Hi all, At the end of last month I released my first game, Animal Kingdom. Thanks to Apple, it only took me 2 weeks to get approved. Since then, I have been paying a special attention to items ranking from one sub-category to another. And something i found is very interesting: the BOARD may be the least sexy category among all the sub-categories of gameļ¼I am not a statistician but just share something I felt. Take Animal Kingdom(AK) for example. At the first day it released, AK sold almost 100 copies and quickly climbed onto rank #45 of BOARD. BUT, at the same time, AK even could not show itself in STRATEGY. That means the competition in STRATEGY is much fiercer than that in BOARD. It is an intuition that the more the attention paid, the intenser the competition is. The same situation I also find on other items of BOARD. Like Conquest, Blocked, Chess Premium, t Chess Lite, etc... In other sub-categories like ADVENTURE, FAMILY, PUZZLE, etc... they also get much lower than they are in BOARD. In another word, it is something refering to popularity. Chess/Board game may be already a little out-fashion and less innovative. Perhaps, it is the reason why there are so many Mahjong ,Tic-Tac and Sudoku in BOARD ? They are similer to each other. During the devepment, I want someting diffierent in AK from other board game. Finally I decided to add unique animation to each chess of the game and hope that can attract more attention and bring lots of fun. But i finally found that, even after AK being featured, it is still not gain much attetions than what i expected May be chess game need more effort and exposal. And, i really curious that is there a board game in your device? What kind of game do you like most? Role playing? Strategay? Action? or something. I can not wait for your answers.
Currently have chess, Checkers, cribbage, connect 4, two risk-style games, two slide puzzle games, two word games, two dice, and two puzzle games in addition to many action and many racers and sports titles. I have friends who MUST have chess, for example, but I can't think of anyone I know who is waiting anxiously for the next board game to come out. We all jump at the next fps or racer. The Mario Party games do a brilliant job of bridging board gameplay and action, although they are not at deep as board games.
Maybe the situation just like what you said: no one is waiting anxiously for a chess game... We need a long way to go.
As a big fan of AK and board games in general, I have the same concerns as you have. But I think you have to be realistic here : a new thread on a new FPS will get up to 200 post on TA easily, when board ones have a few dozens, unless they are very famous ones. This is just not the most popular genre out there. Most gamers will want action, blood, or military strategy. I actually think that board gmaes are perfect for the iphone, often allowing "complete" play sessions in a very short time. As much as I love Dungeon Hunter, i won't launch in for 5 minutes of tram because it takes two minutes to launch and I'll restart at the beginning of the level anyway... Keep on the good work on AK !
Thanks thevagrant! I will definitely keep working on AK and a new update will out these days. I really enjoy myself when developing games and really feel nice if gamers like it! Assuming the game you are making is actually good and creative, the most important thing is awareness in the community. AK need more efforts in future, the same thing to board games. At last, a very interesting thing is the app Shark's Treasure was free for last 24 hours as it only got 2 downloads each day for a while. But during the promotion time, it got 11,688 copies downloaded!!! I think as a dev, nothing is happyer than making thousands of peoples know your games and know what you are doing, especially for indie devs. Because there are something beyond money.
Yeah I woudl thank the vagrant to cause he summed up my thoughts too But I think that as long as anything is polished enough, even if it doesn't offer anything new, customers are drawn to it. "Make it simple and beautiful"- Me (1/10/09) P.s: took the libety of editing a thing in your post which I think makes it better
I have quite a few board games (including AK, which is awesome by the way - thank you for that). And yes, I think it is a flavour going out of style. No real idea why though, except that the youth today are infused with stronger console games, often with strong action influence. Whereas the older generation, that can remember a time without the consoles and computers (yes, there was actually such a time), also remember many of the board games. - Some even with fond memories...
Apple also lumps a lot of games that aren't really 'Strategy' games into the Strategy section. I mean, Flight Control? Bloons? Apple should really re-categorize games into their common genres. For instance, Line-drawing and Tower Defense should probably be their own separate categories.
Most board games take forever and have crappy AI. Something like dicewars (a miniboard game if you will) would do well on the iphone if there was good multiplayer (like dicek the popular internet game) and you initially attracted enough people. Solves both problems, taking forever and crappy AI
It's not Apple doing this - it's developers trying to game the system and get visibility for their game by tagging it with a less competive (albeit inaccurate) genre. Some of the genres are a bit silly. What's the difference between "Action" and "Arcade" for example? There's a lot of games lumped into arbitrary categories that just make you want to scratch your head. Apple's review process has a lot to be desired in terms of consistency, but genre tagging is something I wish they actually paid attention to. I agree that it would be nice to have new genres created to cover things like Tower Defense and Line-Drawing which have emerged as popular genres in their own right.
It is pretty sad that a device so well suited for boardgames doesn't have many on it. I think that boardgaming in general just doesn't have the popularity that it once had. Maybe it's time to create an "Ultimate Board Game List" thread and spread the word. I might do so myself...
That's a very good idea! Most of board games are very classical, but unfortunately, sometimes 'classical' doesn't mean 'popular'.
I'll start work on it, then post a everything in a new thread. I think I may leave out solitaire games/puzzles - if I include things like all those Rush Hour clones, they'd dominate the list. Same for card games, perhaps a different thread for those as well... Lemme get this started, then people can add comments and I'll update the main post, like Zincuous' great thread on OpenFeint games with achievements.
I love board game so much and also is a big fan of AK. Board game can train the way of your thought, this kind of game always have depth. But, apparently, board game can not compete against the BIG ones.
Sadly most Americans aren't into strategy board games. Most would rather play Sorry or Monopoly or Risk as that's all they know and pretty much all you can buy at Toys R US or their local toy store. Most aren't familiar with bgg (boardgamegeek). I myself only got into european board games or German board games around 2005. Sadly I think it'll always be like this no matter how bad we wish it to change. Kind of reminds me back in 2001 I think it was I used linux for my desktop for one whole year at work hoping linux would take over the world. Since then I came to my senses and realized it will never happen at least not for many moons. Still love linux as a server as use it so but since switched to Mac a few years ago. So to get exposure for strategy board games on the app store is an uphill battle especially for Americans. Sometimes boardgame geek doesn't help as some of their top games are like 4 to 5 hour bloodbaths and the average joe is just looking for a nice light 30 to 45 min strategy game to play. I was almost disowned by my sister and brother-in-law for making them play Caylus and Santiago and that is no joke. Also my friend about punched my lights out for making him play my wife Twilight Struggle as it took 5 hours since I was explaining the game to them and they had a hard time grasping the concept. Usually it only takes 2 1/2 to 3 hours. Ones I'm still hoping for on iphone (haven't given up hope although it's been over a year) is for Can't Stop and Quoridor to see the light of day.
Egads mrbass, you gotta start slow! First you play Apples to Apples (drinking recommended!) Then you play Settlers of Catan or Carcassonne. Then you sneak in something like Aquire (money game route) Memoir '44 (wargame route) Formula De (sports route) or Age of Renaissance (strategy route) Baby steps! First get people used to playing games, then creep up the difficulty level. "My favorite boardgame? Advanced Squad Leader! What? Yes, that's the rulebook. And those other two folders as well... Why are you running away?"
Oh, just a bit OT, but to add to my post. - Would you for the love of God please make a chess game with the same style, feel and animation as AK? I would send you cookies and wash your socks!!
Anyway, AK will keep updating, always for the one loves it. v1.3 & v1.4 are written on the schedule, maybe when it out will be called AK Pro I guess ~
