Melodive - (by Johan Gjestland)[Universal]

[gjestland]

@baracus:
It makes me very happy that you get and like my game! I made it for myself, but I hoped other people would get joy from it also! Please consider posting your review to the appstore and the user-review forum of this site. (No nagging in-game, so i'll nag a bit here instead, haha, hope thats ok? )

@bigrand1: Did you read the help? It is a bit confuzing in the start, I know, but give it a little time and it will grow on you... I will be making a detailed instructional video this weekend, hopefully that will clear things up a bit. Also, it is both a game and a tech demo, the game part is really about learning to fly and then flying faster and faster with more and more control. If you reach 10000 meters you will unlock the in-game sequencer so you can make your own music. But Melodive is all about the journey and not the end goal. So even though i have tried to gamify the experience with upgrades and an end goal, it is a "musical cave exploration"-simulation (as appspy put it) in its heart. I sincerly hope that you warm up to it! Please keep me posted on your progress. If there is anything I can do to make the experience better for you, please let me know!

[Gabrien]

Originally Posted by Baracus

This is really lovely. Such a nice flow to it, really tight controls and trippy visuals. I had no idea what I was doing at first but read the help and all makes sense now.

You do have full control, like a very responsive jet fighter. Tilt to yaw, bank, turn etc and tap to thrust.

Idea is to go 'down' as deep as you can (for points, more points for going faster) but finding a safe route and even just orientating yourself to know which way IS even down, is the thrill. (Hint: mushrooms point up).

There are upgrades to buy or save for like better handling, more speed, heavier gravity and more.

Really nothing like it - such a creepy universe to fly around in with some fabulous organic shapes, stunning lighting, and smooth as silk frame rate on my mini!

Hmm. My impressions were pretty much the opposite. The controls felt extremely "loose," everything looked the same, and at no stage did I feel any sense of progression, or inkling of any particular "aim" with the exception of trying to prevent the screen spinning to avoid nausea. I wanted to like this too.

[drelbs]

Originally Posted by jsrco

Bah... ipad 2 is gone and iphone 4 isn't supported.

Wait, what?

Damn I just bought this ... On my iPhone 4.

[jsrco]

Originally Posted by drelbs

Wait, what?

Damn I just bought this ... On my iPhone 4.

It works... but man this game just feels like a mess. I can't put my finger on it. There isn't that many people on the leaderbords but I hit number 1 and only died because I got really bored... the music does not seem to do anything. There is no explanation as to what is going on. I am just hoping that becuase I am using an iphone 4 the game isn't working as intended.

[MidianGTX]

This looks like the sorta game you listen to Kyuss whilst playing... I'm down for that.

[MidianGTX]

Yeah, this is some trippy s**t. I really like it. I must admit, I feel more like I'm playing a Windows Media Player visualization than a game, but that's just fine. Put some headphones on, crank some tunes and get lost in the music for a while. That's a near-perfect evening for me.

I would like to suggest a no-fail mode though, if I'm enjoying my music I might not care about points, I just don't want my calm, trance-like state interrupted in the middle of a song. Unless that's what sequencer mode is? I haven't unlocked it yet. 10,000 seems pretty hard, but maybe I just need practise... or perhaps you could have it unlock at something like 100,000 over all of your attempts or something, then everyone will be able to get it eventually.

Also I'm kinda wondering if touch controls could work? Tilt works very well, but if the aim of the game is to be relaxing I don't know how long I can throw my iPad around for. I'd be able to play comfortably for much longer if there were touch controls. That said, I wouldn't want to ruin the visuals with virtual buttons either, so they'd have to be pretty intuitive. Perhaps even just holding your finger on the point you want to fly to? One finger movement controls with rolling being automatic, then a second finger to boost or something.

Really nice app anyway, I'm looking forward to sticking a few albums on now

[gjestland]

Melodive will NOT work on iPhone 4 unfortunately because of the lack of dual-core. I will mark it even better in the app description. If anybody have bought the game in error, please drop me a private message with your itunes-receipt and I will gladly refund your money through paypal.

[gjestland]

I will also release an update shortly, so if anybody have any good suggestions i will try to make them work. I might even get rid of the whole upgrade/unlock-system if that's desirable.

[m44]

I had the same problem that Gabrien had (spinning ship leading to disorientation). I like the concept for the game though.

Maybe tether the craft? The Tether could prevent the craft from spinning, and would (more quickly/clearly) indicate up from down. Maybe just as a "training wheels" type of option?

[drelbs]

Chops up a bit, but still plays OK on my iPhone 4. (Didn't get to try it on our iPad2 last night.)

I didn't have any problems with the tilt controls, and am pretty happy with this title. It feels very much like Elite minus the weapons and trading plus tripping the light fantastic.

Perhaps for people having trouble with orientation you could place a button in the upper right/left corner that would steer the player to level while held down. (i.e. hold, start leveling regardless of device tilt then stay level/straight while held down or stop leveling when let go, correct roll first, then pitch.

It's a neat game/experience and like Midian, I'd be happy with a "visualizer" mode that just flew itself, would pinball off solids w/out 'dying' and just run until I touched the screen to end it. You could program it to mostly fly level, then go up/down between the areas periodically.

Also, I didn't know the goal was to "fly down" until I saw it on the forums here, a simple help screen telling you to do that (and pick up bits) would be great.

Final comment: It might disorient some, but I absolutely love how the title screen reacts when you start the game.