The “PHASE TWO: Break & Desist” content update has now been submitted to the AppStore for approval.
New features and content:
Just a quick glimpse behind the scenes on how the tracks are made for Repulze! The colored spheres are used to bend and twist the track.
As Phase 2 enters the final stages of development, the days at the office goes by much quicker. Game developing may never be easy, but it’s especially near the end when all the separate pieces really come together that the days can be a little hectic. But it’s at the same time a lot of fun too! Every day a new feature, fix or cool effect has been implemented that makes the game a little better.
This week, all the new tracks are “finished” and enters the polish and tweak stage. Compared to Phase 1, the new tracks are much MORE in every way; they look great, are more organic, fluid and have more gameplay features. We kept the colored gates from Phase 1, but expanded it with pickups, smashable shortcuts, huge jumps and magnetic force fields that affect you depending on your color. Besides that, we also added ghosts to keep you company until we release Phase 3!
Click for a larger image.
Even though the focus lately has been on the iOS launch, our work on the Android version of Repulze still proceeds. Our plan is to release Repulze on Google Play shortly after Phase Two hits iOS, making February not a promise, but a pretty good bet. And if everything goes according to plan (and doesn’t it always?), the Android version will contain Phase Two from the start, closing the gap between the two platforms.
The status on the Android version so far is very good! The Android-inclined half of the office is always eager to lend their devices every time a new version is built, and currently the game runs well on Nexus 4, One X and Galaxy S3, albeit with some graphical issues. There’s a lot of work and optimizations left to do, so we’re still not sure which devices we ultimately will support. But we will keep you updated along the way!
Bugs. No matter how well you code or how much you test, there’s bound to be one or two bugs in your software. One of the most reported bugs we got on Repulze was a rather curious one; the steering arrows slowly inched closer and closer towards the center of the screen. “How does a thing like that even occur?” you might wonder.
The answer was found in a small feature that scaled the buttons depending on device. On an iPhone, the touch area for the buttons felt too small relative to the bigger screen of an iPad, so we scaled up the buttons automatically on iPhone and iPod.
Unfortunately, this happened every single time you started a new race! So for each race, the touch zone for the buttons were slightly scaled up and since the actual button graphic remains centered within the touch zone, it looked like the steering arrows moved. Simple.
The bug was quickly fixed and now we continue working on Phase 2!
Phase Two will be the first free content update and, basically, it’ll add new tracks and features. The plan is to have it released early February and so far we’re on schedule. We’ll announce and leak more info on this blog in the near future. So stay tuned!
We’ve submitted a first tweak-and-fix patch Tuesday 8/1 and are hoping it’ll be available soon.
CHANGES:
The hope is that this will address much of the controller feedback out there. Internally, with these tweaks, we’ve shaved off several seconds per race. Also, last but not least. Thank you for all the support and feedback! We are listening to you and these are a few changes that didn’t make it into this patch but will be available in Phase Two at the latest:
An early preview of the work done so far on the Phase 2 update for Repulze. In this phase, the racing moves from the big city out to the wastelands among canyons, mines and military outposts. More info about the update will be released as the development proceeds, so stay tuned!
And don’t be afraid to give us feedback via Twitter, Facebook or our contact form!
Yet another game release under the belt! This makes for Pixelbite’s 10th game! This time it’s a futuristic hovercraft racer running in a smooth 60fps. Take a look if you enjoy a good speed induced adrenaline rush! In the mean time, we’ll continue working on the upcoming Phases. As usual with our games, the first release is just the beginning!
