Kiz Studios, creators of free-to-play multiplayer battle arena SmashMuck Champions, are trying to avoid "making Dota" by speeding up gameplay and involving the community, art director Allen White told us at PAX Prime 2013.
According to White, Dota continues to act as the template for the genre. When the indie developer began working on SmashMuck Champions, it sought to stray away from other titles by taking a fast-paced track.
"There are so many games out there that are really doing the traditional, hardcore fantasy look and vibe, and the MOBA genre is not being explored thoroughly," White said. "When we got into this genre, we said 'gosh, if we sped it up a little bit, we could do so much different, interesting stuff.'
"But we weren't sure how the players would respond to it. We wanted to make sure that not only were we building a game that we liked, but it was a game that they liked. Involving the community just made total sense from the beginning."
According to White, it was easy to incorporate players into the development process because the studio is so small. Fans have helped to redirect aspects of the game, like its Plunderball mode — the game's twist on capture the flag.
Players have also helped design different characters, such as the platypus unicorn mixup, Platymus (pictured above). During the studio's panel at PAX Prime, the crowd shouted out design ideas, resulting in a new "alien vagabond hobo" character, White said. All fan-designed characters will be available as free content.
SmashMuck Champions is currently in open beta. The game is expected to launch via Steam Early Access Sept. 6.