TWIP: The Last Rocket

TWIP (This Week I'm Playing) is a reoccurring weekly post where I highlight a game or app that I have been playing recently. This won't necessarily be about new games, just ones that have my attention this week.

This Week I'm Playing The Last Rocket by Shaun Inman. This game has been out for a while, but I recently picked it up and have been loving it. The 8-bit graphics easily drew me in, but the interesting new control scheme and deep puzzles have kept me busy.

Title Screen

In Game

The game is 'cute', has style, and the music is superb. There is even a 'sound test' section in the settings, something that retro gamers are familiar with and reminiscent for. Now-a-days you have to buy the soundtrack as a separate purchase, but with The Last Rocket you get the whole thing for free, accessible from the menu. It's good music too.

Gears!

The early puzzles look simple, but quickly ramp up in difficulty and requires thought and timing. I'm really impressed at a game that isn't following the norm lately of a free download with in-app-purchases for tokens or coins that lead to upgrades. This is simple a great game with plenty of levels, and a fair price.

Yesterday was fun

I made a couple of posts yesterday, and they must have been posted at the right time, and I hit a sweet spot with the ads, added $31 to my adsense account. I still haven't been able to cash out yet, need to hit $100 before that happens. I think I'll be blogging more in the future.

...and another thought

One idea that keeps floating around in my head lately, usually as I clock in at my day job, is that I should be making things that make me money even while I sleep, rather than getting paid only when I work. This mentality didn't cross my mind when I was younger and just started working. I always believed that you only get money for spending time working. This is great if you honestly love what you do, but this isn't the case for most people. Instead, one should spend their time making something that they can sell or something that perpetuates money for them. With the iOS/AppStore ecosystem and the spirit of indie gaming/development that has spurred in the last few years, I am at the perfect position to jump into an independent work-for-myself business. All I need is the tools and skills to make it happen.

Also, this is my 50th post in this blog. Yipee! So far this year I have banked about $30 from the ads on this site. The only cost for me is the domain name, which is $10 a year, so I've already paid for 3 years of this blog. Pretty cool, eh? Until you realize that you can't cash that out until you reach $100. So, click an ad or two for me so I can cash out!

Another year, another resolution & goal

I started this blog near the end of last year, with a goal to get an app in the AppStore and start my career as an independent developer. I didn't really have a plan on how to get there, just a few tutorials and my Macbook Pro. Reflecting on this past year, I realize that a lot has changed. Most notable, I upgraded to a Macbook Air.

Seriously though, I accomplished what I set out to do, but not the the extent that I had dreamed. That I still dream. I learned the basics of how to hobble an app together from various tutorials. I made about $25 from sales, and have about 1,500 downloads overall. Not a smashing success, but it's a start. And having done all this in my spare time, I am constantly curious about what I can accomplish if I had more time to put towards this part of my life. Ready for it?

So my resolution for 2012 is to continue learning and creating apps, blocking out dedicated time each week to spend on doing this. No more "I'll do that tomorrow" or "I'm going to spend my weekend playing Skyrim". I am hesitant to make a monetary goal for myself because I want to focus on the creation side of this game. I truly believe that the developers who do what they love (and love what they do) will create amazing apps that will sell themselves. I think I can reach this level in a year, building on what I already know.

I also want to blog more. @theonlylars mentioned on twitter that the best way to learn is to teach someone else. I have always felt that I don't really have anything to teach to others, so why bother writing out a tutorial. But I think coming at it from another angle, and writing the steps out to cement them in my head would be hugely beneficial for me, and possibly some beginners out there. This might also drive some more traffic to this site, which would also help out financially if I got a few more ad clicks. I really hate to have ads on my site, but for the time being it's a necessary evil.

So there's some blog for you. This all has been swimming around my head for the last few weeks as I stock shelves and pretend smile at the customers, trying with all my might to tune out the Holiday music. Had to get it out today. Thanks for reading =]

A Nice Bump

About two weeks ago I decided to bump up the price of quadrobounce! to $1 for a week, just to see if anyone would buy it. I'd been having a steady trickle of 4-6 downloads a day (I know, watch out world), and I thought if only one of those people per day bought my game, I could buy a can of coffee or something. No surprise, zero downloads for the whole week. BIG surprise, over two hundred downloads over the weekend after the price drop.

Click to embiggen

The price dropped back to free on November 12. I had 116 downloads on that day, and 109 on the following. They were all free downloads, but still kinda cool, eh?

I don't know if someone was tracking the price, or if some automatic system watches these price changes, but it's nice to see a spike like that. What I learned is that I need to get ads in this game immediately, because there are a large number of new players.

Free Time = Nonexistant

Movement on my experiment to be a free-from-the-working-man's-life software developer has cooled off recently. Skyrim has already taken up a bit of free time, and I haven't even had a proper weekend to play it. That starts tonight after my night shift.
I want to spend more time coding and designing apps. I want to go through tutorials, both for coding and pixelmator. I want to get lost in code and show off my apps to the world. I just can't seem to get motivated when other things get in the way, namely my ~40 hour a week job. I have a new schedule at said job that I think will help me out. I now have two days off in a row (Tuesday / Wednesday), and I'm hoping to block out a large chunk of time, each week, to devote to development. It won't happen this week because of Skyrim, but next week DEFINITELY!
I have been actively taking notes though on things I want to make. I keep my moleskine notebook close so that when an idea pops up, I can quickly jot it down.

