Author Topic: Finished my first iPhone game (Read 10023 times)

Raizor · « **on:** April 02, 2011 »

As some of you might know, I've been working on a game for iPhone/iPod touch for a while. It's finally finished and on the App Store, which means I now have some time for some more demo coding - yay

It's a retro style game akin to Arkanoid or Breakout, with some new features and ideas that hopefully make it really fun to play.

You can see some screenshots on the website, here: http://wallwarrior.b-magic.co.uk/. I haven't had time to put together a proper video yet.

If anyone fancies taking a look at it and giving me some feedback, that would be much appreciated. Here are some promo codes that you can redeem via iTunes to get a free copy. Each code can only be used once, so when they're gone, they're gone:

R6AERJKLE374
MKYHJ69YRF9N
39RWNL3LWMJP
77PFT7ATAREL
936KNA6L9R63

Cheers,

Raizor

LittleWhite · « **Reply #1 on:** April 02, 2011 »

Hey,

Your game looks really nice

and has a nice idea (non linear bouncer path (I don't know how to say)).
Unfortunately, I don't have an iPhone to play with.

Raizor · « **Reply #2 on:** April 02, 2011 »

Thanks LittleWhite. Glad you noticed the paths

I generated a canonical spline for the paths that the bats move along and the path for the wall bricks that sit behind the paddle. Was a bit of a pain to implement but it makes the level designs a lot more flexible. I considered adding a sine-wave to the paths so they bob around like water as you play. Didn't get round to doing that yet, so maybe I'll add it in a future update.

Shame you can't play the game. Hopefully I'll have a video of it soon so you can see it in action.

Kirl · « **Reply #3 on:** April 02, 2011 »

Looks awesome, some cool variation ideas, well done!

Shame I don't have an iAnything, would've enjoyed this for sure...

benny! · « **Reply #4 on:** April 02, 2011 »

Screenies look very promising. Will have a closer look at the game later. Thanks
for sharing the info!

Raizor · « **Reply #5 on:** April 02, 2011 »

Thanks Kirl and Benny

padman · « **Reply #6 on:** April 02, 2011 »

Yup this is looking great as far as I can tell from the screenshots, always loved Breakout style games! Can't test it though, only got a crappy Samsung mobile.

rdc · « **Reply #7 on:** April 02, 2011 »

Looks really good. Good luck with this.

boogop · « **Reply #8 on:** April 05, 2011 »

How long did the approval process take you? My iOS demo has been sitting on 'waiting for review' for about a week.

Raizor · « **Reply #9 on:** April 05, 2011 »

boogop, it took 8 days. It really depends how busy things are though. Sometimes it takes a few days, sometimes 10 or more. About a week is average though. Hopefully yours has been approved by the time you read this

boogop · « **Reply #10 on:** April 05, 2011 »

That would be nice

but this one's a little questionable. It's a demo, and 'demo' things aren't permitted. So I had to scrub all references to 'demo' and replace them with 'intro' which will hopefully make it through. But it is what it is, and there aren't any others with oldschool effects and music like this--though there's an app called 'effectz' which shows four or five demo effects.

Raizor · « **Reply #11 on:** April 05, 2011 »

Ah yea, I remember you posting about it before. They force you to make it interactive, which is a bit of a bummer. Could always make it into some kind of music visualizer if they bounce it back. I'm looking forward to seeing it! Hope they give it the thumbs up soon. Good luck

benny! · « **Reply #12 on:** April 06, 2011 »

First, thanks a lot for promo code. Much appreciated. I downloaded the game. Here is some feedback.

Gameplay

+ Gameplay rocks. Really good Arkanoid clone
+ All known power ups available.
+ Nice feature to use TILT phone functionality
+ Level design is pretty good too IMHO

- The PAUSE button is too small. Sometimes hard during INGAME action to hit it
- It is a bit frustrating if you need to restart at level 1 if you lost all your lives
Proposal: Forget about lives (only have one) and implement restart/continue at last level

Highscore

o This game definately is worth to have a highscore. But it has only local highscore. I would recommend using OpenFeint or something similar.

Music/SFX

+ Fantastic music/songs. Who is responsible for them? Very well chosen.
+ Ingame SFX also fits.

GFX

o It is Okayish - not bad, but could be a bit more polished, e.g.
oo Better Logo
oo Ingame Space Backgrounds are looking good - some textures in later levels look a bit unpolished
o Effects when brick explodes for example could be a bit more colorful/stressed out

Overall, I really like that game. I do not know how many Arkanoid clones are out there - but this one is a really good one IMHO.

Wish you good luck with it! Would be interesting to know if you would share some revenue/install stats once it is online for a while.

Best,
benny!

Raizor · « **Reply #13 on:** April 06, 2011 »

Benny, you're a star. Thanks for the feedback, it is really appreciated and very useful. I've added some comments to your feedback. K++

Quote from: benny! on April 06, 2011

Gameplay

- The PAUSE button is too small. Sometimes hard during INGAME action to hit it
* I will make the pause button bigger as I agree, it is too small at present.
- It is a bit frustrating if you need to restart at level 1 if you lost all your lives
Proposal: Forget about lives (only have one) and implement restart/continue at last level
* When I first read this I thought "what a crazy idea!". But the more I think about it, the more it makes sense

Highscore

o This game definately is worth to have a highscore. But it has only local highscore. I would recommend using OpenFeint or something similar.
* I'm about half way done with the first update, which already has Game Centre integrated with leaderboards (high score, most coins and most levels completed in one go). I've also added 10 different achievements. Hopefully this will make the game more fun and fulfilling.

