays as a lalafell Summoner and is excited to exploreDawntrail’s new Pictomancer job. He’s proud of the way his game can emulate the experience ofFinal Fantasy 14in a new way, and also hopes to timeRabbit and Steelupdates in the future to coincide with lulls in content for the world of Etheirys.
The next timeFinal Fantasy 14falls into a little bit of a lull, maybe between patches or something like that, I can try to have something big, something like new bosses, new classes, that kind of thing, as free DLC. It might be like, you know, “Let’s agree to meet back in the Moonlit Kingdom next time we’re all bored, okay?” That kind of thing.
For now, his focus is on requested features he can implement before Dawntrail releases. He was reluctant to make many commitments about what will make that deadline, but he did mention working on both mod support, possibly through Steam Workshop, as well as a system to try item combinations against training dummies as possibilities. Mod support will not be ready by Dawntrail, however, but there’s still plenty to enjoy and look forward to.SinceDawntrailreleases July 2, fans can expect some updates before then, but it remains to be seen what exactly makes it in. After that, Mino will meet players back in the Moonlit Kingdom during a patch lull.
Rabbit and Steelis available on Steam.