Inspiring

All of this Steve Jobs talk lately, watching his speeches for the first time, and hearing so much about his life and the passion he had for creating a mark on this work has been moving and inspiring for people around the world. I can't stop thinking about 'living someone else's dream' and not following your own heart and desires for your own life. I think I feel that spark for making apps again, even stupid little games that are simply about fun.

Man, I've been lazy

Or busy, I can't decide. All I know is I haven't touched iOS stuff in a while (same old story). Working two jobs makes it hard to work on the hobby job.
I have another 'practice app' idea, one that I could easily deploy with some ads and an IAP to remove them. I also want to add adds to quadrobounce because I have about 1500 downloads of the free version so far. But I can't decide if it's worth screwing over the people who actually bought the game in the first place. I'll probably do it, but I'm hesitant.

Still alive, just lacking in free time.

Creative

Check out "The Adventures of Timmy..." (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/the-adventures-timmy-run-kitty/id463104059?mt=8&ls=1) in the AppStore. Not necessarily for the app itself, but for the artwork/screenshots. I love how they stitched together a larger landscape image from the five available, and added pieces that overlay across the borders.

Gives me an idea...

quadrobounce! is live

iTunes link. Nothing in the game has changed except the name, graphic assets and the icon. If you like the old stuff, don't update, otherwise grab the new version.

New version submitted

Hopefully I changed everything correctly. I changed the name of my first game to 'quadrobounce!', which doesn't quite roll off the tongue as smoothly as quadropong, but I guess I will get used to it. Unfortunately I will (probably) be waiting about a week for the review process to wrap up, but I will announce here when the game is available again.

I was going to make a whole new app id for this name change, but I was curious if I could get away with just changing all the visible references of the old name and just use the same bundle. This way, it would show up as an update for those who already have the game. I changed all the artwork too, as well as the icon, which I'm sad to say I whipped up in about five minutes. I'm not super proud of it, but honestly I'm ready to move on to other things. I feel like this game is hobbled together and barely compiling as is, mostly due to an upgrade in Xcode and cocos2d mid-project. I strongly advise AGAINST doing this. Serious headaches await if you try.

My next project is another quick simple game, but something that I haven't seen a ton of out there. It's original this time, but still pretty basic in gameplay. Something you could pick up and play for five minutes, then come back to in a few days to try and beat your score. You may have seen this enemy squid that I drew for this project on my Facebook page.

SQOID!!

He will play a big part in this game, but for now it's the only thing I've done with this project. Hopefully this game won't take as long as the last one.

Good news everyone!

I heard back from Atari today, and the response was actually pleasant. Apparently the only infringing aspect of my app quadropong was the name itself, and the inclusion of their trademark name, 'PONG'. Atari said they have no claims to the graphics assets or even the gameplay mechanics, so if I renamed my app and resubmitted it, there would be no further problems. Sweet!

This is a slight pain, and will take a few hours of work to change some graphics around, but I am worried that I will have to resubmit to Apple as a completely different app ID. I haven't poked around iTC yet to see if I can keep the same bundle ID but just change the name slightly. We'll see how big of a headache that side of this ordeal will be.

Which brings me to my next point, and an outreach to my dozens of readers; what should the new name be? I had some funny suggestions on Facebook from my friend Greg, including 'quadro-ping' and 'comparewithactiveingredientsinatarispongx4'. I kind of like the idea of a long ridiculous name like 'Happy Fun Four Sided Bouncing Ball Game', but a simple tweak like 'quadropUng' would be funny too. Any suggestions? Leave a comment or a tweet (@jonnysuave) with your ideas.

Well that was fun while it lasted (copyright infringement!)

I was notified by Apple a few minutes ago that they got a letter from Atari, demanding the removal of quadropong from their app store, stating it violated their copyright to the game/name "PONG". So of course I went through iTunes Connect and removed the app for now, but I am a little conflicted. Yes, they created this game like 40 years ago, and yes, they have a legal right to defend that name, but I can't help saying "COME ON!" A quick search for 'pong' in the app store brings up dozens, if not hundreds, of results for pong style games, some of which are designed to actually resemble the original game. Why are those still allowed in the store, for sale? Maybe they all got letters today too, I don't know.

I'm just doing this for a hobby. I'm one guy trying to make games, sorry for not being completely original on my first try. Guess I should take down my ticalc.org version too incase they see that.

So cheer me up and click on an ad or two, I'm might need some extra revenue soon. *pleaseDon'tSueMeAtari*

Now to test from the blogger app :)

No landscape support!? Instant fail. Loading blogger's "draft" page in mobile safari worked fine, though it's a little slow. At least I could type comfortably there. And why is this app SO ORANGE?

