Denshattack! is one heck of a quirky and exhilarating action game. You control a train and perform Tony Hawk Pro Skater-style tricks against the backdrop of a colorful Japan that's been devastated by climate change. I played a demo a few months ago that showed off a few of the modes, and many ways the game utilizes its trick system, but we didn't experience boss fights. Now that it's available as of today, July 15, everyone can experience them, but Undercoders has been particularly excited about their bosses. I was briefly able to interview game director David Jaumandreu about the creation, inspiration, and design philosophy behind the fights, as well as ask one silly question—because it's Denshattack!
Anthony: I was able to play some of the Denshattack! demo, but I don't recall fighting a boss. How did the team come up with the idea of including bosses in a game about a train doing Tony Hawk's Pro Skater-style tricks?
David: The idea to have boss fights in the game came both from a story and a progression necessity. Firstly, we wanted to create a shonen-like story in which players would advance in their adventure by facing more powerful gangs every time that were always led by a powerful rival. Boss fights were ideal to represent this, as the climax of every region, where the protagonist needs to measure their forces against the gang leader.
Secondly, we wanted the game to introduce new challenges and mechanics in every chapter, so that the adventure would always feel exciting yet the difficulty progression curve felt smooth and well paced. To achieve this, we wanted to make sure that everybody would have mastered the mechanics taught by the end of the chapter and bosses felt like a great way to put players to the test in one final exam, before advancing to the next challenge.
Anthony: What makes each boss in Denshattack! special?
David: Each of the rival gangs in the game have a very unique style, based both on modern day and historical Japanese sub-cultural trends, such as rockabilly, bosozoku, sukeban or gyaru. Of course, the leaders of each gang represent that concept in its maximum expression, not only in terms of fashion or style, but also in terms of attitude and, of course, their preferred machine for riding and combat.
All of the battles are designed to feel as special as their leaders. For example, Yoshie, the rich girl gyaru boss, forms a giant mecha boss by combining her train with her colleagues by using friendship power; Madoka, the bossy and violent sukeban leader, attacks you with a giant pitching baseball machine, while using her minions as a shield; and Fumihiko and Shin, the Rockabilly mechanic geniuses, have modded an old castle with scrapped automobile parts to work as a giant steam-powered machine. We’ve put in a lot of work so that every battle not only feels different in a mechanical way, but also tied to the characters and story the game is in at every moment.
Anthony: You mentioned to me that each battle shakes up the typical gameplay. I'm sure you want to keep those a surprise, but what do you want players to feel, generally, from these fights?
David: On one hand, we want to keep surprising players so that the game stays fresh throughout all the adventure. Like a good shonen manga, each chapter anticipates the presence of a new gang and a powerful leader that builds up the tension up to a climatic one on one fight. Of course, the combat has to feel more exciting, unique, spectacular and higher stakes than the rest of the chapter!
On the other hand, we want players to have a feeling of accomplishment when defeating a boss. For this, we kind of followed the Super Mario Kishotenketsu four step design philosophy, in which after presenting new mechanics and challenges at the beginning of the chapter and increasing the challenge throughout its development, we end up with a boss that twists them in a way that feels unexpected and spectacular, to offer a satisfying conclusion once they have been defeated.
Anthony: How challenging was it to create battles that felt true to the rest of the gameplay and still uniquely interesting as a fight?
David: It was quite an interesting design challenge and a really fun one to tackle. The most constraining factor when creating these was that the train never stops moving and, consequently, either the enemy has to move at your pace or you need to circle around the enemy. All of the encounters are somehow designed so that they work at a high moving speed by combining different situations in which both parts can clash: sometimes you're chasing, sometimes you’re fleeing, sometimes you’re just finding an opening to unleash your attack.
The train’s moveset ended up being so broad that we could use it in many interesting ways when designing a clash: if the train can trick, it can also parry back projectiles; if it can jump, it can avoid attacks; if it can groundpound, it can crush enemies below; if it can multi-track drift, it can hit multiple targets, and if it can honk… well, honking is always fun!
Anthony: From the trailer, it seems that there's a mecha-girl robot, a mecha-worm, and some sort of crab? It's a wide variety of ideas. What was the design philosophy behind the bosses?
David: We always want to keep players amused and entertained. We believe that part of what makes a boss fight memorable, besides obviously an interesting gameplay proposal, is its presentation and staging, so we’ve tried really hard to make each boss feel unique and spectacular in its own way. The design process behind this was always going all-out on each boss encounter design and just trying to topple it the next time, always bringing new ideas to the table that felt that the stakes were only getting higher.
Anthony: Would you consider including Thomas the Train as a boss fight? Maybe you don't hurt him, you just have to impress the godfather of trains.
David: Well, to nobody’s surprise, I’m a big fan of Thomas. I’m particularly fond of the first couple of seasons which I watched over and over as a kid and were narrated by the one and only Ringo Starr! Having Thomas in the game would be a dream, but I wonder how it could be? Maybe having him join the crew as one of the good guys, and fight against Miraido for crushing children’s dreams? Or maybe as a corrupted legend, driven by greed and corporate ambition, putting up an unfair fight by appealing to childhood feelings while attacking you without any remorse? Oh the opportunities, one can dream!
David: How many battles in Denshattack! can we expect?
There’s a total of 9 chapters in the game and each of them ends up with a big boss fight! However, there are also a few surprise mid-level encounters, towards the second part of the adventure, that also give good fight vibes!
David: Any particular fight the team can't wait for players to experience?
It’s hard to choose one! In the team we all have our own favorites, depending on the style of gameplay we favor, the boss’ style or even the music track that accompanies them. Personally I’m particularly fond of the Yakuza fight in Aomori, as it was the last one I designed and I was worried we might have run out of ideas… but it turned out to be varied, exciting, surprising and a good challenge for one of the latest parts of the adventure!
Denshattack! is available today, July 15, on PC, PS5, Xbox Series, and Nintendo Switch 2.
