UPDATE ITS BEEN APPROVED! iTunes Link
Well i've submitted to the App Store (Sunday) so now its the waiting game!
You are the last surviving member of a UNMC rescue party. Your whole squad murdered by hostile alien life forms. Surrounded, they are attacking you from all sides. The only option is to fight, take as many of them with you as you can!
You can play the game in either portrait or landscape and using either the on screen controls, the accelerometer or the compass (iPhone 3GS only).
Theres an online score system so players can compare scores, lots of nice fx and it plays really smoothly. Im really pleased it turned out this well!
YouTube Video of Gameplay
Website
Beautiful design. I wish you the best in this venture.
Alex
Nice!!! That's really impressive!
Same here Matthew, it's looks awesome. Not sure how to play it but it looks great.
Thanks fellas!
Mike, its as simple a game as I could make it, didn't want to get too ambitious! Im going for the pick up, play for a couple of minutes demographic. Think Space Invaders in 360 degrees.
The aliens basically come towards you, the centre of the circle and you need to kill them before they get to close. You can do this by lining up the alien in front of you and the system will lock on the closest alien. Its got a 30 degrees field of view for the targeting. Then all you need to do is shoot!
If they get too close the system automatically fires the shotgun, which kills the alien. These shotgun shells are your life, so when you run out the next alien that gets too close kills you. You get 10 pts per alien, a new shell every 500 pts and the aliens just keep getting faster and faster with every generation. As the game goes on the aliens start to appear at greater angles so there is more of a chance of them sneaking up behind you.
The controls are simple, left and right buttons, a shoot button and thats it. You can also use the accelerometer or the compass (like the aliens film which its sorta based on) to rotate the disk. The buttons change if you are in the menu system but on one of the screen shots you will see the target button highlighted in blue.
Talking of buttons I extended the ui class to allow for buttons to fade out rather than just flick off and to have a disabled over image as well (the red highlight is both danger and disabled). Also notice the buttons are not rectangles in the portrait view and im detecting the exact shape of each button.
I think the thing that will impress Corona coders though is the portrait / landscape support, its taken a while to get right as it rotates about different points depending on current and target orientation so the screen stays in the centre. It also draws its own splash screen depending on the boot orientation.
Theres an online score system im hosting in MySQL on a remote server and after each game the iPhone tells you your world rank.
All in all thats it, im thinking of adding a boss, but need a good idea for that...
Thanks for the explanation. I think I have already an idea how you did it with the button shape. :-)
Yeah it wasn't that hard, this one im checking the distance from a point as well as in the bounding box of the button. Im looking at doing more complex shapes at the moment.
Point inside polygon shape collision detection.
Great job Matthew and I can't wait to try the app when it's available. Thanks for the "inside baseball" info on the game details.
Tom
Mike, was going to thank you. Took your advice and switched to JSON for saving files (thanks for links), it really helped when dumping the full game state when the app is closed.
Saved me a ton of time, no idea now why I was writing my own!
Damn... want to buy (play) it NOW ... I love the theme... I love alien and I really like the graphics and audio design as shown in the video. Wish you only the best for that game! Make sure you send us an heads up after approval!
Hey Hans
As my first twitter follower its only fair I send you a promo code once its approved!
The youtube vid doesnt do it justice, the screen has a pixel effect over it to make it look like its crt / old school screen like in the films. YouTubes compression just blurs all that into a compressed mess.
I did the vid to be watched on an iPhone (over wifi best) as its then the same exact size as the real game when the iPhone plays the mp4 vid
Only got website to do now!
Hey cool!
I am going to promote the game in my channels too (after it is in the store)... the Promo Code is a nice offer but I fear that will not work for me. I found others not working because I am in the German App-Store... But my Budget for iPhone/iPad Apps is "huge" since I moved to Mac and don't buy 2-3 Windows Games a month :-P
But then we have steam now .. lol :-)
Steam a little to late as ive played through everything on the 360 so far. Portal 2 though, been delayed until next year...
There is also a mac version of Star Trek Online if you fancy losing many hours of your life.... Its not official but I can point you to the wrapper for the PC game if you are interested.
I was in the Star Trek Online Beta and did not buy the game.
Tell me about losing hours of life... I was playing EVE for some years and tried nearly all new MMO/RPGs for a while.
Currently I am back at writing my own games and playing "Urban Rivals" for the kicks on the iPhone/iPad lately...
I wished there where a really good Magic the Gathering Client for iPad ... lol but they can't even create one for the PC ... what a mess :/ I own about 6900 virtual MTG Cards but stopped playing with Release of the V3 Online Crap.
Anyway... you may laugh at me but I am going to play my own game a lot when it is ready for the iPhone. The coolest thing about playtesting so far was that my sisters 13 year old son picked that game up and played it for some hours the first time he saw it (my sister is playtesting and writing documentation and stuff).
But I am buried in regular work (which pays the bills) so it may last a while till I have more than the basic graphics and gameplay implemented.
