An infinitely spawning poo feature causes issues in a Japanese indie game

Written by. Nick Mosier based on the original Japanese article (original article’s publication date: 2022-07-02 17:09 JST)

Japanese indie game developer Tadasumen released an update for their game I’m going to die if I don’t eat sushi! on June 30 (JST). The patch notes simply stated, “removed physics calculations from the poop,” which seemed to be causing all sorts of problems. In order to find out more about these peculiar issues, we reached out to Tadasumen.

お前は何を言ってるんだと思われるかもしれませんが、自作ゲームの隠し要素として実装したうんち無限生成スキルが様々なバグの温床になっていました。うんちから物理演算を剥奪する事で解決しました。 pic.twitter.com/iojwIjKgit

— ただすめん (@tadasumen) June 30, 2022

I’m going to die if I don’t eat sushi! is an action game for PC developed by Tadasumen. Players control a man who must continuously eat sushi or else he will die. Each stage has a goal of eating a certain amount of sushi, eating a specific type of sushi, or reaching the goal, which players must do while also eating sushi scattered across the ground to keep their sushi gauge from depleting. But contrary to the strange setting is a game players have been praising for its tense action.

A free version of the game was first released on December 29, with the paid Steam version launching on June 22 of this year. The Steam version supports multiple languages, online leaderboards, and a number of other Steam features. In addition, both versions were updated with new content and the game’s true ending. As of now, the Steam version has received 30 user reviews and sits at a rating of 100% “Positive.” With all that said, one might think it was nothing but smooth sailing for I’m going to die if I don’t eat sushi!.

Stage breaking poo

However, an odd bug was discovered. The “poop” component within the game had issues. In I’m going to die if I don’t eat sushi!, there are abilities called “Jump Skills” that can be purchased with the currency collected within the game. These include handy abilities such as a mid-air dash and being able to immediately land on the ground. There’s also a hidden Jump Skill called “UNKOWN” that gives players the ability to infinitely spawn poop. When pressing the jump button again while jumping, “poop,” or rather, a bright pink cartoon turd will appear where the player’s head is. It’s these pink pieces of poo that were causing unexpected issues for both players and Tadasumen.

We spoke with Tadasumen about everything from what kinds of bugs the poo was causing to why they added secret poo in the first place. According to them, the bugs were caused by “the poop being treated the same as the player character by the game.” This made it possible for players to use the poop to get an unfair advantage, which is a bigger issue when you consider the game has online leaderboards.

One example is if you left some poop at the beginning of a stage and continued to the next one, your stage score and completed stage conditions would remain intact for that next stage. This would make it easy to achieve fast clear times in difficult stages. While a funny use for a fecal body double, it’s ultimately an issue that can’t be overlooked.

Quickly resolving the matter

And with an update on June 30, the poo problems were taken care of. When we asked Tadasumen why they added an infinitely spawning poo feature in the first place, they simply said, “because I thought it would be funny.” And when asked why they gave the poo physics calculations, they said, “I thought it would be funny to see poo rolling around.” Sometimes even something added with the best of intentions can cause unforeseen problems.

The discovery of the bug and research into its cause can be credited to Japanese speedrunner Nore139, who is known for running games like DEEEER Simulator. Nore139 is the one who noticed the poo had the same properties as the player character and set out to find if it could eat sushi or not. But as oddly as the poop behaved, it sounds like it at least wasn’t able to eat food. For Nore139’s contributions, they were memorialized on the poop statue within the game.

なんと！『そろそろ寿司を食べないと死ぬぜ！』にて、UNKOが原因で発生するバグの原因を解明しお伝えしたことで、ゲーム内に私のUNKO像を設置していただけたようです！　UNKOが主人公と同じ属性を持っているっぽいのでUNKOが代わりに寿司を食べれるのか研究してたりしました（結局できませんでした） pic.twitter.com/4iVMyUXwdA

— Nore139 (@Nore139) June 30, 2022

While added to be humorous, the poo had to quickly be modified to prevent unexpected behavior. But thanks to Tadasumen’s quick response, players can now safely drop poop as they please.

I’m going to die if I don’t eat sushi! is now available on Steam for $3.99. A free version of the game can be downloaded from Tadasumen’s personal website kusoi.site. Tadasumen’s most recent release A game that saves the muscles caught in the ceiling of the gymnasium is also available on Steam for $1.99, with a free version available via BOOTH.