Knighturn - Fantasy Strategy RPG

[undeadcow]

I noticed Knighturn was removed from App Store so contacted the developer and here are the details for "prosperity."

Allow me to start with why we have removed Sw&Ear and Knighturn from Google Play:
With Kingturn [Mangobile's newest SRPG; Android exclusive] we have introduced many improvements over Sw&Ear and Knighturn (full screen scaling for all screen resolutions, smoother scrolling, faster paced unit movement, elite units, legendary items, spawn chances for enemies, and so on). Since we wanted to apply these improvements for Sw&Ear and Knighturn as well, we’ve initially planned to update Sw&Ear and Knighturn accordingly. Well, it turned out that Kingturn was just too incompatible to Sw&Ear and Knighturn (e.g. save games), so we couldn’t do that. Instead we’ve decided to republish Sw&Ear as Kingturn Plus and Knighturn as Kingturn Underworld with all benefits of the Kingturn engine. While we are still supporting Sw&Ear and Knighturn for existing customers, we’ve taken them from the market so new players can focus on the superior Kingturn versions and are not confused by a plethora of different game versions.

As for removing Sw&Ear and Knighturn from iOS:
1) We didn’t want to have two different quality standards for iOS and Android, with better quality games on Android (Kingturn series) and lower quality on iOS (Sw&Ear and Knighturn)
2) The interest in our games has been extremely low on iOS. (Android downloads in 1 hour = iOS downloads in 1 month !!!)
Funny thing is that we’ve put way more effort into advertising on iOS than on Android.
As far as I can tell, the iOS market is much more Top-100-driven than the Android market, so many small indie developers (like us) are struggling hard on iOS.

That said, there is actually a chance that we will publish Kingturn on iOS within the next two or three months. For our future games we want to switch to Unity, a 3D engine that supports almost all platforms out there and drastically reduces required effort for porting.
Right now we are porting Kingturn to the Unity3D engine, mainly in order to get familiar with the system. As a ‘by-product’, Kingturn should be fully compatible with iOS then.
So if we don’t run in any iOS specific problems, we will quite likely publish Kingturn on iOS as well.

The developer made no guarantees we'll see Kingturn port to iOS or Knighturn/Sw&Ear reappear but I am hopeful.

[DaviddesJ]

I wish they didn't have to remove it (I don't tend to back up my apps; when they are gone, they're gone), but I understand their reasoning. But it makes me want to go back and play Knighturn more! Or maybe I'll get Kingturn on my Galaxy Nexus (but I don't like playing games on phone-sized devices, and I don't have an Android tablet).

[iPadisGreat]

Originally Posted by DaviddesJ

I wish they didn't have to remove it (I don't tend to back up my apps; when they are gone, they're gone), but I understand their reasoning. But it makes me want to go back and play Knighturn more! Or maybe I'll get Kingturn on my Galaxy Nexus (but I don't like playing games on phone-sized devices, and I don't have an Android tablet).

I heard somewhere that developers have to pay Apple a fee to keep their apps listed, so it would be logical to cease their publishing agreement with Apple when they intend to go full Android.

They seem to be burning bridges with their customers and I would guess that might result in burnt buyers being wary of buying from them again, no matter the platform, in future.

[the9quad]

I don't understand, let me get this straight. They took the game off the AppStore because they have a better version they don't want customers to get confused with; This better version isn't available in the AppStore, only for android....so exactly how does taking the only available version off ios benefit the customer?

[iPadisGreat]

Originally Posted by the9quad

I don't understand, let me get this straight. They took the game off the AppStore because they have a better version they don't want customers to get confused with; This better version isn't available in the AppStore, only for android....so exactly how does taking the only available version off ios benefit the customer?

Playing the Devil's Advocate here, but it helps punters by showing them only the best version available? So their customers will henceforth buy only the developer's best efforts and become loyal clients for life?

[DaviddesJ]

Originally Posted by the9quad

I don't understand, let me get this straight. They took the game off the AppStore because they have a better version they don't want customers to get confused with; This better version isn't available in the AppStore, only for android....so exactly how does taking the only available version off ios benefit the customer?

I don't think it's to benefit the consumer. They would rather remove the version that is not well received so that if, in the future, they issue a better product, it's not tarred by association with the earlier game. And so that online discussion of their products focuses on the stronger products.

I wish they didn't do this but it's not completely incomprehensible.

[DaviddesJ]

Originally Posted by iPadisGreat

I heard somewhere that developers have to pay Apple a fee to keep their apps listed

No, not really. There's a $99 annual fee to publish as many apps as you want. Not a significant factor.

They seem to be burning bridges with their customers

Why is that? I wish they wouldn't remove the app, but, as a customer, it doesn't really harm me much.

[Isilel]

Argh, that's a pity! I am just now finishing Knightturn and I intended to pick up Swords and Earrings next...

P.S. In fact, I find it a bit of a jerk move that they didn't at least come here and issue a warning of imminent take-down.

[undeadcow]

Wow... where were all you diehard proponents of Knighturn/Sw&Ear when it was available? I am not sure if I would have posted the developers straight forward and candid email if I knew it would turn into such a negative backlash against them.

I think their move is understandable; not only has iOS not been a financially viable market for Mangobile but Android has been 30x more successful. I'm a little disappointed myself that a lot of iOS consumers aren't very small studio friendly (Star Traders RPG is another current example). With the difference in platform and Apple's unwillingness to support "older" devices Mangobile were not going to be able to keep the games functional forever.

They removed these games from both stores to protect their brand. They were around for years so I suspect most interested players had opportunity to download (except maybe Isilel). These are some of my favorite iOS games and I think this move makes sense. Otherwise people, if they even noticed these games, would be complaining that there needs to be iPhone 5 widescreen optimization, higher definition graphics bump, a lower price, or any number of routine criticism that gets hurled around here.

Hopefully they will be back; but until then consider Partia: The Broken Lineage, Fall of Angels, QuestLord, or Tactical Warrior for your iOS "indie" RPG fix.

While we are still supporting Sw&Ear and Knighturn for existing customers...

I think you can still download these from the purchased history if you previously had them.

[DaviddesJ]

Originally Posted by undeadcow

I'm a little disappointed myself that a lot of iOS consumers aren't very small studio friendly (Star Traders RPG is another current example).

Well, I tried Star Traders RPG and I didn't like it.

I think you can still download these from the purchased history if you previously had them.

Apparently so! I didn't know that. That makes it less of an issue for current owners.