Design decision. I figured more people would just want to have no music for the extra concentration on the harder levels, or just play their own music. Instead of having music for each level, we just made added support for playing your own music library. The shotgun usually helps. The lowest level of the shotgun is a good 5 second stun if the Chaser is about to eat you. If you haven't done monkey yet, try that instead, as it's a little easier than bat. Other than that, we encourage trying to get better scores on lower levels if you get stuck, since beating Developer Scores gives you a lot of money for upgrades.
I love what you guys done with the game. At first when I saw the early screenshots, first thing that came to my head was this game reminded me of Spelunky. But after playing it, I was wrong. This game is super addictive, I was playing it into the early morning until my iPod kept nagging me about the 20% battery left.
Thanks! Just beat the level. Upgraded the rope twice. I think that helped + the level 2 shotgun. Thanks again.
If anything, the game's probably a ripoff of Dino Run. I'm against BLATANT ripoffs, so I totally gave the dinosaur a grappling hook. Dino Run itself was a ripoff of Sonic the Hedgehog. Oh, Quake's grappling hook was also an inspiration, and I guess You Found the Grappling Hook. Not that I wouldn't like to rip off Spelunky. It's one of my favorite games, though I'd want to make some design changes.
Oh, I didn't mean anything negative by what I said =] (I hope you didn't take what I said for something else) I just said the early screenshots reminded me of Spelunky.
Oh, I didn't take it that way. I took it as a compliment. I just tend to use "rip-off" and "inspiration" interchangeably.
played some more I now finished: The Whimpy Idol Its of course quite easy. I let me 3 year old son play it for farming gold hehe) The Bat Idol For me the most difficult part were those walls I constantly had to break through. What is this bat item doing that can be purchased? Does it help or not, it seems I can go though the bats more easy, but hard to tell. The Monkey Idol More of the same. Not finished yet. The Frog Idol Now here it started to get interesting. Lots of water that slows you down, and it helps a lot to have a long robe and rocket boots, so you can take the best routes. But the last level just kills me with all those walls. Too often I don't have the speed to break through, and at the end the big buy eats me. The Bull Idol Now that one really has it. Lots of lava, you fall into it and it takes your flesh of your skinny body. Later on there are small lave pits, which you can stay in for a fraction of a second. Though, but I like it. Pro Controls I did try them, but could not figure out how to use those. Anyone really getting better result with them? As for the price. I think $1.99 might be ok, but for more I doubt it will work out unless the potential buyer already knows how good the game is. The screenshots and the description just does not communicate it well enough to have a price of $2,99 for the game.
People don't seem to have any problem paying $2.99 for Canabalt. Hopefully Kepa prices his game based on what he thinks it's worth instead of following the advice of amateur App Store economists. edit: http://toucharcade.com/2009/10/17/hook-champ-swings-to-the-app-store/
The difference with Canabalt is that it has the press on its side already. That and a demo version in flash form. What we're doing for Hook Champ is having a Lite version so people can experience the gameplay before they buy it. Sadly, Apple hasn't approved the Lite version yet for whatever reason. It was actually submitted a little while before the full version.
great game. love the descriptions for alot of the upgrades like "the stache - facial hair is like a hat for your mouth' lol
Hell yeah. You know, the checkpoint thing was considered but decided against due to the score-competition aspect of the game. Instead we went for shorter levels to lessen death frustration, as you picked up on. The only difficulty tweak I'd like to make in a content patch, so far, is adding a new item that gives you a mulligan in magma-heavy levels. I feel okay with the end of the game being difficult, as replaying the early levels for secrets/score competition is encouraged anyway. Yes, that would be helpful. As a pretty new (and independent) developer, a lot of my emails seem to get lost in the shuffle. Seems unavoidable, so any hype I can get from fans of the game will be important. If I have one complaint about the game, as a developer, it's that it doesn't have nearly enough hats.
Errr it seems like another good game. Still haven't beat any of the games o bought wasent trying to buy another untill I beat 1 but am so tempted .: and elnimate is free now so ...
Having played the flash version, I prefer this to Canabalt. Not to say Canabalt is a bad game, but it gets old after a while.
