D-Pad Studio is not known for rushing work. That his second game, his Owlboy in 2016, took him ten years to create for the team. In the wake of Metroidvania’s new renaissance, various life events, and a new renaissance directed by Simon Stuffsness Andersen, it was restarted multiple times due to studio concerns about fan expectations. Fighting Perceived DepressionAnd now D-Pad is about to release a game that took even longer to complete. It’s Vikings on Trampolines that’s been in the works for 20 years.
Speaking to IGN at Gamescom, creator Jo-Remi Madsen said he had the idea for the bouncing Butler when he was 14, playing games like Mario Kart and Super Smash Bros. with his sister. “She was giving up all the time,” Madsen says. Because even though she understood how to play, she didn’t understand the controller and she found his explanation of how it worked boring. So he started working on developing a game to be played using only a joystick. This is his core concept that Vikings on Trampolines still relies on in 2022.
So how did the Vikings get to the trampolines? When Madsen programmed the first version of the game, he didn’t yet know how to make the characters walk. But he was able to make them jump. “I’m not an animator,” he says.
Madsen’s prototype served its purpose, and for about a decade Vikings on Trampoline was largely forgotten. But when he partnered with his Andersen on his D-Pad Studio, Madsen shook off the cobwebs and showed off the new business to his partners. Andersen loved it. The team created a new prototype of the concept and turned it into a Smash-like brawler. Its prototype won the first-ever Nordic Games Indie Sensation Award at the 2011 Nordic Game Awards. A promising start for a new indie game studio.
And… then back to the vault again. D-Pad Studios initially focused on Owlboy, but in the end it took much longer than they thought. So, for almost a decade after that, the trampoline Vikings fell into oblivion once again, but by the time Owlboy was finished, D-Pad was able to shake off the dust and crack it again.
But not all the trampoline Viking hurdles have been cleared yet. The version we see now in 2022 was initially intended as a competitive couch game. There, the famous Vikings bounce around the stage on trampolines, attempting to slam each other into the ground off the trampoline. Hopes that such a game would succeed faded.
So the D-Pad pivoted again. The competitive mode remained at the core of Vikings on Trampoline, but the team repeated the idea of fleshing out a full adventure mode complete with story, villains, mini-games and boss fights. And this is the trampoline Vikings we saw at Gamescom this week. We’re still waiting for an official release date, but the 20-year story is finally coming to an end.
Yes, you can still play with one hand. Andersen joked that the one-handed setup is great for parties, “so you can have a beer with your other hand while you play.” What started out as a novelty has turned into a way of making Vikings available on the trampoline for many people who might struggle to play a couch competitive game like this. Because it uses only one, it is easy to play even for those who have trouble pressing many buttons, or for those who are not familiar with the game and do not want complicated operations. Inexperienced siblings like Madsen did it years ago.
we hands-on preview Vikings hit the trampolines at Gamescom 2022, calling it “the brightest in multiplayer” and “a blast in the right environment”, but Adventure mode also has a lot of potential. Trampolines can catch more Vikings. round up When live show in progress.
Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. you can find her on her twitter @duck valentine.
