In the second part of our Galaxy on Fire™ 2 Developer Diary Lead Programmer Hans-Christian-Kühl tells us more about the production process and the teamwork involved. In addition, HCK shares his personal favourite features of the upcoming version of GoF 2 with us.
For all the sci-fi junkies among you, who still haven’t played the first part of our space saga yet, FISHLABS offers GoF at a 50% discount starting today. The weekend sale ends on Monday – so make sure to quickly lay your hands on the Betty or one of the many other ships of the GoF universe and enjoy premium 3D-space-action for just $ 2.99.

Part of the porting of GoF 2 has been major changes in the design and artwork. Why was that?

That happened, because we did not have so much room for the original Java version. Back then, the entire version could not be larger than one MB. At the time, we used the trick of not building the ships completely as one object, but rather like a ‘Lego’ ship put together from individual modules. Ultimately, there were 30 different modules that were used to create roughly 40 different ships. But there were essentially the same ships for the different races, varying only in the colours and textures. Now, we have a lot more possibilities and can create a set of unique ships with their own textures for every race – because now we have the necessary memory. The same is true for stations. Previously, they were put together from modules. Now, we can create unique stations for every race, which of course is a lot of work, but looks really good.

What is the process in developing the new 3D ship models?

Marc Nagel, our Art Director, doodles the ships from three sides with a rough texture template. Then the 3D artists get a specification from me what the maximum size of the texture can be. Then they get started, and constantly look it over and say where the geometry has to be fiddled with, the size changed, or other changes have to be made so that everything fits together. After all, the models also have to fit the design specifications that are already there from the Java version, such as weight, speed, or armaments of a ship. If we were to completely rebalance all of that, we would be working on the port even longer. Therefore, we try to use the original data as much as possible and ‘only’ change the graphics.

You also have someone on the team who is only responsible for the different space stations, right?

Yes, Jeremias Hohn is our lead 3D artist. Jerry is currently only doing stations, but he has to be finished with them this week, so that we can try them out in-game. Be he can explain much better about what he is currently working on.

Who coordinates the project when it comes to the balancing?

At FISHLABS, we work in very small, flexible teams, that are always being reformed as needed. So of course, there has to be someone who always has an overview of the whole project. As Lead Engineer, I am not only responsible for the programming, but at the same time, I am also the project manager and concept developer. In the end, I look everything over and say if things should go more in one direction or another. Apart from that, we frequently sit down with Marc or Uwe Wütherich, our creative director, and of course with Michael Schade, who considers everything once again from a marketing perspective. Naturally in particular cases, it depends on the department. One good example is the interface.Fredrik Überle, who works on the interface as 2D/3D artist, loads the latest skyboxes and new 3D models for his work in Photoshop behind his current interface, so that he can see right away if it fits with the style, look-and-feel, and brightness.

What role do the production meetings play?

Of course, the production meetings are becoming much more important at the moment, since we are working with more and more people on the project. In the initial phase, it’s enough for someone to come by and look at the current status and adjust it. In the current phase, where more than 10 people are involved in the project, we have to coordinate more closely, which is only possible through regular production meetings.

How will GoF 2 be tested?

First, I test the game until it makes sense to give others access to it. In the next stage, we enter a new project in our test tool and inform all FISHLABS employees by e-mail where the game is, what needs to be done, what to look out for, and what should still be disregarded in this phase. Then we ask who wants to test the game. But of course, there are also people in the team who have to test the game. We also like to get feedback from outside and, for example, invite students in. Here, we work with questionnaires a lot, particularly to get a feel for our balancing and find out what the testers especially like and if the game is too hard or too easy.

The new version of GoF 2 offers more room not only for 3D models and textures, but also for more characters and plot threads. How do these new content options affect the development?

Previously, we didn’t have as much room for text. In GoF 2 for Java, we had a total of just 1000 strings, that is character strings from one word up to about 10 lines. Now we can add as much content as we want, for example, a description for every solar system or piece of equipment. That is why we also plan to work with professional authors. One example: we need an alien race. Aha! What are they called? OK, they’re green, and what else is there about them? The new smartphone platforms give us the opportunity of providing a lot more information and backgrounds. In the future, for example, the characteristics of the different races, systems, planets, and characters will be better developed, so that the whole universe will have more depth and vitality.

That sounds as thought the new options are both a blessing and a challenge for the developers?

Naturally, we have to adapt. If GoF 2 is going to become even better known and suddenly we’re facing a port to platforms such as the PC, XBLA, or other major consoles, you could quickly create a universe that may not have been properly thought out, but which continues to be used, and then suddenly you are confronted with unsolvable contradictions. Therefore, we have now reached a point where we have to go over the prior content, so that there is nothing in the way of a future expansion of the GoF universe.

Has the system of alliances and factions in the GoF 2 universe been further refined as part of this development?

