Metal Fish Eggs

Since we launched Arctic Shuffle we’ve been keeping a running list of feature ideas for future versions. Ideas have come from our own experience playing (useful), talking and watching friends and colleagues play (more useful), iTunes reviews (mostly useless), reviews on app review sites (mixed bag), and emails from users (all over the map).

When we’re weighing feature ideas they have to pass through a few basic filters – how long will it take to implement? will it have an adverse affect on another aspect of the game? will it translate into happy players (read: sales)?

I’ll cut to the chase and share a few of the items that are on our ‘no-brainer’ list:

• performance: we’re rewriting it all to use openGL which will go a long way toward addressing the ‘laginess’ of the current version.
• scoring system: once you unlock a level there’s not a whole lot of reason to go back and play it again. The next version will award a score based on how quickly a level is cleared and how many penguins were used.
• launching UI: it’s very hard to get a sense of the power of your shot in the current version because the information you need is obscured by your finger. We’ve drawn up half a dozen ideas on how to improve on this. Now we just have to pick one.
• better help: we hate help. we like to just play and learn by doing. Apparently not everyone is like this so we’re going to expand on the help to explain more explicitly how some of the obstacles work.
• keep the tunes rolling: this is our bad. the current version of the game stops your tunes when it launches so there is no way to listen to your own playlist while you play. Maybe you like boy band action with your penguins or maybe a little Einstürzende Neubauten? Who are we to stop you?!

Of course there are many more items on our list – more obstacles, more sophisticated collision detection, power ups and other fun stuff. Now we just need to see how many of them we can cram into the next few weeks of development.