Testing posting from iPhone

I brought my laptop with me on vacation (one week in Tahoe for my brother's wedding), but I haven't had any urge to code. I just want to sit, and veg, and relax. I'm a little bummed because I was hoping a week away from my real job would give me some time to program, but all I want to do is rest by the pool. :)

Experiment failed (kind of)

I had heard some buzz about the 'upswing', or making your app free for a few days, then using that momentum to sell some copies after the free period. I made quadropong free for two days and had over 1000 downloads, which in itself is pretty cool in my eyes. After the return to $1 though I was back to zero sales for a few days. It's back to free and will stay that way. As I posted before I have some ideas that I might implement to try and capitalize on the audience I have now (at least until they delete it...), but as I've said before, I do this for fun not for the money. I'm just stoked that 1000 people are playing around with something I made.

Alternative ideas for monetization

While it would be great to be profitable from selling your software outright, it seems that many iOS developers are exploring alternative ways to make money from their apps. With the In App Purchase system it is possible to give a base app/game away for free, reach a much larger audience, and offer ways to pay for extra content or 'shortcut' purchases. When the barrier for entry is lower (or non-existant), customers are much MUCH more likely to try out an app, and with the right persuasion, will feel good about dropping a buck or two to the developer.

While my numbers are small, they still paint a pretty picture of this situation. In my first month in the App Store with quadropong at $0.99, I had roughly 30 sales and 40 promo codes used. The leaderboard on Game Center had 39 players listed, so assume that about half of the people use and sign into their game center account. Last night I dropped the price to free and posted about it on reddit, facebook, twitter and here. At the moment, there are 223 players listed on the leaderboard! I can't wait for the morning update to see how many actual downloads this translates to, but assuming from the numbers above it could be around 400. Now, this is exciting to me for two reasons. 1) More people are playing my game. I've never had an audience like this before with any programming projects I've done, and it's fun to watch the downloads climb, even if they are free ones. Which brings me to... 2) I have the opportunity to try some new pricing strategies. Now, I really want to be careful here, because there are some people who have paid for this app, and I don't want them to feel cheated. I don't want to just slap some ads on there and call it a day. So I've decided to design some kind of In App Purchase that will reward people who like the game, but won't cause any unfair advantages.

One idea was to have some powerups in the game, like slowing the ball down or making the paddles bigger for a short amount of time. These could be purchased and used during the game, sort of like the eagle in Angry Birds. The problem with this is that it would give an unfair advantage to those players who decided to pay, which would cause some skewed results on the leaderboards. Yes, I want to have integrity in scoring even in my small game. So this idea is off the table. So, how can I have something that isn't essential to the game but still gives the player incentive to buy? And how can I give payers and non-payers access to this content?

My idea is to design multiple graphical themes that can be purchased with real money or points accrued by playing the game. This adds a fun element to the game without drastically altering gameplay or giving any advantage to certain players. My idea is to keep an overall tally of the points earned during the game, and letting the player 'purchase' themes through some sort of theme browser, say at one theme for 1000 points. They also have the option to purchase a 'theme pack' for $0.99, which would include five themes at once. This way the player has the option to unlock the content quickly and support the developer, or play to unlock and enjoy the game for free.

This is a new venture for me, and an experiment as well. I will be hard at work on making these changes so my new project will have to be shelved for a bit. Oh, and in the last 2.5 paragraphs, 10 more players have showed up on the leaderboard, making the total 233 now. CRAZY!

Wow...

In just a few hours since that last blog post, the site got over 100 hits. Small potatoes, I know, but if each of those people had clicked an ad, it probably would have paid for my developer license for a year. How can I actually improve click-through rates without bombarding my page with ads?

quadropong is free!

I've decided to make quadropong free for a limited time. So far sales have been pretty lack-luster, and what I really want is for people to play my games. Financial overflow would be lovely, but it isn't why I started this project. I started pursuing game development because I love games. I've been playing video games for as long as I can remember (Final Fantasy on the NES is my first game btw), and I've wanted to make them for more than half of my life. I finally have a medium that, in my opinion, fully balances the homebrew / garage developer spirit with a chance to make some money, and have the time spent not feel 'wasted'. quadropong was my first venture into the AppStore market, a notoriously competitive and brutal place to try and make a buck. I had a lot of support from my friends and family, and I really appreciate everyone who threw a buck my way. It was a fun first week watching those numbers roll in, but at this point I'd rather have more people play and possibly leave reviews. Or come to this site and click some ads. :)

So, check out the iTunes AppStore page, send this link around, and check out my game if you haven't already. And stay tuned to this page, or my twitter stream, because there will be more coming soon.

Waiting for review...

I'm wondering if there is some secret I'm missing as far as when to submit an application or an update for review. All I changed in my first update, which I submitted almost a week ago, was the graphics and one line of code. I assumed that for updates the process would be faster, but I guess this is how things go. I've read plenty about how frustrating this process is, but now I see it first hand.

But I get it. I understand that this review process keeps (some of) the junk apps out of the app store, and provides a higher caliber of content for consumers. It makes a developer think before spending time working on a project, or making clones of all the popular games just to make a quick buck. I just wish it didn't take over a week to approve a bug fix.