Originally, there were only two factions: the Terrans and the Vossk. If you have done a lot of missions for the Terrans, you will eventually be out of favour with the Vossk and have to pay money if you want to land on their stations. Meanwhile, we have four factions: Terrans, Vossk, Midorians, and Nevelians. Now the reputation system oscillates between the Terrans and the Vossk, as well as the Midorians and Nivelians. If you do something for one side, that has an effect on the other side – even if all you do is fly out and attack some random ship. In extreme cases, there are diplomats where you can buy your way out, if your reputation has reached a critically low level. Unlike in GoF 1, there is no simple division into friend or foe - in GoF 2, every faction is innately neutral toward the player. Only once you cross the threshold of a certain number of points, will the entire faction be hostile to you and its members will shoot on sight.

What parts of GoF 2 have turned out particularly well so far and what are your favourite features?

You can just fly out and do whatever you want! There is a tutorial in the beginning, which explains the basics of the game, but after that, you are soon given a great deal of freedom. Another favourite feature is the abundance of items. We have approximately ten times as many items as in GoF 1. Then, of course, you can design your ship however you like. What weapons do I install? What are their characteristics? Or should I use the slot for more cargo space, or install a better scanner? Another favourite feature is definitely that you can now communicate more with your environment. Previously, there was only the mission board, always with the same text. Now, there is a personal address, which varies. That makes it more lifelike. At the same time, we now have virtually unlimited character portraits. Here, we used the head generator we had already used in our title Deep.

That almost sounds like we can expect a completely different game under the old names with GoF 2?

Naturally, the core and the story remain. But compared to the Java version of GoF 2 and the GoF 1 version for the iPhone, the new version of GoF 2 will clearly stand out and represents a major step in development. The original GoF 1 was very limited in terms of the freedom you had. The universe was already open, but you could only leave the stations as part of missions. Now, I can just leave the station and decide for myself if I want to complete missions or just fly around and mine ore, hunt pirates, use maps to discover new systems or stations in the growing GoF universe.

Next will be Marc explaining the art redesign in Galaxy on Fire 2 for iPhone…

We started the new year with a bang: Our most successful iPhone ad game, Barclaycard Waterslide Extreme, has cracked 10 million downloads, Rally Master Pro™ will be released –  for free (!) – in an extra high resolution Symbian version for Sony Ericsson Satio™ and Vivaz™ in a few days, and we recently launched a new iPhone game for Volkswagen: Volkswagen Think Blue. Challenge. This iPhone promotional game we are particularly proud of, because usually promotional games are inferior to regular commercial games for reasons of budget, and the subject of fuel saving is rather uncommon in games. Nevertheless, we were able to turn all that into a high-quality, exciting game, as even the folks at toucharcade declared (a great honour!). You see, promotional games can be quite entertaining, and so you can look forward to at least two more free  casual games, that will be launched by this summer.

Fresh games for iPhone, iPad & friends

Of course, this year, we aren’t just developing ad games for iPhone and iPad and revamping existing iPhone games for other smartphones; we are also working on several completely new titles. With a racing game that has music as an essential component, we are entering new territory. We can’t tell you too much, but the first playable version caused quite a sensation both in-house and with marketing partners.

Along with our iPhone and iPad developments, we also want to put out feelers towards Android this year. As with the iPhone before, we will first port our casual games, like Burning Tires™, to get a feel for the new platform. If the effort proves worth the trouble, we will definitely follow up with more titles. Beyond that, we are working on a AAA title closely together with Nokia featuring OpenGL ES 2.0 graphics for a large screen.

Reunion with Keith on iPhone, iPad and Nokia Smartphones

It’s been at least a year since we ported our most important brand to the iPhone: Galaxy on Fire™. Our 3D space shooter with open gameplay and RPG-like equipment options for spaceships is still unchallenged in the AppStore. But despite heavily pepped up graphics and crisp sound, GoF on the iPhone cannot deny its Java origins and its five-year old design. Sci-fi action fans will be glad to hear that we have been working on converting Galaxy on Fire™ 2 to the iPhone and other smartphones since October.

The sequel to the space epic has set standards in the Java field similar to Part 1 and, thanks to the even more open game design, offers significantly greater potential to be a megahit on the iPhone. So you can look forward to seeing Keith and other acquaintances from the first part once again later this year and play the Alien part for the first time in the Mission Pack in summer. And to keep the wait from being all too boring, we will keep you up-to-date with the status of the development with a regular developer’s diary.

Become a fan of FISHLABS on Facebook for instant updates on all current projects.

Casual Connect in Hamburg, from 10. – 12. February 2010 right at the front-door of FISHLABS 

We are very pleased to attend Casual Connect with three topics on the second day. Casual Games Association Events are the premiere events for the casual games industry with over 3,500 professionals attending Casual Connect Events each year. Casual Connect Europe brings together the most talented and knowledgeable experts in the casual gaming field to further the casual games industry with the best of networking and learning.

