Hello, Toons of the world! Today's edition of Backstage: Corporate Clash concerns a most monefied mallard, Mr. Buck Ruffler, AKA the Duck Shuffler! This most dexterous duck has become a favorite among our street manager lineup, which made him an obvious choice for our first Makeship plush campaign last year. Your generosity has allowed us to raise over $22K for Extra Life, and for this we were nominated as one of the finalists in the Extra Life National Awards, an award scheme that celebrates community fundraising efforts.

So, let us dive into the history of the Duck Shuffler!

Before the Duck Shuffler

Believe it or not, the Duck Shuffler was not the first street manager conceived for Toontown Central! The original proposed manager that would stalk the streets of TTC was a little Sellbot called the Handholder. 

The Handholder's cheat was "Mentorship," a passive buff that would have increased the Cog join rate and the damage that Cogs dealt while simultaneously reducing the damage that Cogs took. We decided not to proceed with the Handholder because it wasn't easy for us to come up with a design that looks good.

We considered a number of ideas for a new TTC street manager. Some of these ideas included the Spokesweasel, Nontreprenuer, and Salesblazer, but we ended up with the Duck Shuffler.

Designing the Duck Shuffler

Concepting the Duck Shuffler

The Duck Shuffler turned out to be a very difficult Cog to make, not just in terms of creating a design, but in getting it to the final product. Mailman, the primary figure behind the character's design, spoke to us about the development of the dexterous duckling:

"A Duck Shuffler is defined as someone in management who changes a project's direction after its approval. I wouldn’t have it any other way, primarily because I wanted to design a duck, but additionally, many of us were more invested in this concept than in the previous one.

"We listed our ideas for this character in the creative channels and formed a new direction: a duck detective."

"'A duck detective?' We were caught up in the pun of 'Ducktective' without considering other possibilities. This concept wasn't bad, but it lacked the impact I wanted from a manager intended to be the first that you see in Corporate Clash. The internal staff reactions were positive but not overwhelmingly so. It made its way into the early modeling process, but I knew I could push the concept further, so I sat on it for a while.

"Detectives have nothing to do with shuffling, much less the shuffling of ducks. 'Mind mapping' is an approach I often apply to cases where I’m stuck like this, and it’s particularly helpful when dealing with Cog designs. In this case, I listed any ideas that reminded me of 'shuffling.' After much research into that topic, I concluded with an approach you might be familiar with and shared it without warning.

"Closer. Did I mention we initially planned for him to be a Bossbot?

"I always do these very quick sketches when creating concept art. They’re like taking notes in that I'm jotting down my thoughts for later improvement. This Duck Shuffler especially interested the Game Design team. A Cog with a gambling theme proposed greater gameplay potential and fit nicely into the early game. I continued to build on this idea, and the final concept fell into place.

"Duck Shuffler is a gambling robot mallard. His eyes and ears are a functioning slot machine, while his wild beak gives him the appearance of a mascot you might see on a slot machine cabinet. I took the visor hat from casino dealers, so it felt right to stick some poker cards in there. Originally, the base of his neck referenced video blackjack, but after some discussion, I changed that detail to a generic, cylindrical base. And, yes, the green on his head are his... hair feathers.

"I never finished the concept art for Duck Shuffler. Sketchy lines and a lack of rendering make its incompleteness obvious. It was illustrated only for my reference and for others on the team to agree on the final direction, which they did. As an art director, I typically expect concept artists to provide accurate artwork for 3d modelers and texture artists to reference. But from the beginning, I wanted to create his assets independently, so a fully completed illustration was unnecessary. Concept art is a communication tool; I only needed this to communicate with myself."

Modeling and Texturing the Duck Shuffler

"Duck Shuffler has one of the most complicated head models I have made. A busy design like this requires so much intricacy, detail, and careful placement. I spent a pretty long time on the model and texture alone. There isn’t much to say here, it just took a lot of patience."

"At this stage, there were multiple discussions regarding how his slot machine head would function. We decided the best approach for the eyes would be a UV scroll animated by the technical team. I textured his eyes specifically to account for this."

"Each texture artist has unique approaches to texturing, and we encourage everyone to do what’s most comfortable for them. I have a background in digital painting, so I paint directly onto the model in Blender. Because Toontown lacks shaders, we have to incorporate shading into the texture, and I find it easiest to do this when I can paint in the areas of shadow. It’s satisfying to watch it all come together!"

Duck Shuffler head animations by Mailman.

