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Written by Bryn Gelbart.

There is a common joke in games media that everyone is passing around the same $20; everyone is everyone else’s subscriber on Patreon. The indie games space can feel this way too. Developers have to adapt to the subscription model of the big Internet to continue making art and a living. Relatively small Patreons are entire support systems for creators like Puppet Combo.

Ben, the sole developer behind the prolific lo-fi horror studio responsible for Babysitter Bloodbath and Powerdrill Killer, posts updates to the Patreon at least once a month to a group of nearly 2000 bloodthirsty fans. They’re not bloodthirsty for content like some of the more demanding fanbases online, they just like the gore Puppet Combo games are best known for.

Puppet Combo’s creations typically meld ‘80s VHS slasher aesthetics and tropes with PS1 era survival horror controls and camera angles. The games grew in popularity on Twitch and YouTube, spreading through communities by word of mouth. Communities like the now very active Puppet Combo Discord server, where Patrons of any level are granted access, have become a common perk for supporting content creators. Behind all the bedlam and posts is just one person making games who, honestly, doesn’t pay much attention to it all.

When asked about his involvement in the Patreon, Ben commented that “it’s helpful for finding bugs” but doesn’t play a part in the creative process. For him, it’s not a conversation. And that’s to the benefit of players, too.

“Being transparent about how things are made takes away from the final product I think, “ he said, “especially with a horror game. If you know how it works, it’s less scary.”

But with Ben needing to meet the requirement to put out something new every month fans get to see prototypes and games that never really get finished. Something that makes Puppet Combo an anomaly is that half of the games fans have played of theirs are probably unfinished or work-in-progress. Even one of the most popular games in the Puppet Combo catalogue , one that arguably feels as complete as many of the finished releases, Powerdrill Killer is still technically an incomplete work.

“I had a habit of working on something for a while, getting bored and putting it on hold, then going back later and working things, sometimes drastically,” Ben said, “I’m trying not to do that anymore.”

One ongoing project has taken on differing aesthetics and evolutions since Puppet Combo’s inception. Technically now spanning two games and one prototype, Puppet Combo’s biggest no-brainer idea was one of the toughest to get right.

“I’ve been working on the idea of a game where you play as a serial killer for years,” Ben said. First, this became a Texas Chainsaw Massacre inspired slash-em-up, Texas Butcher, which never evolved past the prototype stage. The game was always intended to be a dry-run for Blood Maniac, the full game that was to follow up Texas Butcher.

“I did a pretty long prototype and had people test it. The feedback was bad overall,” Ben said. “It’s harder to design than it probably sounds because it’s not very exciting to kill defenseless npcs. It gets monotonous.”

The design inspiration was a loving ode to slasher movies, offering fans of the genre a long sought after perspective. Most horror games, even in Puppet Combo’s library, are meant to be scary, putting you in the shoes of the eventual victim. The empowering horror game is still a rarity. But in hearing the story of Blood Manic’s development, it became clear why.

“If the police are added as a mechanic, it becomes an action game – basically the same as rampaging in GTA,” he said, detailing the early struggles of development. Sticking the landing on Blood Maniac is still a work in progress, as it’s still technically in development. Still, Ben managed to find the appropriate mechanical inspiration to match the idea. “I was reading about Hotline Miami and I thought a more arcade style stealth game with a quick fail state could work.”

Through the iterations, the fundamentals of Puppet Combo’s “serial killer sims” have remained the same. Players take control of Larry the Butcher, a serial killer who grew up in a catholic convent. The basic mechanics stayed the same, sticking to a level-based action stealth game, with quick deaths, and quicker restarts, like a blocky 3D Hotline Miami. Each game was rife with enough camp to keep the whole thing from falling into weird power fantasy territory, especially the idea’s most recent iteration.

The Glass Staircase, Out Now

“I added different mechanics such as toggling lights, moving bodies around, executions, making it open world and the game became too complicated so I put it on hold for a while.” But scope creep, as this wealth of ideas overcomplicating development is often called, was not the only reason for Blood Maniac’s hiatus.

While patrons get access to all the games, the platform isn’t a utopia. It can’t single-handedly sustain 99 percent of its creators. Artists still need to double as salespeople. The games still need to be marketable enough to hock the product. Puppet Combo itself has even expanded in recent years. Making forays into publishing other indie horror titles and putting some of the most popular Puppet Combo games like Murder House on Steam and consoles.

While Blood Maniac is in limbo, another Larry the Butcher game was developed years later. Christmas Massacre was released in 2021. Puppet Combo’s most recent game, it is the story of Larry told via Silent Night, Deadly Night and Christmas slasher tropes. It is also by far the tightest, funniest, and most fun version of the concept yet. It leans fully into being campy and arcade-y, the sharper tone matching the polished mechanics. It is the ultimate case for revisiting ideas… and assets.

Loud Reddit browsing gamers may claim that re-using assets is the death of artistry in gaming as we know it. But, as we know, revisiting old ideas is the backbone of good sequels, sure, but most good ideas in game design.

“I usually feel like if a mechanic is working well, like a character controller, camera system, menus, there’s no reason to do it again if I want the same features,” Ben said. UI elements, controls, and menus are among the most common repeated elements in Puppet Combo’s games. Character models and assets also get reused from game to game out of convenience. From a game developer’s standpoint, it’s not laziness to reuse assets. It is common sense. “I have base character models so I tend to keep creating new characters out of them. But I make new character models too.”

“I see a lot of people saying all my games are the same and I reuse everything all the time,” the creator noted. This is what Ben is most adamant about sharing; for every instance of slotting in a model or asset from the backlog, hours go into creating unique elements for each brief, frightening experience. “I often make new things that are only used in one game, like the AI in Spiders, or the camera system in Murder House, or all of the Hell Night style mechanics in Day 7.”

When ideas sprout so quickly from a prolific creator, reuse slowly becomes a mark of craft. The smaller repeating elements become trademarks. The menu fonts, the way the characters move, these become reminders that you are playing a Puppet Combo game. Dress accordingly.