This year FISHLABS is among the front runners: With 10 iPhone Games and more than 21 Millionen downloads we are now ranked as one of the top players worldwide.

At Casual Connect we are attending three panels:

What’s the Smart Choice in Smartphones?

Attendees:
Alex BUBB, Senior Partner Manager, Media and Games Nokia
Joe NEALE, Head of End User Programs Symbian Foundation
Michael SCHADE, CEO FishLabs
Moderator:
Chris JAMES, Founder Pocket Gamer

Smartphones are the new black in the mobile content world, but who are the main players and which of the many new platforms and accompanying app stores should you be supporting? Our expert panel of platform representatives and publishers offer an invaluable guide from Android to Windows Mobile.

Case Study: Ad-Funded Games

Speaker: Michael SCHADE, CEO FishLabs

Smartphones are on their way to become the most engaging media in everyone’s life. Millions of downloads with hundred thousands of hours game time make ad games on smartphones like iPhone, Android and other new mobile platforms the Trojan horse for brands to cut through the daily media noise. Learn from best practices with Volkswagen and Barclaycard how to engage with consumers on a global level in a long-lasting and lean-forward experience.

Business Models & Pricing – Making Money on the App Store

Attendees:
Nicholas LOVELL, Director GAMESbrief
Michael SCHADE CEO, FishLabs
Christopher KASSULKE, CEO HandyGames GmbH
Moderator:
Tim HARRISON Founder The Mobile Consultancy

The iPhone has well and truly shaken up mobile games pricing, enabling a wide variety of new business models. This session examines these models and key pricing trends from the initial rush to the bottom to the emerging premium bracket along with micro-payments, lite and free versions, subscriptions and asks the simple question…which models are making money?

Of course there will be enough time for chats and discussions after and in between the panels and we look forward to many inspiring conversations.

Sony Ericsson has been known for its outstanding 3D gaming performance on Java phones for years now. It all started back in 2004, when Sony Ericsson introduced the first mass market Java phone that could render decent 3D graphics on a 176×220 pixels screen. We had been early on and released our first 3D games Motoraver, featuring 3D driving physics in a fairly large sandbox-style city at night, and Robot Alliance, a proper first person shooter in full 3-D (!) with smoothly animated 3D characters, all within 350KB of data.

Continuously, Sony Ericsson improved their hardware and, even more important, the Java Virtual Machine it was running. The crown of 3D enabled java phones still belongs to the K800i, the game experience felt close to the Playstation 1, even if it was not as fast and on a smaller screen. And Fishlabs has to give Kudos to Sony Ericsson. Without this great performance we could never have created mobile games of such high quality like Blades & Magic, Rally Master Pro, Snowboard Hero and Galaxy on Fire 2.

From music to photos to games

In 2005 3D gaming was hyped very much but could not break through as the carriers always forced developers to support the lowest common denominator and the majority of handsets could only render 2D graphics. Sony Ericsson did right in focusing on music instead and introducing the Walkman brand to mobile with great success. A year later Sony Ericsson repeated the success story labeling their photo feature phones with the popular brand Cybershot. With all those millions of Walkman and Cybershot phones sold, sharing a consistent Java platform and decent 3D rendering capabilities, Sony Ericsson’s strength in mobile gaming started as the best kept secret of the industry and led into ruling the mobile gaming business: in 2007, Sony Ericsson was the fourth largest manufacturer of mobile phones worldwide, seven out of ten games downloads were happening on Sony Ericsson phones in Europe and emerging markets like Latin America and South East Asia. Until today, Sony Ericsson has released over 50 models supporting proper 3D rendering and has an installed user base of approx. 200 million devices (Fishlabs’ estimate). Not a bad thing for developers like us, focused on 3D mobile games, if only the ecosystem was right.

iPhone – the mobile games game changer

Nothing is constant but change. It was not Nokia, with its great ambitions in mobile gaming, finally introducing N-Gage as a service, or Vodafone with more than 300 (?) million subscribers who literally changed the mobile gaming business over night. New kid on the mobile block Apple swiped away all competitors with a mobile phone featuring a game experience beyond Nintendo DS and close to Sony PSP. With the latest installment of iPhone 3GS and iPod touch 3rd generation featuring OpenGL ES 2.0 even beyond PSP. In combination with the App Store integrated in iTunes, a fair business case for developers (70/30 revenue share) and a low entry barrier (get started for less than $299 with an iPod touch and the iPhone SDK) for everyone mobile game developers were flocking to this new exciting platform.

Satio – ramping up for the fastest mobile gaming device?

