Killer Queen Black

Partner studio: Puny Human

Concept

A competitive multiplayer strategy-platformer adapted from a cult arcade cabinet, where two teams race to win by military, economic or speed victory. The arcade original ran 5v5 across two linked cabinets sharing one large communal display.

Requirement

The arcade design did not survive contact with home hardware — a Nintendo Switch handheld panel cannot reproduce a cabinet's readable playfield. Player characters had to grow, maps had to shrink and team sizes had to drop to 4v4. Online play needed netcode that stayed fair and responsive between remote players who could no longer see each other's hands, and cross-platform voice had to work across storefronts. Beyond the Switch and PC launch, the title needed to reach additional consoles.

Approach

Engineers took on network, gameplay and systems programming for the console adaptation, working on a server-authoritative model with a manual “press to attack” input scheme that keeps remote play responsive without rewarding latency.

Cross-platform voice was integrated through a third-party voice service. Game and render performance optimization was carried out across the target hardware, and hardware porting delivered the additional console SKUs.

Delivery scope

• Network programming
• Gameplay programming
• Systems programming
• Game and render performance optimization
• Hardware porting (Xbox One and additional console SKUs)
• Cross-platform voice integration
• Platform certification support

Results

• Nintendo Switch, Windows and macOS 11 October 2019; Xbox One 22 February 2021; Stadia 30 March 2021; Amazon Luna 10 June 2021
• OpenCritic 81 across 27 critics, with 84% of critics recommending — rated “Strong”
• Player count, map scale and character scale rebalanced from the arcade 5v5 to a readable console 4v4
• Cross-platform online and voice shipped across four storefronts
• 30–45 person-months delivered, across 3–4 engineers

Engine: Unity.