FingerGaming

Hello and welcome to this 5th Equilibrio developer diary. If you missed the previous diaries you can still find them here.

In the last dev diary, I talked about the status of the game and posted some screenshots. Unlike what I said in the previous diary, I’ll not talk about the submission process this time (I’ll do it when the game is in the submission process). Today, I’ll talk about two distinct things: first, how to create a casual and hardcore-friendly game, and secondly, I’ll give some general information we’d like to share with fellow and wanna-be iPhone developers who’d like to launch a worldwide title.

Some of you may have noticed that I’m one week late. No need to worry — this is because this dev diary is longer than the previous ones and it took me a little bit more time than I expected to wrap it up.

Let’s get started with the first topic: how to create a compelling game suited for multiple audiences (casual and core gamers, in the case of Equilibrio).

Read the rest of this entry »

Tags: Action, Developer Diary, equilibrio, fishing cactus, Puzzle, Upcoming, upcoming release

Welcome to this third Equilibrio Dev Diary. You can read our previous entries at the following links: Entry 1 and Entry 2.Today I’m going to talk about a slippery subject: defining the price of a game on the App Store.

As independent game developers, when you start development on a new game, one day or another, you’ll have to face the following questions: What will be the price of this game? What will be our strategy to make a good game as well as a financial success? What?! This industry is not just fun and joy? Uh… In what world are you living in? Developers are not only making games for the sake of entertainment, it is also a business, and people are living off of it.

Independent studios should be careful thinking about the price, costs, Apple’s cut (30% of the price), and marketing budget amongst other expenses as not really an option.

So, defining the price is not an easy task, especially if the price varies a lot like on the App Store where you have really good games at $0.99 and some lesser quality games at $7.99… It is difficult to define a price that will make your game stand out. You have to correctly analyze what other games propose and find a way to interest the gamers into buying your game.

There are different marketing strategies. Some “bigger” games have the following commercial principle: start with a very “high” price point, which they lower every month or so thanks to the App Store’s flexible system. Other games remain at a high price point. Some other games offer different versions of their game with more or less content depending on the price (lite, normal or premium versions).

For Equilibrio, we are thinking about launching the game with a low price point (less than $5). We also want to explore the option of providing additional content packs, which can be purchased and downloaded with new bonuses and levels. We plan on making content packs available for less than $2.

We think that this way, the game stays accessible for a wide range of gamers and their budget while those who enjoyed the experience can invest more money if they want to.

Don’t hesitate to post comments if you want to share some ideas and comments about the price and trends in general on the App Store or for Equilbirio. I think it would be very helpful for Fishing Cactus and the whole iPhone developers’ community.

See you in two weeks, we’ll talk about some IGF.

Tags: Developer Diary, equilibrio, fishing cactus, iPhone

Welcome back for this second episode of Equilibrio Developer Diaries. If you missed the first episode or if you want to read it again, you can find it here.

Two weeks ago, I did a small presentation of the company, myself and the project we’re making on the iPhone/iPod Touch which is called Equilibrio. Today I want to talk a little bit more about what’s going on with the project, and it’s current status.

We are currently in alpha phase, meaning that we have all the game working, all the game features and mechanics have been implemented and are working as supposed to (oh yeah!). Which means we’re already looking at how and when to release the game. We’re also polishing the controls, adjusting the difficulty, placing the various bonuses etc.

So as you’ve guessed we’re already pretty much advanced in the development process. Except bugs, loading times and a small size problem to fit everything in memory our biggest concern is the testing process. I don’t own an iPhone yet (bouh!) but I own an iPod touch and for me it is quite difficult to get a testable version without having to put the build online or to grab it from the devs’ machine. It is also even worse if you don’t have a Macintosh…

When you’re developing a game, it should be easy to give a version to other collaborators whom may be designers, artists or musicians. Simply because a game is not just some code with graphics on top of it (I agree some games are like that). A game is a clock made of variables and gears which need to work smoothly together to create a good game experience. The gears (game mechanics) need to be adjusted by tuning variables. This process is done mainly through iterative tests. So as a game designer (I do the tuning), I do a lot of back and forth in all versions to adjust variables. If sharing versions is not a simple process, then it becomes a bottleneck for the whole production of the game.

In a nutshell, Apple’s system is pretty much secured for end users and I think it is simple and very intuitive to use. On the other side the system can be definitely improved on the developer side, especially if members of the same team aren’t physically in the same room and are remotely connected.

In two weeks, it will be screenshot week.

In the meantime have fun.

Tags: Developer Diary, equilibrio, fishing cactus, iPhone

Welcome to the very first Equilibrio Developer Diary. This column is intended to give you some insights about what’s going on in an independent game studio which is currently working on its first iPhone project called Equilibrio.

My name is Bruno Urbain, and I’m one of the founder and design director of a small independent studio called Fishing Cactus which officially opened its doors in summer 2007 in Belgium. I’ve been working in the gaming industry for something like 10 years. I started with mods development and quickly moved to the pro category. I’m a full time game designer since a little bit more than 5 years. To speak a little bit more about Fishing Cactus, our primary focus is to develop games on digital platforms, iPhone is the one in which we have strong feelings for.

We’ve been recently promoted as official iPhone developers and started a project called Equilibrio (a port of a Wiiware title developed by DK-Games). It is our first iPhone project and we started it only 3 months ago. Equilibrio is a 3D game with a similar gameplay to Monkey Ball since you have to control a ball from point A to point B. Even if the game is in 3D, the game is played in 2D. You control the different types of balls by tilting the iPhone left or right. You can control 5 types of balls which all have different properties and weight. For example the paper ball can fly a little bit while the iron ball never breaks. This creates tons of gameplay experiences that we captured in the levels (this will be the subject of another dev diary). More generally I can say that the core experience of the game feels more like a Sonic game in the way that you have to do loops, smooth landings, jump over ramps or avoid deadly obstacles.

For Fishing Cactus, Equilibrio is a probe project. With this project we are going to probe the market and see if the app store is a viable market for mid-scaled projects. Every two weeks, I’ll try to give you some information about the problems we faced or the tools we used to develop the game on iPhone. Later on I hope I’ll be able to share about reviews impact and, if possible, sales.

That’s it for this week. In the meantime if you want me to dig a specific subject, don’t hesitate to shoot in the comments section.

See you in two weeks.

Tags: Developer Diary, equilibrio, fishing cactus