It took Sony Ericsson a while to find an answer to the unexpected competitor coming from the computer area backed by a loyal customer base addicted to superior user experience – which is exactly why Apple is so stunningly successful with the iPhone. Although, feature phones based on Java had been a great success for Sony Ericsson and were the preferred mobile phone for gaming by tens of millions users, the future in mobile gaming lies in smartphones. However, any half-hearted attempt to stand up against the leader of smartphones will fail. But Sony Ericsson has sent a decent device stuffed with the latest hardware to the race. The Satio features the same 3D-Chip PowerVR SGX  as the iPhone 3GS running Symbian on an even more powerful CPU ARM11 clocked at 600MHz. Furthermore, it comes with plenty of memory and with a bigger display than the iPhone featuring 640 x 360 pixels resolution. 

Lots of horsepower – what is it good for?

It is one thing to stuff a lot of nice hardware into a mobile phone. It is another story to make all this power available to the developer. Sony Ericsson did an amazing job here. We have ported Rally Master Pro from iPhone to Symbian featuring almost the same functionality on Satio (only automatic acceleration when using touch controls due to single touch on Satio and no multiple simultaneous sounds due to lack of layered sound capabilities). Although the resolution of the Satio display is quite higher compared to the iPhone we experience a stable frame rate of 30 frames per second on both devices running identical game code and graphical assets. Thanks to the better screen resolution of Satio, it is stunning how much more details can be rendered in the scene (the original iPhone textures were designed with some head room for larger screens).

Xperia X10: Mobile games on the big screen

Today a prototype of the latest Sony Ericsson smartphone has arrived at our studio: A shiny Xperia X10 and we have to convey it looks stunning, indeed. It is still a very early proto but navigation on the capacitive touch screen feels great and fluid and the whole menu is much more inviting and intuitive to play around with than it used to be with previous smartphones from Sweden. As the X10 is an Android based phone it will take a while until we have our first game running on it. But one thing is for sure: The big screen is a great, great plus. You can see our website in full 800 pixels width and everything is crystal clear. Even the small fonts can be read with ease. Equipped with a whopping 1 GHz Snapdragon Chip supporting OpenGL ES 2.0 it promises high-end smartphone gaming on the big screen.
 

Apple has just announced its most successful non-Christmas quarter ever with incredible 5,2m iPhones and 10.2m iPods sold. Since launch, that’s about 45m iPhones and iPod touches and users have downloaded 1.5b applications from the App Store so far. That’s 33 applications per iPhone or iPod touch user. Congrats to that and we could not be more happy about Apple’s success as we are making close 60% of our revenue with iPhone games so far. However, there were a lot of talks about the new iPhone 3GS and OS 3.0 might drive fragmentation which could be a serious threat to the developer community and the success of the App Store in the long term.

Since there is hardly any reliable data available how many devices and which operating system is used we thought we share some figures based on Barclaycard’s Waterslide Extreme, developed off the back of the iconic Barclaycard ‘waterslide’ ad, based on a concept by Dare Digital and developed by FISHLABS (obviously).

Since Waterslide Extreme is a casual game appealing to a broad audience and currently the most downloaded app in pretty much every country (more than 2m downloads within 5 days) we think it gives a pretty good overview of the current installed base.

How many iPhones? How many iPod touches?

Let us start with the iPhone and iPod touch statistics. Most of you know already there are slight differences among the iDevices. As a developer, you want to know how many potential users you might lose if you optimize your app (game) to the more powerful devices like the iPod touch 2nd gen and especially the iPhone 3GS, of course. Respectively, you might consider providing different sets of graphical assets, for instance. 

All data records have been collected anonymously, no back-tracking to individual users possible

As we can see clearly, iPhone 3G and the iPod touch 2nd gen are the most popular devices with pretty much identical market share around 38% each. The iPhone 3GS is around 12,5% and given the short time it is available that’s a pretty remarkable chunk, already.

We at FISHLABS optimize our upcoming games for the performance level of iPod touch 2nd gen which give us a great game experience on close to 90% of the iDevices (iPod touch 2nd gen, iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS) out there. For the first iPhone and iPod touch 1st gen we reduce some of the graphic features, like disabling vertex coloring or reducing the viewing distance accordingly. On the other hand, it is just too early to come up with a dedicated high-end version supporting the OpenGL ES 2.0 for iPhone 3GS. Even more critical if you think about an app (game) that relies on exclusive iPhone 3GS features.

How many iPhones and iPod touches with OS 3.0?

Most developers are very excited about the new iPhone OS 3.0 features like in-app purchasing, push notification, Bluetooth multiplayer and many more. But when is the right time to launch apps, and games in particular, utilizing these new features. Check out the next chart for your consideration.