Music/SFX

+ Fantastic music/songs. Who is responsible for them? Very well chosen.
* They're all royalty free tunes from a number of different sources. I don't have any information on the composers though.

GFX

o It is Okayish - not bad, but could be a bit more polished, e.g.
oo Better Logo
* Yes, I'm not entirely happy with the logo. I made all the graphics myself and the current logo was the best of the bunch that I came up with. If you have any suggestions on improving it, I would appreciate that.
oo Ingame Space Backgrounds are looking good - some textures in later levels look a bit unpolished
* Fair point. I should look to get some better textures for some of the backgrounds.
o Effects when brick explodes for example could be a bit more colorful/stressed out
* Having better explosion effects on newer devices is certainly possible and something I will look into.

Wish you good luck with it! Would be interesting to know if you would share some revenue/install stats once it is online for a while.
* Sure, I'm happy to share that info. It's quite poor at the moment, about 20 or so paid downloads for a profit of around $35. Hehe. I'm planning on reducing the price to $0.99 when the first update goes live, which should hopefully help pick things up...

Thanks again,
Raizor

benny! · « **Reply #14 on:** April 06, 2011 »

Hi Raizor,

you are really welcome. Glad that my comments are of some help for you. I really respect the work you have done. Especially when you consider that you done most of it on your own (Leveldesign, GFX, code). I know how much it takes to really finish a project and release it. The last 20% of the project are often the hardest (esp. when motivation is decreasing). And btw. K++ for you for giving some promo-codes.

Quote

...
I've also added 10 different achievements. Hopefully this will make the game more fun and fulfilling.

Yeah. Did not think about achievements. That's a good idea. Go for it.

Quote

They're all royalty free tunes from a number of different sources. I don't have any information on the composers though.

Awesome. Can you recommend some sites/portals for royality free music?

Quote

Yes, I'm not entirely happy with the logo. I made all the graphics myself and the current logo was the best of the bunch that I came up with. If you have any suggestions on improving it, I would appreciate that.

Being no GFX-artist either, I know how hard it is to come up with some good GFX. Especially when your time is limited and you need to split your time on coding/leveldesign/bugfixing and gfx. I know that there are some 3D-Logo creators on the INet. But most of them are not that good. Quick google result give me this for example:

http://www.flamingtext.com/net-fu/dynamic.cgi?script=amazing-3d-logo

(Example pic see attached file)

If you have access to photoshop maybe there are some easy to follow logo-creation tutorials you could use. Or of course best, you find a cool GFX man. Personally I think some good GFX really helps your app/product to stand out from the mass.

Quote

Sure, I'm happy to share that info. It's quite poor at the moment, about 20 or so paid downloads for a profit of around $35. Hehe. I'm planning on reducing the price to $0.99 when the first update goes live, which should hopefully help pick things up...

Thanks a lot for sharing those information with us. This is really interesting. I guess an Arkonoid-clone is rather hard to market, but I think you will get more revenue. Reducing the price could be a good idea. Maybe giving some free copies to some blogs could also have a nice effect. I also heard that offering your game for free for a limited time could be worth it (refer to http://www.freeappaday.com/).

An alternative would be offering a free version of the app with limited functionality or a free version with ads in it.

That said, I just want to underline that I am not an expert in app-marketing.

Anyway, keep up the good work and wish you lots of success with it. Would be interesting to hear how things work for you.

Best,
benny!

LittleWhite · « **Reply #15 on:** April 06, 2011 »

I have to add on Benny! ideas that if you are adding ads ingame ... I would kill you ... I mean ... I really would have hate it (after ... I don't have a iPhone ...)
For shareware process ... not sure if it is good ... but why not.

Raizor · « **Reply #16 on:** April 06, 2011 »

Thanks again benny. I just searched google for royalty free music. There are tons of them but I doubt you'll find anything great without paying. Some are reasonably priced, some not so much.

I will have a go with using of those 3d images as a template and jazz it up in photoshop. I like that font so will probably use it. Thanks.

Yeah, Arkanoid games are not exactly in vogue at the moment but I've always loved them

Will probably make a free (less levels) version at somevpoint rather than going the ad route. I have almost as much disdain for ads as LittleWhite tbh

Sales are always slow to start, especially for anything above 99c that's not made by one of the big name companies. Hopefully a sale will get it noticed a bit more. The key seems to be getting mentioned by someone famous or featured by Apple. I heard it was the Jonas brothers mentioning Doodle Jump on Twitter that pushed their sales up by about 2 million. Just need to find an Arkanoid loving celeb now!

And yea, saying motivated is hard, especially with a day job and a young family. But coding stuff for yourself, for fun is never that much of a chore

benny! · « **Reply #17 on:** April 07, 2011 »

Yep, a free version sounds also good.

Btw, voted it 5 stars on appstore.

Raizor · « **Reply #18 on:** April 07, 2011 »

Hehe, thanks benny. A little generous, but much appreciated

Raizor · « **Reply #19 on:** April 08, 2011 »

Benny,

I've created a new logo, in a very similar style to the one you posted before. I think it looks much better, hopefully you agree