JoyJoy Turns 2: Everything’s On Sale!

15 May, 2012
Ballistic, Crossfire, Crossfire 2, Fireball, Fluid, Inferno, JoyJoy, Slydris, Super Crossfire

It’s been 2 years since I released my first game, JoyJoy, on XBLIG.  It was not exactly the smoothest launch.  But it’s still a good thing to celebrate since Radiangames is still going and I’ve had 15 significant releases over the last 2 years.

It may not be the best week to have a sale (two of the biggest games of the year, Diablo III and Max Payne 3, come out today), but that’s exactly what I’m doing.  Everything is on sale.  All my iPhone/iPad games.  All my PC/Mac games.  All my Xbox games.  And all the soundtracks too.

The iPhone/iPad games and PC/Mac games (and the soundtracks) will be on sale for a week, meaning they’ll stop being on sale on sometime on May 22nd.  I can only change the price of the Xbox games once every 90 days, so they’ll be on sale for much longer, probably forever.

iPhone and iPad Games

The iPhone/iPad games are on sale for $0.99 each, except Super Crossfire (the non-HD) version, which will be $0.00 for the next week.  Ballistic SE and Fireball SE are normally $1.99, Super Crossfire HD is normally $2.99, and Super Crossfire is normally $0.99.

Ballistic SE – Fireball SE – Super Crossfire HD – Super Crossfire (free, iPhone-only)

[Note: Both versions of Super Crossfire are getting a significant update in a couple weeks.]

PC and Mac Games

The PC/Mac games are on sale for $1.99 each.  They are normally $4.99 each.

Inferno+ – Super Crossfire – Ballistic – Slydris – Fireball

Xbox Games

The Xbox Live Indie Games are now 80MSP (1 dollar) each.  They were previously 400MSP (5 dollars) each for the last 10 months.

JoyJoy – Crossfire – Inferno – Fluid – Fireball – Crossfire 2 – Ballistic

Soundtracks

The soundtracks are all on sale for $0.99.  Normally they are $1.99 each.  I’ve removed the Crossfire and Crossfire 2 soundtracks, and the Super Crossfire soundtrack now contains the complete set from all 3 games combined.

Super Crossfire – Ballistic – Fireball – Fluid – Inferno – JoyJoy

 

http://radiangames.com/blog/?p=1124

A Quick (Slow) Preview of Inferno+

9 May, 2012
Inferno


While the launch trailer will cover a lot more of what’s in Inferno+, for the teaser video above I only wanted to show a single quick sequence to give a taste of the game.  Obviously it’s in slow motion, and zoomed in a bit, so I cheated a little, but I think that’s ok.

Inferno+ is coming soon to iPhone and iPad, but I’m not sure what the release date will be.  It will probably be May 31st or June 14th (I’ll be out of town on June 7th).  I could theoretically release it earlier (only a few small tweaks left), but releasing games too close together isn’t a good idea, and next week I have something big happening (more on that below).

After Ballistic’s more successful (than Fireball’s) launch, I’m obviously no longer doing the “surprise attack” launch.  Though Ballistic SE didn’t gain much (any?) attention when I announced it a couple weeks before launch, I’m still following the same overall pattern with Inferno+, just with better assets to work with.  In addition to the trailer above, and having more games being updated on the launch date, Inferno+ is just a better game to promote.  It has twin-stick shooting like Ballistic, but that’s just the control mechanic, not the defining characteristic.  There are elements of Geometry Wars, but it also has healthy doses Gauntlet and Tron, along with quite a few other elements that add up to a significant and more unique game.

Party Time

Next Tuesday, May 15th, is the 2nd anniversary of JoyJoy’s launch on XBLIG, and it seems as good a time as any for a celebration.  For a small developer, that usually means a sale.  JoyJoy’s not the only game going on sale, so make sure you come back on Tuesday for the full details.

http://radiangames.com/blog/?p=1086

One Game, Seven Builds

4 Comments
4 May, 2012
Ballistic, Fireball, Gobs of Fun, Inferno, Slydris, Super Crossfire

Ballistic SE has had a fairly nice launch week.  It managed to get onto the Games list in the New and Noteworthy section for the iPad, though just barely.  It was near the end of the list, and isn’t on the What’s Hot list this week (normally games from the previous week are listed there).  But that, combined with a similar level of press coverage that Fireball got, and some updates for Fireball and Gobs of Fun, combined to make the first week better than Fireball’s by a significant margin.  Nothing to get too excited about, but it’s hopefully a promising trend.

For Ballistic SE, I had to create 3 builds, in essence: Ballistic, Fireball, and Gobs of Fun.  For Inferno+ and its coming launch, that number would normally swell to 4, but I decided to try even harder.  Super Crossfire is getting a significant update (and that means updating 2 separate builds), and Fireball is getting a free version called Fireball LE, all of which will launch on the same day as Inferno+.

Seven builds is a lot, but Inferno+ is my biggest and best game yet, so I have to try as hard as possible to make it a success.  One thing I’m slightly worried about is the icon: I was happy with the one above after finally getting it to look nice, but then someone asked why I have a glowing U as my icon.  So I may have to change to a different ship shape (there are 4 to choose from) to put on the icon.

Beyond Inferno+

The last icon in the image (for Slydris) isn’t final, but it is what will likely be out next, and what I’ve just started working on.  It’s unlikely I’ll do 8 builds for Slydris, but the game after that (the big new one I keep alluding to) will likely result in 9 builds at launch, possibly more.  It is possible I’ll bring Fluid to iOS at some point, particularly if Inferno+ does well.

Ballistic Reviews

Reviews for Ballistic have been all over the place, unlike Fireball and Super Crossfire (which both got mostly 8/10′s).  The average is a little lower than Fireball.  I think there are two major factors there: 1) People either love or hate twin-stick shooters, and 2) It looks a lot nicer on an iPad2, iPad3, or iPhone 4S than other devices.