 
All data records have been collected anonymously, no back-tracking to individual users possible

If you are up for an app (game) with the new iPhone OS 3.0 features you face about 60% of the total potential user base. Still quite a lot people you can reach out to but it will be very hard to rise to the top 25 if your thrust of downloads is cut by up to 40% (some may upgrade for killer apps, though) compared to any competing OS 2.x app. For sure, Apple will promote apps (games) with OS 3.0 features to compensate that. Seems like risky business once the promotion has ended, though. We haven’t decided yet when to launch our first iPhone game utilizing OS 3.0 features. Perhaps launching a game with OS 2.x features first and when the hype is over running an update with OS 3.0 features is a good idea. Of course, this won’t work for apps (games) that rely on OS 3.0 features completely.

Success or failure of each and every iPhone app (game) won’t be based solely on the considerations above but for sure the right strategy when to support new features of iPhone OS 3.0 and/or iPhone 3GS will be fundamental. Given the dynamic in the App Store we will know soon what approach was good and what was not. Just that Apple will have sold another couple million devices in the meantime and the rules of the game will be changed once again. Which keeps it all exciting.

Alright folks, hope that helps when planning your next app / game. You may quote these figures above. Of course, a link to our blog would be most appreciated: http://blog.fishlabs.net/en

Game on!

Michael Schade

Brawn GP has teamed up with Upstream, to create the Brawn GP Racing Game for Apple’s iPhone and iPod touch that includes a chance to win a luxurious Mercedes SL Roadster (US, CA and UK only). Of course, we are thrilled that FISHLABS has been chosen to develop the very first F1™ racing game for iPhone and iPod touch and now the game is live!

What’s in this Brawn GP iPhone game?

You get the chance to drive the Brawn GP F1™ car to qualify on four imaginary, international circuits. The game features a track located in the city of London. Players can drive by landmarks such as Big Ben and Buckingham Palace while doing a qualifying lap around Hyde Park. Three additional tracks inspired by the most famous and challenging elements on the world racing circuit, such as Road America’s Carousel, Silverstone’s Copse and Monaco’s hairpin, will be made available as free updates throughout the 2009 season. 

F1™ racing on iPhone - How does it feel?

Based on our advanced racing engine with 4-point-driving physics, Brawn GP Racing offers the most realistic high-speed racing experience available on iPhone and iPod touch. Well, we tried to give you a F1™ driving experience as close as possible but without being too realistic - if we had done a proper F1™ driving simulation game you probably wouldn’t be able to make a single lap without destroying the car ;-). So it is still about having both thrill and fun here.

How can I win a Mercedes SL?

As soon as you qualify on each track, you are ranked globally, and are awarded entries in the draw according to your rank – the faster you are, the more chances you have of winning. The contest will end at the precise time at which the winning car crosses the finish line in the last race of the season in Abu Dhabi on November 1, 2009. A draw will be held on November 12th and the grand winner, hopefully you, will receive a brand new Mercedes SL. The contest is available to US, Canada and UK residents only.

Off the back of the iconic Barclaycard ‘waterslide’ ad, Dare has developed an iphone game concept which will be available for free download from the apps store as of mid-July.  In keeping with the TV execution, the game allows the user to ride a series of waterslides through urban environments and Dare has hired Fishlabs as mobile technical developers to help bring the concept to life. 

Well, we haven’t been at any WWDC before so we can’t really make a comparison, no doubt, Apple is way ahead of its competitors and the show was also much more than we expected. But first things first. Still quite jet-lagged I missed to take a picture of Marc, our CTO, queuing up for the keynote. I can’t think of any developer congress where people literally wait in line for hours to get in. Now I know why they call it a Blockbuster, Moscone West had a nice queue of greedy developers to conquer a seat in one of the front rows in the riesig Ball Room, easily seating 5,000 people.

Inside, the atmosphere was like being at a rock concert. The crowd was critically anticipating the show to begin. The stage was indeed huge and massive speakers and colorful spotlights hung down from the ceiling and a big luminous Apple logo was glowing in the back. Looks like Apple wanted to blow us away. Phil Schiller, SVP of Worldwide Product Marketing, entered the stage and kicked-off with facts about this year’s conference: 5,200 developers from 54 countries around the world, “this is the best level of anticipation and excitement for our developers conference yet”, he said enthusiastically.

In the next 15 minutes Phil announced the new line-up of MacBook Pro, all with better CPUs  (up to 3GHz), more memory (up to 8 Gig) , better graphics and new battery (good for 1,000 recharges and lasting up to 7hrs). All models are even cheaper than their forerunners and are available today – great stuff – Followed by impressing stats about the Mac OS installed user base: In the past two years the number of OS X users has tripled to 75m today (well, mainly because of the 40 million iPhone and iPod touch users but still impressive).

What’s better than a Leopard?

