High on Life, a game where you use a talking gun to prevent people from being sold for drugs, is the latest title from Squnch Games, a development studio founded by Rick and Morty co-author Justin Roiland, When I Played Their Last Game, Trover save the universe, a few years ago, I was surprised to see how naturally Roiland’s brand of impromptu dialogue translated into video game form. The characters will ram as long as you make the effort to listen, and I’ll find myself standing in certain positions for five or six minutes, listening only to Roiland (who voices many characters, including myself). Trover) repeats a joke over and over. Although High on Life and Trover are two very different games, Roiland’s sense of humor is very much on display in both. When I got a chance to speak with Roiland (and design director Erich Meyr), I was surprised to learn that he originally wanted the game to take a different direction.
“I really didn’t want to play the lead role,” said Roiland. “I tried to get out of it. But the team said, ‘no, you have to do it.’”
Meyr interjected and repeated the group, “That’s kind of our signature at this point.”
Roiland finally agreed because the team worked so hard. “I must be wrong if others are saying so,” he continued. “So I was like, okay, I’ll do it. And I know it would be useful from a production point of view for me to do that.
The player shoots Kenny, the gun voiced by Justin Roiland.
They explained that Roiland did a lot of voice acting in Trover Saves the Universe as it was initially a temporary dialogue meant to be replaced later in the development cycle. In the end, the team decided to keep it, because it wasn’t worth documenting it all and because they thought it was funny enough.
“Trover is like 70% improvisation, 30% scripting, maybe,” says Roiland, unsure of the exact proportions. “This game is definitely the opposite. But still fun improvisation.
“Especially with guns,” Meyr said. “A lot of improvised guns.”
The guns mentioned are the main gimmick of High on Life. As you explore the world, you find a bunch of talking guns with different personalities, each voiced by a different comedian. I asked Roiland about the casting process for such an odd series of roles, and he said that most of them know who they want before they even start.
“JB Smoove was definitely the person I wanted from the start,” says Roiland. “Tim Robinson is a different person… our lead screenwriter Alec Robbins is his friend. So he was like, ‘hey, do you want to do this?’ and [Robinson] like, ‘yeah, I’ll do it’ without even really realizing what he was getting himself into.
Gus, pictured, is voiced by JB Smoove.
Meanwhile, Betsy Sodaro got the role through an audition, completing a cast that Roiland says is of the same quality as a good animated comedy. That said, narrative design in a game like High on Life is much more complicated than the linear dialogue of an episode. Rick and Morty.
For example, one mechanic this game shares with Trover is the “opt-in” dialogue. It’s what Square calls a scene where the player can leave at any time, even while other characters are still talking: the player is in charge of the level of dialogue they want to experience and the NPCs respond to their behavior appropriately. Squanch Games’ work on Trover gave them an idea of the structure of those types of scenes and helped make the writing process go more smoothly.
“You can stand near them and they know you’re there, and then when you leave, they’ll know you’re leaving,” says Roiland. “Writing all that is just thinking about how players can interrupt or rejoin. If they do something, how will the NPC react?”
An example of this in High on Life is in a sequence where the player encounters a group of aliens called the Mac and Cheese Brothers. Usually, a player would approach, meet the brothers and decide how to act. However, Meyr said, “When we were playing, we had someone from a distance who fired a special ability and blew them all away before meeting them. And we were like, ‘okay, that’s something someone can do, right? Write a line for that.”
No matter how much they predicted player behavior, Roiland said he could see them stay active for another year just by adding more details. The project was so ambitious that they tripled the studio’s staff from about 20 to 60 to complete it, and they still cut a lot of content.
“There are a lot of things,” said Roiland when I asked what wasn’t included. “However, the cool thing about those things is that sometimes you’ll come back to them… Sure Rick and Morty there are episodes in each season made like in season one or two that we’ve been back [to] with new eyes… and then suddenly it clicks.”
Justin Roiland, founder of Squach Games.
“It’s really surprising how much we got,” Meyr said. “A lot of ideas are like a nut.” He didn’t mention it here, but one of the most surprising things that made it appear were the four licensed full-length movies that appeared in the game and played on TV in the background. The two developers don’t want to list specific clipped content in case it comes back one day, but I can’t help but wonder — if four full movies are included in the list, which isn’t?
Today, the game is finally complete and available to the public. For Meyer, this is an exciting time.
“You know, it’s great to see it complete,” Meyr said. “Because there’s so many cycles focusing on what’s broken… and then last month you almost had to take off your little developer glasses and be like, ‘Oh, that’s the game. right?'”
Meyr said his favorite thing after one of his games comes out is watching streamers play it. Before Twitch, they would have to wait for reviews and then be able to hear some people mention it online, but watching someone handle it on launch day is “much more enjoyable right away, that really amazing”.
After hearing about Meyr’s passionate love for streamers on launch day, Roiland paused for a moment and then said, “Yeah, I didn’t do that.” When I asked why, he said, “I’ve lived and seen it so much, I’m fine. I’m fine. I’m glad everyone is playing it… I just need to keep my distance.” It’s not a game-specific opinion either—he feels the same way about all of his creative projects. He and Meyr also agreed that it would take them several years after launch before they could enjoy a game they had worked so hard to create.
However, that does not mean that they are not satisfied with the project. “I’m really proud of where we landed with this one,” said Roiland. “All the crazy ideas, it’s just crazy. The team worked extremely hard. It’s great that we’ve all lived with this and believed in it for years.”
High on Life is out now on Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, and PC, and is available on Game Pass on those platforms. For more on the game, check out ours rooftop interview from earlier this year.