Even if the reviewer doesn’t call out the device they used, you can tell what kind they used by their comments on the graphics.  All of my games look best on those devices, but it’s more obvious on Ballistic than Fireball or Super Crossfire (and the graphics improvements for Super Crossfire were added in the first update, after reviews were done).  Inferno+ is somewhere in the middle of that spectrum.

http://radiangames.com/blog/?p=1080

Ballistic SE on iPhone/iPad

2 Comments
26 Apr, 2012
radiangames

Ballistic SE is out! It’s a $1.99 universal app (for iPad/iPhone). You’ll want iOS 5.0 or above. See more below for why iOS 4.x support isn’t working (yet).

Ballistic SE on iTunes

In case you didn’t catch it in the trailer, Ballistic Special Edition is a twin-stick shooter.  But it’s a friendly one for new players, because you can play with just one hand.  And it’s easy to hang out in the corners and do ok.  But corner-hanging will not get you very many points.  But if you normally don’t like twin-stick shooters, Ballistic SE will not lure you in the way Inferno+ might.

Today’s launch of Ballistic SE seemed like it was going well, until I started getting reports that iPhone/iPods with iOS 4.3 were crashing on start-up.  Turns out it’s all 4.x versions.  If you have iOS 5.0 or later, you should have no problems.  A fix has been figured out, and already submitted to Apple.  It will release as soon as they (hopefully) approve it.  That seems to take about 7 days in my experience.

I seem to run into at least 1 issue with each launch no matter how hard I try.  Fireball SE actually didn’t have any significant issues, but that seems to be the exception.  With Ballistic SE, the culprit was iCloud saving.  The plug-in I’m using was fixed last week (after I submitted Ballistic SE), but I didn’t know about it ’til today.  I probably need to buy more iOS devices since I’m doing so much with them (I already have 3, and none of them are phones).

So iCloud saving isn’t a feature I really wanted to add, but it seems to increase the likelihood that Apple will feature your game, and that’s my main goal with Ballistic SE’s launch push.  The trailer was actually released Monday, and it seemed to help get the game featured on Slide To Play, Touch Arcade, and Pocket Gamer’s “what’s coming out this week” lists (in the headlines no less).  I don’t expect it to be one of the main games, but if Ballistic is not listed in Apple’s New and Noteworthy section, I’m going to be a little crushed.  So now I just cross my fingers.

Well, after I finish sending out the press release and download codes.  I meant to be doing that this morning, but fixing the iOS 4.x issue took priority, and now I can mention it in the press release rather than it being an unpleasant surprise for some players (it’s also listed at the top of the app description).

Either way, it’s good to have found this issue with Ballistic, rather than finding out with Inferno+.

http://radiangames.com/blog/?p=1074

Indie Royale (Again!)

23 Comments
18 Apr, 2012
Ballistic, Inferno, Slydris

Indie Royale’s Spring Bundle is now live, and it includes not 1, not 2, but 3 of my PC games.  Those three are Inferno+, Ballistic, and Slydris.  Go get it now before the price goes skyrocketing!

3 games is a big commitment to Indie Royale, but it’s not really considering the alternative, which is complete obscurity and practically no sales.  It’s also been a pretty consistent pattern that the Indie Royale bundle sales are very much tied to how awesome the bundle is, and since I was already committed to giving them 2 games (Inferno+ and something else), adding another 1 in wasn’t a big deal.  I don’t get any more of a cut than the other developers in the bundle, but we’ll all benefit, so it’s a win for everyone involved.

Another reason I feel like committing to Indie Royale isn’t a bad thing is because it’s my second bundle with them (both of which have taken then non-Steam slot).  For whatever reason Steam just can’t seem to make a decision on Inferno+, and that’s the game of mine I feel is most deserving of a Steam release.  Super Crossfire is also highly deserving, but I screwed that up by submitting it too early.  Indie Royale has been happy to feature both games.  So I feel indebted to them.  Indie Royale and Unity are my two favorite companies right now, as they’ve both been 100% behind my games.

More About The Future

By all accounts, Steam is an awesome company and great to deal with once you get them on your side.  Inferno+/Super Crossfire aside, it seems my other games are too niche/minor to get their attention.  The same thing might be said about Fireball SE and Apple.

So that’s one reason to start making bigger games: Attention.  I need to make bigger and even better games to get Steam and Apple (the two most powerful digital distribution companies) to pay attention.  They aren’t the only ones though, as getting larger websites to pay attention to my games has been a constant struggle.

Another reason to make bigger games: Less overhead.  I won’t have to do all the non-game-related tasks SO often.  Over half of my time is spent doing stuff that doesn’t make my games better, but is just necessary for each new release.  Things such as taking screenshots, making icons, capturing and editing video, making builds, creating updates, sending out stuff to press, and getting my games to work on different platforms (or resolutions).  That’s just a taste of the overhead for each game release/update/etc, and I’ve had a LOT of game releases over the past two years.

The final reason to make bigger games: Quality and Sales.  My two best (selling/reviewed/etc) games are the ones I’ve spent the most time on.  I still think games like Fireball are awesome and I’m very proud of it, but I’ve not even come close to making any money on it even though I’ve spent relatively little time on it.  And don’t forget to multiply that by 3 platforms (XBLIG, PC/Mac, and iOS).

So I have started working on a bigger game.  It’s probably not the kind of title people would expect given my past titles, but it’s time to stop going for singles and doubles and swing for the fences.  Ballistic SE and Inferno+ are still coming soon to iOS, and Slydris will get there too.  Beyond that, look for something bigger and better (and a bit unexpected).

http://radiangames.com/blog/?p=1070

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