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Exclusive Interview: Hogrocket
by Alex Wozniak
13.11.11

Hogrocket is an indie studio that arose from the ashes of Blur developer Bizarre Creations in March 2011.

Consisting of Ben Ward (ex-Bizarre community manager), Pete Collier (senior level designer on The Club and 007: Blood Stone) and Stephen Cakebread (creator of Geometry Wars), the team has just released their first game on the App Store, entitled Tiny Invaders.

Co-founder Ben Ward was kind enough to answer some questions and tell us a bit about the game, the future of the studio, and why Hogrocket doesn't have bikini Wednesdays.


Firstly, congratulations on the launch of Tiny Invaders, and being named 'Portable Game of the Week' by IncGamers. Your first game is targetted towards the iOS market; what was it in particular about iOS development that led you to decide to release your first game on this platform, rather than on PC or the PlayStation Network, for example?

We're really pleased that so many people have enjoyed Tiny Invaders already, only a few days after launch. Hopefully more and more people will play the game as we continue to tweak and refine it over the coming months.

There are plenty of reasons why we picked iOS as our lead platform for Tiny Invaders. Firstly, the audience is huge. There are so many iPhones, iPads and iPods out there, and it's a userbase which is growing larger all the time. The idea of working with a touchscreen device was also interesting, as was being able to update our game quickly and easily.

Finally, as a small, self-funded company, money is a real issue for us. We simply don't have the cash to hire fifty people and become competitive in the console space. And, to be honest, even if had the funds I'm not sure we'd want to be there anyway. iOS allows us to be agile, creative, experimental and have some fun. Almost all of the new and exciting game design concepts are coming out of these new platforms, and that's where we want to be.


Do you have any plans to develop for other platforms, or will you focus purely on iOS development? If plans for other platforms are in the pipeline, will we be seeing ports of Tiny Invaders or any other new IPs?

We're playing it by ear at the moment. iOS is a great platform and we'll certainly be creating more titles for it, but we're also interested in the likes of Android, Windows Mobile, and of course the PC and Mac. As I mentioned though, we're self-funded. We need Tiny Invaders to do well enough initially to fund its own expansion onto other platforms, so if enough people buy it then we'll pump that money straight back into getting the game onto other platforms. If Tiny Invaders can't do it then we'll find another way of spreading out; Hogrocket is a multi-platform company at heart.


Tiny Invaders is an action puzzle game. Was it always the plan to choose this as the genre of your first game? If not, how did the decision come about?

Initially, we created several prototype games. We looked at the kind of thing that works well on touch screens: games that involve tapping, sliding, rotating. There were a couple of interesting concepts that came out of that prototype period, but the one that really stuck was a game we called 'trains'. The idea was to create a path-prediction game in which the player used their fingers to alter the path that a projectile travelled along. There are plenty of interesting mechanics that can come from that kind of basic idea, and we started developing some of these in the initial prototype. Over the months we developed 'trains' into a more sophisticated game, and when our art team came on-board it morphed into Tiny Invaders.


Are there plans to expand into other genres for future Hogrocket games? Is there any genre in particular you would love to work with?

The nice thing about iOS and other agile platforms is that they don't enforce rigid genres like the console world used to. You can see it in Tiny Invaders; it's a bit puzzley and a bit actioney. It's likely that many of the more interesting games over the next few years will define their own genres, and for me that's what makes it so exciting.


If there is one lesson you could take from the development of Tiny Invaders into your next game, what would it be?

Make decisions early. Even though we created the game relatively quickly - seven months from start to finish - we lost a lot of time to bad decisions and loss of focus. For example, we spent about a month of that time working on a 3D version of 'trains'. We interviewed an artist, contracted him to make some meshes, built a 3D engine, tweaked with the graphics endlessly... and then threw it all away. The visuals became too messy, we introduced loading times, it was harder to design level,s and it would have cost a lot more to build the assets. All of these things were obvious from the start, but we got caught up in the chase. On our next game we will lock down all of the fundamentals much sooner so that we don't fall into that trap again.


Hogrocket was formed following the closure of Bizarre Creations, a studio which predominately developed for consoles. Were there many challenges in switching focus from consoles to portable devices such as the iPhone?

I think we coped with the switch pretty well. Some of us had previous experience on iPhone and other mobile devices, so technically there weren't too many surprises. Design-wise, the team took to the project pretty quickly, and it didn't take long to nail the design fundamentals. We did our tech homework at the start of the project, and kept important restrictions in mind right from the start. For instance, we always kept handy a second-gen iPod Touch, running iOS 3.1.3 (which we termed the 'iShit') for testing our base platform. We also tried as hard as possible to keep our file size down throughout development, as we had to fit the entire game under 20MB for distribution over 3G. Luckily, Tiny Invaders runs great on the iShit and is also under the 20MB limit.

