GameClub Hook Champ (by Rocketcat Games)

Lots of things to respond to, I apologize if I don't respond to everything. I do read everything, like the HAT IDEAS.

We'd like to, but it's a massive undertaking. It would be something we'd slowly work on between games. It would be a great feature.

We finely balanced Hookbot to not be too powerful, in a variety of ways. If anything, he might be the weakest of the three characters (slightly) for speed run purposes, overall. There may be about two levels he actually has an advantage in, but I don't foresee him dominating the top 3 of each level. I would like him to make appearances in the top 10, though.

A version of Hook Champ that's like Metroid or Castlevania, huh. You might be hearing more on this in this week.

We'll never offer level packs via paid DLC, for any game, ever. I hate it when DLC pulls that. Obvious exceptions: If we made DLC that was basically a huge expansion pack (big enough to count as a sequel), or we made a "first chapter is free" game where you bought a chapter at a time for 99 cents (like Rolando 2).

May as well say this again: More levels in update 3. I think it was a mistake of us to do a patch that didn't have new levels, but had DLC... it may give the impression that we're not adding more levels. We are. In update 3. I promise.

The next character, a bounty hunter who's after Gunny, was going to be a speed-based character that had a much weaker loot magnet. Due to opinions on Hookbot, we're changing her to a flashy cosmetic-only character. Sorry to disappoint!

We're not too worried about DLC sales, but we obviously don't want to damage our reputation. Then again, we also want to take this time to experiment with what works and what doesn't work. We're going to compare both DLC's side by side and then probably abandon the concept until maybe our next game. We do hope it works, because the plan was to offer future games at about half price, counting on DLC to make up some of the losses.

This was actually a feature that's been requested before, that we just haven't put in yet. That is, a preview of the map. There's certain limitations to the game that we didn't plan for, as it's actually our first major game, ever. Because of this, a map preview might actually be less feasible than a level editor, as goofy as that sounds.

In hindsight, I'm going to admit that we shouldn't have made Hookbot paid DLC, we should have just made the DLC cosmetic. Hookbot is really just too handy for people struggling with the game, or people that want to explore. I'm against charging for new levels in DLC, so that should really extend to charging for such functional content.

I had good intentions: I didn't want to do cosmetic only DLC because I thought it was too lazy. What we're going to try is this: Doing cosmetic DLC, but making it as flashy as we can. This will hopefully still reward people that buy the DLC, while not excluding people that don't buy the DLC.

Farther in the future, we may also experiment with expansion packs: That is, DLC so big that it counts as a sequel, with major new features, completely new story and characters, etc. Not for Hook Champ, though. At this point, we'd probably want to rewrite the whole engine to do things that we can't do well with current limitations. These things are a growing laundry list that I could get into later.

 

You just have to delete the parts you don't want. If it's more than one person, click the multi-quote button on them all, but click the normal quote button on the last one.

 

Hook champ rocks, can't wait for the new levels in update 3. Just rated hook champ a 5 star on the first post with the new app info thing.

 

I was thinking about giving it a rating purely because I like the graphical style and all the unlockables as well as the constant updates... then I figured it'd be a little unfair considering I only have the lite version and don't have full experience of the game.

...then I figured that no one else is gonna play by this rule, so I gave it 4 stars. You can like a game without owning it

 

does anybody know what the hats do

 

The later upgrades and levels are like miles better.

 

Thanks for the response, Kepa. I understand about the map preview thing, that's fine. I understand about the DLC as well, and I don't mind if you do only cosmetic DLC or not. I kinda just suck at this game for now, so I kinda want to be just be able to practice swinging and trying things out, but the chaser makes that harder. Hopefully I'll get better, but right now it's a little frustrating since I'm stuck and I'm having trouble figuring out if there is a better way to do this level.

Maybe you could make a character that is invincible, but you can't set high scores with him?

 

Well, I'm working on Bronze Rat, and have #4 on the weeklies with Hookbot. Took me no more than a dozen or so plays to set that score. Gunny is clearly theoretically faster than my Hookbot run (and top score is Gunny) but damn, it's hard. You basically need to time three of your four shots to both maximise speed and have ghost on screen, and if you get it just slightly wrong, you get eaten. If I get everything right, I would get the #2 global score. I think I've tried about two hundred times so far.

That's a real shame.

What I'd really like to see is a *hat editor*. Meanwhile, how about a Christmas cracker hat?

How much am I playing this game? Zelda: Spirit Tracks is sitting untouched since the update came out.

 

Kepa,

I love the DLC and I was happy to pay for and will continue to pay for content that you have for Hook Champ.

