Blippo+

We speak to the designers of an indie game about retro TV that's out of this world

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Are you pining for the glory days of channel surfing, left cold by the rise of streaming services?

If so, you may well be tempted by the interplanetary televisual treats of Blippo+, which recently arrived on Switch and PC after making its debut on Playdate earlier this year. It's an unconventional game, but Claire L Evans and Jona Bechtolt aren't conventional game designers, being far better known for their band Yacht. We caught up with them to learn more about one of our favourite indie games of the year.

What inspired you to make a game themed around old TV?

Jona: In 2020, I don’t know - it arrived in my head like a flash of lightning, that we should start with an electronic programme guide and then build something out from there. We were watching hotel TV, and I was like, “Oh, yeah. How come someone hasn't done something with this? How come someone hasn't completely misused, or just screwed with the idea of there being fictional programming within a very ubiquitous, but kind of boring and forgotten interface?”

Claire: Then it becomes like, “Well, how do we fill this interface?” That was kind of an obvious proposition, because we have this video artist friend, JJ Stratford, who directed all the live-action elements of the game in her studio, and we knew that she knew how to make precisely the kind of TV that these interfaces were born to host.