Supermarket Times is delightfully odd. A point-and-click supermarket-simulator with a distinctly British flavour, that manages to be surreal and comical in equal measure. Pantaloon found some time to pick the brains of Joel Winsor, the solo-developer behind the game, and source of all subsequent absurdity.

Enjoy x

What was your path into game development? Talk me through the history leading up to Supermarket Times.

I had always wanted to make games but the programming really put me off (which is ironic because I actually really enjoy it now). About 5 years ago I was working in film as an Assistant Editor but I found this creatively very unfulfilling. When Covid happened, the entire film industry was stopped, and I was very unemployed and had a lot of time on my hands stuck in the house so I started following YouTube tutorials for GameMaker and I made a couple of small games - I decided quite quickly that film was for losers and that I was definitely going to make games from now on.

Kenneth (who I made Supermarket Times with) and I have been friends since uni. I showed Kenneth the games I had been working on and we decided to make one together. The game was originally supposed to only take a few months to make, but (in typical fashion) it ended up being a lot longer than that.

Kenneth is an artist and had recently at the time decided that nothing was more creatively liberating (and also financially cost-effective) than using felt tip pens so this is where the art style for the game came from.

Supermarket Times captures a scarily authentic British supermarket 'vibe' that any player from the UK will recognise - how did you go about achieving this?

The highlight of the week for me and my girlfriend is a trip to the big supermarket near us - we have to drive there and everything - but it’s worth it. There is always something bizarre going on. Last Sunday little Edwin was berated from the car park to the checkout and back again by his irate mother - he just wanted a chocolate croissant. Another man scooped all the puddings out from the shelves and threw them on the floor, raspberry trifle splatting everywhere, all so he could get to the coldest ones at the back. The 21st century really is an amazing time to be alive!

In my experience, supermarkets are full of weirdos everywhere - all over the world. But yes, we both grew up in the UK and were exposed to the supermarket experience here, as well as all the UK products and advertising campaigns. I think the humour works in the game because we've all had a similar deep psychological mass brainwashing.

Comedy - in any medium, really - is notoriously difficult to land. SMT manages to weave this into the experience incredibly well. How did you approach the writing and niche brand of humour that is central to the game?

I would have an idea and if it made me laugh I would then create it in the game, if it still made me laugh then it stayed in. Once we had a drawing for a product/character, Kenneth improvised the voice-overs on the spot. 90% were done on the first take. There’s no real explanation for how that's possible other than he’s a genius.

I honestly had no idea if anybody else would find the game funny or not. I think only 2 other people saw the game as I was making it. As the project continued on over the one-year mark, I was worried I could have wasted all this time making something that nobody would find funny. It came as a massive relief that when it was released other people really did like it.

Across the development of the game, were there any features left on the cutting room floor? Or anything from your original vision that couldn't make it in due to scope reasons?

Hmm, not really I just kept adding more and more ideas in and at a certain point I had to stop or I would have gone crazy - it took me a year and a half to make the game working alone most of the time, by the end of it I was 100% burnt out.

We would have liked to put way more products in but Kenneth couldn’t find inspiration for the voice-over descriptions after a while, and we thought it would be better to have products we liked in rather than force ourselves to make crap unfunny ones.

One idea that got cut was to have a checkout assistant talk at you about the products you were buying at the end - I thought quite a lot about how we could make this person/interaction work in a way that would be funny, but I was never happy with it. Now you watch all your product choices go through and beep and you get a big bill printed out for you, which I thought was a better ending!

Did Supermarket Times present any difficult production challenges?

Yes, I had to plan an elaborate heist to steal a trolley (from a supermarket that will go unnamed here) - the trolley was integral to production for sound recordings. I worked out the security guards' routes and shifts, where were the blind spots on CCTV? Could it fit in my car? This elaborate plan turned out to be totally unnecessary when I found one in a park.

So for 6 months I had a shopping trolley in my flat. My cat loved sitting in it and being wheeled around.

When it was done, I released it back onto the street. It was gone within a matter of hours. Where it is now, I don’t know. But I often wonder where it is at this moment... are you happy? Did you find someone else? Are you full of shopping?

What other games have you seen recently in the indie space that are doing something bold or interesting?

It’s not exactly a hidden gem but I loved Animal Well - for me it was one of those games I couldn’t wait to get home from work to play on. Which is really rare to find I think.

I recently discovered the developer Zachtronics, their games look super cool and are on my wishlist to play next.

I’ve also become obsessed with Rollercoaster Tycoon in the last couple of weeks. Not being a ten year old anymore, I can finally design rides that don’t break everyone’s necks.

What's next for Rabbit Hole Games? Are you looking to branch further into the world of bizarre, comedy-centric games?

Yes, Kenneth and I are working on another game with a very distinctive style. We’re planning on taking it into a 3d world which looks absolutely mad in the little sketches we’ve done of it so far. I’ve also got an idea for an fps comedy game that might be coming next.

Until next time.

pantaloon.

Supermarket Times: The Interview