Author Archives: Martin

For The Win is out now!

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For The Win is out now and on sale at launch for only $.99 in the App store!

For The Win is probably the most ambitious game project I’ve ever worked on, and represents months of hard work. Surprisingly, I’m not even sick of playing the game, and supporting the project means there is a better chance that I’ll be able to add asynchronous multiplayer (and a universal version) in an update in the near future. The game is already packed with features, including five different AI personalities, with three levels of difficulty each, GameCenter leaderboards for number of games played and won against each AI difficulty. You can quit and resume your game at any time, (great for pass-and play games), and it’s easy to name the players and customize their colors and avatars.

I think it’s well worth a buck, so go download For The Win now!

Oppo-Citrus 1.1 release notes

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Here are the things that changed in Oppo-Citrus 1.1. (Waiting for review with Apple.)

* new TAP control scheme – Tap instead of drag to place the bottom row. Hopefully this clears up the confusion about how to use the menu. Can be used in-game also.

* There is a now a music track!!! Access volume controls from the pause menu. (But it sounds great, thanks Tori!)

* New sound effects – sounds for level complete

* Fixed visual mismatch between level select screen graphics and actual levels for levels 3 and 4

* custom games – disabled mini pieces (too many bugs with it)
* custom games – disabled horizontal powerups when piece size is anything other than normal

* about screen – added “all apps” button

* Fixed a crashing bug with completing 200% on level 11. This also fixes the “all levels 200%” achievement. (Special thanks to @brackeen for reporting.)

iPad Game Recommendations

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A friend of mine just picked up a new iPad, and he’s totally new to the world of iOS gaming. He wanted some recommendations, and I spent some time coming up with a list of what I’m playing regularly. Keep in mind these are all iPad or Universal games. (The list would be different for my iPhone.) Also, it’s clear my tastes are pretty short-attention-span. I have some longer-form games on my iPad, but I almost never sit down to play them.

Without further ado: these are the games I’m most often playing right now:

Three of the most innovative puzzle games I’ve played in the last year or so (these are must have, IMO):
– I Love Squares
– Slydris
– Dream of Pixels

Pick these up if you like word games:
– Letterpress
– Spelltower
– Puzzlejuice

My “sit down and play for an hour” favorites of the moment:
– Minigore 2 – A really well done dual-stick-shooter
– Ski Safari – Pretty fun/addicting skiing game
– PunchQuest – really fun game in the “endless runner” vein, I think they call it an “endless puncher”.

You should check out Spaceteam, because it’s such a neat concept (and is free), but keep in mind that it’s multiplayer (local, real-time) only. Super fun even if there are only two of you, but it plays up to 4.

Oh, and I almost forgot the board games I’m playing right now:
– Carcassonne – probably the best implemented iOS board game of all time… they are releasing a new in-app-purchasable expansion for it sometime in the next couple of weeks
– Ascension: Chronicle of the Godslayer – quite fun deck-building game, also playable async, highly recommended
– Qin – fun but simple-rules type abstract strategy game, playable asynchronously, (let me know if you pick it up as I’m not playing with anyone I actually know right now)
– Cafe International – card game that won the Spel Des Jahres like 10 years ago. (ditto on the async want to play people I know thing)

Let me know if you have your own list how it differs from mine!

For The Win

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So the “big” freelance project I’ve been working on part-time for the last five months or so was submitted to apple last Friday. It’s public knowledge that I’ve been working on it, but I wasn’t sure if I could talk about it until yesterday.

It’s called For The Win, (app store link), and it’s a tile-laying abstract strategy game for 2 to 4 players. Unfortunately, the app took a lot longer than I’d estimated, and we didn’t get to put asynchronous multiplayer in there, but if the app does well I’m really looking forward to adding that in an update. (I think it will be a really fun addition to all the other games I already play that way on a daily basis.)

The game is played by placing tiles from your pool of five different types (Alien, Monkey, Ninja, Pirate, Zombie — everyone has two of each) next to each other on the gameboard until someone has all five types of their color connected. The difficulty comes in that you can’t immediately place next to your existing tiles, and have to manipulate them into position by either moving them, or using each tile’s unique special ability.

As you can see, the game really has a really great look and feel to it. The app was designed by Luis Francisco Baroni Coutinho, who has worked on art and graphic design for an absolutely ridiculous number of board games in the past. He took the game’s original character artwork (by Eric J. Carter), and designed basically everything else needed for the iPhone version.

The “client” for this project was Tasty Minstrel Games, and if there is one thing Michael Mindes did exceptionally well on this project, it was bring together a great team. The leader of that team was Brad Cummings, (of iOSBoardGames.com fame), and it has really been a pleasure to work with Brad, as he just really has his finger on the pulse of this weird little sub-niche that is iOS board games. He did all the early UX design for the app, as well as keep track of everyone’s tasks and all that other lovely stuff that a good project manager does.

The app also features five different AI personality types, with three different difficulty settings for each. One of the biggest technical challenges (and most rewarding aspects) of the game’s development was working with AI programmer Tysen Streib, whose work was so good that most of the changes we had him make were to make it easier to win against the AI on easy difficulty.

