Thanks for the excellent answer. I don't usually like big file sizes, but for those graphics I think 300mb is actually pretty small If it's $4.99 I'll buy it for sure I think you should have a release sale and then have it at full price. But I don't know much of marketing, that's just how I'd want it to be
We have discussed that. We're a new developer and we know we have to work for your loyalty. We also want to price it as inexpensively as possible, in line with similar games in the App Store. Richard Cowgill www.facebook.com/sunsidegames
5 dollar is a excellent into price. 7 dollar would be the normal price. Dont underestimate the awesomeness of your own creation. Now please give me the beta or something! I wanna play this nowwwwww! Im a good bug hunter
It's a tricky one. On the one hand you have rock-bottom standard app prices with freemium flooding the lists, then you have those symbolic price points and then there's "implied value" of a higher price. So how to find that point that works best? & also how does that affect reviews too: Value for money? My own input is that as you have v impressive game engine, it's "implied value" is looking a bit higher which then should work at a higher point. I'm not advising one way or the other, but definitely want to try to get exposure as high as possible before release if you set a higher price point. Weren't apple looking for apps to show off the iPad3 in all it's glory? I'd suggest you get on line to Apple HQ as a serious candidate! The game lends itself to a visual treat of an experience and is very distinct/stand-out different too? Kinda perfect for advertising/show-casing... Still recommend the responsiveness of the crow avatar be as life-like as you guys can possibly apply!
I appreciate that! We don't undervalue what we've done, if anything we're trying to both value it appropriately and give you a good deal. As for a public beta, we may do one soon. When we get there I'll let you know, I think it may be sooner than later! We'll be looking to gather feedback from fresh faces who have only seen the game through previews and media. Richard Cowgill www.facebook.com/sunsidegames
We have been talking to Apple about how to best showcase the game. We may have just barely missed the iPad3 window, since the latest rumor now is that the announcement will be March 7 (of course more than just a rumor at this point right?). Still I think in the next couple months you'll see us coordinate with Apple on the release of the game. Richard Cowgill www.facebook.com/sunsidegames
It's Official: March 7. All the big sites were invited. WOW if you could showcase it on the iPad 3 keynote, price it at at least 6.99$ Try calling them showing them the demo, it's a week from now maybe you can make it, I think this game can look awesome on stage with the (rumored) retina display for the iPad 3! BTW awesome premise! EDIT: I've shown this to my friend and he also thinks it would make an excellent showcase, I've even started directing it a bit: 1-2 min: Start where the scarecrow level is, fly around a bit then pinch to zoom to show the full land in TRUE RETINA (whatever name they call it). 3-5 min: Fly through the cave collect gems and slash via slowmo to get more and while in slowmo talk about the nice effects you can see. 5-7 min: Snow level showing every snowflake very lush with dynamic lights antistrophic filter etc, with good fps. 8-10 min: Finish with snow cave for the BIG kreshendo with the boss guy at the end of the cave (the best crowd GCD is usually a big boss battle). Cut!
Here's a look at some of the environment art in Crow. This is ingame and how it appears on the iPad. Richard Cowgill www.facebook.com/sunsidegames
Here's a look at some of the environment art in Crow. This is ingame and how it appears on the iPad. Richard Cowgill www.facebook.com/sunsidegames[/QUOTE] Those are some fantastic normals on the foliage and walls! The fact you are two man team is truly incredible. I'd really love to know a bit more about your build process when you get more comfortable talking (e.g. are you loading in game cutscenes and then loading levels later). I only say that because those textures look expensive if you have a ton of assets with that level of detail. Also, can the 3GS even handle those normals? I don't think we could even handle a dynamic art pipeline with limited man hours we have but man I have nothing but appreciation for a team who maximizes each device they build for. That's certainly worth 5 bucks or more though. Hit me up if you want some beta testing with a more technical eye. If you ever want to do the same I can easily send you a build through Test Flight as well.
Ok, look, you gotta tell me a little more. You already know I'm a huge fan. Are you really running the same normals that you are on the iPad 2? That just doesn't seem possible considering the fill rate. I'm not a programmer so maybe I'm just not thinking this through but I don't think I've seen anything of that caliber running on 3GS and as brilliant as I think you are there has to be a reasonable explanation for it
Well I just wanted to assure you we get these same details at 30fps on 3gs hardware. It's not that much of a stretch, the 3gs in fact is very similar hardware wise to the iPhone 4. The same SGX535 GPU, same generation (A8 single core) cpu, it's just that the iPhone 4 has it upclocked slightly and repackaged into the more efficient A4 system. The iPhone 4 is more powerful, but the delta between them isn't that wide, and it kinda evens out when you realize that the 3gs only has to render 1/4 of the pixels because of it's lower resolution. The biggest challenge with the 3gs is memory, since it has less than all the other currently shipping iDevice hardware with only 128MB. But that's been another focus of Radiance and Crow, keep memory under control. I've seen comparative memory statistics where Crow actually uses less memory than alot of 2D games like Angry Birds! We definitely use less memory than alot of 3D games. We worked to keep memory down, that helps quite a bit. We do run the same detail levels between devices. Those details are more visible on the Retina Display but we don't cut anything out of the 3gs build. And we don't have a good way to do that anyway, since we're making a universal build of the game and personally I wouldn't want to. I'm very proud of the fact that we can make a fairly modern, pretty game and have it run well everywhere. Richard Cowgill www.facebook.com/sunsidegames
That's just awesome to hear. It gives me confidence that 3GS won't be as much of a headache as I've been told. Unity has some pretty cool stuff for batch rendering but one of our problems is gunning for 60fps, which isn't super critical, but really helps give the 3D illusion.
This is 100% in-engine running on the iPad. As an added bonus to you guys in the forums, I have some wireframes of the Giant so you can get an idea of the kind of detail levels Radiance can do: You can see from the texture and lighting highlights on the wireframe how he is lit as well. In-game the Giant is about 10,000 triangles and 120 bones. We apply bone weights to individual clumps of fur, his beard, chain links, fingers and other details to give them added animated weight and movement. This is more character detail than most characters on X360/PS3 titles (which usually are half or less than these numbers), and we achieve these detail levels on the 3gs iPhone. You might say its only one character, except we have a bunch of archers on horseback onscreen with the Crow at the same time, each one is nearly equal to the Giant in terms of detail and complexity. Richard Cowgill www.facebook.com/sunsidegames www.sunsidegames.com
It's coming! We just need a few more people to accept and register devices and then we'll send out the public beta! Richard Cowgill www.facebook.com/sunsidegames
Breaking News: SUNSIDE GAMES TO RELEASE THEIR RADIANCE ENGINE AS FREE OPEN-SOURCE SOFTWARE Source: indiegamemag.com
