Vans – Upcoming iphone Skateboard game: test demo

[ktfright]

http://cdn.fuelgames.com/sites/all/themes/custom/FuelGames/images/Header.jpg

Not enough words for how how happy i am...:eek::D:eek::D:eek::D:eek::D

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[Eng]

sadly, it looks craptacular, but I guess I'll still buy it.

[salsamd]

Concept: good

Gameplay/user interaction: elusive

[Tennisking1o1]

that looks like a very, very large pool if it takes him a handful of seconds to get from one side to the other...

[smokin okin]

pretty sick, worth 99 cents

[yourofl10]

Touchgrind is still looks better

[smokin okin]

touch grind sucks my... lollipop (in a matter of speaking) it sucks, its terrible, and since it came out, it still says: special limited time sale

[pablo19]

Touchgrind is still looks better

touchgrind is a simple concept, it's just very well make. swipe here and there and this happens swipe there and there and that happens.... It's not something that has pushed the limits of ipotch gaming

[pablo19]

touch grind sucks my... lollipop (in a matter of speaking) it sucks, its terrible, and since it came out, it still says: special limited time sale

lol, it's not that bad, I haven;t played it in weeks, but it was fun:D

[smokin okin]

touchgrind is a simple concept, it's just very well make. swipe here and there and this happens swipe there and there and that happens.... It's not something that has pushed the limits of ipotch gaming

u were quoting the wrong thread lol, u meant to quote the fungus guy on the payback thread

[salsamd]

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[pablo19]

u were quoting the wrong thread lol, u meant to quote the fungus guy on the payback thread

yes I was. lol My baaaaaad:o

[amusing Grace]

Any more info on the Vans app?

[dannys95]

something does not seem right..............i dont know what. we'll have to wait for it to come out

[dubane]

Any more info on the Vans app?

What more would you like to know? I won't promise that I can tell you everything but I'll tell you what I can :)

The first post by ktfright linked the demo video so I won't bother reposting that here. I will say that it was taken from an earlier build and the game has improved a bit since then. We've been spending a lot of time over the past few weeks working on the meta-gameplay for career mode, events, accomplishments, etc. Our goal is to make something that's really easy and quick to get into but still provides a bit more long-term depth to the game.

I'll try to answer any questions you may have here, but we'll also be posting about the development progress of this over the next few weeks on our blog at - www.fuelgames.com (http://www.fuelgames.com/)

[salsamd]

http://cdn.fuelgames.com/sites/default/files/images/bucky_omar_grabs_0.jpg


from the Fuelgames Website (http://www.fuelgames.com/):

"What's up guys (and gals)

Allow me to introduce myself, Christopher Scrivens here and I am Art Directing the Vans iPhone Game here at Fuel. In the next few weeks I'll be keeping you up-to-date on some the visuals from the game. To start, I've posted a few screengrabs of Vans sponsered riders, Bucky Lasek and Omar Hassan. Using swipes on your iPhone or iPod Touch you'll be able to nail a BUNCH of tricks ranging from aerials, grinds and boardslides. Bucky & Omar will each have their own "special" moves, but we might tell you more about those later ;)"


Click image below to enlarge. (has Gameplay features)

[arta]

Hope they get the controls right.

[dubane]

We've definitely spent a lot of time working on the controls and I hope we've got them right. You'll be able to find out soon but in the meantime you can see our discussion of controls in a couple developer diaries we posted on our site:
http://www.fuelgames.com/blog/10-02-2009/vans-developer-diary-03-game-controls-part-1.html

http://www.fuelgames.com/blog/12-02-2009/vans-developer-diary-04-game-controls-part-2.html

[arta]

Video's with the bunch of updates on the previous page.

http://www.fuelgames.com/category/blog-tags/developer-diary

Vans Developer Diary 03: Game Controls part 1
February 10th, 2009 | BY: Brian Robbins | Developer Diary iPhone vans

http://cdn.fuelgames.com/sites/default/files/images/poolB.jpg

One of the most interesting challenges of creating games for a platform like the iPhone is figuring out a control scheme that really works. Ideally the controls should be completely natural to players so that the learning curve is as low as possible and players can spend more time playing, and less time learning.

The catch is that the iPhone is such a new platform there are no established standards for how to interact with the game. There is no thumbstick or arrow keys that people are used to using, and there's no A or B buttons to press.