The main thing that tripped us up was a silly one. We were lucky enough to be featured on the App Store at launch, achieving a pretty prominent place in 'New & Noteworthy'. However, we didn't realise which of the two icon files we supplied would be chosen for use in the promotion. Unfortunately they used the larger 512-pixel-square icon in places we didn't expect them to, which resulted in a pretty crappy-looking, downsampled image in some locations in the store. Unfortunately, you can't change this icon without patching the game, so the change was delayed for a few days whilst it cleared submission. It's something we'll know to remember next time!


What attracted you to the idea of forming your own company rather than working for another studio after Bizarre Creations closed?

There are plenty of reasons, the main one being the sense of adventure. Even if we mess it all up and make a hash of everything, it'll be our mistakes that caused it and we'll learn from them. Ultimately it'll make us better people, even if we fail. Also, the core team is a pretty flexible bunch so it was great to be able to try things outside of our comfort zone. From my personal point of view, I've got quite a specific vision of how an online-enabled company should be run in this new age of agile platforms, so it's really good fun to try out some ideas and see how things develop.


Hogrocket is an independent studio. Did you ever consider getting support from a publisher or another studio?

Of course we considered it, and we've had discussions with most of the big boys in the space. We wouldn't be doing our due diligence if we didn't investigate all avenues. We ultimately decided against having a publisher for Tiny Invaders because we thought we could do a pretty good job of self-publishing ourselves. Looking back on the launch, we were correct in terms of PR; the game has had a good amount of exposure in the press. However, we have failed in terms of cross-promotion within existing apps. It's become obvious to us that this is a very important string in the mobile publishers' bow, so we'll certainly be looking to strengthen our presence here in the future.


You all currently work from your own homes and meet up a few times a week as a means of keeping costs down. How successful do you feel this approach has been? Did anything arise that you weren’t expecting?

We decided to work from home as a cost-cutting measure, and in that respect it's largely been successful. Turning a profit whilst renting an expensive office isn't something that we could turn into reality, at least not straight away. Despite this, we've tried hard to maintain a professional outlook despite working out of our bedrooms. As an example, we've stuck to pretty rigid working hours and kept a base level of professionalism - there aren't any bikini Wednesdays.

The hardest thing about working from home has been the cabin fever. If you don't leave the house for a couple of days, you definitely start to climb the walls. I've taken to cycling and taking long walks as a way to break up the days, and that's been a pretty good tactic. It'll be great to move Hogrocket into a permanent office space, but realistically we can only do so once we've achieved a decent level of financial success. At the very least it's an incentive to work harder in the meantime!


There’s been much talk over the past year about tax breaks for the video game industry. Do you think such a tax break would benefit smaller companies such as Hogrocket, and if so, in what way?

Of course a tax break would be nice, but realistically it's not going to catapult us back onto the world-wide scene. Ultimately, I think studios should compete in the environment they find themselves a part of. Hogrocket is based in the UK, and being here comes with some inherent costs. However, we also get some great advantages that you might not get in other areas. The games industry isn't so strong right now, but other industries are booming. We've been lucky enough to work with BAFTA-award-winning animators on Tiny Invaders, and a pioneering composer on the music. Both teams are based in the UK, so we see freelancers like those as our competitive advantage.


What advice would you give to people who are thinking of setting up their own video game company?

Take it seriously. It isn't all fun and games. You can expect more stress than you've ever experienced in your life. Your game needs to be amazing. Not just good, but amazing. That's the base line. Then you need to take all the business side of things seriously. That includes marketing and PR. If you can't nail all of those things yourself, then find somebody who can. In the meantime, keep an eye on the pennies and don't overspend. It can be a rewarding thing to do, but goddamn there's a lot of hard work that goes with it!


Many thanks once again to Ben Ward and Pete Collier for the interview. Hogrocket's debut game, Tiny Invaders, is available for purchase now over on the App Store.

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- Alex Wozniak
Review: Mirror's Edge for iOS
by Parker Scott Mortensen
8.7.11

Mirror’s Edge is one of my most favourite games of all time. It’s a game of simplicity; a sublime experience where all excess between you and the the game environment is thrown out the window. It’s defenestration of the superfluous in favour of immersion, and that’s a wholly unique concept for video games.

Mirror’s Edge for iPhone is not this, but it is worthwhile in its own right. While the console iteration of Mirror’s Edge was a first-person experience, the iPhone iteration is a side-scrolling platformer among the lines of Canabalt. As a game about fluid momentum, Mirror’s Edge translates extremely well to this type of gameplay, and the iPhone is a great place to execute it.

