For the guys following this thread, the game has gone live now, please download rate and review if you liked it, thanks a mil!! http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?p=3907798#post3907798 [Update: The game is slated for a 8th September release. I am currently working on the first major update to v1.1. Update date unconfirmed as of yet] Hi everyone, after another horrible attempt at making a casual twitchy game, I had decided to return to what I am better at making, Puzzle games. Think Shift is a minimally designed puzzle using one of the most fundamental mechanic of puzzle game, sliding pieces. Slide each colored piece into the slot with the correct color spot, that's all. Features: - 50 pre-designed stages - Complete all stages to unlock Endless mode (generated stages) - Playable in both orientation (suitable for iPad landscape) In the testflight build, the endless mode is unlocked and accessible immediately for testing purpose. Interested parties please PM me your testflight email. All feedbacks(design, gameplay, features, etc) are welcomed. Subscribe to the TouchArcade YouTube channel
Argh, the Testflight build is finally up after 2 ays of Beta Review by Apple. Anymore Interested parties do pm me or leave your tf email here if you willing to reveal it.
It's not perfect, I am still refining the algorithm for generating levels. I'm not like a super coder, so I used simple logics. And I believe Blyss has endless levels as well? Theirs would be true random.
Thanks dude! Meanwhile if you are into similar puzzle games, check out Singularity, one of my earlier game, links in my signature or 7 pips, another puzzle I personally prefer but doesn't seem to get any traction
Latest build out. Dear testers, feel free to feedback here if it's easier than email Still accepting testers.
Thanks for the feedback! Don't be! Due to Apple's change request I had been rushing said changes. I will be making level design changes to make a number of the stages less frustrating.
I like the simple but colorful UI, puzzles you designed, it's fun and full of clever tricks. I played about 10 levels and the endless mode. The endless mode is really challenging and creative.
Thanks for the email feedback! Yep the endless mode was supposed to be "end game" content supposedly unlocked only after you have completed all the stages in Stage Mode. I haven't got around to redesigning some of those levels, but I have refined the random stage generator for endless mode! And the game is slated for a 8th September release *fingers crossed* *fingers crossed*. Achievements are being implemented right now, not really sure how many players are still bothered about achievement hunting, lol.
Please report if there are any cases of prolonged lagginess or frame rate drop. This is a 95% completed pre-submission build. All features should work as intended (except the IAP is still insta-unlock for testing purpose). Some level redesign/re-balancing are still in progress. - Game Center Achievements implemented - Endless Mode stage generator has been improved - BGM replaced with something more appropriate - Settings implemented - In-game layout improvements + additional cues for larger stages
@mh12 Hi, Just to reply your questions which i left out the last time i responded in a rush. 1. How many levels will be there in the final build? Currently only 50 stages has been planned in the Stage Mode, but in Endless mode, since its programmatically generated, based on my estimation there can be over 120,000 possible levels. 2. What's your monetisation strategy? Premium/ freemium/ads? Right now, I'm working with ad banners and interstitial. Also if you'd noticed the More button to unlock a new set of stages every 10 stages, that is actually a calling point for Reward Videos. Of course, there's an IAP to remove all the ads, in addition to unlocking Endless mode immediately (instead of having to complete all 50 stages). Pricing of the IAP is not finalized yet.
So I've played this game for a bit (fully completed first three worlds and half of the fourth, and did a few endless levels). In terms of bugs I can't say that I've come across any or any lag etc. My device has a lot of apps and it's storage is nearly full so you know that this game won't have any problems when there's low memory. It's a super barebones puzzler but it is quite addictive when you're in the mood for it. It's the classic sliding puzzle; no tricks or twists. Endless mode seems to provide very big puzzles but they seem a bit easier than the campaign puzzles. One thing I've noticed is that a lot of the puzzles can currently be solved using similar methods. I'd suggest implementing some levels with very different solution tactics and I've drawn up a few examples. Could you PM me your email so I can send you some? Additionally, if you use some of these layouts in the Endless mode, you could reduce the monotony of that. Right now endless seems like all very big open levels. The sliding mechanic is a classic for a reason because it can be utilised in many ways. Right now I don't feel like Endless mode encapsulates that (but then again, with any randomly generated puzzles it can be hard to make them feel unique). Main campaign has some interesting levels, although the solution tactics are quite similar for most of the levels. In other nitpicky stuff: the blue and purple colours are in my opinion a bit too close together. Maybe make the blue a lighter shade of blue? Even if it were a bit lighter it wouldn't be confused with the teal colour. Level select, world 4, the colour of completed and not completed levels are waaaaayyyy too similar. It's practically impossible to tell the difference. Also the controls felt a tiny bit sluggish at the start but I've gotten used to them now.
Thank you very much for the detailed play through and feedback! I'd really love to do a line by line respond to your post, but text selection/cut paste is a hassle on the ipad I'm typing this on now, so bear with my wall of text. Firstly, I'm not sure if you have gotten the latest tf build 1.0(03), I should have already fixed the Colours in the stage selection screen to (green,red,yellow,blue,purple), removing the original beige for world 4. Next, yep, I'll try to re-tune the blue and purple (and beige) for better visibility, thanks! I had intentionally kept the game Mechanic bare boned, as I wanted to go for something more Rubix cube-y, no special tiles. I had previously made a game called Singularity, which is Lights Out made into stage based format, with introduction of special tiles. This time I wanted to create something that can hopefully stand on its basic Mechanic alone. And that posed me the next problem... Without special tiles to introduce new mechanics into the game at any point, most of the stages feel like they are solved with the same techniques. In my latest build (not pushed to TestFlight yet), I have redesigned nearly half the stages in a bid to make a playthrough less monoto ours, maybe I have already implemented some stage designs that you want to suggest to me! Nonetheless, check your pm for my email address, I'd love to hear your suggestion, and hopefully have sufficient time to further redesign some stages before I submit the game for Apple review very very soon. Currently, the base design of a stage, there are two kinds, one that looks like one large or long joined landmass, the other looks like small islands joined by bridges. In early builds most of the stages are landmass design, now I have introduced more island types as this type somehow provides a different feel when trying to solve. I was avoiding having too many island types as those usually contain many empty spots, which actually makes solving puzzles pretty easy, but now I'm thinking it's ok to have easier puzzles every now and then to break any monotonous/ frustration feeling that might have built up in the player. In Endless mode, the biggest problem is that it is dynamically generated based on a bunch of formulae and condition checks (to ensure the final stage generated is solvable), and all the generated stages belong to the landmass types. I have yet to figure out an algorithm to generate both landmass and island types. So in Essence , I hope people can approach this game like solving a Rubix cube, the starting state is always different but the solving technique is usually similar. Of course, (just the pessimist me speaking) many will not understand that and will probably hit me with 1-2 stars for making a monotonous game, lol. [BOLD]Sorry for the long winded post, but I want to make sure I provide a somewhat satisfactory respond to your detailed feedback.[/BOLD]
Thanks to @TheGreatEscaper 's suggestion. I did some last minute tinkering with the random stage generator and manage to get it to produce some interesting stages![image below] The game has been submitted to Apple for review. The same build is also up on TestFlight
The game is slated for a 8th September release. I am currently working on the first major content update v1.1. Update date unconfirmed as of yet.
For the guys following this thread, the game has gone live now, please download rate and review if you liked it, thanks a mil!! http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?p=3907798#post3907798
