Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

ThomasLund
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Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by ThomasLund » 05 Dec 2013, 10:48

Time has come! We today officially released Space Hulk to iPad 2+ around the world.

Always a scary thing to launch games, but we are super excited. First reviews dropping in too

Wish us luck!!

8 out of 10:
http://www.iplayapps.de/tests/Space_Hulk/12289/

4 out of 5
http://www.pockettactics.com/reviews/review-space-hulk/

Best
Thomas
Full Control
Makers of Smack Boxing, Smack Hockey, Monster Ball, Electrocute, Touch Wars, Tactical Soldier, Frontline Tactics, Space Hulk, Jagged Alliance Flashback, Space Hulk Ascension

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buchardt
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by buchardt » 05 Dec 2013, 10:58

Crossing fingers!

Did you guys change anything gameplay wise to make it work for the ipad?
Or did you just port mouse controls to touch?

- Peter

ThomasLund
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by ThomasLund » 05 Dec 2013, 11:19

It was a much bigger job than expected/hoped.

The biggest issue really came from
- performance
- memory usage
- iOS 7

We also had several rewrites of subsystems. On PC we have historically in our tech been loading prefabs of level geometry inside a common "game" scene. Then run static batcher combiner tools to get performance. But with the 100s of thousands of objects in some of our levels gave it a huge loading time in the combiner utility.

All shaders have been rewritten to try to get it as close to the PC version while still running 30 fps. Our tech guy Adrian has pulled some long long days to get this running.

Memory usage though - especially on iOS 7 in combination with iPads - was a big big BIG bitch. When we started out, we were running around 1 GB runtime memory and we had to get it down under 200 for the iPad 2 - preferably 150-170.

This meant for us that we now have 3 versions of level geometry. "PC version", "iPad 3+" and "iPad 2". The 2 first ones are very close copies where only shaders have been changed and some vfx got fixed. The iPad 2 version is very downsized also in content and running at a lower LOD level on the geometry.

We had the game pretty solid some months ago, and then Apple decided to release iOS 7. It introduces something called "memory pressure" that turned into hell. Without knowing all the details myself, it seems to be a feature where iOS shuts down an app if a single thread inside it suddenly jumps high on memory usage. Even if total memory usage still is within device limits. And Unity is single threaded.....

So no - it was NOT a write once and run anywhere port :-)
Full Control
Makers of Smack Boxing, Smack Hockey, Monster Ball, Electrocute, Touch Wars, Tactical Soldier, Frontline Tactics, Space Hulk, Jagged Alliance Flashback, Space Hulk Ascension

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vonknut
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by vonknut » 05 Dec 2013, 12:20

So not only is iOS7 ugly, its also evil?
-I kinda suspected that...
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buchardt
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by buchardt » 05 Dec 2013, 14:41

But no gameplay & control changes?

[Edit: I know tech is a bitch, but is also very solvable given enough time and resources, where as the control interface can be a genuine game breaker]

ThomasLund
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by ThomasLund » 05 Dec 2013, 16:45

No changes in gameplay, no. Turn-based is very platform agnostic fortunately.

But we did rewrite the entire control mechanism on top of the game for iPad so that it uses proper and expected touch controls. But inside the game it was already prepared for this.
Full Control
Makers of Smack Boxing, Smack Hockey, Monster Ball, Electrocute, Touch Wars, Tactical Soldier, Frontline Tactics, Space Hulk, Jagged Alliance Flashback, Space Hulk Ascension

DonSonz
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by DonSonz » 06 Dec 2013, 11:36

Hey

Ser egentligt ok oldschool fedt ud :)
Tror godt det kunne fange min interresse.

Håber I får succes med det.

krolldk
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by krolldk » 06 Dec 2013, 13:08

best, best, best of luck. I really enjoyed Space hulk on steam. I might even consider buying it for iPad as well :-)

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vonknut
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by vonknut » 07 Dec 2013, 00:52

Ventede bare på at det kom ud, det er købt nu.
-giver det 5 stjerner, såsnart det requester en rating :)

Dejlig stemning og fin grafik.
Ånden er 100% tro og board game mechanics er bevaret.
-fatter ikke de folk der bitchede over ting som "man kan se hvor mange stealers der er i en blip - CAREBEAR MODE", for det har jeg da ikke erfaret der er noget i den stil (men måske er det fjernet siden steam launch?). -har dog ikke testet "undo" ift. om man kan abuse (men det kan man også i Eclipse singleplayer, I Uniwar etc.).

Men rigtigt at der er nogle bugs hist og her.
1+2 mission kørte som smurt, men blev så ramt af en del visuelle bugs i mission 3. Ikke noget game breaking (mest bolter shooting anim+particle, der kom ud af sync med stealer mis/hit anim), men måske lidt meget "in your face" => let at flame grundet det...
Har dog ikke oplevet crashes, result changing eller noget i den stil.

