90 days ago I had a great idea for an app and rushed to the Developer center to see if the name was already taken — it wasn’t! So I got it all set up to start coding and…
…life intervened and I put it on the back burner.
Today I got a nice reminder email from Apple letting me know that if I didn’t upload a binary by July 27 I’d lose the name. Eek!
The game that I was thinking of can’t be done in less than 30 days — not even with the super cool Corona SDK, but I don’t want to just give it up so I’m going to create a scaled-back version that I can build on later.
And I’m going to start it today, June 28, and have it ready to upload in 30 days or less.
The only work I’ve done on it so far is thinking about it — just brainstorming while driving around earlier. I have no artwork and no code written yet, although I expect I’ll be able to use some of the routines from Match Game Magic and Roly-Polies.
That means I’m going to create a cool game — from scratch to iTunes submission — in less than a month. If I wasn’t using Corona SDK I don’t think I’d stand a chance (for what I have in mind) but as long as I can get the artwork I need…
…and no, I can’t do the artwork. š I need cartoon horses and tack (saddles, bridles, etc.), so I’m going to have to hire an artist. And since I’m working under a short deadline it’ll probably cost me more than usual.
I just released version 2.4 of Corona Project Manager and until Horse Crazy is done I’m going to hold off on adding any more features — bug fixes only. I’m going to focus as much as I can on this one game.
The one thing I will take time to do is to update this site with status reports. I’ll also share some of the code I’ll be creating in the form of tutorials so you can use what I’m creating in your own projects.
Project Overview
Horse Crazy is going to be a Universal app; it’ll work with all the current iOS devices. It’ll probably go in the Kids and Family categories in the App Store (possibly Kids and Educational). The target audience is 6-11 year old girls who are horse crazy. (I had one of those — then she grew up to become a 15-year old girl who’s still horse crazy.)
If I can get it on the Nook I’d be interested in that, but otherwise have no plans at this point to target Android devices.
It will include Open Feint and Game Center Leaderboards and the ability to share what you’re doing on Facebook and via email.
In a future upgrade I’ll be introducing in-game currency and will probably lay the groundwork for that in the first version.
Horse Crazy will sell for $.99 and will have in-app purchases available. I may do a free version — if so it will come after the initial version is launched.
Tools Overview
I’ll be using Corona Project Manager to handle all the coding and game assets, of course. I’ll also be using the Crawl Space Library, Director, and Particle Candy for some of the code, and Gumbo to help layout some of the graphics.
Coming Up Next
Within the next few days I’ll post a list of milestones I’ll be shooting for in order to stay on track with this game. I’ll also post a description of what the game will consist of. (Some people might think game is the wrong word, but it’s something kids will play with so I think it fits.)
I wasn’t aware of the name thing on app store? Hmm, I have many app names and about 29 projects I am working on.
Maybe I should just register for one and that will put a fire under my ass!
-Nick
What’s icky is that in the warning email Apple sends you it says the name will be released in 30 days — but the email they send you AFTER it’s been released tells you that you are NEVER able to get that name again. So if you let it go, someone else can get it, but you are not able to get the name, not even if nobody else wants it.
Which means either work fast and get your apps uploaded, or slow down on reserving names for your apps. š
Jay
WHAT? So if you reserve a name, and then don’t use it you can’t get it back? They should at least have a 1 chance rule or something.
off topic:
Do you know how to loop a object so that it jumps constantly, but can’t double jump unless it’s touching ground? I am using apply linear impulse, and I can get the object to jump once (when I hit relaunch in Cor sdk) but I can’t get it to loop.