If you’ve been paying attention, (and I don’t know why you would be), you’ll notice that the version numbers should all match now also. There was a discrepancy between all the various versions because I wanted to number things 0.1.x, but I’d launched with 1.0 (by default, I just hadn’t changed the string in my plist project file), and since apple only allows upward version number changes, I had been trying to mirror the “real” version number, but with one instead of zero. This is a silly little discrepancy, but I’ve given up and moved everything to 1.1.x to avoid confusion.

As I mentioned in an update to a previous post, I wanted to get “global high scores” and a new “Puzzle Mode” into this update, but both features are proving to be fairly time consuming endeavors. I do have some progress into both tasks. So far, I’ve finished most of the shell for puzzle mode (still needs some UI love, and there are a couple of bugs). I’ve also programmed enough puzzles in to figure out that this mode is totally worth the effort. It is harder to make puzzles than it is to solve them, but I should have some more progress made by this weekend. I’d like to launch the feature with 100 puzzles. I don’t know how realistic that is, but that’s my goal for now.

In related social networking news, I also started a page for ActionChess on Facebook. You can become a fan! (At present, this serves no purpose, but I may do contests or something with it in the future.)

ActionChess Demo from Martin Grider on Vimeo.

• A new game mode: Puzzle Mode
• Global High Scores (working with GeoCade)
• Multiple Game Saves (one per game mode)

Realistically, if I shoot for all of them (and I am), it might not be until the following weekend. But we’ll see. I’ll keep you posted.

Update (5-10): I may have been a bit ambitious guestimating two weeks for these three features. It’s been two weeks now, and I’m partway through all of them. I should finish the multiple saves tonight. Maybe I’ll push that to apple for approval before the other two, but I’m not sure yet. So far, I’ve got about a half-dozen puzzles for puzzle mode. It’s harder to make puzzles than it is to solve them, but I’m far enough along that I’m now confident it’s worth the effort. My only worry is that it may be difficult for me to make mid-level difficulty puzzles. So far all of them have been really easy, or really pretty hard. We’ll see. I’d like to launch the feature with 100 puzzles. I don’t know how realistic that is, but it’s my goal for now.

Anyway, onto the numbers (after the link).

As you can see, there was a relatively large jump in sales when the Lite version was released.

4th week:
2009-04-23 - 0 sales, 38 lite
2009-04-22 - 2 sales, 31 lite
2009-04-21 - 2 sales, 31 lite
2009-04-20 - 4 sales, 49 lite

3rd week:
2009-04-19 - 6 sales, 2 promo, 109 lite
2009-04-18 - 0 sales, 209 lite
2009-04-17 - 12 sales, 300 lite
2009-04-16 - 8 sales, 518 lite
2009-04-15 - 2 promo, 2 lite <- lite version hits!
2009-04-14 - 1 promo
2009-04-13 - 1 paid

2nd week:
2009-04-12 - 1 paid
2009-04-11 - 0
2009-04-10 - 1 paid
2009-04-09 - 2 paid
2009-04-08 - 0 :(
2009-04-07 - 2 paid, 1 promo
2009-04-06 - 1 paid, 23 promo

1st week:
2009-04-04 - 1 paid
2009-04-03 - 1 paid
2009-04-02 - 2 paid, 1 promo
2009-04-01 - 3 paid
2009-03-31 - 4 paid
2009-03-30 - 5 paid, 1 promo
2009-03-29 - 6 paid

Things are pretty much long-tailing now… I have another update in review, so we’ll see if updates get as much attention as putting out a lite version (somehow I doubt it). Again, I haven’t been reviewed anywhere, so maybe that’ll happen someday. In the mean while, I’ve decided not to stress about it, and focus on development. It’s the fun part, for sure.

That’s right, all this stuff it’s taken me months to learn… yeah, a 13 year old kid can also do it.

In other news, John Bauer and myself are starting a Minnesota iPhone Users’ Group. He registered iphone.mn, and we’re going to make it the source for news about where and when we’ll meet when we figure that out. Right now we’re thinking about getting together every other week or so. We’ll probably just sit in a coffee shop and code. Let us know if you’d like to join.

Maybe Nicholas is from MN, and he’ll come hang out with us.

This is my first link to a “published” google spreadsheet, and I think it looks rather nice. In that vein, I think I’ll also publish the list I’m working on of iPhone review sites.

Please let me know if you have any additions or suggestions for either list!

Here’s the changelog:

* fixed bug with saving multiple high scores after a game
* fixed can click start game from the info screen (and possibly config)
* fixed can click “(opens in safari)” text to open a text input box
* fixed game didn’t save when sleep button is pressed
* replaced Icon.png with better render

Special thanks go out to my friend and co-worker Justin (Dez) for finding a lot of these bugs the day the update was released. Thanks Dez!

This wasn’t the first time I’d played a version of 3D tetris, however. In fact, not more than a few years ago (possibly as many as 5), there was a time when I was SERIOUSLY addicted to 3DTRIS which is a flash implementation of this type of 3D Tetris, playable in your web browser. I think this relatively simple flash implementation gets a lot of things right. It may have been one of the first high score lists I’d ever seen that keeps track of scores for “the last 24 hours” and “the last 30 days” in separate lists.

But I don’t think even the flash game was the first place I’d played 3D Tetris. Way back in high school, I remember distinctly discovering a version of 3D Tetris called Welltris. I’m not sure if I even understood it enough to play it. Looking at the screenshots now, I’m still not sure I know what’s going on exactly. I also didn’t know if Welltris was the first version of 3D Tetris ever made, so I did some google searching, and it looks like both Welltris (pictured above and including game’s designer, Alexey Pajitnov who was also the developer of Tetris), and another game called Blockout (pictured below, and obviously a more direct ancestor of all these modern 3D Tetris variants) were both released in 1989. I have no idea which was first, and it was probably close enough that it doesn’t matter.

Enter today, when I reluctantly purchased Polycubes on my iPhone for ninety-nine cents. I say reluctantly, because it’s hard for me to justify purchasing games that are obvious clones of games I could be playing in flash… for free. The flash games were obviously first, (although just as obviously still clones) and I have this inclination to distrust developers that just make clones of already-existing games. (Flash games are somehow different because they’re free to play. I see it as sort of the democratization of video games.) Anyway, there are so many game possibilities out there, why make a game that already exists? (There are actually tons of reasons to do so financially, but that’s a topic best left for another post.) Anyway, let it suffice to say that curiosity overcame my disinclination, and within minutes, I had absolutely no regrets.

Polycubes is pretty no-frill at this point. I’m really hoping the developer decides to add some more features. I’d give at least my pinky toe to see the piece coming up, for instance. I’d also like a way to access the high scores, and I’d give out huge bonus points if there were any sort of online high score tracking. Right now I think it’s supposed to tell you if there is a higher or lower score already played with the same game configuration, but even that doesn’t appear to be working for me. (Either that, or the fact that the game doesn’t remember your previous game settings is making it impossible for me to play the same configuration more than once.) This leads nicely into the main reason why I’m particularly impressed with this implementation. I guess at least some versions of Blockout also have this ability, but on the configuration screen (the only other screen other than the game itself) you can choose the size of the gameplay area, the starting level, and also choose from three different types of pieces to play with, simple, medium, or complex. That leads to a whole heck of a lot of gameplay possibilities. Dialing the playing field up to 16×16 is almost unplayable, but totally fun at the same time.

I’m clearly a geek for this sort of stuff, but I have no regrets about picking up Polycube, and neither should you. Not to mention, hey, it’s A LOT cheaper than buying a Virtual Boy on ebay!