I wanted to say that I developed Rocket Renegade [1] for iOS. It's an 80s-inspired arcade shooter, with elements reminiscent of Space Invaders, Asteroids, Galaga... and, of course, it contains bosses.
I wrote all of the code, and I composed the soundtrack as well. The bitmap graphics were done by game designer Daniel Cook, who released them under a Creative Commons Attribution license.
I believe that it fits all of your requirements: the quality is high, the gameplay is fun, it runs rock-solid at 60 frames per second, the music is awesome, and it's a POP game (Pay Once to Play); no IAP, no ads.
It's essentially a straight-up, gun-for-your-highest-score-classic-arcade-shooter.
[1] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/rocket-renegade/id955229059?...
I was kind of hoping for some power-ups, like a faster shot rate or scattershot. Those might be present, and I just didn't get to them yet, only made it to stage 3-x on first attempts. I also wish the stages had more variation, might feel too repetitive after a while – though that might happen later also.
Anyway, for $0.99, I'm definitely not complaining. It's a fun game and definitely an example of what I'm looking for. I'd personally be willing to pay more, in the $4.99 range, for a game like this, especially if it had some the variation features I mentioned above – but I might be unusual.
Unfortunately, there are no power-ups, and the levels do repeat after the boss level (although the game does become progressively more difficult). Those are definitely great ideas for the next iteration of the game.
Thank you, again. It means a lot to me.
I play(ed) a game called Sky Force 2014 that would have benefitted from a prestige mechanic.
As for your game-play issue, try off-setting your finger on the screen, away from the actual ship. That is to say, I made it so that you can actually have your finger anywhere on the screen to control the ship (i.e., you don't have to have your finger directly on the ship to control it). That will help you as you're trying to navigate through the asteroid field (and the other levels as well)!
Thanks again!
Could you please take a look at my game:
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/drone-invaders/id1047158768
Powerups are there. :)
The reason IAP became so big is because there was a huge race to the bottom in pricing in mobile, $1 isnt sustainable, so everyone was forced to find alternate revenue streams. If apple got rid of free and <$5, the average quality of the app store could be so much higher
I spent 3 months building Hipster CEO and its made me approx $40-45k (as well as leading to other projects). Not a bad return for 3 months work.
Each version improves existing games in the arcade and/or adds new ones... you can play your 20 coins/day first, then buy extra if you choose... there's no reason that model couldn't work quite well.
We didn't even make the development cost back. We actively fought against the idea of IAPs and trying to hook whales, even though it would have been easy to introduce mechanisms to do it (on the hardest level it's almost impossible to beat).
[1] iOS: https://itunes.apple.com/za/app/fleet-of-one/id580453079?mt=... Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=za.co.polymorp...
https://unity3d.com/learn/tutorials/projects/space-shooter-t...
Again, thank you for taking the time to play and provide feedback. This was my first game, and it's clear that I have a lot to learn!
Most of what they cover is buy-once. IAP in their covered games usually takes the form of optional DLC or as a way to buy the game outright after trying the initial levels. When they occasionally review a F2P game, they take the side of the average consumer and discuss how intrusive (or not) the IAP is.
Please check it out, you're precisely the type of audience we are aiming for: http://playellipsis.com
Regarding curation, aside from places like TouchArcade, there are occasionally nicely curated video lists of best new premium games like these from Gameranx:
- January: https://youtu.be/Nuaj_ti5MtA
- February: https://youtu.be/aTQO0_bhuUI (disclaimer: we're in this list)
- March: https://youtu.be/oreE8YX5jQI
They stopped making those videos sometime last year.
Here's a compiled list of their featured apps: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cnARmaoMH-ZzAHCmaqkBus3r...
If I could:
* Filter out any apps or games with microtransactions.
* Filter out any apps or games with ads.
* Filter down to apps with at least x downloads or ratings.
* Choose how the content is sorted.
I feel I could find things that I'm actually interested in. As it is at the moment it feels random whether I'll find something I'd actually want to download.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.wp.wordbox
It could be weekly or monthly, with a mix of new games and classic gems that maybe aren't so well known. I'd tolerate a fair amount of advertising or sponsored content in the newsletter as long as it was clearly labeled.
The key thing for me is quality. I think that's true for many (extremely) casual phone gamers. I'd much rather get 1 outstanding recommendation per week/month than 10 of varying quality. And I know game enjoyment can be somewhat subjective, but there are still some games that are generally well-done and broadly appealing to fans of a genre. If the top recommendation is a racing game, I might skip it. That's okay. I don't need a new game every week or even every month. I just don't want to waste my time sifting through bad games or games that start fun but quickly ramp up the IAP pressure.
HumbleBundle kind of fits this niche, but I found their volume to be too high. And frankly, I don't want to buy a bunch of games at once. I think I'm less of a gamer than their target audience.