Independent games have garnered a great deal of attention recently, with companies like Steam and the Humble Bundle greenlighting indie projects and bringing them to the forefront of the industry. With the help of PixelDash Studios and the Baton Rouge Technology Park, University alumni Matthew and Michael Taranto have jumped into the fray with their new and novel brainchild “Tadpole Treble.”
“‘Tadpole Treble’ is basically an adventure game where you swim through sheet music,” Matthew Taranto said.
The brothers came up with the concept for their game after watching their father, a professional composer, create songs with autoscrolling music software. In “Tadpole Treble,” players lead the game’s heroine, Baton, to her home through similar autoscrolling stages built around an original score. The main objective of the game is to dodge notes, but players can also increase their score by using cymbals and battling bosses along the way.
Much of the music featured in the game is inspired by classic Nintendo series like “Banjo Kazooie” and “The Legend of Zelda.” Some of the stages feature compositions from donors who contributed to the brothers’ Kickstarter fund, which they used to make the game.
“One of the stages is centered around 8-bit chiptunes – I think a lot of people will like that one,” he said.
With Kickstarter, the brothers raised more than $34,000 and were able to completely fund the development of their game for Mac and PC. They are currently raising money through Paypal to bring their game to other platforms. If they raise $45,000, it will be released on the WiiU, and if they raise $50,000, they will make versions of the game for the iPhone and Android. Some of the money was spent on marketing, taxes and rewarding donors, but 60 percent of the money paid for the cost of hiring professional programmer Dane Caro, who has worked on more than a dozen games.
Matthew Taranto said he and his brother have come a long way since college, but the education they received at the University was essential to their success. Michael played trombone in the Tiger Band and is a professional singer who plays guitar and composes music in his free time. Matthew is a professional church pianist with a Bachelor of Arts in graphic design.
“I started drawing my webcomic, ‘Brawl in the Family,’ at LSU as a homage to Nintendo, and our dream of making a game evolved from there,” Matthew Taranto said.
He said the process of transitioning from comic art to game development was a difficult but rewarding experience. The biggest challenge they faced was transforming their visual art into workable code, but with Caro’s expertise, they were able to create a polished product.
“It’s a lot of hard work, but it’s amazing to see our dream come true,” Matthew Taranto said.
He said the game should be released in the final quarter of 2014. It will likely be available through Bitfinity, the brothers’ game studio, and through Steam as a candidate of the Greenlight project, a community-driven program that sells games professionally for a percentage of the profit.
“I started drawing my webcomic, “Brawl in the Family,” at LSU, as a homage to Nintendo, and our dream of making a game evolved from there.”

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Trey McGlothin

Level Up Lab's Mike and Matt Taranto work on a new indie video game in room 307 at the Tech Park.