Well, after many months of hard work and constant derailments due to client work, we finally released Light Riders (previously Light Bikes). It was first shown at iPhoneDevCamp 2 where we created the first version of it in 12 hours. Let's just say it had to be rewritten :) It now uses a 3D engine we are creating in house called Hurricane. On the iPhone, it utilizes OpenGL ES. For the first version of Light Riders, we used 2D sprites for the bikes and explosions. It has a simple camera over a 2D plane for the board. We really focused on the Multiplayer aspect on this first version. We would love to hear feedback from everyone on it. It supports up to 4 players on LAN now and a new update in the works will support internet play. We are really working hard on the Multiplayer pieces. We want to see 3 vs 3 and 4 vs 4 Team Death match in your hands :) Blue team, this is blue leader...
For the next version, we already have our 3D bike models completed. If you have watched any of the videos, you will notice 3D bikes. Those are the same models we are using in the upcoming 3D update. Our competitor has an upper hand with their 3D view, at least for now ;) I only wish I could show you what is coming for Light Riders. It's going to be insane. I can not wait for everyone to get these new updates. I can say, the video is a hint on what is coming your way :)
If you have any thoughts or ideas, please go over to http://iphonestudio.dsmedialabs.com/, and shoot us some feedback through our contact form. We are always looking at how we can improve our products.
I will be posting some new iPhone development tutorials here soon. It has been nuts here at DS Media Labs. DS is a small studio of friends and we have developed 20+ iPhone apps in 9 months. I would say we have been pretty busy.
We need to come up with a different name for our game Light Bikes. As most of you know, LightBike is now taken. We need to rebrand our game and want to allow the users to vote on it. So please head over to Touch Arcade and vote! NOW!
So, back at iPhone Dev Camp 2, we entered the competition with a TRON style game for the iPhone. We called it Light Bikes. Since iPhone Dev Camp 2, we have rewritten pretty much all the code and the game uses a 3D engine. We are using OpenGL and OpenAL. It supports 4 players over WiFi. Each player uses a separate device.
The first version we are doing has a overhead camera view. We are putting in support for different camera views for 1.1. The game will mostly likely be pushed to the App Store this weekend.
It came to a surprise a few weeks back when we seen another company stole our name (LightBike) to ride on our coat tales with all the websites and press we had generated over the past few months.
Pretty sad if you ask me. So, because of this, we are going to be rebranding our Light Bikes game as Neo Riders.
Be looking for reviews on Touch Arcade and other sites for Neo Riders.
UPDATE: I have removed the statement about the source code. I was contacted by Pankaku, Inc and they have assured me that they built their version from the ground up. I apologize for posting information based on a source that was incorrect.
I know this is old, but for those of you looking to have a nice Unit Testing process down for your apps, definitely check out the below link.
So, at DS we are always looking for good drinking games and making bets. We are always looking at little fun apps we can do in between our normal development sprints. Cause, like everyone else with ADD, you got a feed it with something a bit different once in awhile or you get bored ;)
Touch Roulette was born. You can go check out the YouTube video or the Touch Roulette page at iPhone Studio to get more info. We submitted it to Apple today. We will see how that goes...
We are still working hard on Neo Riders (previously Light Bikes), FLOverload 2.0, and Rogue Sniper. You will see vids, review, and eventually the actual apps on the App Store in the next couple weeks.
The application I blogged about yesterday, Stun-O-Matic, is now on the app store. So, if you want a taser on your iPhone or iPod touch, go grab it :)
All I can say is, wow. The DS team has been working around the clock pretty much since July 2008. We were working hard before that, but nothing like we are now and have been since last summer. The iPhone market is super hot and we are right in the middle of it.
Since last summer, we have been working on or have finished 16 iphone applications. Out of the 16 iphone applications we have finished 6. Out of the 6 we have finished, 2 of them belong to us. FLOverload [app store] was the first app we ever did. We rushed it to the App Store to be one of the first on it when it launched. Big mistake on our part. It has a lot of problems. A LOT. We then started getting slammed with client work and took it on to help bootstrap the company. It came down to deciding to take on funding and give up a large portion of the company or bootstrap ourselves through consulting. We chose the latter and it has worked okay so far. We would like to be working on more of our own stuff. It is now getting to that point.
The crazy part about all this is our team. The team I work with is just sick. We have 1 designer and 8 iPhone Developers. Out of the 8 iPhone developers, 2 of them are working only on our 3D game engine. That leaves 1 designer and 6 iPhone developers to work on 10 active applications. The applications range from very easy to very complex. So, I can safely say that this team is one of the best in the industry. It is amazing the amount of work that comes out of this small company.
The great news is that we have new application on the App Store that is ours. Sounds of Fury made it on a few weeks back and is a fun little sound making app that allows you to be a Ninja. Who the hell does not want to be a Ninja? No hands, I thought so. You should check it out. We have a lot of cool updates coming for it.
FLOverload [apps store] is getting an overhaul. It is coming in two stages. The first update, 1.5 is a complete rewrite of the game engine and fixes all the issues and complaints. We have also addressed the other issues of no instructions and the game not being intuitive to play. We think this is the beginning to a game that could have been a lot better. FLOverload 2.0 is adding 2 other game play modes that are completely different games. We have dubbed the original ClassicFLO. The other two modes are going to be a lot of fun, at least we think so, and we hope you do to.
We have two new applications submitted and in review right now. Stun-O-Matic and Confessional. We always love to hear feedback on our current and future applications. We are opening a beta site to the public on Monday. We will accept a limited about of testers, but those accepted will help us beta test all of our games. We will post more details here and on the company blog.
Next week we are releasing betas of our game Light Bikes and a new game we have not announced to the public yet. We will post more details on Monday.
One more thing... We have launched a rough beta of our site for Dark Age of Reality. Check it out and let us know what you think!
When you get a chance, come over and visit our company site too.
Talk to you soon.
I was going to post a guide to do this, but Craig Hockenberry already did. You can find his post here. I will add to this though, that it is easier to create a PayLoad folder, drop your app bundle into it, and then zip up the PayLoad folder. Rename it to your app name with a .ipa extension. For example, LightBikes.ipa. Then your users can just drag and drop your ipa file to iTunes and Sync. This will work for both Windows and Mac users.
Are you sick at Cocoa development, OpenGL, or making pixels do your bidding? Want to be part of a cool company doing really cool things? Check us out at www.dsmedialabs.com and our new iPhone Studio division at iphonestudio.dsmedialabs.com. We are looking for talent to join our team right away.
The DS Media Labs team sponsored and attended iPhoneDevCamp 2. I have to say, it was pretty damn cool. We took part in the hackathon and received honorable mention for Light Bikes. We would have taken first if we would have had an idea that was fresh and new.
Or next game at DS Media Labs is called Light Bikes. It is a Tron light bike game. We wrote all the code in 14 hours at the hackathon and actually got a playable demo showing off the concept. We also finished up our Menu system and score tracking back end. It turned out really good.
Make sure you attend next year! It was a blast.
Check out our new site and Light Bikes.
