gamepad to finger swipes: resetting the mindset postmortem of wobble bobble
TRANSCRIPT
Gamepad to Finger Swipes: Resetting the Mindset
Postmortem of Wobble Bobble
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The Awesome Game Studio
• Based in Hyderabad, India• Current headcount of 21 people• Credited for India’s first PS3 game• Approved developer for Sony, Nintendo, Apple &
Android• Studio balances WFH and IP based projects• All the resources come from console background
About Myself-Rajat Ojha
• 18+ years of industry experience and worked with some of the top industry people.
• Represented entire creative industry of India on various platforms.
• Proven track record of finishing and releasing over 25 PC/Console games
• Project Management Institute, USA certified Project Management Professional with specialization in Risk Management.
• Created India's first freeware game back in 1994 and repeated history by making India's first global PS3 game.
• Over 9 years of experience in running divisions and entire organization.
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About my colleague: Atul Sharma
• Technical Director of TAGS• 8+ years in the industry• Worked on 5 games and two mission critical
simulators so far• Most thorough person on PS3 platform in India
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Wobble Bobble-A Quick Intro
• A game about your hand eye co-ordination• Absolutely opposite of Labyrinth• Three different modes:
– Classic– Challenge– Arcade
• Innovative pickups
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The Start
• One previous studio got consolidated after releasing worldwide top 10 driving game on PS Store.
• President (Me) opposes the move and walks out with bunch of people.
• One VC assures a sum of USD $1M and backs out.• Friends join hands and support the newly born studio
which is now “The Awesome Game Studio” or TAGS• The immediate focus of TAGS was to let the world know
that we exist and we are now an independent entity. • Coming from console background, it was challenging
because we had been completely ignorant about mobile market and how it works.
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Challenges
• The major tussle was to do something we know but that takes much longer vs. do something we don’t know but apparently that takes much shorter time.
• The biggest challenge for TAGS was to think from a much bigger audience point of view because:– Console games are generally for gamers and you have a history to pick
the best genre– Console games appeal to those who want to see larger than life detailing
and long story based experiences.– Casual games should appeal to much wider audience which is well
scattered– Casual games should engage audience in first few seconds and if you
lose that time, you are doomed.
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A quick decision table
Criteria Console Games Mobile Games
Main Objective-To let the world know That TAGS is born
Limited number Enormous presence
Time 8-10 Months 1-2 Months
Cost $300,000-400,000 $10-20,000
Skills Existed within the team
Non-existent but enough resources online
Publisher Support Very much needed Can live without
Maintenance Fixing and patching are time consuming
You can put out fixes almost every day.
Monetize If we get a ton of users and we don't make any money, that's still cool to us
If it doesn't monetize, we are fine because we just want people to enjoy it and make our presence felt
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Green Light Process
• Perfection and not tech and visual prowess showcase.• Collected 15 ideas• By default, we think big and think from hardcore • Criteria:
– Short and focused gameplay– Apt for the device. Should not look like a port– Should be played with one hand– Iterative
• Three ideas were quickly prototyped• Wobble Bobble is chosen because
– It had no learning curve– Quick party game/Drinking game– Unusual and no clone
• Initially called Shaky Hands but changed it as it had more than one meaning
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Technology
• We prefered to use Cocos 2Dx which was fairly new for us as we are very used to of 3D graphics.
• We outsource sound and music.• Bought particle effects tool
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Focus Gameplay
• The focus of the game was to keep a ball in the center of the table for as long as possible.
• There are multiple circles and each circle adds extra points in the score.
• Absolute center has a multiplier which sets the basic scoring pattern.
Great but not good enough. There was no curve in the game except the multiplier but was still fun as a party game.
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Good and Bad
• Classic mode helped us to perfect the game. Good thing was that we put the game on test devices right after Classic Mode.
• We checked our PoC only on iPOD Touch and iPhone 4S but not on older phones.
• Classic mode was still not far so, good time to correct things.
• We had used imperfect formula to deal with motion tilt and speed of the ball. The speed was dependent upon the processor of the device.
• Finally we managed to deal with it using Delta timing.
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Adding Curves
• Added Challenge Mode where it’s race against time.• Added Arcade mode which had several pickups to add
the excitement like:– Extra Life– Bonus Score– Brick Wall All Around– Sliding Wall– Flickering Light (Negative Pickup)– Star Burst
• Even Classic mode got two pickups:– Flickering Light– Anchor
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Those Little Things
• A very dynamic menu which is not dull• Those musical chords for each ring in classic mode• Short animations• Particle Effects• Engaging music• And that nasty negative pickup
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Near Perfect Project
• No major feature change• Strong Project Management Roots• Iterative Implementation• Minimalistic graphics• Revelation that if you have awesome people, they’ll
adapt themselves to organization needs• Great team work execution, great chemistry within
the team as we are working together for minimum three years
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Lessons Learnt
• Always go for iterative development• Gameplay Testing can’t be ignored• Make games which have short gameplay duration but have addictive
gameplay. Mobile games are still used primarily to pass free time.• Always have common scoring system like Game Center. Good tool to
challenge your friends• Facebook/Twitter integration definitely helps• Make games which can be played with one hand• Screens, colors & fonts all look different on mobile so try them on mobile
before you finally implement them in the game.• Immersion is not possible on mobile games so use other ways to engage a
player and that too in first few seconds.• Don’t write too much of text in objective screen. It’s not a PC or a console
game so use more of images than text.• Keep your overall game size low. Larger games require Wi-Fi only
connections and hence reduce instinct driven purchases.
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Post Release
• No money for PR so Facebook helped• Lot of industry feedback (Specially from Stephen
Griffith of RIPStone)• Pro version was release after couple of weeks which
was paid version but we made it free after seeing poor sales.
• We didn’t plan but lot of people asked for competition around Wobble Bobble which we finally organized and were shocked to see 1000s of people participating and scoring millions.
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Way Forward
• Plans of releasing Wobble Bobble 2 by the end of March.
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Way Forward
• Already working on one more mobile game IP which is very ambitious and is called Alphaman
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Way Forward
• Working on one WFH project for an upcoming Hollywood Movie
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Way Forward
• Three year contract with USA based toy manufacturing company and work is on for one mobile game for them
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Contact Us
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/TAGSIndia
/rajatojha
/TAGSIndia
/TheAwesomeGameStudio
www.theawesomegamestudio.com
THANK YOU
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