On consoles, Mirror’s Edge was somewhat difficult to control, but Mirror’s Edge on iPhone - we'll refer to it from now on as 'ME iOS', for simplicity's sake - is smooth and intuitive. To make Faith run in a given direction you swipe either left or right, to make her jump you swipe up, and swiping down makes her slide. It’s a pretty simple set of commands, but the game achieves that desirable zen-like sensation of fluidity by churning these variables together, and adding a handful of micro-gestures that increase how quickly Faith can traverse. It’s a little more complicated than Canabalt, for instance, where your only control is when and how long to jump, but ME iOS not so complex that it’s frustrating.


ME iOS is a short experience, and no single level is completely satisfying either, as each is short and typically littered with a few enemy encounters. Similarly to the console version, the enemy encounters are the game’s weakest aspect: combat in ME iOS is frustrating, a nasty road-bump on an otherwise calming experience. Faith can slide, jump kick and disarm enemies she meets by swiping either down, up, or left and right, but each option will either follow lethal gunfire, slow Faith down, or eventually kill her and end a run if failed. None of these consequences enhance the game experience; rather, they detract from it. Like the Mirror’s Edge on consoles, ME iOS would benefit from either retooling the role of combat or doing away with it altogether, especially as it interrupts the more satisfying fluidity of the gameplay.

Since this mobile version of Mirror’s Edge succeeds so well in delivering a calming, zen-like experience, I would have appreciated some longer levels, or perhaps a mode of infinite level generation where I could just keep running and navigating. As it is, I probably won’t return to ME iOS, simply because the levels aren’t worth returning to once you’ve mastered them. There are collectible runner bags, akin to Mirror’s Edge on consoles, but they are frustrating to reach and don’t really exemplify the game’s controls and what kind of gameplay they can achieve. Still, if you liked Mirror’s Edge and can find enjoyment in spurts of fluid platforming, Mirror’s Edge on iPhone is definitely worth checking out.

7/10 [?]

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- Parker Scott Mortensen
Review: Unpleasant Horse
by Cathal Geoghegan
29.4.11

Rarely do I burst out laughing while playing a games tutorial. 4th and Battery's Unpleasant Horse, however, makes me do just that. It's a simple enough premise: you direct an 'unpleasant horse' as it flies through a mountainous realm filled with Strauss' Blue Danube, 'Pritty Ponies', pleasant clouds and small birds. Your job, as an unpleasant horse, is to turn the clouds stormy, to hit small birds and to force the Pritty Ponies to the ground where running circular saws await.

What ensues is a game full of storm clouds, sweet music and eviscerated pony parts.

Unpleasant Horse is the first game from Popcap-owned developer 4th and Battery. Whilst Unpleasant Horse is far from Popcap's normally family-friendly games, it does has a distinctive Popcap quality and style; the artwork is superb and the and the gameplay is highly polished.

Unpleasant Horse is extremely entertaining and you will soon find your time fly by, as you try and try to break your own high score. So far, I have only reached 226,960 points, and my fingers are itching to get back to the game, in order to bring more unpleasantness to Pritty Ponies.


One thing must be made clear though. Popcap's games have a reputation for cutesy, family-suitable content. Unpleasant Horse is a definite departure from said reputation; it is not a family friendly game, and I do not recommend that young children play it.

Unpleasant Horse has the potential to become the next Angry Birds or Doodle Jump, but at the moment it is still in its early stages. The game currently lacks Game Center integration, and whilst it does have a scoring system, there is no way to share or compare scores with your friends. That aside, this is a fantastic game that will have you returning time and time again, for more and more unpleasantness.

Unpleasant Horse is a game you pick up to pass five minutes, but inadvertently spend an hour on.

Unpleasant Horse is currently available on the iPad and the iPhone for free for a limited time only.

7/10 [?]

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- Cathal Geoghegan
Hardware Review: iPad 2
by Cathal Geoghegan
28.4.11

We have entered a new age of gaming. Gone are the things that I grew up with; cartridges, discs, memory cards and controllers are things of the past. What we now have is a generation of gaming-capable devices, that are completely digital and rely entirely on touch-based input. I am, of course, saddened to see the things I grew up with disappear, but I am a modern person and I welcome these new devices. It's these new gadgets that bring progress and help to extraordinarily change and enolve the industry. If you had asked me ten years ago what I thought the gaming industry would be like, I would almost certainly have described it being essentially the same as it was way back in 2001.

That said, I also thought the Xbox would never catch on as a games console.

