How the Game was Born - Starting to create an App

You know, these things start off in the most unexpected ways sometimes.  "Save My Bacon" was a concept that was brainstormed with my kids.  It was to be a simple game where you didn't have to think too much, but instead you could just turn off your brain and waste some time.

Initially we weren't even interested in the skill level, but as the game development progressed, the skill level, although pretty simple, became an important part of the game.

Now, I have been developing or managing the development of software for many years, but the focus has always been on business applications.  We have developed some pretty handy stuff over the years, but this was our first attempt at a game.

Fortunately for me, during these years of development, I have been able to identify and form a good team, and my first action was to shoot a note off to my graphic artist to have a chat and get his feedback.  He seemed pretty enthused, so I pulled together a product specification outline.

It wasn't long before the first images started to appear and the game started to come to life!  This is possibly one of the most exciting parts of these projects.

Check this out as some of the early artwork.  It kinda makes you a little ill with him jumping up and down like that!!

However, it was at this time that I knew we would proceed.  The game looked good, the gameplay was nice and simple.

Next...advertising.  We wanted the game to be free, but we wanted some way of recovering our outlays.  When you consider Flappybirds...well that was one of those amazing benchmarks.  Apparently, at its peak, Flappybirds as raking in $50,000 per day.  Seriously.  Have you seen Flappybirds?

Some people must have found it amazingly addictive!

Well, there are lots of Ad networks you can plug into your App.  We have landed on Chartboost. This is a useful plugin that pays reasonably well for ads.  I'll let you know how we track, as this is a first for us.  I just hope we have chosen well.

Please let me know in the Comments as to whether you have used Chartboost and/or others and what you think of them!

OK, Artwork, Ad partner and into development in earnest.  A few weeks and a fair bit of testing later, we had v1 of Save My Bacon ready for release!

Um...so now what?

Well, we wanted to sell at the Android Play store and the Apple App Store.  Time to set up some accounts.

Unfortunately, this is not as simple as you might think...and I'll think I'll make that the topic of the next post.

And so the journey continues...

AG