While we have some good ideas on what might work well, we ultimately have to just test things out a bit and see what feels the best, and what just doesn't feel right at all. Today I'm going to talk about the basic player movement and next time I'll talk about trick execution.

Movement in a 3D game is actually pretty tricky since most people have issues (whether they want to admit it or not) in easily navigating and understanding 3D worlds. We knew that we wanted the movement to be accelerometer based but had to work to find something that was intuitive enough.

Our first attempt was an over the shoulder camera view. This actually worked out fairly well but it got a bit confusing as you came back into the pool and the camera flipped around quickly. You might think that you were going left but you ended up going right because of this.

http://cdn.fuelgames.com/sites/default/files/images/poolA.jpg

Next we tried keeping the over the shoulder view but fixing the controls so that a tilt up on the phone always took you "North" in the pool and tilting left always took you "West", etc. We found that this worked great for experienced gamers, but got very confusing for casual players as you'd often times end up tilting left to go West, but moving right on the screen because of the direction you were traveling.

At this point we decided to drop the over the shoulder camera view for a bit and see if we could get a top down or isometric camera to work.

Our first top-down controls style was similar to the first over the shoulder one in that the camera followed the player around but always from a vantage point above and slightly to the side of the player. This again worked out great for experienced players but as the camera rotated around a bit became confusing to know which direction you wanted to go.

Our final test is what we've ultimately decided to use for the game and you can see in our Gameplay test video. We have an top-down camera view that follows the player around a bit but stays fixed to always be on the "South" side of the player. At the same time the tilt controls are also fixed so tilting up always goes North, Left is West, Right is East and Down is South. We've found this to work out very well and even new players are able to pick it up quickly.

Vans Developer Diary 04: Game Controls part 2
February 12th, 2009 | BY: Brian Robbins | Developer Diary iPhone vans

http://cdn.fuelgames.com/sites/default/files/images/Vans_ControlsInput.img_assist_custom-360x240.png

Last time I wrote about the various ways we let the player move around the pool environment. While that is the most fundamental aspect of playing the game, it's something that should just work without the players having to think about it. In contrast performing tricks should not only work but should "feel" right as you do them, and should be fun to do. Again we tried several different things and ideas, and the screenshot above shows part of what we finalized on.

One of the exciting, and challenging aspects of an iPhone is that there's no buttons available for the player to press. While we could put artificial buttons on the screen that feels artificial. It doesn't make sense for the platform and we feel should be avoided wherever possible.

Without buttons we still have fingers and accelerometer input which we can key off of, thus our first test was the simplest. When the player was in the air you would tap to perform a trick. This actually worked incredibly well, with just one problem: you lose a lot of player control. We could either give the players just one trick to perform (boring) or we could automatically choose a trick based on where they are in the pool or something (also boring). We needed a way to let the player have more control over what move they could do.

http://cdn.fuelgames.com/sites/default/files/images/bucky_omar_grabs_0.jpg

We had been thinking about "swipes" as input for a while and decided to try out a system of swipe input where the player would perform a series of swipes while on the ground, and their trick would then be performed when they jumped into the air. Again this worked out fairly well except that as a player you did all of your playing while in the pool, but had to simply watch when you got into the air.

Ultimately we settled on a system where the user swipes their finger while in the air to perform a trick. This means our swipes are much simpler than the previous method (simply swipe up, down, left or right to perform a trick) but the system is a lot of fun to play and provides the right balance of immediate gratification for user input. We also still have harder moves that involve swiping two fingers at a time, for instance swiping one finger up while swiping another finger right.

After we got the air tricks sorted out we tried out grinds, and based on our initial tests with air tricks we found the grinds to be very straightforward. When you want to grind you simply press and hold two fingers on the screen when going up the side of the pool. When you reach the lip you'll start to grind and you'll need to tilt the iPhone left and right to maintain balance and bailing.

The latest addition to the controls was adding in the "swipe indicator" that you can see in the screenshot. This shows what type of swipe you just did giving visual feedback to the player in addition to the actual trick being performed.

I'm excited to tell you a bit more about how you, the user, can customize your experience in a number of different ways in our Vans game. The first, is the ability to pick from a wide range of board designs. There's a little something for everyone here. You're into 80's retro colours? We've got a board for that. You're into Death Metal? We've got a board for that. Overall there's 20 boards to choose from. Next, you've got your wheels. There's 10 different designs, so there's bound to be one that fits just right with your board. Being a skater myself, I wanted to make sure we are giving the player the chance to add that "flair" to their experience. I've included below some of the boards I'm really digging from the arsenal.

http://cdn.fuelgames.com/sites/default/files/images/boards_0.jpg


Wow, looks like you truly thought this out. Loving the single finger and double finger swiping tricks, with visual feedback.