So when the iPad 2 arrived on my doorstep, I was prepared for something outside my comfort zone. The first thing that comes to mind when you take the iPad out of the box is how elegant and majestic it looks. It is an extraordinary example of function following form. Compared to the computers of the past 50 years, the iPad is the equivalent of an elegant Georgian building, compared to a modern functionalist one. The iPad is a triumph of minimalism, but also of beauty. It's a slight ray of hope in an an age that lacks beauty.

It's The Four Courts, an opulent Georgian building in Dublin's city centre, compared to the Unité d'Habitation in Berlin.

These things, however, have no bearing on how good the iPad is at gaming. As the subject of this piece is on the iPad as a gaming device, for the time being, I shall henceforth not mention things superfluous to gaming. The first game I tested on the iPad was LEGO Harry Potter: Years 1-4. It's a game which provides two methods of control; the first is similar to the one used in point and click games, whereby you move your character by tapping on the screen according to where you want your character to move. The second method used a virtual D-pad on the screen. Whilst the first method was extremely precise, it felt unnatural in a game like LEGO Harry Potter. The second method had no such problem, feeling very natural, but unfortunately made the iPad very cumbersome and after a while my hand began to get sore. The screen and the touch interface in LEGO Harry Potter are used very well, and the picture quality is superb; it wouldn't look out-of-place on a home console.

The second game that I tested on the iPad was Fruit Ninja HD. Fruit Ninja, despite being a simple game, feels much more natural on the iPad that its iPhone counterpart. The picture quality is somewhat hazy, however, a problem of the game itself, rather than one with the iPad. Aside from that, the game's control scheme feels very natural and responsive. The crowing achievement, though, is the multi-touch functionality of the iPad, which makes stringing combos easy but also somewhat hectic and incredibly enjoyable.

The third game that I tested was World of Goo. This game is a triumph for the iPad. When playing, one would not notice that it was originally a PC game; the control and the visual display are so perfect that I would consider World of Goo an essential application for all iPad owners.

You may be wondering how I can judge a device based on three applications. I haven't; instead, I've tested the iPad with at least twenty other applications and games. The iPad is a fantastic device. The sheer number of apps available mean you can do almost anything that you would do on a PC on the iPad, whilst also being able to carry it around like a book or newspaper. Some other recommended apps that make the iPad useful must be mentioned; the likes of Zinio, Flipboard, the Engadget app, Wikipanion, Amazon Kindle, Photoshop Express, Adobe Ideas, Simplenote and IM+ really deserve a download. In terms of games, whilst the iPad is a fantastic conduit for playing some very intuitive, imaginative games, I don't personally consider it to be the next big gaming device. In my opinion, gaming on the iPad is a frivolity - an entertaining frivolity, yes, but a frivolity nonetheless.

Now that I have assured your 3DS that it's safe, I come to the slightly more boring bits about the iPad. I call these "the boring bits", but - in fact - these are probably the main reasons that would convince you to buy an iPad. The battery life on the iPad is phenomenal; I've used it extensively throughout the past week or so and I've only had to charge it twice since its initial charge. The battery life alone places the iPad above the majority of laptops and netbooks. The picture quality on the iPad is also amazing; whilst not as spectacular as the iPhone 4's Retina Display, an average user shouldn't notice any real difference in quality. The iPad's built-in speaker's audio quality is as expected; it isn't exceptional but it fulfils its purpose. I would, however, recommend you use a pair of headphones if you want to listen to something in its full aural fidelity.

The iPad is superb and it makes some tasks much easier than they would be on a laptop or netbook. It doesn't, however, make gaming easier. There are many superb games on the iPad, but I'd advise against purchasing an iPad on its gaming-based achievements alone. If you want a pure gaming device, I would recommend that you buy a 3DS or - when they release - an NGP, but if you want an exceptional multi-purpose device with gaming capabilities as a sideline, then get the iPad.

As a standalone gaming device: 4/10
iPad in general: 8/10

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- Cathal Geoghegan
Review: Nelson Tethers: Puzzle Agent
by Anonymous
17.10.10

I'm glad to see Telltale are still hard at work on getting some of the most interesting and creative ideas out and about. Their latest, Nelson Tethers: Puzzle Agent, follows the FBI's Puzzle Research Division director and only employee, Nelson Tethers. Receiving a call from none other than the president himself, Tethers is ordered to sort out puzzle-y goings on in the small and intensely creepy town of Scoggins.