I didn’t work closely with him, but it’s worth giving a shout-out (since it appears that’s what this post has become) to the game’s original designer, Michael Eskue. I actually backed the board game on Kickstarter way back before I had even an inkling that I would be working on this project. Coincidentally, I got my Kickstarter reward copy in the mail about the same time I got started on development. Anyway, the game has real hidden depth and strategy. It can be a difficult one to wrap your head around at first, (and that may be the biggest challenge to this app’s success) but I genuinely think it can be rewarding to learn and play.

I will post again when it hits the app store.

My latest game, Oppo-Citrus

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Hey, in case you haven’t already seen it, my latest game, Oppo-Citrus is now available. It’s got procedurally generated puzzles that are unique every time you play, with 11 different game modes (levels) of varying difficulty and gameplay. Each level has it’s own GameCenter leaderboard, and there are some achievements in there as well (more coming soon). It’s a take-your-time-style puzzle game, where you can think about what move you want to make as long as you want. I’ve been told it’s an unforgiving game. It can be really hard. Some game modes rely more on luck, but there are definitely ways to optimize your strategy. The game also keeps track of a lot of statistics for each level. Please consider giving it a shot, especially if you like my first game, ActionChess. Thanks for playing!

Dream of Pixels

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I have been remis on here not writing about a game I got to help beta test called Dream of Pixels. It’s been available on the app store for exactly a week today, and has received some amazing reviews and press, over at TouchArcade, as well as some other crazy prestigious places like Kotaku and IGN. The game’s designer, Žiga contacted me months ago to say he liked Go-Tetris, and would I like to test his latest Tetris-inspired game. Of course I said yes, and I was VERY pleasantly surprised at how great it is. We’ve exchanged more than a few game recommendations in the time since, and it’s clear we share very similar game tastes. I’ll admit to a bit of jealousy at how great it looks and feels to play. It’s a brilliant game that turns Tetris on its head and does something different with our friends the tetrominos.

Dream of Pixels is an absolutely fantastic game, and if you buy one tetris-inspired game this year, it should be Dream of Pixels. If you have room for two Tetris-inspired games, then I also recommend Oppo-Citrus.

Oppo-Citrus v.0.8

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Oppo-Citrus is live today in the app store.

I sort of forgot it was going to be released today, and the app description, which I’d fully intended to replace with something more descriptive, was simply the following:

Oppo-Citrus is a puzzle game with a catchy name!

Drag the row of fruit from the bottom into the middle of the gameboard, and try to make shapes of 4 or more of the same fruit. It’s that easy!

Enjoy!

So what I’ve settled on (hopefully it’s beter) is the following:

Oppo-citrus is a puzzle game where you drag a row of fruit squares from the bottom of the screen onto a grid to make shapes of 4 or more of the same fruit. As the shapes are removed and points are scored, additional levels are unlocked. Each level introduces some new mechanic or combination of mechanics. See how high you can score on each level!

Play Oppo-Citrus and enjoy the following features:
– 11 unique levels of increasing difficulty and complexity
– hand-drawn pixel graphics for iPhone and iPhone 5
– stereo sound effects made entirely using the sounds of fruit
– GameCenter leaderboards and achievements
– Beat the 11th level to unlock the custom game mode, for unlimited replayablity!

Enjoy!

Anyway, please consider giving Oppo-Citrus a try. I spent about six months making it (part-time), so I hope it’s worth at least a buck. And let me know if you have any problems or find any bugs. Thanks!

ActionChess 1.5 Release Notes

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I’m in the middle of the process of submitting ActionChess 1.5 to apple. There is a ridiculously long list of things this build adds from the last one, which was… oh back in October of 2010. That’s over two years ago, and that means I’m a slacker! Anyway, that list includes:

* GameCenter achievements and leaderboards for all game modes.
* Retina graphics for normal iPhones (iPhone 5 support in the next version… probably).
* New “tap-based” input method. (The old drag-based method still works also.)
* New AbstractPuzzle/ActionChess news feed.
* New help button on the home screen.
* New “wiggle” animations when pieces get near the top of the screen.

There are probably about 500 other minor changes. Unfortunately, that list doesn’t include fixing the one or two UI bugs I know about (that annoying flashing that happens *sometimes when the level changes is still there, I’ve seen it). Here’s a list of things I want to tackle for the next version:

* release the more or less completed static-Puzzle mode
* modernize the interface to support iPhone 5, and possibly (hopefully) the iPad
* fix those bugs I mention, and quite possibly give the graphics an overhaul

Thanks for playing!

Oppo-Citrus is waiting for review!

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I have been pretty radio-silent around here about Oppo-Citrus as well as the hundred other projects I have going right now. It’s hard to find time to blog when you can’t even find time to do all the coding that you have planned or on your plate.

So yeah, today I sent out a few trusted beta-testers what I’m considering the first “final” version of Oppo-Citrus. Then I fixed a bunch of bugs I found in it. Then I uploaded it to Apple. Here are the screen-shots I settled on using for iTunes:

The game has leaderboards for each of its 11 levels, as well as 10 “starter” achievements. (I hope to add about the same number of new achievements in an update in a week or two.) It’s not universal (boo!), but it does support the iPhone 5 screen ratio for those who have one (yay!).

I’m hoping yet tonight to submit a new version of ActionChess for review also. I’ll write another post if I can finish that.