Next topic was Mac OS in detail. Bertrand Serlet, Head of OS, took over and showed some interesting facts and figures about the improvements of Snow Leopard (90% of what was in Leopard has been refined in Snow Leopard) not without some sharp comments about Vista and its disadvantages. Most interesting: Snow Leopard runs up to 45% faster, it shares up 85% functionality with iPhone OS and it weights about 6GB less, through file system compression.

Safari 4 and Quicktime X reloaded

Along with Snow Leopard, Safari and Quicktime also get an update. Safari 4 now shipping for both Mac and Windows PCs impressed with great performance. According to Acid 3 test it scores 100/100 (benchmark executing HTML web pages) and outperforms Google Chrome and Firefox by far. Craig Federighi, VP of Mac OS engineering, had great pleasure to demo the speed of Safari opening the heavy NYT home page showing huge adverts for Microsoft’s new Bing search engine splashed all over it.

Quicktime got an overhaul of its user interface. Actually, there is hardly any user interface left. When you playback and the mouse is outside of the Quicktime window no status bar or controls are shown. Reduced to the max. Also, it works with any web server now. Bottom line: you can easily upload your video to YouTube. What’s really nice: Trimming options are included seamlessly and Quicktime renders your clips almost instantly for optimized output on HDTV, Apple TV, YouTube and other formats.

Now comes some heavy developer stuff

64bit, Grand Central Dispatch, OpenCL. You probably won’t need it for daily stuff if you are not a hardcore user but worth taking a look at it: With 64bit Mac OS applications are no longer limited to address only 4 Gig of RAM and of course a speed boost of software written in 64bit can be expected (Photoshop users happy now?). Next was multi-core. To benefit from the multi-cores in modern CPUs (we don’t see higher CPU operation speed but more and more cores to increase performance) software has to be organized in threads. Grand Central Dispatch is a new technology in Snow Leopard with built-in support for multi-core, which organises threads. Surprisingly, even Apple Mail benefits quite heavily from that as it uses a lot of threads. Finally, OpenCL, an open standard c-based language to utilize the computing power of modern graphic cards, gives developers up to 1 Teraflop (a trillion operations per second) at hands. Whatever you might want to do with that amount of horsepower underneath the hood if you are not a scientist.

Making New Friends

Personally, the last new feature of Snow Leopard made me think there is no excuse anymore to not have a MacBook Pro: Integration of Microsoft Exchange. So the MacBook Pro can now connect to our company email backend server without hassle, it looks better, it’s faster, it lasts longer, has a better integration with iPhone (tethering e.g.), I don’t need to worry about viruses and after turning it on I don’t have get me a coffee before I can start to work. Eh, hang on, that wasn’t all bad.

iPhone gets the rest of the show

Alright, most of the news was interesting but not why WE were attending in the first place. SVP of iPhone software, Scott Forstall, took the stage and we (iPhone developers) were listening much more closely now. “It has been an incredible year for the iPhone. It was less than a year ago that we launched 2.0 and with it the SDK,” he said. “The response has been staggering - developers have downloaded the free SDK more than a million times. There are now more than 50,000 apps on the App Store.” [applause] “Now we’ve been working really hard to grow the user base for your apps […] We have already sold more than 40m iPhones + iPod Touches […]That’s a lot of devices. And of course passed a billion downloads.”

iPhone Firmware 3.0 Highlights

Well, MMS support is surely not a highlight for Europeans as other handset manufacturers have been supporting this for quite some time now but in the US it seems to be a big thing though. You could argue the same about cut & paste but the way Apple implemented it is again way beyond the way their competitors did. Parental control, tethering (use your iPhone as a modem) and dynamic language switching is all nice to have but nothing that made me got too excited. The feature that finds my iPhone based on GPS or mobile network cell (useful when your iPhone is lost in a building) and alerts, even if silenced, did. Even better, “Remote Wipe” deletes all data (contacts, emails, photos etc.) on the device. Anyone who ever lost a phone knows what I am talking about.

Next is peer-to-peer Bluetooth connectivity: “great for games, will automatically find the other player over wireless or Bluetooth, no carrier needed.” Well, that’s cool but Sony Ericsson had that in place, when was that again? Ah, 2006. But no complains, they integrated the API quite nicely so there is not much to do for the developer to set up a match.
Connecting to 3rd party hardware, like the diabetes monitor demoed, might be also useful for an external game controller for all those PSP lovers still holding up all the buttons it offers. Well, buttons are out, touch and tilt is in! Get it, folks!
Embedding Google maps into applications is for sure great for some utilities but I have never been a fan of location based games and such. Neither do I believe in digital books. Hence,  Scroll Motion passed without any reaction on me. Last one I remember was the integration of TomTom navigation on the iPhone. Since most new cars come with a satnav system anyway I don’t know if that’s going to be a burner. However, I only I’ve only been riding 20+ year old cars for quite a while so you got me.

No new iPhone or what?

