When I met Wan Hazmer and Daim Dziauddin, founders of No Straight Roads developer Metronomik, at EGX Rezzed last year, I was immediately taken with the great story behind the game. Not only did the two want to release a homegrown Malaysian game and thus support their local game industry, but they also envisioned rhythm gaming as something more than following cursors and pressing buttons to the beat. One loves rock, the other is more into EDM, and thus Vinyl City was born, a place where a lone rock band takes on an evil EDM empire.
Vinyl City is a place so infused with music that it’s powered by the screams of its music hungry fans. Bunk Bed Junction, a rock band consisting of the boisterous Mayday and her friend and polar opposite Zuke, wants to be the next big thing, but despite playing a solid show at an audition, they’re told to beat it – all of the top performing artists play EDM, and simply see no reason in changing what works. About to give up, Bunk Bed Junction discover that the EDM Empire called No Straight Roads also disproportionately favours the rich and famous when it comes to electricity distribution, and so our heroes decide to become a very vocal opposition and climb to the top of the charts.
It’s confusing at first, but at no point is No Straight Roads ever really a rhythm game. Instead, it’s an action adventure with platforming elements that vaguely follow a rhythm. Before taking on an artist, you need to bypass “security” by traveling through rooms filled with enemies that attack to the beat. You can either play as Mayday or Zuke or play with a friend – either way you need to give these fiends a whacking and you can only do that during the moment they don’t attack, as being hit cancels out your own animation.
