Just Shapes and Beats

Δ & ♫

So, what is JSaB?

Just shapes and beats is a bullet-hell style rhythm game where you control a small shape (most of the time a small cyan cube) and try to avoid all of the pink shapes and objects that appear on the beat!

Simple to understand, but the levels can get hard fast

Story?

Amazingly, yes! JSaB has a pretty simple story, but i absolutely love the fact that it can be so impactful using absolutely no words!

Would love to tell the story in here! But... i feel like putting it into words kind of defeats the original purpose :P

Characters?

Yup! Though none of the characters are actually named in game, there are a few other sources we can use to 'name' them.

The main ones are:

Cyan

Cyan - They are the main character in the story, and the player 1. The official name is 'Square', as seen in the steam trading cards, but the most common name by the community is 'Cyan'. They are also known as 'Hero' in the game files.

Boss

Blixer - They are the main antagonist in the story. Their official name is just 'Boss' (on the steam trading cards and game files), but since there are other bosses in the game, that got pretty confusing, so the community calls them 'Blixer' (which allegedly came from their attack pattern in Long Live the New Fresh).

Big Square

Big Square - A friend! Literally named 'Friend' in the files, this is one of the most beloved characters in this game. They are pretty much a pure cinnamon roll, caught in a bad situation.

Boat

Boat - Another friend! One of very few charaters which the community name is the same as the games name. They dont have hands like a lot of other characters, and has around 3 unused animations (one of which actually went on to be used in a steam point shop avatar)

Helicopter

Heli - Yet another friend! Their community name is just the games name, 'Helicopter', but shortened! They are my personal favorite character in this game, and i find them just so dang cute

Other notable characters are:

Sun

Sun - While they are one of the first characters you meet, they are unfortunatly not that popular in the community :(. They are so cute please give them more recognition!

Birds

Birds - Super adorable little guys!! You dont see them a lot during the actual storyline, and they generally dont get a lot of screentime, but they are technically the first character you ever see aside from cyan, since they teach you how to dash in the tutorial.

Plant

Plants - Technically a species and not a character, but they are pretty prominent! They might also get called 'Flowers' or 'Cacti'.

Spider

Spiders - Also technically a species, and they are only seen in the 'Lost Chapter'. They were originally cut content, but eventually released alongside a prequel chapter to the main storyline!

A rhythm game?

Yea! Every single song (aka stage) in this game has its own unique theme and attack you on beat! There is a huge emphasys on simplicity on the attack design though, so it never becomes 'hard to read' a pattern. It gets its difficulty from the speed of the attacks, and since a lot of songs either have a high bpm or really impactul beats, it can be really hard to dogde some attacks.

What songs is in it?

A lot. They stay in the EDM umbrella, though! Here are a sample some of the soundtrack:

  • Dubwoofer Substep - by Omnitica
  • HYPE - by Tokyo Machine
  • Flowers of Antimony - by Rainbowdragoneyes
  • Deadlocked - by F-777
  • Last Tile 海底撈月 - by Kommisar

Any secrets?

A few actually! They are all still spoiler free ^^

  • Quarble

    This little guy pops up during one of the songs (from the shovel knight crossover) and moments before i saw him for the first time i heard the song sounded quite a bit to another song i love and, lo and behold, i was right!
    He is a straight reference to Quarble! The song in question was a remix made by Rainbowdragoneyes, who made the soundtrack to The Messenger, the game quarble is from :D
    Both The Messenger and JSaB are games that i really hold dear to me so this was a huge thing for me

  • You can change the language of your game to 'Hodor'. Guess what it does :3

  • If you are in the overworld in story mode, repeatedly trying to go in a direction you cant will make cyan especially angry

Wait! You missed [BLANK]!

I know there are a few things in this game i would love to add here, but this is meant to be as spoiler-free as possible! So... Sorry if your favorite charater is 'cuda or lycan :<