2D ain’t dead – - not by a long shot. Games such as Mega Man 10, Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode 1, and Tatsunoko vs. Capcom prove that the art is still viable in the age of open worlds and polygon-counting. French developer Golgoth Studio is currently contributing to the 2D renaissance with its first title, Toki, a remake of an old Amiga side-scroller. We spoke with Anthony De Sa Ferreira, business development director, Golgoth Studio about his company’s plan for 2D gaming.

Golgoth Studio is a relatively new development team. Please tell us a bit about your company’s background.

Golgoth Studio started to exist in my mind sometime in June 2008 after a meeting with Philippe Dessoly in regards of his great skill in 2D arts. At this time, I just lost my job and wished to work in the game industry. I’ve played since I was a little boy; I’m really what people call a hardcore gamer. But as I said often, play with games and make one that is completely different!

So when I started to talk with Philippe about Golgoth Studio, he was very excited and me too, of course. In 2008, it was the beginning of the retro gaming wave on digital platforms. As our studio was absolutely unknown to first-party companies or gamers, our wish was to start making remakes but really good remakes! Keeping old school spirit!

So after many days of searching what games could represent the picture we’d like to give, we agreed on Toki. I was a fan of this game when I was a child, and Philippe was the lead designer on the Amiga version. So, it was natural for us to chose it. We started to find new members for our team and finally today we are seven of us–six guys, one girl.

Your mission statement is that you aim to keep 2D gaming alive. 2D gaming made a big comeback in 2010 with the likes of King of Fighters XII, BlazBlue, and others. What are some of the projects that you’re working?

You are true, 2D made a comeback, with amazing titles like BlazBlue, Braid, Tails, King of Fighters XII, Castle Crashers, and many, many others. Lesser known, but great are games such as Arkedo on XBIG!

Actually we are working on two projects: the first is Toki , and the second is a game ( sorry confidential name for the moment) we’re developing for the Japanese company G-mode in order to fund Toki. Once we finish Toki, we’ll start Joe and Mac: Caveman Ninjas as promised to our community.

Was it difficult to acquire the rights to remake Toki and Joe & Mac?

Complicated for Toki, and pretty easy for Joe & Mac. I think we arrived at the good moment when the Data East IP was just sold and we were already in contact with the licensor, so after they saw our first artwork they said “let’s go” and we signed different agreements.

Are there any other Data East properties that you’d like to give the modern 2D remake? Personally, we need more Bad Dudes in these crazy times.

Bad Dudes is an IP we could get easily. But I agree with you we need to get a good beat ‘em up in these crazy times, let me think about that….

Now, about others licenses, currently we are more focused on, such as Wonderboy, Windjammer, and some Capcom licenses we’ll never have (Dungeon & Dragon for example).

Why the focus on 2D gaming? Is it simply more cost effective to make a 2D title, or is there something more to your decision to work only in that area?

It’s a good question, often people ask me the same kind of question – - why have you chose 2D instead 3D?

My opinion is, it’s a question of taste. I mean of course develop a 2D game allow our Studio to work with a small team and the development cost is not the same. But primarily, we make 2D Games at Golgoth Studio because we love it! We grew up with that kind of game, and you know personally I prefer play with a little 2D Production than a modest 3D game.

3D / 2D is not something we can compare, it’s absolutely not the same kind of works and/or skills. If you ask to a 3D animator to make a 2D traditional animation I’m not sure he could make it , and it will be the same for a 2D animator.

All of that is to tell you that before everything else it’s a love choice from our side to focus on 2D for the moment. That does not mean we don’t appreciate or will never develop games using 3D technology.

Your games are targeting the digital download platforms. Will they be across the board on PSN, WiiWare,and XBLA?

Toki is currently approved on Wiiware. The PSN approval answer should come before the middle of February. And for the XBLA we need to find a publisher.

So we can guess that if we not find a publisher for the XBLA, Toki will release firstly on PC, PSN, then on Wiiware. I’m not worried about the XBLA publishing but I think this version will come last.

Is there any chance that you’ll develop title for the iPhone/iPod touch/iPad?

Yes of course, iPhone/iPod touch/iPad also PSP and/or DSi all these platform are already in our mind but currently we need to be focus on digital console market.

What do you think are some of the gaming possibilities that the iPad delivers that previous Apple devices can not? Considering the side of the device, do you think we’ll see a controller market be created?

Honestly even I seen it last week, I don’t take the time yet to invest about what could be possible or not. Right now, I have more the feeling that it’s a big iPod touch than anything else. The first target of this iPad is the e-book market.

So what is your vision of Golgoth’s future in 2010?

2010 and also 2011 will be for us the years of our first games release on the digital market, so it’s probably our most important years. About our future, I think our activity we be cut slowly in several activity :

1 – The development of our own original IP and remakes

2 – The digital publishing of other independent studio or indie team game

3 – The licensing of our 2D cross platform engine and other tools

I’d like to thank you so much for this interview and the opportunity to share our works and history with your readers!