PewPew 1.4 and PewPew 2 1.2 submitted to the app store

I finally submitted to the App Store updated versions of PewPew and PewPew 2! Both versions now support the iPad's and the iPhone 4's resolution.

Most changes are in PewPew 2:

• There's an improved Chapter One: among the things I did was adding visual feedback showing destructible objects were reacting to the players' bullets, so the players would know those objects were destructible . More importantly, I've corrected the bug where the game denied the completion of a level when a player died just after completing the level's objectives, but before the transition back to the menu.
• There's the long awaited Chapter Two ! It took a really long time to create because it's containing a lot of new enemies, and the levels are more complex than in the first chapter.
• I now display the best times for the campaign levels.

• I've added a new infinity mode that you unlock by completing the chapter Two. This mode is very different from the existing ones since you actually control 2 ships. It took a while to adjust the difficulty progression because I am actually not a very good player at this game mode =). It's tough to adjust the gameplay for players that are going to be much better than you.

• I've slightly improved user interface. I've made the buttons prettier because I've always felt the old buttons (just a rectangle) were boring. Also I've removed the explosions in the backgrounds since they just weren't justified, and in my opinion reduced the purity of the menus.

I've also re-done the website. The client side is done in GWT while the server side is in python. One of the visible change is that the high scores now include the colors of the nicknames :-)

Now that I think about it I was quite productive. I really hope you all like the new stuff. My goal is to make PewPew 2 the best twin joystick game on the App Store, so I am going to keep on working on it.

I received a mail 2 hours ago...

...telling me that PewPew 2 is live!

Yay!

Gold

PewPew 2 is Gold! I submitted it to the App Store yesterday, and hopefully it will be accepted in the App Store within a week. It will be priced at $1.99, which I think is a very good deal considering the quality of the content :o

This month I did some beta testing on different devices (3GS, iPad), and discovered the performance on the 3GS was worse than on my iPod 2G! I lost a lot of time trying to find out what the problem was, until I finally found a post in a forum explaining that using timers to set the FPS is bad on the iPhone OS 3.0.

I also did a small trailer with iMovie:

PewPew 2 trailer from Jean-François Geyelin on Vimeo.

It was my first time doing video editing, and it was pretty fun. It's frustrating that iMovie does not allow placing the text where we want it, but overall it's still a cool and simple software.

That is all for now, more updates when PewPew 2 is live.

PewPew 2's progress

I haven't posted in quite some time now because I've been so busy with programming PewPew 2, but quite a few people are asking for news, so here we go:

PewPew 2 is progressing real well. Here are some of the new features that are currently done:

-Scores can be uploaded anytime, not just after you've played (it should have been the case from the start, I know)

-Replays are now uploaded along the scores. This will allow you to watch and admire the best players play. Also, you'll be able to show off.

-Better graphics, 3D sound, seriously optimized engine.

-2 new sound tracks.

-A 10 level campaign with a lot of diversity. And a boss.

-2 new unlock-able game modes (in addition to megagore, assault, chromatic conflict and dodge this)

-Medals. These are rewards when you achieve certain scores in one of the 6 game modes.

-6 different ships. You progressively unlock them by obtaining medals.

-Lot's of new ennemies.

I think it's enough new content for a first release of PewPew 2. Make no mistakes though, there will be updates ;-)

So what am I waiting for? Why am I not submitting PewPew 2 to the app-store? Well, I need to polish everything up. This is the step that will make PP2 awesome. I have to carefully balance everything, make sure the difficulty is not too high (I tend to do that), not to low (no worries there), that the in-game explanations are clear, that the objectives in every campaign level are also clear, etc...

One more thing... I have been busy bringing PewPew 2 to the iPad! Here are the first screenshots of PewPew 2 HD:

That's Megagore. Notice the increased viewing field.

And that? That's one of the level of the campaign ;-)

That's the splash screen. The quote comes from a review on the Canadian App Store, and I find it absolutely hilarious. I had to put it somewhere; I hope the author doesn't mind!

Fun fact: like 99% of the developers creating iPad apps, I haven't got an iPad to test it on. To find the ideal position for the virtual joysticks, I've made myself a dummy iPad in cardboard and imagined myself playing with it! Actually, probably all the game developers for the iPad have done the same thing.

OK, enough chitchat, I have a game to finish.