Third In The Space Watch Trilogy

WatchOS 6 is launching soon, and I've been busy preparing some new games exclusively for the Apple Watch.

I've already released Kepler Attack, a fast paced space shooter inspired by the arcade classic Gyruss, and I've recently completed Star Warp, which is now available for pre-order on the App Store. Star Warp will launch on the 4th of September and is inspired by Galaxians.

And right now I'm busy working on another space game -  the third in my Space Watch Trilogy - and that game is called Asteroid Commando. No prizes for guessing the inspiration for this one...

Like the other two games, Asteroid Commando is built using Swift 5 and SpriteKit and is designed to take advantage of all the latest features of the Apple Watch. It uses the Digital Crown with haptic feedback, runs at a silky smooth 60fps, works with Game Center for the Watch and runs independently of the iPhone.

I've built up a framework while developing Snappy Word, Kepler Attack and Star Warp - sharing a menu system, leaderboard and save/load system between games lets me kick off new projects and get into the core game a lot faster.

Initial sprite set for the game

I'm finding the constraints of the Apple Watch a joy to work with. The smaller screen size and limited input, coupled with the shorter play sessions means that a Watch game is much smaller in scope than the average mobile game. And this means shorter development times without compromising the quality of the experience. In some ways, the Watch is a great delivery platform for what is essentially paid hyper casual games.

I plan on doing more regular updates as I close out Asteroid Commando, so please check back to see the new features I'll be adding over the coming weeks.

Cheers,
Johnno

Space Watch Trilogy

It's been almost 3 months since Kepler Attack launched on the App Store as a paid Apple Watch exclusive.

The game did well out of the gate, getting a bunch of downloads without any featuring and has continued to perform well. So far it has garnered over 61 rating with an average review score of 4.6.

I quickly followed up the launch with an update that included iOS support - letting folks play the game on their iPhone or iPad using the touch screen in lieu of the Apple Watch Crown.

In terms of marketing I managed to get only two online reviews despite sending the game out to as many Apple and Watch sites as I could. I'd like to give a big shout out to The Apple Watch Cast and HotshotTek for their support! I will continue to try and get the other sites to notice my game, so if you're reading this you haven't heard the last of Kepler Attack!

As far as I can tell, most of my installs have been organic via people finding the game on the App Store through search and browsing. 

However, just this week I was excited to see that Apple featured Kepler Attack in the What We're Playing section of the App Store!

Featured on the App Store!

Plus, Kepler Attack is also featured on the Apple Watch App Store running on WatchOS 6 Beta!

The new Apple Watch App Store

Before any of this happened, I had decided to dig in and go hard on Apple Watch games. And now with the featuring it feels like I may have made the right call - of course time will tell.

It's no secret that I am a huge Apple Watch fan, having worn an Apple Watch since the day they were first released. I even had a game (Snappy Word) on the Watch on launch day. 

I love my Watch and I love games and I think there are others like me out there who enjoy playing on their Watch. The only problem is it's been damn hard to find apps and games made for the Watch. I'm hoping that the upcoming Watch App Store changes that.

So, along with Kepler Attack, I've been working hard to make a number of games for people to play now that they will be able to browse for content on their Watch.

I figured that I would share my journey making these games in a series of dev blogs.

To kick this off, here's a look at my next Watch game called Star Warp. It's another space shooter game, this time inspired by Galaxian.

Star Warp builds on a lot of the work I did for Kepler Attack - using the same framework for high scores leaderboards, front end menus, game over logic and ship movement.

I'm hoping to use the work I've done to start to evolve each game. I don't necessarily want to make them more complicated as I think there's a sweet spot for content and play session time for these games - but I definitely want to start pushing what the Watch can do in terms of mechanics and play style.

I'm aiming to launch Star Warp in early September - so In the meantime, why don't you check out Kepler Attack on the App Store here!

Oh, and the title of this post is Space Watch Trilogy... so yeah, there is a third space game in development.. but that will have to wait until the next post!

Cheers,

Johnno