iPhone dev can't decide if we should do iPad version....

[hbeverly]

My company is working on an iPhone MMORPG set in the Traveller Universe (a 35 year old RPG franchise)... it's called Traveller AR http://www.traveller-ar.com

Do you all think that we should port it to iPad?

We just got an iPad 2 in the office, and the native test port we did looks freaking amazing.

Thanks,
Harlan

p.s. if you are interested, we've got a cool video and a little contest (name an in-game star system) going on:
http://www.traveller-ar.com/2011/03/23/name-a-system-sweepstakes-and-new-video/

 

[hbeverly]

To be more specific: our app uses Augmented Reality features of iPhone (such as location + Camera, as well as compass, etc.)... to overlay our game onto the real world.

the iPad 1 doesn't have a cam (as I'm sure you know), so those features wouldn't all work right.

However with iPad 2, we could do AR... (albeit at lower location granularity without GPS).

So the question is should we do an iPad release, knowing full well that it would only work on iPad 2...

make sense?

 

[psonice]

I've not looked at the video, but.. ipad2 is selling extremely fast. There's going to be a lot of devices out there pretty soon, and a lot of people playing games on them. Not as many as iphones perhaps, but still enough to seriously consider.

I guess it comes down to how much work is involved compared to the potential rewards - let's say 30m devices in 12 months time. Does the size of the market justify the effort? The other thing to consider is that lots of new ipad2 owners want some ipad2 apps. Your app is going to show off what the ipad2 can do, so that should make it a bit more successful.

One other thing to consider: the ipad isn't exactly small, and it's not ideal to carry around while using. If it's a game that needs lots of motion while using the touch screen, it might not work out too well.

 

[W1MRK]

Signed up for Beta. Looks like a great idea. I would say iPhone to start. Better size and camera, and has the handheld game feel. iPad would be great if you had it sitting in your lap and could play. If there is a demand, port it over to the iPad or have a second version. But I have yet to get my hands on the ipad two and you said it looked good so in the end its your call. Universal games do sell better In my opinion.

Mike

 

[hbeverly]

thanks for the feedback!

I think we'll probably do an iPad 1 build and an iPad 2 build (where iPad 1 doesn't get augmented reality).

It looks so good on iPad, we can't just ignore it!

 

[hbeverly]

Update & New challenge

Hey everyone,

Just a quick update: we've figured out how to make our game work well for both iPad1 and still use the iPad2 features [e.g. rear-facing camera]... we detect the camera and if not present, we just show a "star-field"... so it worked out pretty well.

We ran into another challenge (which was a game design challenge), and I'd love any/all feedback you all can provide:

Our game is trying to be like "Eve Online" for iPhone... but a major problem came up that I'm not sure other MMORPGs have properly addressed. I think our approach is quite novel.... but I'd love everyone's thoughts/feedback/suggestions.

We realized that on a galactic scale, you can't say "these are good guys, and these are bad guys". Good and Bad is so relative after all.

So we came up with this solution: http://www.traveller-ar.com/2011/07...-alignment-in-traveller-ar-a-true-iphone-rpg/
Would love your feedback.

Disclaimer: Our game is not Eve Online, but is only similar in franchise/design/game style.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_CQZbVVhe8s