I have some pretty interesting ideas for iPhone / iPad games and apps which are not available (yeah... there is still stuff not existing.. hehe) in the gaming and business application area. I just got a cool idea for an "leisure" app to... The same goes for MAC applications. Did I tell that I am programming since 1982 and still like it :)
Matthew, what's your twitter name?
Nice job Matt!! Looks quite impressive and fun!
Thanks Guys
Corona has to me, been so much, and in some ways its shown me what ive been missing in my professional life lately.
Hans, I know what you mean about work getting in the way, thats why I did the game, something to push myself in a new direction and have some fun doing it. If the game doesn't sell its no big deal as its not why I did it in the first place.
Hans / Mike if you want some help with graphics then im more than willing, its what I love. Worked with Electronics Arts and 3D0 in the past so I more than capable. One thing im no good at is characters though, its out of my skill set.
Matt
Thanks for the offer Matthew,
I will get back to you on that when the time comes.
Michael
Thats a generous offer and I will come back to you for sure at some time. Actually I am entering the phase of graphics sugar for my app in the next week I hope. Thanks in advance!
Just to let you know, its been approved. It was submitted in the OS4 approval process and didnt spent at all long in review. Took 6 days awaiting review.
iTunes Link
Currently runs on my iPad :) nice work! Love it and retweeted it already...
One thing to improve imho! I was accidently muting it because I had to try what the buttons do! I think you need either have an indicator for this or a little text appear on switching the mute button!
Hi OderWat
Thanks mate. It runs great on the iPad, looks a little huge though. I was thinking of doing a version with a marines hand holding it.
If you leave a review could you mention is has sound as there is currently a review saying it has no sound and I think thats going to hit sales.
Its to do with the iPhone volume rocker, if the ringer is set to 0 you get no in game sounds and if the mp3 volume in iPod is set to 0 then you dont get the screams.
I see what you are saying about the speaker / mute, I think its necessary so people can play it on the bus / train etc... but I should flash up a volume icon like you say!
Once the website is up I will be taking suggestions for future enhancements and I will hopefully develop a better, top down sequel in the Corona Game Engine.
Today is turning out to be an interesting day, im hitting 2 sales an hour now (saw your score submission as 14.10, if that was you, I get an email for every new user, I dont collect details though, just assign every device an id for future hi score tracking)
Yeah could be me... I was testing compass mode and my GF and me had a lot of fun but got killed early :-) had to replay because that score was just to low .. hehe :)
Well I also thought that there is a bug with the sound because of the mute button... Something I would definitely change!
Second thing is that the highlight color of the buttons (the frames) would be green or orange if I had made that :)
Third.. I think it is a bit unclear about how to use the menus ... one finds it out when experimenting but that could be made easier accessible ... for example by highlighting the buttons which can be used.
I stop here... but at the same time I am thinking about my own beta testers... it is pretty hard to find people which are really testing stuff. I still need more people testing my app. But I did not opened up for a broader audience so far anyway.
Going to write a review for your app now ... :)
Yeah the compass is just for fun really, I added that in the description, although you can use the on screen controls as well. Just dont get dizzy!
Ok review written (in German / German Store... it's the first review here)
"Wow... Ich schreibe das gerade zwischen den Wellen von Aliens die ich killen muss!
Als großer Fan der Alien Filme musste ich direkt zugreifen als ich das Spiel im Store gesehen hab und
ich wurde nicht enttäuscht!
Grafik und Sound erinnern sehr an die Alien Filme und sind super gemacht!
Mit ein wenig Phantasie und Kopfhörern kommt man echt ziemlich in Stimmung beim Alien schlachten!
Kompass- und Tilt-Modus für die Rotation sind natürlich das i-Tüpfelchen ... man sieht zwar was albern aus,
wenn man sich mit dem iPhone in der Hand um sich selber dreht und alle möglichen Geräusche von sich gibt..
hehe aber Spaß hat man dabei :)
Also für das Geld auf jeden Fall eine Kaufempfehlung!
P.S.: Wenn ihr keinen Sound habt versucht mal in der Mitte auf den Lautsprecher zu klicken!
Damit "Muted" man den Ton.. wird aber leider nicht angezeigt! Ausserdem muss man "Klingelton" und!
"iPod" Ton laut stellen.. irgendwas hakt da wohl. Aber das tut dem Spielspass keinen Abbruch :)
Translation (roughly)
"Wow... I am writing this between killing waves of alien I have to kill
As a big fan of the Alien Movies I had to grab this game as soon as I found it in the app store
and I am not disappointed.
Graphics and Audio reminds me a lot on the alien movies and are excellent!
With a bit of fantasy and headphones you really get in the mood of alien killing.
Compass- and Tilt-Rotation just top this! It may look a bit silly when I rotate with the iPhone
in my hand and making strange noises... lol but it is great fun!
For this amount of money a bargain! Go buy it!
P.S.: If you have no audio try to press the "Speaker" Button in the middle! This mutes the sound but
there is no indicator. Also make sure you have rintone and ipod sound set. Seems to be a glitch..
but does not influence the great gameplay at all
(I should continue writing the serializing code for my gamestate... arg.. again some aliens ... KIIIIILLL EMM!)
