Rockbeasts is about managing an animal band in a BoJack-style world, but it’ll need to do more than horse around

BoJack Horseman was a show about Horsin’ Around.

There was a good thing that had once been and a horse man who was now years removed from it, but still clung on to the idea that the magic was still there. I’ll not stray into spoiler territory, but that clinging generally didn’t go too well for old BoJack. He was a bitter, selfish, washed-up star who so often looked back, rather than looking forwards. It was to his detriment.

That brings me to Rockbeasts. Or, rather the challenge that this band management game from Polish developers Lichthund Studios faces. It’s clearly drawn plenty of inspiration from BoJack’s Netflix adventures, transporting you back to a version of the nineties in which anthropomorphic animals roam America doing the things that humans do. In this case, rather than starring in TV shows, they’re starting bands and running the apparatus of the music industry that hums and rattles around those making the tunes.

There’s adult tragicomedy going on, as deer guitarist Paz Gordon swears at you for acquiescing to a strip club trip that saw troubled rabbit drummer Keith Boon refuse to stop eating chicken wings. At one point I convinced a trio of goats hammering away at metal tune to give up a room at a recording studio by remembering that their only lyrics went ‘Blood, death, piss, satan’.

The bridge between these encounters and story beats is your day-to-day management of the band, filled out by narcissistic ostrich singer Vernon Rose and mild-mannered fish bassist Carlton. The game’s built up of episodes, each of which culminates in the band performing one song at a gig, which requires you to play along with them quick-time event style by hitting keys in a fashion that’s very much like Yakuza game karaoke.

The meat of the action occurs before you get there, though. Having given your group of misfits a name and allowed them to crash on your sofa, you’re the manager and therefore need to go about whipping them into something that can earn a record deal. The game presents two avenues via which you can secure the artistic and/or literal bag – you either spec into the progression tree that’s all about maxing your ability to attract fans, or the one that’s focused on just making your tunes so banging that the rest takes care of itself. It’s corporate sellout versus being managed by a portly English bulldog with a cynical worldview.

To advance up through the levels of either, you make sure your gigs are as good as possible by choosing which activities the band does in the preceding days to further their chances of impressing in either vein. These days are split into four timeslots – morning, afternoon, evening, and night. Each of these turns give you a chance to do one activity, such as buying ads or showing your faces around town to promote that you’re doing a music thing, getting rehearsals in, or hunting down a killer amp so that the band don’t sound like Guns N Roses in a washing machine.

In line with most management games, there’s a smattering of resources you’ve got to earn. The four baseline ones are the band’s health, mood, hype, and money with each designed to be used up and refreshed by doing corresponding activities in the various locations around the game’s town of Buxville. Generally, you’ll build all of them up to then accomplish either buying a new bit of kit or trick that can be slotted in at one of the sections each song’s made up of to boost how well you do, or earning focus points that are used to activate those bits and bobs. It’s a cycle that I can see maybe starting to drag a bit as you get beyond the three episodic chapters I played as part of this preview, but there was just enough drama going on to keep things interesting.

It’s the story which I reckon will principally determine whether Rockbeasts will either earn an encore or be booed off stage. Going in, I wasn’t sure if there’d be enough unique meat on the bone in satirising the world of rock’n’roll specifically to properly set the game apart from Bojack’s brilliant and both-barreled dissection of modern celebrity culture and all of its cross-sections. Sure, you’ve got everything from This Is Spinal Tap to The Comic Strip’s Bad News Tour showing that there’s plenty to make fun of here. What makes Bojack so special, though, is taking the sorts of gags folks have been making about celebs for years and dragging them into a surreal version of the modern day that isn’t afraid to dig deeply into the alienation, complex psychology, and intricate issues that face us all in the here and now.

It took the show much of its first series to properly get into the swing of that, and the same sort of learning curve faces Rockbeasts, assuming its writers are prepared and keen to develop the deft, informed touch necessary to take their characters beyond the surface level. For what it’s worth, there was definitely some potential in the short snippet I played. Paz seems the most well-rounded character in this regard so far. Both the scenario I mentioned earlier and one that sees her follow you opting to order the band not to say anything controversial in an interview by sarkily dragging it off the rails are the preview section’s strongest examples of the promised choice and consequence being on song.

There’s some exploration of addiction with Keith that didn’t quite get paid off before I hit the end of chapter three, so it’ll be interesting to see how that evolves. Carlton and Vernon’ll need a lot more fleshing out, especially the latter as he risks being relegated to a paper-thin stereotype of the egotistical vocalist, a caricature to simply be wheeled out whenever the writers need someone in the band to be a dick.

The voice acting’s great across the board, especially when it comes to the litany of fun side characters that bring Buxville’s three single street districts – Downtown, Mory Place, and Old Riverton. I’m not sure that going the voiced protagonist route with the unnamed manager you play was the right call, though. Sure, it means conversations flow a little better, but in a game that’s otherwise so dedicated to customisation that it’ll let you name the damn band and dress them up like barbie dolls before they take to the stage, making a blank roleplaying canvas properly blank seems the obvious thing to do.

All in all, there’s potential here, and some indication in the intro – which scored big GTA 4 nostalgia points with me by having Iggy Pop host a rock radio station – that the events of you guiding the band to superstardom in the 90s will echo into what they’re up to nearer the present day. If Rockbeasts is to properly sell out stadiums, though, it’ll have to prove it’s more than just a tribute band.