More apps using iPhone 3.0 firmware were shown but all very niche like tuning amplifiers for electric guitars or monitoring and displaying data for physical experiments. 135min had passed and we listened patiently to all the hot and the luke-warm stuff, too. But hey, what about why we came here? Phil Schiller comes back on stage: “To call the iPhone 3G a hit would be the understatement of the year. The iPhone has changed how people think about their phones - it wasn’t too long ago that people were frustrated with these… what I’ll call crappy devices.” And he doesn’t stop bashing the competitors: 2/3 of all mobile browsing (most be US) is done on an iPhone or iPod touch. Schiller compares the iPhone App Store’s 50,000 apps to Google Android’s 4,900, Nokia’s 1,088, RIM’s 1,030, Palm’s 18 – big ouch!

iPhone 3GS – The S stands for speed!

“The iPhone 3G has been great, so that’s why I’m excited to tell you about an entirely new version - the iPhone 3GS.” I guess no one expected the suffix 3GS. “The S stands for speed - because it’s the fastest, most powerful iPhone we’ve ever made.” Apparently, about three times faster on average, depending on benchmark. Launching messaging is 2.1x faster, loading apps (SimCity) is 2.4x faster, loading the New York Times homepage 2.9x faster.  Good to hear that Apple also improved the battery life, how much this really adds when playing games needs to be seen.

With the integrated compass and the 3 megapixel camera, also taking VGA videos at 30 fps, it looks like they have some more new cool tech features implemented but for us as 3D game developers this is less relevant. So, the big news about the iPhone 3GS for us at Fishlabs was the new graphics chip, faster CPU and more memory. Especially the new PowerVR SGX GPU by imagination supporting OpenGL ES 2.0 drew our attention. The only thing as a developer that concerns us is that the iPhone 3GS will drive fragmentation. Well, we will see how that goes in the near future.

Okay, that’s enough flying around. Time for some action. The first mission with the space junk is quickly resolved and I blow away the rubbish outside the space station in no time. The way the debris bursts with a tremendous explosion when I hit it is fantastic. I don’t have to wait long for the first mission with potential for enemy contact.

I still have to grin at nervous, one-eyed Bolar. Right then, let’s get him home in one piece. As expected, we have company on the way. My first encounter with the Vossk in over 3 years. As before, their dull, dark grey hulls make them difficult to spot, even on the gigantic display of the iPhone, but the head-up display reliably shows them as an enemy target.

First enemy contact on the iPhone

Their spaceships are significantly better than my little Icarus in weaponry, armour, and manoeuvrability, and a frontal attack was not a good idea even in the past. I duck under the first salvo and fire my booster to get behind the enemy fighter with a wide loop. All right, now you’re going to get it. A fine salvo from my twin lasers hits the target and the Vossk fighter’s energy bar declines significantly. I’d love to finish him off, but the time limit to get Bolar to the next waypoint is getting short. A quick moment to orient myself and then set course for the yellow dot at the edge of the screen. Bolar whinges away at me, and I boost again. Time presses. After another attack by the Vossk, which I am also able to parry, I bring Bolar to the last waypoint. He’s happy as a clam that we made it in one piece, and I pocket the credits. It’s a pity I had to let the Vossk get away, but I’m sure we’ll meet again soon.

The Doctor offers a lucrative assignment

Word of my deeds appears to have got round. Doc Washington hires me as a wingman. He won’t tell me much, just that we are guaranteed to run into trouble. Sounds like fun. The money is right, so off we go. At first, the journey is quiet. We reach the first waypoint without incident. Doc’s spaceship makes a much better impression than mine; his business seems to be doing well. As soon as possible, I’ll take a look around and see what the market offers for better ships and weapons.

The dramatic music announcing the approach of enemy units pulls me out of my thoughts of a new spaceship. Vossk fighters. I ignite my booster and hurry toward them to draw their fire, so that Doc can attack the Vossk with his powerful lasers. I am able to shake off the Vossk with time-tested evasive manoeuvres and launch a counterattack. With satisfaction, I wipe out two of the Vossk, whose ships are much better than mine. Well, it all comes down to the pilot, doesn’t it?

But where is Doc? I aim for the green dot on the radar until the green marker appears in the middle of the screen. Far away, Doc is in a hot dogfight with the last Vossk. I fire the booster and hurry to help him. The Vossk doesn’t last 10 seconds under fire from both our lasers. BOOOM – and Vossk wreckages flies through space.

No mercy for GOF iPhone aliens

Christine has the first delicate mission for me. A Vossk weapons convoy has been reported. Together with Christine’s wingman, we go hunting to stop the delivery. We fly in formation for a while. I enjoy the view of the smoothly flying Terran fighters with their triple engines. Suddenly, enemy targets pop up on the radar: three large Vossk freighters with an escort of four Vossk hunters. We break formation and dive into the fight. Now I have to keep an overview. My weapons are intelligent enough that they only hit enemy objects, but with a total of seven ships constantly circling between the gigantic freighters, you have to watch out who is behind whom.

