This is the two hundred seventeenth entry in the Scratching That Itch series, wherein I randomly select and write about one of the 1741 games and game-related things included in the itch.io Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality. The Bundle raised $8,149,829.66 split evenly between the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund and Community Bail Fund, but don’t worry if you missed it. There are plenty of ways you can help support the vital cause of racial justice; try here for a start. This particular entry is also part of the Keeping Score series about games and their soundtracks. Lastly, as always, you may click on images to view larger versions.

Our two hundred seventeenth random selection from the itch.io Bundle for Racial Justice and Equality is challenging us to a hacking battle. It’s Danger Crew, by Team Danger Crew, and its tagline in the bundle reads:

Retro-style, top down RPG about being a programmer

Grab your laptop, folks. It’s time to program.

As the tagline says, Danger Crew is modeled after retro Japanese-style role-playing games, specifically citing Earthbound, Super Mario RPG, and Pokemon as influences. I’ve never played any of those, and my Console History series hasn’t reached them yet, so I can’t comment on which elements Danger Crew takes from each. I can say that there isn’t any Pokemon-style monster collecting or breeding in the game, so I’m guessing Danger Crew is mostly taking the battle mechanics, lighthearted and comedic tone, and cast of everyday people (rather than destined heroes) from these name-checked classics.

Players begin Danger Crew by choosing their protagonist’s appearance and name, and then guiding them to their first day of work as a programmer at Five Star Belts in Clayton. Why does a company that makes belts need programmers, you might ask? Oh, reader, you poor thing. Everyone needs programmers. And the protagonist aced their interview, so they’re excited for work! Just getting there turns out to be quite the ordeal, however, with road closures creating detours, and run-ins with other programmers in coffee shops. You see, programmers in Clayton are fond of challenging each other to hacking duels, where they use malicious code to try to drain each others’ laptop batteries. Naturally, these duels take the form of turn-based and menu-based combat, which each side executing scripts or using items to try to gain the edge.

The hacking duels are pretty fun, and surprisingly thematic. Sure, there are scripts that act like standard attacks, dealing some direct damage to an enemy’s battery (but usually also having an extra effect, like lowering their defense or accuracy). But there are also iterative attacks, inspired by for loops, which hit an enemy several times in a row. Sometimes it will only be a few hits, but other times it will be a long chain that does a ton of damage. Later in the game, I was able to use one of my swappable laptop upgrades to boost these loops, which was really satisfying. Other characters who join the protagonist’s crew (and whose appearance and name can also be chosen) might specialize in other types of coding, inflicting status effects like a DDoS (making opponents miss turns) or putting allies under a Deadline, making them work more efficiently (getting extra turns).

Items also play a bigger role than I expected. Laptop upgrades can be changed out each turn during a battle, and the first one I found gave me an extra turn after using the Curl script to steal items from the enemy team. I soon found another upgrade that gave me an extra turn after using an item myself, so I got into the habit of nabbing items and them using them to boost my own team. Heal up with a battery pack before boosting my team’s defense, or use an attack sticker on an ally right before they launch their big iterative attack. Battles are full of little synergies like this, that are simple to understand and satisfying to use. My only complaint is that later in the game it was pretty easy to just take out enemies with attacks rather than relying on more devious tactics like stealing items or inflicting status effects.

But for the bulk of its relatively short runtime (I finished in just a few sessions), Danger Crew’s hacking duels felt just about right. That’s because battles are not random. Even the optional ones are shown on the map, and players can decide whether or not to engage with them. That keeps the challenge level well tuned throughout, and even when I occasionally lost a duel I could just try it again immediately. Usually a loss meant that a specific strategy wasn’t working well against that particular crew, and I just changed up my approach next time. This kept duels satisfying and fun.

