Indie studio Cipher Prime has launched a Kickstarter project for Auditorium 2: Duet, the sequel to 2008's rhythm-physics title Auditorium, which is celebrating its debut on Steam today. Duet aims to be a polished playground built on the experience Cipher Prime has gained developing Auditorium, Pulse and Fractal over the past three years, but its most exciting feature is something none of the developers have attempted before -- multiplayer.

"When we first started our studio we were very nervous," Cipher Prime's Will Stallwood told Joystiq in an exclusive interview. "We created Auditorium by accident and had little game design experience. We've spent the past three years honing our skills so we could tackle multiplayer.

"Auditorium has been our playground since the day we started, so the only logical step is to keep her as our playground," Stallwood adds, unknowingly outing Auditorium as a female game, for those of you keeping score.

Auditorium 2: Duet will be optimized for two-player gameplay, and Cipher Prime will be testing it as a local feature to start, with tentative plans -- more like vehement wishes -- to include PS3/Steam and iPad/Steam crossplay functions down the line.