Toronto developer, Get Set Games Inc., is making waves with its simple, yet popular math puzzler Addicus. Rob Segal, Lead Developer, sat down with DDGW for an interview to discuss the new studio, Addicus and the game dev scene in Toronto.
Click 'Read More' for the full interview.
Q. Could you introduce yourself and tell us about your team?
A. Get Set Games is a team of four guys in Toronto, Canada who have all
worked in the games and real time 3D industries for the last few
years. We have two coders and two artists on the team and we've all
done professional work for large companies either in full time or
freelance roles. We've really been getting into the indie Game Jam
scene here at the Toronto Indie Game Jam (http://www.tojam.ca) as well
as the international Global Game Jam (http://globalgamejam.com/) and
had a blast making fast and furious games in a short time frame. Every
time we finished a jam (making an entire game from the ground up in 48
hours) we had so much fun and were so stoked with the results that
there was always talk of getting our games out on Xbox Live or some
other distribution network. After the last jam we did in May, we made
a decision to actually do it and launched Get Set Games Inc. in July.
Q. What was your design inspiration for creating Addicus? Did you
originally set out to make a brain teaser?
A. Addicus came to fruition from the fact that first off we love number
puzzle games. "Big Brain Academy" and "Brain Age" were some favorite
DS games amongst our group. Other inspirations included Drop7 and
classic dice games such as "Shut the Box"
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kSeiDjeYmUI). We started out with a
different concept altogether, not a brain teaser which was quite a bit
larger in scope. After realizing that it would take quite some time
to complete that project we started brainstorming other possibilities
which would see us completing something in a much shorter period of
time. You can actually see some of early concepts up on our YouTube
channel (http://www.youtube.com/user/getsetgames).
Q. How long was the development timeline?
A. All together it was probably about 3 months. We didn't start with a
goal date as there were so many unknowns to the whole experience of
getting a game onto the app store.
Q. The newer models of iPhone have substantially faster graphics and
processing. Do 3Gs users enjoy any special enhancements that the
slower models do not support?
A. One of the nice things about developing for this platform is that with
the limited range of hardware, you can ensure that all players have
the same high quality experience. This also reduces development time.
With Addicus, we aimed to support all versions of the iPhone and iPod
touch, so we focused on optimizing to make sure that the game ran
smoothly across the board. That said, the 3GS is a bit snappier with
loading times.
Q. What were the biggest challenges in bringing this game to the
iPhone? Were there any challenges making the game perform responsively
across all the different performance levels of the iPhone/iTouch line?
A. The biggest challenges for us was likely learning all the new required
technologies for developing with the iPhone SDK. XCode, Objective-C
and of course the iPhone SDK itself were all new to us. Once the
initial learning curve was surpassed however we started making some
excellent progress. As for challenges getting Addicus to perform
responsively across all of the iPhone/iTouch devices optimizing is
just good practice – we would never want a game we’ve created to just
squeek by performance-wise, or require the latest tech to run. Our
approach is that if the game runs well on the 3G and iPod Touch, then
it’ll be even better on the 3GS. We just like to make everyone happy!
Q. Recent figures indicate there are over 15,000 games on the
Appstore. How do you feel going into this marketplace?
A. We feel there is always room for well produced, well designed games.
We’re not trying to compete with the app-a-week crowd. If we can aim
at the PopCaps and Gamelofts of the world, then that sets a good
standard for us to shoot for. Obviously we don’t have the same
resources as those guys, but there’s a lot you can bring to the table
if you have experience and dedication. Quality is key for us, and
we’re hoping people will respond to that. Despite the volume of games
in the app store, we think there is plenty of room for great games to
proliferate, just as there room for great web pages on an internet
that has trillions of web pages. When all is said and done, we are
confident that people will want to play our games again and again.
Q. Now that you have completed the game on the iPhone, will you
be bringing Addicus to other platforms or can we expect to see more
iPhone games from Get Set in the future?
A. You can expect to see many great games from us in the future and
perhaps sooner than you think! We would love to bring Addicus to other
platforms. We hope to hear from Addicus players what they would like
to see in future versions. For those visiting our website there is a
feedback tab on the left side of the page where people can contribute
their favorite ideas and suggestions.
