So, please tell us a bit about your game

Bzzzt is a cute and fast-paced “jump-dash-run” platformer heavily inspired by beloved games from the eighties. The game transports players back in time to enjoy that era again, but this time with boosted pixels at max and fresh design twists.

In the role of ZX8000 – a tiny robot no larger than a regular household toaster – players will face deadly traps, lasers, and tricky enemies. While using special abilities, they must prove they can fully control their newly obtained robotic body and save the world.

On top of that, gamers can pick one from three difficulty options, beating multiple challenges in more than 50 stages, and compare their skills with others in global and friends’ leaderboards.

And who are you? Tell us about your studio

Karel Matejka – the solo developer behind the BZZZT game, known as KO.DLL, is an artist who started his career as an illustrator and a graphic novel artist. Soon after he got in touch with the first computers, he started making games, which earned him the status of one of the first pioneers who ignited the gaming industry in the Czech Republic. His unique and multi-genre art style brought him worldwide popularity. Although his main passions are all art forms, he’s also a coder, a game designer, a terrific chef, and a dedicated friend. And above all, he’s a hard-working game lover with a dream to make games the old way again and pay homage to all the great games from the ’80s that – like for so many of us – have formed his style and passions.

What inspired you to create a game such as yours?

Maybe it is my pixel art passion, the magic of old games boosting players’ imagination, or I feel comfortable in the past. All that led me to try making games the old way again – to see if that miraculous ’80s magic could still work and if I could share my first 8-bit games experience and feelings with nowaday’s players.

If it weren’t for the 8-bit computers, I would never have started making games. And that was the main reason why I started this project more than 3 years ago – to pay homage to all the great games I grew up on.

Thank you for taking the time to talk to us! Please tell everyone when and where the game will be available

The BZZZT game will be released on November 13, 2023, on Steam, GoG and Epic Games stores on PC, Mac and Linux platforms. Next year, the game will be released on Nintendo Switch and Xbox. And I personally hope I will be able to release it later on PlayStation as well.