Are you slowing down on the updatable content for Hook Champ? It sounds like you are scaling back, is Hook Champ on it's last update legs? Have you fallen in love with your new game? And is your new game going to be a sequel to Hook Champ but with guns and ninjas?

Keep the updates coming, love the game!

 

Love me some Hook Champ, and SO excited to see the devs still working on updates.

I wasn't going to buy the DLC, but after Kepa's awesome reply, how could I not?

 

Thanks for answering Kepa. Really looking forward to a future update with a Level Editor.

One last question if you dont mind aswering. Just for curiosity, was Sonic's gameplay somehow a influence for Hook Champ? I am just asking because i read it somewhere, a person saying that in the game you have to run as fast as you can, while collecting coins and emeralds.

When i read this description, instantly i remembered Sonic (a game that i really liked in the old 2D days), and i was thinking, maybe because of this i also really liked Hook Champ

 

You better not just be messing with us. Because that would be amazing. Shadow Complex on your iPhone? From a dev that made one of the best games around on it? Count me in!

That's actually a really cool idea. I always remember Mario Kart DS had a logo on the hood of your cart you could make yourself... I made Nes from Earthbound. Something similar in this would rock. Although, with different angles and such, I'm not sure how easy/possible... But some customization of stuff can be fun, and the devs already obviously enjoy that themselves.

PS - I don't expect your next game to be Shadow Complex specifically, but something Metroidvania style with the hook mechanic would be good fun. Can't wait for the announcement! Do you guys have a twitter account that you use for the company?

 

I was going to put my vote in for "Hookbot is great, keep DLC just the way you're doing it", but it sounds like you guys have already made a different decision on that.

Regardless, I'm a big fan of Hookbot, and was happy to spend the dollar.

 

Offhand: We're updating the lite in update 3. To have all the crazy OpenFeint stuff.

Keeps yer head warm.

In update 3, we're increasing the length of rope at early levels, for new players. This should help a ton.

We were thinking about a free character that is extremely hard to die as, like Hookbot, but free, but even harder to do speed runs as. It's a bit late to design him at this point, but maybe an update 4 thing?

Probably not. Well, at least for this update.

You know, we were JUST TALKING about this. That is, a little MSPaint hat editor. Weighing the pros and cons: We'd have to have a REVIEW PROCESS for each hat. That is, you'd design the hat, hit a button, and like two weeks later we'd approve or trash the designed hat. This last part really turned us off on the idea, heh.

We'll have to slow down eventually, as the first few updates have been bigger than any updates I've seen on the platform. After update 3, we'll probably go on some sort of half-on, half-off schedule for Hook Champ. That is, some updates will be small bugfixes and new hats, and alternating updates will have ONE major new feature (not, say, nine), such as a levelset or major OpenFeint revision.

We're going to stay in the genre of "WITH A GRAPPLING HOOK" for awhile, though we'll also be working on smaller games with different genres. More info on new games soon.

Hook Champ is indirectly inspired by Sonic. It's actually inspired by the flash game, Dino Run (by PixelJam). Dino Run, in turn, is pretty blatantly inspired by Sonic.

Is "Metroidvania" copyrighted? Because I have no idea how to describe the genre without saying "Metroidvania".

Our very next game won't be that genre, but we clearly want to tackle it. Metroidvanias aren't done very often, apparently, but it's one of my favorite types of game.

 

Wow, Kepa, I might have to buy Hookbot just to show my appreciation for how seriously you take all the comments here and how much work you are putting in to updating Hook Champ.

 

By some miracle, I was able to reclaim the top spots on Stone Monkey, Bronze Bull and Silver Bull. I'm sure qpawn will make short work of those scores, but maybe I'll get to keep one of 'em. I'm amazed at the scores and times that can be pushed out of the levels. I'm positive a sub-1:45 time on Silver Bull is attainable.

So much for that break I was going to take. I think I need a Hook Champ Anonymous (HCA). "Hello, my name is Mike, and I have a hook addiction".

 

Nice game but i dont like the monster running after you each level (well, i like the monster itself, but dont like to run through the level like mad without exploring).

 

It was even worse in Dino Run. This is one reason why we ended up making the monster way slower in late beta. Originally, EVERY LEVEL was basically the Rat level set, with the monster travelling at light speeds.

For our next game (which I'll probably start talking more about within the week), we're going to make it less about exploration and more about adapting to situations on the fly and going as fast as possible. Eventually, when we can tackle a Metroidvania, this will reverse and be completely about exploration and taking your time.

Definitely this week: Updated info about what's going to happen with new levels in update 3.