Cheers dude!
Thats awesome I owe you one!
Hi Matthew,
I got it too and I love the whole package. Great graphics and sounds. The gameplay is simple but fits the purpose. I can imagine it is even more fun to play within a completely dark room.
I agree with OderWat reagrding the menu. It's usage was not clear at first.
Will write a review in the german store soon.
Cheers
Michael Hartlef
http://www.whiteskygames.com
http://www.twitter.com/mhartlef
Hi Matthew,
Congratulations and it looks like a great game. I'm not into "shooter" games but I'm tempted to buy it and check out based on the feedback here. :)
Tom
Deleted (duplicate posting)
Progress Report
Sold 30+ in its first day and is getting a mention in the new and noteworthy for games > action, its also showing on first page of new games at the moment. Reviews been on average 4 stars which is good!
Cool, it seems that the rating and the amount of sales have an affect on New and Noteworthy section.
congratulations for that.
Yep seems so... Guess your are getting stinky rich soon :-P
Ha not really!!!
I have no American reviews, come on Americans (especially you Ansca guys) give me some reviews!
Hi Matt,
Just bought Alien Horde, great little app and clever use of the tilt. Fantastic that us UK developers are getting on the Corona act. Their Game Edition is looking good and seems so simple to implement great looking effects! Anyway well done on producing a great app and good luck with your future projects!
Cheers,
Nick
I've got a lot of crash dumps from "Alien Horde" on my device. Did you get notified of that yet?
I've seen a few, IOS only. I've been stress testing the game and can't replicate any crash
If you try to reload the game straight away after quitting that will generate one, I thinks that's the new multitasking trying to pickup the game or it doesn't have time to fully quit the game before it's asked to load it again
Yeah it's iOS 4 related... I did not found crashes before I updated .. nor on the iPad. I try to check when it happens later on.
Thanks Nick for your comments!
Just bought the game, loved the movie Aliens, and this game is simple yet entertaining. Here's hoping that you'll be able to use the gyroscope in the iPhone 4 version, and it will be more accurate than the compass. I'll gladly put a 5-star review for it (and I'm in the US).
I think this pushed me over the edge to buy the SDK now at the prelaunch price (or even at the educational discount). I showed my brother who's a physics professor at Bowdoin College and he's loving the idea of utilizing the Game Edition for his projects.
I have GameSalad and Torque 2D, but I think this takes the cake. Thanks, Matt.
Hey BeyondtheTech,
Thanks for the comments. Yeah Corona is, from my point of view, the perfect balance of the different SDK's out there. If we could get some simple 3D in there as well it would be awesome.
The game edition is looking really promising but ive not really had the time to experiment, real work getting in the way these days!
Game Update > Its now been pirated!
I was seeing about 1000 pirated copies a day but thats now dropped down to about 10 a day, normal sales have dropped to about 10 a day as well now. But im not promoting it at all now.
Went free for 1 weekend fri - sun. That shifted about 4500 copies and was noticed by lots of websites that track prices.
Im waiting for the sound bug to be fixed in Corona and I will then put out an update with a few little extras.
Matthew,
What sound bug are you waiting to be fixed? Beta 7 fixed all the known sound bugs in iPhone/iPad. (There is still one issue in Android.)
-Tom
@Tom ... I am not sure.. but my observation about the different sources for volume control could be classified as bug... and not to be taken light ... I had multiple reporters reporting confusion. And it is pretty easy to reproduce
See: http://developer.anscamobile.com/forum/2010/07/07/audio-volume-inconsistence
and my latest email.
Hi Tom
OderWat is correct, the volume control on the iPhone only works for the mp3 sounds and not the short aiff sounds. This is probably because the first sound the game plays is an mp3, its reported as a bug.
I spoke to Eric yesterday about the issue and im told the sound api will need to be extended for this to be corrected.
Matt
@Matthew
You may be able to use the same workaround as I do: Never "stop" the sound but pause it... or have a "silence.mp3" started and paused right afterwards when no other mp3 is playing.
And that transfers volume control back to the short sounds? I will give it a go, I use other mp3s as well though so it might be more complex, thanks though.
I was using a silence.mp3 for something else, cant remember now what for though. I also preload an mp3 (load and stop playing) when booting so the game doesnt stutter when playing it for the first time later so I may already be doing what you suggest.
It is like this... the "short sounds" are regulated by the ringer volume slider if no "long" sound plays (or pauses)... if you have a long sound playing the ipod slider controls the overall volume...
There is still the problem that if the ringer is silent you can't make it louder with the ipod/music volume controller... but that is a rare case.
This is a really nice game - great artwork and high production values!
The hi-score feature really interest me.
Is it reliable enough to implement it as you did (on your own server)?
Can you share with us the code for that global hi-score system (or maybe post a short tutorial)?
Great job,
EZ
EZ
Will answer on the other thread you posted on.
Thanks btw!
views:2787 update：2011/9/24 8:48:32