How to make an iPhone game
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Gaming, Developer, iPhone, iPod touch
The folks at Gogogic asked Twitter if they wanted to see how the company’s iPhone games were made, and since the answer was in the affirmative, we all get the benefit of looking into just how one iPhone developer put their game together.
It starts with a wiki; the company keeps a collaborative site of all the ideas they have for upcoming games, and if the decision is made to go ahead with an idea, that wiki page branches out into the planning documents behind the eventual app. Concepts are drafted in sketches, conversations, and outlines, and eventually they feel like they have the idea “fully developed,” at which point the game goes into a proposal pool, and then is eventually picked for production.
That begins with an animatic, as you can see above — before they ever write the first code line, they map out what will happen in certain game situations. It looks like they used Flash to put that together pretty easily, but you can see how well it shows off game design elements and how things should work during gameplay. After that, there’s nothing to it but to do it — the game is coded, art and sound elements are put together, and of course the usual run of playtesting and so on takes place (the company is going to show off how to test and publish games in a future post).
The game above turned out to be called Symbol6 (Hexago was a working title), and is in the App Store right now. Thanks to Gogogic for sharing a look behind their process — there are tons of developers working on apps at the moment, and it’s neat to see how someone else does it.
TUAWHow to make an iPhone game originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 11 Feb 2009 17:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Flickr Find: Unusual Apple designs from the early 90s
Filed under: Hardware, Blast From the Past, Flickr Find, Apple History
TUAW reader Mike turned us on to a Flickr photo set and a related post on Aussie Mac site MacTalk.
MacTalk forum regular Donnie Darko was visiting a used book store in the Sydney suburb of Newtown when he came upon a rare find — a 1991 copy of a Japanese design magazine called Axis featuring concepts that Apple was working on at the time.
In this jewel are a number of concept computers:
- The bike computer on the front cover (see photo at right)
- A wrist-mounted Mac called the TimeBand
- A device called the Exchanger that shows an American dollar being inserted and another currency coming out of a slot
- Several server concepts that look similar to Apple servers of the early 90s
- A very cool flat-panel TV that looks cutting-edge even in 2009
- Several tablet Macs
- A device that looks like a hybrid Mac / digitizer tablet
A sidebar in the article shows stills from Apple’s classic Knowledge Navigator concept video. It’s a fascinating look at what products might have come out of Cupertino in an alternate universe.
TUAWFlickr Find: Unusual Apple designs from the early 90s originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Wed, 28 Jan 2009 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Found Footage: A fanboy’s Mac mini concept
Filed under: Hardware, Odds and ends, Mac mini, Found Footage
The Mac mini has an amazing following. It’s a great machine for switchers who want to use their existing keyboard, mouse, and monitor, there are companies devoted to using them as small colocated servers, and the mini is the machine to use for all sorts of cool hacks.
TUAW reader, designer, and Mac mini fanboy Sait Alayali decided that it’s time for a new look, so he created his own conceptual design for a new mini. Rather than the little flat box we know and love, it’s designed like a right angle. It has a low-speed fan for quiet and effective cooling, a design that makes it simple to swap out drives, and it can be placed on a surface in a number of ways.
Call me old-fashioned, but I like the “boxy” look of the existing Mac mini. They’re easier to stack and there are plenty of matching peripherals. I’d prefer to see a new Mac mini made with some of the MacBook Air tech so it could be thinner and smaller. How ’bout you? Leave a comment with your ideas for a new Mac mini design.
The New Mac Mini Concept from Sait Alanyali on Vimeo.
TUAWFound Footage: A fanboy’s Mac mini concept originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 15 Dec 2008 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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