Bullion – The Curse of the Cut-Throat Cattle [Game Showcase]

Yarr! Bullion – The Curse of the Cut-Throat Cattle is the new local multi-player brawler from Leda Entertainment. With a motley cast of bovine buccaneers and a unique competitive/cooperative gameplay style, Bullion aims to evoke the same feeling of friendly rivalry as the classic “couch” multi-player games from the SNES and N64 era.

Previously a mobile-focused studio, Leda Entertainment changed direction following finding that a local two-player demo of platform-racer “Bopscotch” – created purely for expos – was getting more interest than the mobile versions it was supposed to be promoting! This decision was backed up by a successful Xbox 360 launch of Bopscotch, putting social gaming first and foremost in the design for our next game.

Alongside this, we wanted to create something a bit different from the typical “first past the post” or “last man standing” mechanics of local multi-player games. Memorable characters and slapstick, family humour were also high on our “must-have” list… the result is Bullion, with its crew of pirate bulls and cows – Long John Silverside, Admiral Mootilda, Bovy Jones and others – and competitive play (only the pirate with the most treasure survives) blended with cooperative elements (if all players are dead at the same time, the game ends with no winner) to create a new local-multi-player game with huge potential for family fun, social nights in with friends and couch rivalry.

Features

Game modes

Bullion features three gameplay modes:

Avarice: the pirates fall pray to the curse. Players have a limited time in which to gather as much treasure as possible, with all but the one with the highest total being struck down. Round duration can two, three or five minutes – this can be set in the game options.

Defiance: the crew choose to stand against the heathen gods and face their champion. The players take on the island’s boss character… but seeing as they are pirates, the one with the most treasure is still the winner!

Voyage: the pirates travel across a series of islands, each of which is either an avarice-style match or a defiance-mode boss battle. At the end of the voyage, the pirate claiming victory on the most islands is the overall winner.

Treasure

Regardless of game mode, winning is all about grabbing the most loot:

Treasure chests frequently pop out of the ground (their previous owners must have done a lousy job burying them!) – these can be smashed with a few swings of a suitable weapon, spewing out loot that can then be grabbed up. Chests also occasionally contain power-ups.

Enemies drop treasure when they are cut down; additionally, the island bosses in defiance mode are treasure pinatas! And every now and then, a boss will drop a BFD (big fat diamond) on the player inflicting the right damage at the right time…

Other pirates – if you backstab your fellow pirates, they’re almost certain to have some loot on them for you to swipe! Plus cutting down a crewmate turns them into a ghost for a time, during which they cannot grab more treasure… but also cannot help you if you get into trouble!

Note that just because you smash a chest, kill an enemy etc., it doesn’t mean you get the treasure automatically… so charging in at just the right moment and stealing loose treasure due to someone else’s actions is just what any other pirate would do… the only exception to this is the boss’s BFD, but otherwise, everything else is fair game!

Death and Respawn

Should a member of the crew be cut down, they will become a ghost – in this form, they cannot enter combat or collect treasure. When this happens a grave will rise at the location they started the round in. By running back to this grave, they can respawn, re-join the battle and start grabbing loot again. Ghosts are automatically respawned after fifteen seconds, however…

If the whole crew are cut down at the same time, the game ends. Even in voyage mode. If all four players’ pirates are cut down before one of them can respawn, that’s it – the crew is lost and the gods have won!

Dash – “Bull Rush!”

When the gauge is fully charged, holding the dash button will make your pirate lower his horns and charge straight forward in a burst of speed! Any chests in the way will be smashed, while other pirates and smaller enemies will be knocked flying, but beware… running into a solid object will stun your pirate, leaving them dizzy and vulnerable to attack for a few seconds!

Power Ups

Not all treasure is silver and gold, mate! Occasionally, smashing a chest will reveal a useful power-up item to help the lucky pirate who collects it!