[salsamd]

Looking good.

Touchgrind I just couldn't get into, and Grind (http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=302802808&mt=8), while getting better, still has shortcomings.

Hopefully, there will ultimately be additional locations beyond the Cali pool in this game...

[rich_952000]

Looking good.

Touchgrind I just couldn't get into, and Grind (http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=302802808&mt=8), while getting better, still has shortcomings.

Hopefully, there will ultimately be additional locations beyond the Cali pool in this game...

Salsa, any projected submit date? I agree, all the graphics look good, but one location will make all the nice scenery seem a shame unless some form of open/freestyle skating is allowed.

[salsamd]

The developer post from today says "soon", but I don't have anything more specific than that.

[rich_952000]

The developer post from today says "soon", but I don't have anything more specific than that.

Well hopefully it's soon, one location or more I'll be d/l. Everything else looks very prof.

[rhcpdrummer]

if they put nick trapasso in there then its a definitebuy for me

[Spartan12103]

Ehhh, I don't think it looks too great. I guess I'll stick with Touchgrind, which desperately needs another update to add more depth.

[dubane]

Salsa, any projected submit date?

Sorry, right now all I can say is "soon" :) Though I'll make sure we let all of you know once I can give you anything more specific than that.

[rich_952000]

Sorry, right now all I can say is "soon" :) Though I'll make sure we let all of you know once I can give you anything more specific than that.

Thanks dubane, I'm personally looking forward to this.

[Paulio]

Finally. I love you dubane :D been waiting for a game like this for a while. PLEASE add free skate, level roaming (out of bowl), kick ass story, cut scenes, ability to design boards and hidden features. Lots of them. Even if these are updates, I'll jizz in my pants :D:D
Can not wait :)

[dubane]

Finally. I love you dubane :D been waiting for a game like this for a while. PLEASE add free skate, level roaming (out of bowl), kick ass story, cut scenes, ability to design boards and hidden features. Lots of them. Even if these are updates, I'll jizz in my pants :D:D
Can not wait :)

Wow, quite the response Paulio, though I'm not quite ready to return the feelings towards you :D

Seriously though everything you've mentioned is things that we've talked about internally. Not all of them will get into the initial release but our hope is that we'll be able to do more with future updates and expansions.

[super6ft7]

Vans Finger Fracture on iPhone- 01.16.08
http://www.notcot.com/images/fingerfracture.jpg

i want that^^^

project 8 pics BTW, so not iphone graphics, it was just concept art for an idea, but it looked good and different

more info:
http://www.notcot.com/archives/2008/01/vans_finger_fra.php

[Paulio]

Wow, quite the response Paulio, though I'm not quite ready to return the feelings towards you :D

Seriously though everything you've mentioned is things that we've talked about internally. Not all of them will get into the initial release but our hope is that we'll be able to do more with future updates and expansions.

:sadface:
Haha.
As long as I can have a full on skate adventure game this year, I will be happy. Bucky Lasek was the skater I chose through the THPSs. Pretty much THE game I've wanted my entire iLife :D

EDIT: Here is my choice of board :D

[dubane]

Hey everyone, we just posted up the first trailer for the game (which has a name now: Vans SK8: Pool Service).

Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQ89B5kVcC0

jQ89B5kVcC0

[jawslover]

Hey everyone, we just posted up the first trailer for the game (which has a name now: Vans SK8: Pool Service).

Check it out: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jQ89B5kVcC0

Looks awesome! Like Skate and Tony Hawk. What will be the price?

[Paulio]

Sweet can't wait. So is there a story/career mode? Can you tell us a bit about the finished product?? :D. The graphics look awesome :D

[rich_952000]

Sweet can't wait. So is there a story/career mode? Can you tell us a bit about the finished product?? :D. The graphics look awesome :D

I agree with Paulio, very sick graphics!

I hope to seevthis released really, really soon:D

From that teaser,the game already looks to offer what alot of people have asked for in Touchgrind; CUSTOMIZATION!

Anyway, good luck with the game and if possible keep us up with the latest.

