INTERVIEW Jigrapher, From Plant Budz 98

Plant Budz 98 is the latest project from publisher G-Bean Studios that provides a wholesome, playful experience with a healthy dose of nostalgia for 20th century gamers.

It’s a uniquely multifaceted game because it’s really a hodgepodge of different types of genres, so to get more information about what went into development, I interviewed game designer/coder Phil Walsh (AKA Jigrapher) and composer Peter Karman.

Disclaimer: the author of this article is a personal friend of the primary interviewee.

Thom Stone:I like how succinctly you described Plant Budz 98 on the Steam page: “Raise a pet on a retro desktop. Then play as them across 4 completely different games.” Why did you choose to package these games together in such a way, rather than release each one separately?

Phil Walsh: Initially, Plant Budz 98 (PB98) started as a game jam. The theme was ‘idle’ with the sub-theme of something like ‘mutation’. We had four people: me (code), Qristy (code), Thomas (art), and Riley (audio). We riffed on the virtual pet craze of the ’90s. We figured we would hone in on a pet simulator and then, if time permitted, lean into our strengths (mine being side scrolling shooters, Qristy’s was the dating sim). The plan was always “pet evolves into a game.” That structure helped me a lot. I lose interest in a project if I have to hone in on one thing for too long, so having four other games to juggle when one got stale was nice.

Fun fact: PB98 was originally created using a third-party plugin that allowed you to raise pets on your actual desktop. Pets could interact with your tabs and things like shooter.exe could be played around your icons and windows. At some point we realized the plugin was a trojan horse that could mess with users’ actual files – so that had to go.

Thom Stone: As a millennial, I’m very familiar with the era of gaming that you and your team are evoking, not to mention the OS (Windows 98) itself. It actually made me nostalgic enough to make me want to track down emulators for all the built-in Windows games I used to play as a kid! What specific games influenced you and your team?

Phil Walsh: The virtual pet bit was inspired by Tamagotchi, Gigapets, etc. As for the offshoot games (shooter.exe, run.exe, fps.exe, and arcade.exe)…

Shooter.exe (side scrolling shooter) was supposed to be something between R-Type and 1942.

The FPS started with me wanting to make Hexen. Because it’s the game tied to the cat, one idea was to call it “Cat-stlevania.” The title never made it in, but the influence is there!

The runner was nuts. I found out I was showcasing PB98 at the Portland Retro Game Expo like a week ahead of time. Thomas and I agreed we could add a new pet AND dedicated game in that time. Thomas pitched Canabalt for the reference game, which I had never played, but seemed easy enough to adapt. He messaged me a few days in saying some things came up and he no longer had art time before the expo. He gave me like eight sprites. Challenge accepted. I did all the pig sprites and then created the runner out of the art assets I had. It was a hot mess at the expo but was refined over time. So, if you’re curious why the runner is mostly blocks – that’s what I had to work with!

Plant Budz Remake (arcade.exe) is, well, a remake of the original Plant Budz (which you can play on itch.io). The PB remake was originally a dating sim where, yes, you dated an anthropomorphized version of your pet. This was Qristy’s idea – she did an awesome job creating cute text-based dates with a ripped merman and overbearing cat lady. She had no interest in continuing PB98 after the jam so I made several attempts at a pig and robot date that never tested well. In the end, it seemed more fitting to pay homage to the original Plant Budz.

Thom Stone:I know you’re all part of PIG (Portland Indie Game) Squad but how exactly did you meet and when did you first start working together?

Phil Walsh: Thomas and I have done like 10+ jams together. We met at our first PIGSquad jam during the pandemic and then just kept talking and jamming after that. Qristy is a PIGSquad organizer so she’s volunteering at most of the events. She comes up with wild stuff for jams – like smashing a physical rubber chicken head on a painting as a game kind of wild. I had asked her a few times to jam but PB98 is when she finally agreed. Riley had done one or two jams with Thomas and me so we were all just kind of riding the good-vibe express. At one point Riley moved on so I called up Peter who did audio on the original Plant Budz. Peter jumped in a few months before PB98 shipped. He went radio silent for a month and came back with like a… Sweaty-club-butt-slam-grind-twerk-core soundtrack that blew my mind. I didn’t think there could be more layers to this project but Peter is the onion man (ya know, layers…).