Animating the Duck Shuffler

Because of the Duck Shuffler's status as the first manager players are likely to fight, the encounter had to be fun while simultaneously not too difficult. Mr. Ruffler's sole cheat, "Wager Management," is a very fun-looking cheat that would not be overwhelming for new players. It also came with a spiffy animation! Mailman spoke briefly on the development of said animation:

"Until Duck Shuffler, we didn’t need a complex Cog animation with multiple armatures animating simultaneously. But the head needed to move for the lever pull, and the body needed to reach up and grab it. Plus, the synchronized movement between the head and body allowed for more detail in future custom cog animations. We utilized this heavily for other 1.3 manager bosses after Duck Shuffler, but he was the first Cog we animated this way!"

Early Wager Management cheat animation by Mailman.

Final Wager Management cheat animation by Mailman.

"I feel like I’ve improved a lot since I made this animation. For comparison, the last animations I worked on for 1.3 were the Chainsaw Consultant ending cutscenes in collaboration with Polygon. This was the first.

"Duck Shuffler is one of my favorite characters I have ever worked on, and I couldn’t be happier with how he turned out. I’m very thankful for the opportunity to develop the visuals and assets for such awesome characters. I’m even more grateful for everyone who appreciates my work in any way, even if you don’t know I’m behind it all."

Writing the Duck Shuffler

Duck Shuffler was written in late-2021. One of the proposed name for the Duck Shuffler was Casey Noe (a pun on "casino"), but Buck Ruffler, suggested by Mailman, won the popular vote. Our initial version of him had a more subdued writing style, hardly hinting at the insanity that the Duck Shuffler would become known for. We decided to make his writing 'crazier', and Maven (one of the writers) came back with new versions of the lines that were much more exaggerated and now featured a distinct lisp. We took inspiration from an early version of Daffy Duck, which was much more manic and off-the-wall than the self-absorbed conniver character that would eventually become associated with him.

The Music of the Duck Shuffler

The music of an encounter can make the difference between a "good fight" and a "great fight." The Duck Shuffler encounter music was written by MaxGreatness. We spoke with Max about the development of this music:

"It was interesting to see the TTC boss take shape. The initial Handholder development was coming along nicely, but as Mailman brought up earlier, the idea didn’t strike a chord with anyone, so they were scrapped along with a theme I had written for them.

Handholder theme by MaxGreatness.

"The new Duck Shuffler idea seemed intriguing as well. A suave 'ducktective' did have its charm, though I wasn’t getting any musical ideas for him. Then along came the Duck Shuffler’s final concept art, and inspiration hit me hard! I knew exactly what his theme should feature: Big band! Loud horns! Running bassline! Rapid drums! Anything and everything fit for a gambling man like him! Using MasterFrasca’s TTC street battle theme as the framework, I whipped up the first rendition of his theme.

Early Duck Shuffler theme by MaxGreatness.

"Rough around the edges, yes, but it served as a solid foundation. As this character developed more and more, so too did his theme. After many tweaks, balances, additions and changes, this little number became the Duck Shuffler theme heard in-game today. The Duck Shuffler is one of my personal favorites of the new managers, and it was an honor to arrange his battle music."

Unused Duck Shuffler-Adjacent 1.3 Concepts

The functionality of Kudos managers evolved overtime, and certain proposed ideas were scrapped for a number of reasons. As a Kudos manager, the Duck Shuffler was affected by these changes just as much as the others. Let's talk a bit about them!

Kudos Street Manager Buildings

The Game Design Team had initially planned for Kudos street managers to be able to take over buildings in the same way that standard Cogs could. When this happened, a special one-story building would be created. The floor indicator of the building would contain a single, centered star, and the department indicator would show a picture of the manager. Toons brave enough to enter these buildings would face versions of the managers that had more health and did more damage. For example, the Duck Shuffler would've gone from level 5 to level 7. This idea was ultimately scrapped.

Overclocked Kudos Manager Encounters

Another proposed idea that the Crew opted to scrap was the creation of Overclocked encounters. This would have been a post-1.3 expansion that had 8 new instance encounters. These encounters, one for each playground, would have been accompanied by a new taskline placed after Kudos Rank 10 where Toons collaborated with Mac Opsys and Winn Dos to take on the newest Cog threat: the street and the instance Regional Managers teaming to assert the authority of the Coal, Oil, and Gas Syndicate, forcing players to fight both of them at the same time. These managers would be stronger than before and their cheats would have had similar synergies like the Litigiation Team. The Toontown Central encounter would have seen the Duck Shuffler team up with the Prethinker in an attempt to show the Toons that both intellect and luck were on their side!

We decided to scrap this for scope control reasons, but it's something we might revisit in the future.

Conclusion

That's going to do it for this edition of Backstage: Corporate Clash! We're still hard at work creating the Duck Shuffler long-form comic, which we hope to have out soon.

Until then, stay Toony!