BTW, dubane, answer or don't, have you played Touchgrind by Illusion Labs? If so, what do you think :)

[dubane]

Sweet can't wait. So is there a story/career mode? Can you tell us a bit about the finished product?? :D. The graphics look awesome :D

There's a career and a free ride mode. Career mode is the main focus as that's where you get to unlock boards wheels and new events to try out. We've packed in 10 different events each with their own unique twist on gameplay. All that of course is in addition to the core Timed Run where you're simply trying to put together the best run for points that you can.

It will be a paid app but we're not quite ready to announce the price and unfortunately nobody will let me tell you when it's coming beyond "soon" Believe me I can't wait to let all of you know when it will be out!

@RICH_952000 - You might want to read the interview I did a couple weeks back with iPhoneFootprint http://www.iphonefootprint.com/2009/02/fuel-industries-has-developed-for-a-large-variety-of-platforms-ranging-from-web-and-pc-titles-interview-with-brian-robbins/ :)

[rich_952000]

There's a career and a free ride mode. Career mode is the main focus as that's where you get to unlock boards wheels and new events to try out. We've packed in 10 different events each with their own unique twist on gameplay. All that of course is in addition to the core Timed Run where you're simply trying to put together the best run for points that you can.

It will be a paid app but we're not quite ready to announce the price and unfortunately nobody will let me tell you when it's coming beyond "soon" Believe me I can't wait to let all of you know when it will be out!

@RICH_952000 - You might want to read the interview I did a couple weeks back with iPhoneFootprint http://www.iphonefootprint.com/2009/02/fuel-industries-has-developed-for-a-large-variety-of-platforms-ranging-from-web-and-pc-titles-interview-with-brian-robbins/ :)

Dubane, thanks for the link, pretty classy. Those guys at Illusion Labs are too. I await your entry with Vans........good luck and continued success,

Richard

[kiwi91]

This game looks sick.

I'll definitely be getting it as long as the reviews aren't terrible.

[superbad]

This game looks sick.

I'll definitely be getting it as long as the reviews aren't terrible.

+1111

cant wait! release date?

[Paulio]

AWESOME.

I find it weird how there is no hype? This game type is what I've wanted for ages yet a game like Rolando gets praised like an iGod. Anyone else find that strange? Surly a fully 3D game, first of it's kind on iDevice should recieve something more?

[salsamd]

AWESOME.

I find it weird how there is no hype? This game type is what I've wanted for ages yet a game like Rolando gets praised like an iGod. Anyone else find that strange? Surly a fully 3D game, first of it's kind on iDevice should recieve something more?

Well, actually Grind (http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=302802808&mt=8) was the first third person 3D skateboard game for the iDevice. It actually is not bad in its current iteration, but had a poor start.

http://a1.phobos.apple.com/us/r30/Purple/c5/00/aa/mzl.ufmrictm.480x480-75.jpg

Van has at least gotten a front page preview (http://toucharcade.com/2009/03/02/upcoming-skateboard-title-vans-sk8-pool-service/).

[touch32g]

how long estimatly will u be submitting this in.
and what will the price be around 3$, 5$, 8$?

[Paulio]

Well, actually Grind (http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=302802808&mt=8) was the first third person 3D skateboard game for the iDevice. It actually is not bad in its current iteration, but had a poor start.

http://a1.phobos.apple.com/us/r30/Purple/c5/00/aa/mzl.ufmrictm.480x480-75.jpg

Van has at least gotten a front page preview (http://toucharcade.com/2009/03/02/upcoming-skateboard-title-vans-sk8-pool-service/).

oh yeah, I completely forgot about that. I may buy it when I get my iTunes giftcard tomorrow or sometime.. thanks for correcting me :P

Still, front page review doesn't mean much, not many people here are yacking on about this game like they did with Rolando, Car Jacks, Payback etc. all good games, this looks like one too -but only one thread, with 40 posts from similar people.. oh well, IDC bout other peoples gaming opinions, I want this game! :D

[Paulio]

salsa, grind is a piece of sh!t.
If I had paid for it, I would have cried.

any news on when this game is coming out??? I NEED it!!!

[dannys95]

salsa, grind is a piece of sh!t.
If I had paid for it, I would have cried.

any news on when this game is coming out??? I NEED it!!!

LMAO!!

It was submitted a few days ago so any day now!

[Paulio]

LMAO!!

It was submitted a few days ago so any day now!

I do not envy anyone who bought it... TERRIBLE. :P or perhaps just lacking.


w00t w00t ^_^