Since everyone in the AGG office has been also hard-working at the next best-selling iPhone App, it is natural that we should be allowed to pimp the game we are working on, right here. First, what is the game about?
Tiki Smasher is an arcade pinball castle defense game for the iPhone / iPod Touch. It is planned to be out in the very near future, currently submitted to Apple for approval, it would be initially on sale for 99 cents.
Check out the awesome trailer first:
What is Tiki Smasher?
A new genre of Castle Defense — defend the Tiki God against hordes of enemies with Smasher the pinball, played with just the tilt controls. Explore the land of the Tiki Gods and experience the beautiful seasons, from Spring to Winter, and face-off against unique enemies, collect gold for different attributes and special power upgrades.
Featuring:
- Realistic Physics Engine
- Simply yet engaging gameplay
- Beautiful 2D graphics
- Campaign Mode with RPG style upgrades
- Survival Mode with Integrated Online Leaderboards
- Facebook Connect to share your progress
Now we’ll let AGG ask the dev team some questions (Yes I know, talking to yourself is like the first sign of schizophrenia):
AGG: How did this project begin?
Tiki: Well it began as a couple of gaming enthusiasts getting together to just brainstorm for an idea. Originally we were going to work on a shooter using XNA for the Xbox 360, then the iPhone came along and we saw that as the perfect opportunity for indie developers to enter the gaming scene. Some of us worked on a numeric puzzle game called Summation, mainly as a test into how the iPhone market works. The actual development on Tiki started around September of last year (around 6 months of development). I know we are a little late when it comes to the iPhone bandwagon and we missed the crazy launch the first year app store came along, but all of us have full time jobs (some of us have several) so our time and resources have been limited.
AGG: How did the Tiki Smasher idea come about?
Tiki: Well our idea came from looking at all the castle defense games that arrived at the app store. Castle Defense, just like line drawing, is a totally new genre that isn’t on any other platforms. The difference between a Castle Defense game and a Tower Defense game is that the Castle genre isn’t about strategy and placement so much as fast reflexes and arcade action. We thought that what the App store offers in that genre generally isn’t very interesting, that all you do is keep pressing on the screen with your finger blindly until you destroy all the oncoming waves of enemies. So we decided to invent a new genre — a fusion of pinball mechanics and Castle Defense. And one of our artists actually lives in Malaysia, and he’s been working on Tiki-related products for a while now (http://www.tikigodisland.com/). So we decided that we can leverage what he already has (mostly just the Tiki Gods) , and then we build a world around it. We are pretty sure Castle Defense enthusiasts are going to like this game, and hopefully it will bring different casual players to the genre.
AGG: How big is the development team?
Tiki: Our development team is not that small considering how small we are, but since everyone has full time jobs or several of them, the allocated time to the Tiki project is limited. So we have one programmer/game designer who worked on the game the most, building it on top of the cocos2D engine. We have 5 different artists who worked on the game throughout different phases. Actually one of them is an industry veteran, who’s worked on PS3 best-selling hits Resistance and Ratchet and Clank series. There’s another artist who works at Namco Mobile Division, but the rest of us are just games enthusiasts who are knowledgeable about programming and graphic design.
AGG: What are the future plans for Tiki Smasher and the studio?
Tiki: For Tiki Smasher, we are planning to add new features, levels, and new Tiki Gods periodically. We have a lot of ideas that we haven’t worked into version 1.0 of the game. The good thing about the App store model is that we can provide free updates, or DLC paid content — of course it is going to be based on sales and feedback. We want to provide things for free, but we’ve got families to feed too, considering the app is selling for such a low price point. We plan to make an iPad version as well — we were going to do that earlier but then we decided not to release that version until we had an actual iPad on our hands to test the game on — since the game entirely relies on tilting, and the simulator from the development kit doesn’t simulate that, so it would be hard to gauge how fun the game would be when the screen is much larger — do we make the level bigger and increase enemy numbers or do we make the assets themselves larger? Should we make the player defend more than 1 Tiki God to make the game more challenging? The possibility is limitless, in any case we decided to just go ahead with the phone version first and see how things go. As for the Studio, we have many game ideas to implement so we are going to continue making games and most of us would really love to do that full time. So get a copy of Tiki Smasher when it comes out to support us so we can continue making games.
AGG: What do you think about the iPad and the future of app store gaming?
Tiki: Well we are crazy about the every home having a tablet device being a must in the near future, we are talking about 5 to 10 years from now, everyone is going to have a tablet at home, that is going to be the sole device while is connected to all your appliances — you are going to use that from baking the turkey for thanksgiving to adjusting the room temperature and Tivo-ing your favorite dramas on TV. Of course you are going to read on it and play boardgames with your friends on it as well (paper is a thing of the past). Some of us are Science Fiction writers and we have long foreseen that even 10 years ago. What Apple is doing is moving into this space, doing what they did with the iPhone and iPod. iPad is not really the first tablet device, but it is the first sleek and cool tablet device with the support of the insanely awesome app store. At this moment we aren’t crazy about the iPad. It’s a bit on the heavy side for book reading and its non-multi-application processing iPhone OS is a big turn-off for us, come on we can’t even IM and play games on it at the same time without relying on feeds? This is going to change of course. If Apple takes advantage and become the leader of this space, every household in the future will have multiple iPads — but the price has got to come down from here and it’s got to be lighter. As for games, we recognize that serious good-story-telling games can be done on the iPad, but true gamers are likely going to be just getting a PS3 for the lower price and better selection of serious games and much much better actual hardware performance. There are going to be some games that might fit the iPad better than it is on the PC or a console, maybe real time strategy, maybe point-and-click adventure games, maybe driving games / flight simulators and games that can totally be played from the accelerometer — but the high price point and the lack of joysticks is not going to justify anyone getting an iPad for games. But on the iPhone side, the app store is here to stay, and for a long time it will. It caters to the gaming-on-the-go crowd, whether you are a serious gamer or someone who doesn’t even know what a gaming console look like, you are going to be playing games on the iPhone because you are out waiting in line for something and you are going to get a few gaming sessions in. Tiki Smasher is going to be perfect for that, you can finish a level in less than a minute and you are going to be very satisfied with that minute. With an iPhone in your hands, your time is no longer wasted by unforeseen circumstances when you are out.
AGG: I guess that’s it for today. Check the following links for more info and chances to win free copies:
Facebook fan page for TikiSmasher with the latest updates on the game, promotional codes will be given to fans.
http://www.facebook.com/TikiSmasher
Our Studio’s Website:
http://www.jetfable.com/
Also check out Tiki Merchandises at:
http://www.tikigodisland.com/
Follow us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/JetFable