If you've ever had the chance to play any of the Professor Layton series, you'll recognize many similarities in the puzzles. You move around a scene in search of answers, and most of the interactive elements have a pop-up puzzle to solve, ranging from directing your snowmobile by placing fallen logs to dictate direction, to untangling a rubber band from innards. However, the large variety became a bit tiresome. Perhaps it's just not my thing, but I think I prefer to combine items in wacky ways. To me, the puzzle elements felt a little... childish.

Puzzle Agent has an interesting art style. Although the snowy landscape of Scoggins doesn't create a huge pallet, the hand drawn, almost crayon-like scenes have an art style which I really enjoyed. Mixed with an extremely creepy narrative, this gives Puzzle Agent a truly distinctive feel. Perhaps what helps the story the most is the lack of population in the town: it really feels as you're the only sane one within a mile of Scoggins, and the creepy gnomes only enforce this feeling.

If a sociopath bunny and a noir-style dog are your thing, then you may not see the joy of Puzzle Agent at first glance. You may miss how the strangely addictive storyline - combined with the wonderfully odd graphics - pull you in; and how, after playing through the game, you'll be left with a feeling of "Hmm.... was that a dream?"

And that's the thing: although the puzzle elements can be a little basic and it may not be up to the quality level of many adventure titles we are all familiar with, it does have certain appeal. It has a strange collection of elements, that brought together create a dreamlike adventure.

7/10 [?]

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- Anonymous
Review: Sam & Max S3E1 - The Penal Zone
by Anonymous
1.5.10
Game Information


Basic information
Sam & Max S3E1: The Penal Zone
Developer: Telltale
Publisher: Telltale

Released
iPad: April 2, 2010
Other systems: April 15, 2010

Platforms
Windows
Mac OSX
PlayStation 3
iPad

Genres
Graphic adventure

Certification
N/A
The point and click genre is one that I've had a strong bond with for many years. I've laughed at the piratey wit of Guybrush as he sailed the seas, I've wandered around hell with a Manny Calavera and even helped George Stobart solve strange murders.

So, you may be surprised to hear that I've never played a Sam & Max game. Why? No particular reason. I mean, I've wanted to, but I've never really got around to it. Thankfully for me though, Telltale recently brought the new series - The Devil's Playhouse - to PlayStation. I thus grabbed the opportunity and dived into The Penal Zone.

Now, many people try to convince me that point 'n' click is a dying breed of game. I could go into why they're wrong in great depth, but I'll leave that for another article. Instead I'll just say that, 'it isn't'. Just take a look at Sam & Max, faithful to the genre's core ideas: you can't (really) die; there isn't a single puzzle that a short bit of lateral thinking can't solve; and it's full of humour. These unwritten rules were devised with the original Monkey Island, and still stand today. So I'm pleased to report that The Penal Zone has adhered to the aforementioned rules.

Comedy is one of the biggest and best parts of Sam & Max. You really don't get it in many other games, so it's nice to hear characters crack a joke at one another during the narrative. It creates such a feeling of inclusion for the player siting at home, especially when it's a joke that just takes the piss out of another part of society. This comical feeling carries through the whole game, including the in-game trophies; one example of which being the 'Ask Your Parents' trophy, which is collected by hearing seven references which no-one under the age of 30 will understand.

After you finish laughing at the comedy duo, you might get a chance to actually play the game. The story of the episode follows Sam & Max as they journey to find the real intentions of General Skun-ka'pe, an alien monkey who has come to the planet in search of 'a toy'. By chance, Max has found this toy: the so called Future Vision, which allows him to - as the name suggests - see the future. After finally discovering why the General is here, through a series of complicated and probably very over-thought exercises, the team proceed to try and trap him in The Penal Zone, a place in between existence and non-existence. However it's not as easy as it sounds, as in their quest to do this, they discover Skun-ka'pe's evil intentions with the mole-men of the planet. A few interesting plot twists later and the player is back on track in his quest to trap the General.

Prior to my outing with the freelance police duo, I was a little skeptical - perhaps even worried - about Sam & Max. I thought the whole game would be based around characters from the previous games and I'd be stuck in a state of limbo between laughing and asking 'What? Who are you? How did you get in here?'. But I'm happy to report that I didn't find this. It's obviously something that has been thought out and designed to collect you into the game. Sure, there were a few characters Sam & Max seemed to greet cheerily while I sat and stared, but that's to be expected. The main thing was that I actually followed the story.

So, what is the greatest success for me in this adventure? Is it the fact that Sam & Max S3E1 has proven how this genre still thrives? Is it the fact that I'm glued to the calendar until the next episode is out? I'm not sure. But, I know the best achievement for Telltale is the fact that I'm now going to go out and buy the old episodes. It has got me hooked on the series and, after all, is that not what it's all about?

9/10

Jacques

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- Anonymous
GGTL Classics
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