The story guiding everything is fun too. Five Star Belts is in talks with the big-shot tech company Macrodome about using their platform, but Macrodome may not be as great as they sound. In the course of investigating Macrodome, players get to engage in all sorts of programmer shenanigans: participate in a hackathon, intervene in some comically hostile employment interviews, attend a tech convention, and more. The story is a completely linear affair — those roadblocks and detours are used often, to ensure players have only one path forward — but it’s lighthearted and well written, so I was happy to go along for the ride. Danger Crew’s world is made up of interconnected areas with clearly marked exits, so there’s never any wide open wandering, but the protagonist moves really fast and transitions to other areas are instant, so navigating is a breeze. There was very little between me and the next humorous conversation, or hacking duel, or item pickup, and the key people who will advance the story when talked to are clearly marked so they’re never lost in the crowd.

I could lob a few complaints at certain parts of Danger Crew: there are some instant-fail stealth sections which can be a little annoying, and some teleporter-based “puzzles” which are basically just trial and error. But these are small blemishes on what is otherwise and enjoyable and slickly made game. There are lots of great little touches, like the way enemy laptops literally burst in their hands when their batteries deplete, or how defeated crews curse or express stunned disbelief after a duel. I also liked how both main and side objectives were generally about being nice to people. Help some awkward folks make friends, give a conference speaker some confidence, stop bullies from picking on others. Overall, Danger Crew is an enjoyable adventure that’s easy to recommend. It looks like Team Danger Crew are working on a follow-up game called Legacy Code Legends too, but there haven’t been any updates to its itch.io page in three years at the time of writing, so it may have stalled.

Even if we never get Legacy Code Heroes, however, we can still play Danger Crew. If you missed it in the bundle, it’s sold for a minimum price of $9.99, which includes versions for Windows, Mac, and Linux, as well as the original soundtrack. Which brings me to…

The Score:

The original soundtrack for Danger Crew — mostly credited to Drew Conley, but with a few tracks credited to Henry Leacock and a few more to both — spans 36 tracks and clocks in at about 31 minutes. Math fans will correctly deduce that most tracks are less than a minute long, and intended to be looped during play, although in-game the looping is not always seamless. In the digital soundtrack they’re not looped at all, and levels aren’t consistent either, with a few tracks playing much louder than others. Filenames and numbering is inconsistent too, so I had to manually re-order some tracks. I surmise that this soundtrack was never intended as something to be listened to straight through, but simply as a collection of music tracks from the game that can be shuffled or otherwise folded into a player’s music library.

The music itself is clearly inspired by the chiptune soundtracks of its gaming inspirations, but little of it is pure chiptune itself. Tracks like “Maryland Avenue” or “Coffeeshop” sound a bit like something from a SNES game, with lead melodies alternating between simple PSG-style waveforms and more recognizable instruments like organ or a plucked guitar, all on top of some simple sampled percussion patterns. Other tracks subtly turn up the fidelity, like “Sneaky Sneaky” where the drums sound far to crisp and real to be period music, or “Statue Reborn” which features some lovely piano that consoles at the time could never have produced. Some tracks mix up different inspirations, like “Shaw Park” which gives the lead melody to a pulse wave that immediately recalls the earlier NES, but sets it atop sampled drums and bass that wouldn’t be possible until the SNES. And still others veer away entirely, like “Hacker Battle” which brings in chugging guitars to sound like a late 1990s action game, or “DangerCon” which is almost a synthwave track.

What holds all these together is a common melodic style, a sort of bright and whimsical air running throughout the whole soundtrack. OK, there are a few tenser moments, in tracks that accompany particularly climactic battles or story scenes, but overall the music has a cheerful quality that feels true to its classic console game inspirations. Even the tracks that aren’t chiptune sound like chiptune covers. Does “1990s console game music” count as its own genre? I’m not sure, but Drew Conley and Henry Leacock have captured the spirit of that era in their score. And with each track so brief, I’ll be happy when they pop up during everyday listening, reminding me of certain parts of Danger Crew. The music is a nice bonus for anyone who enjoyed the game.

That’s 217 down, and only 1524 to go!