Oh, and Merlin! He’s also a PIGSquad organizer. Great dude. He did (almost) all the shooter.exe art after Thomas stepped out.

Thom Stone: One of my favorite aspects of the gameplay is the way it rewards creativity and experimentation as the player needs to play around using different tools on the desktop to be able to access all the different games. It’s very unique. What inspired that idea?

Phil Walsh: I like that you like that! Some of my favorite games have little to no tutorial (Shadow of the Colossus, Dark Souls, Vampire Survivors) so I love playing around with how you can teach gameplay without spoonfeeding users the information.

It’s interesting to watch the game at a showcase. It’s a very PG game, but it wasn’t created FOR kids. Adults will walk up and either ask me to outline the concept and rules for them OR fiddle awkwardly with the controller for a moment before putting it down and moving on. I get it, you’re in a room full of people and you don’t want to look incompetent because you don’t know how to play. An 8 year old will walk up – they don’t care. They’ll mash buttons until something cool happens. That’s what I want! It’s how we all figured out life at some point. Then the 8 year old digs into the game and suddenly all the adults are back wanting to play. It’s a fun social experiment. Also, PSA: don’t forget to play in life as an adult!

Thom Stone: The soundtrack also stood out to me, ranging from lo-fi chiptunes to drum ‘n’ bass tracks. Who were some artists or composers that influenced you?

Peter Karman: Monkeyball! Monkeyball first and last, always. But I guess for PB I also thought about Jet Set Radio for vibe, Katamari Damacy for fun, and PS1-era drum and bass. And I always have Animal Crossing and Rhythm Heaven music bouncing around.

Non-game music: Luke Vibert, Lone, FPM, and Casiopea. João Gilberto. Burt Bacharach. MF Doom. Squarepusher and Aphex Twin. Orbital and Prodigy and the entire Hackers soundtrack. You get it.
Game music: The Monkeyball / Sega / F-Zero GX / Gran Truismo folks (Hidenori Shoji, Sakae Osumi, Haruyoshi Tomita, Daiki Kasho, et al.), the Namco / Katamari / Ridge Racer folks (Yu Miyake, Asuka Sakai, et al.), K.K. Slider. Okabe Keiichi (Nier Automata). Jeez!

Thom Stone: I only beat shooter.exe and loved it so I’m excited to explore all the other games too. What is your personal favorite of the bunch?

Phil Walsh: The FPS. It was a big turning point in the project. We hit a slump. Morale was low. We needed another game. I had created two demos that were scrapped (in the game files there’s a Gauntlet style local multiplayer ARPG and a Pokemon ripoff). I pitched the FPS and was met with crickets. So I was like, “Ya know, I’m just going to make this until we have a better idea!” Thomas and Riley phased out shortly after so, with the exception of audio, I did the whole thing myself. It’s not perfect but it really signifies when this project went from ‘refined jam game’ to ‘commercial game’.

Thom Stone: What’s next for the team?

Peter Karman:  Probably a haircut pretty soon, another game soundtrack in progress, an acid album or two coming up, a new EP from my duo EEMMUU, some new stuff from my Pacific Daylight house project, some production work, high-fiving Phil, dinner, brushing my teeth. Stuff like that.

Phil Walsh: Cutting Peter’s hair pretty soon. Me and Thomas just finished our first jam in a while. It was about a gambling addict going insane on a Mountain Dew bender – good times. I’ve been working on a few things: I made AAC software AND hardware for my partner’s job. I’m trying to wrap up a browser-based 2D game engine in time for the school year (to use in my classes). I have started another extremely ambitious game project. It’s like Harvest Moon but without the farming… More details soon. 

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We appreciate the devs for their time and thoughtful answers to our many questions.

Plant Budz 98 is available now for PC.

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