‘Idiot gaming’ developer is back with a PS4 game that’ll make you act like an imbecile

Chris Bulch, the creator of 2014 flash game hit Americlap — designed to make its players behave like idiots — is back! The UK-based independent games developer has a PlayStation 4 kit and is preparing to deliver his next work, Rocket Punch, sometime in 2019. It might end up being one of the last games ever made for the PlayStation Eye.

Rocket Punch will be the apotheosis of Bulch’s creative ideal. He makes video games where anyone playing them looks stupid as hell. Rocket Punch’s goal is to make the user look like a stock-photo model demonstrating a console. You know, like these doofii:

Getty Images

Getty Images

Getty Images

I talked to Bulch last week, then lost the conversation in a hard drive crash. (Look, these things happen.) If I recall correctly, he is excited for Rocket Punch’s launch and, after spending a lot of his own money to get a PS4 devkit, is pretty sure this will actually happen. Rocket Punch is made in the mode of the old Sega Mega Drive/Genesis “super-scaler” games, like Space Harrier, Outrun and the granddaddy of them all, Turbo.

In Rocket Punch, players manipulate a flying, disembodied fist to punch away “satellites, space Nazis and techno-demons.” The game uses the PlayStation 4 gamepad’s motion controls to move the fist, and the PlayStation Eye to photograph the user looking like a complete toolshed.

“The backstory here is it’s the year 20XX,” Bulch deadpans, “and global warming continues to devastate the Earth. The only hope for humanity is to punch the Sun right in the face.”

Believe it or not, Sony has accepted Bulch’s submission.

Chris Bulch

“Even if I don’t get a publisher lined up then the game will still come out, the time spent developing won’t be completely wasted and I’ll have something to show for the risk I took to do all this,” Bulch says.

Rocket Punch does not yet have a release date but I am breathlessly anticipating its launch.