Og når man ser "trafikken" og general anticipation på touch arcade, så ser det ud som om i også overlever evt. små-hating hist og her :)
-glæder mig til at se jer FC'er møde op i full terminator armor til julefrokosten, købt for nogle af de penge i forhåbentligvis kommer til at, om ikke skovle, så i det mindste skrabe ind :)
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ThomasLund
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by ThomasLund » 07 Dec 2013, 19:25

Tak Hans,

Jeg kan desværre pga kontrakter og lignende ikke dele salgstal. Men jeg er MEGA glad lige nu at jeg ikke har satset butikken på iOS salget. Selv med en top-10 placering i rigtig mange vestlige lande.

Skal nok skrive noget mere om et par uger - men hvis jeg var udvikler i disse dage og skulle til at launche et non-F2P spil og tro jeg fik dækket udviklingsomkostninger på mit nye ukendte IP......... Held og lykke.

Også hos os skal der tænkes mange tanker om fremtidens platform strategi, det er helt 100% sikkert.
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Pegepinden
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by Pegepinden » 07 Dec 2013, 20:57

Lyder som om det er gået godt, så hvis det er tilfældet, Tillykke!
I code stuff, it is true!

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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by ThomasLund » 08 Dec 2013, 11:47

@Pegepinden - tak tak. Men det kommer da godt nok an på hvilken vinkel man ser det på. Top-10 placeringer er helt fantastiske i sig selv. MEN. Når en top-10 placering kun betaler peanuts i forhold til Steam salg, så er det lidt noget lort.

Ikke kun for os - men helt generelt for folk som hellere vil satse på premium spil. For hvis vi ikke kan tjene penge på at ligge i top-10 premium, så kan "no brand spil" forvente et par tusinde dollar salg at best. Ikke fedt for dem som er på vej op og arbejder på deres første mobil produktion. Da vil jeg klart klart anbefale at gå efter et lille PC spil istedet for premium mobil.

Ellers lav free to play - troede aldrig jeg skulle sige det..... øv....
Full Control
Makers of Smack Boxing, Smack Hockey, Monster Ball, Electrocute, Touch Wars, Tactical Soldier, Frontline Tactics, Space Hulk, Jagged Alliance Flashback, Space Hulk Ascension

JeppeB
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by JeppeB » 10 Dec 2013, 10:33

Hej Thomas,

Det ser ud som om, at I slet ikke har fået det amerikanske marked med på launchen, har I været i kontakt med Apple's US afdeling eller de større amerikanske sites for promotions? Produktet ser jo godt ud, og feedback fra brugerne er også rigtig positiv. Håber I får noget skub på snart!
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Pegepinden
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by Pegepinden » 10 Dec 2013, 11:49

ThomasLund wrote:. Da vil jeg klart klart anbefale at gå efter et lille PC spil istedet for premium mobil.
Glad for vi sigter efter dette (og noget konsol) :lol:
I code stuff, it is true!

ThomasLund
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by ThomasLund » 10 Dec 2013, 20:21

@Jeppe - vi har haft fat i både Apple EMEA og US, de har alle sagt "skide fedt - send os promo stuff". De har fået det hele, det er godkendt...... og så noooothing. Og de er endda high ups som elsker Space Hulk og 40k.

Kæmpe nedtur forventningsmæssigt.

Men skubber på lidt mere nu her igen.
Full Control
Makers of Smack Boxing, Smack Hockey, Monster Ball, Electrocute, Touch Wars, Tactical Soldier, Frontline Tactics, Space Hulk, Jagged Alliance Flashback, Space Hulk Ascension

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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by JeppeB » 11 Dec 2013, 10:51

ThomasLund wrote:@Jeppe - vi har haft fat i både Apple EMEA og US, de har alle sagt "skide fedt - send os promo stuff". De har fået det hele, det er godkendt...... og så noooothing. Og de er endda high ups som elsker Space Hulk og 40k.

Kæmpe nedtur forventningsmæssigt.

Men skubber på lidt mere nu her igen.
Det var da virkelig underligt. Altså det er jo en travl tid i øjeblikket med virkelig mange store launches, men det er en proven IP, der også har haft succes på andre platforme, så man skulle da mene den kunne få noget "hyldeplads".

Krydser fingre for et ryk op mod jul!
Jeppe Bisbjerg
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vonknut
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Re: Space Hulk out on iPads around the world

Unread post by vonknut » 21 Dec 2013, 11:36

Min mindste datter er i hvert fald glad for den seneste patch :)
Image
-den ser også ud til at have fået en del haters til at pakke sammen?

Den har i hvert fald fikset meget stuff og det virker som om der generelt er "god stemning" på de toneangivende foraer.


Og god juleferie forresten.
Hans von Knut Skovfoged - Creative Dir.
PortaPlay - Interactive Entertainment and Learning

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