I quickly identify the pirate whose hull is already heavily damaged. His evasive manoeuvre does him no good. With a little effort, my lasers find their target. They tear apart the enemy spaceship with a tremendous explosion and a mighty fireball with a secondary ring impulse spreads through space. Quite a sight.  In the meantime, my wingmen have done good work, only one fighter can still be seen on the radar. Not for long. The remaining Vossk doesn’t stand a chance against three Terran hunters, and his life also ends in a ball of fire. The three Vossk freighters are now defenceless against us. We attack them one after the other. Their hulls are strong, but they can’t withstand the constant fire of our lasers forever, and gigantic explosions tear the enormous freighters to pieces. Satisfied, we turn for home.

To be continued…

Tremendous computing power, a huge display, rich sound, and analogue controls via touch or motion sensor. The iPhone was just made for out space shooter game Galaxy on Fire™. For some weeks, our mega-hit is rocking on the iPhone and iPod touch. We have completely reworked all of the graphics, elaborately recomposed the soundtrack, added new sound effects, and developed a new survival mode and analogue controls, for a real outer space feel. But one thing at a time.

Pure outer space eye candy on the iPhone

Right from the start-up sequence, Galaxy on Fire™ for the iPhone has a new look. The FISHLABS logo shimmers in the interlaced monitor design and all of the menus are correspondingly designed. An homage to the early 90s, when many of us spent hours playing Wing Commander and Elite. The first 3D scenes run in the background, more reminiscent of the PC games of the late 90s than a mobile game. Gigantic spaceships glide slowly past the camera, while small fighters fly patrol in front of a huge planet. All of this is accompanied by the familiar Galaxy on Fire™ main theme, but in a rich orchestral sound – I feel like I’m sitting in the cinema.

When is the film finally going to start?

I already have the main menu behind me. I chose the story mode. Of course, I remember the intro well, on the Sony Ericsson K700 at the time. It was impressive, because it was fully animated in 3D, rich in detail, fluid, and with an astonishing visual range. Impressive for a platform where only 2D games had run before. The new intro on the iPhone will knock you out of your socks. A twinkling background of stars shimmers, lone asteroids spin slowly by. The first semi-transparent text box is displayed, while the camera pans gently to one side and a splendid nebula enters the picture. In the middle is a planet, illuminated by a gleaming sun. Subtle lens flares play in the virtual optics. I select continue and the camera pans to a high-resolution, bright orange planet, with a space station in orbit rotating around its own axis in 3D. Eden Prime, AD 3587. It begins. Finally.

Arrival on the iPhone – I mean Eden Prime

Majestically, the SS Ulysses approaches and flies past the camera close enough to touch. The numerous details on the hull of the Terran battle cruiser are clear. On the stern, the gigantic ion drives pulse in bright cyan. Has my jaw dropped? Christine bids me welcome. Sweet. She doesn’t know that we met three years ago. No matter. I don’t let on and follow her to the hangar.

My first mission in outer space on the iPhone

It is roomy here. At the end of the camera pan through the spacious hangar, I spot a small something hovering above the floor. Hmm, it looks as though my first spaceship is still little more that a tin can with rocket engines. Whatever, I listen patiently to Christine’s instructions, and then my first test flight.

Wow! What a frame rate! Small particle fly towards me, my Icarus, with its glowing drives, stands out fantastically from the glittering backdrop of stars. The head up display provides all functions at a glance and, thanks to the huge screen, covers very little of the scene. While Christine explains the basic operation of the controls and the HUD to me, I look for the fire button. The bottom right looks good. PHEEEEW, PHEEW and the first twin laser shots fly toward the horizon in a glowing green. Wicked sound. Again. PHEEEEW, PHEEW. That was definitely missing in the Java version.

In the meantime, Christine approaches the first waypoint. Her ship is far in the distance, recognizable only as a yellow tail and the green marking in the HUD . She is probably wondering where I am. What was that she said about the controls? Ah, the analogue stick in the lower left. This is supposed to work? I’m surprised, the controls are very good. Amazingly smooth, the 3D scene flows past me and I fly in every direction until I start to get dizzy.

Now I really have to hurry to the first waypoint. On a normal mobile phone, the booster would be the ‘3’, but that doesn’t exist on the iPhone. Hmm, maybe the double arrow next to the analogue stick? WOOOOOHOOOOO! Boring tin can? With a noise like a turbine, the Icarus takes off like a bat and my head rocks back slightly, as if I could actually feel the acceleration. Conditioned like one of Pavlov’s dogs. I hope no one is watching me play.

To be continued…