January 2011
17 posts
5 tags
Weekend with Ansca Mobile in Silicon Valley
Biffy and I attended the Mobile Startup Camp in Silicon Valley this weekend, but we came a day early to meet the Ansca Mobile team, which is something we’ve wanted to do ever since I’ve been using the Corona SDK.
We got to meet Carlos Icaza and most of the Ansca team and they were all very sharp individuals. We couldn’t have asked to be around a better people. It feels good...
3 tags
Cavern Drake 1.5.0 Update Now Available →
This update addresses many bug fixes, provides two more FREE characters, makes a couple of the premium items available for free, and best of all, makes gameplay more fun by switching to 100% tilt-based movement, unlimited firing (as fast as you can tap!), and more.
So if you already have Cavern Drake, please update immediately! Otherwise, you can download it for free from the App Store →
P.S....
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Anyone Can Make an App →
Interesting enough, Biffy found this article and it talks about both me and her! It’s about how the Corona SDK makes it easier to develop mobile applications. Oh, and that photo… that’s Biffy painting!
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Tilt Monster on freeAppCalendar.com →
Shortly after the first Corona-made version of the game was released, this game (formerly titled Doodle Dash) was featured on FreeGameofTheDay.com and climbed to #25 in the App Store.
Now, after extensive updates (that was version 1.2, this is version 2.0.1), Tilt Monster is now being featured on freeAppCalendar.com… let’s see how far it climbs this time :-)
Special thanks to Ken...
3 tags
Tilt Monster is Now Free →
Formerly known as Doodle Dash!, the last time we set this game free, it rose to #25 in the App Store charts, let’s see how it does this time :-)
This isn’t a temporary thing. Tilt Monster is now FREE… Tell all your friends!
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BeebeGames Class 1.8 Released →
After releasing Cavern Drake, I was disappointed (and embarrassed) to find out just how many people were experiencing crashes.
Not too long after the game went live, coincidentally, user samlotti posted a reply at the Code Exchange pointing out a major memory leak issue with the destroy() function of my BeebeGames Class (which Cavern Drake uses). After some searching, I found the same issue with...
3 tags
Bubble Ball Surpasses Angry Birds →
Robert Nay, a 14-year old Corona Developer, created and released a free game titled Bubble Ball and as of yesterday, surpassed Angry Birds as the #1 Free Game.
Whether or not it holds that position is irrelevant. The fact that a kid, a one-man development team, had an idea, followed through with it to turn it into a reality in the App Store is amazing enough… but to surpass the App Store...
5 tags
Corona SDK: Revisited
Revisited might be a little misleading, considering the fact that I’ve been using the Corona SDK just about non-stop since I started using it back in July (2010), but I’m going to “revisit” it by writing about just how my experience has gone since I published my first review of Corona mid-September.
So if you haven’t read my first review, I highly suggest you go back and read that first,...
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Biffy's iOS Icon Pack Now On Sale →
At $10, this is the BEST value iOS Icon template pack you can find. 28 high-quality icon elements for you to mix, match, and make your icons look great. At the very least, check out the page and see if the designs could help any of your app icons.
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Cavern Drake 1.0.0 Submitted
It was going to be called Tiny Drake, but finally decided on Cavern Drake instead. This is our first app to include in-app purchases, and by the time it’s approved, it might actually be the first Corona-made in-app purchase enabled app in the app store (there are a total of 11 premium items in the game).
I’ve yet to have an app rejected during the approval process, and with in-app...
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In-App Purchases Work!
I just conducted my first in-app purchase using Corona SDK, and on the Lua side of things (not the iTunes Connect side), it’s just as simple and easy as the Corona docs make it out to be!
I was able to make a purchase using a Test User account, and the item was unlocked in-game afterwards—amazing.
Now that I know it all works great, I should be able to wrap up our next game today...
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Bubble Ball is Ansca's App of the Week →
Congratulations to Nay Games for their app Bubble Ball which had 300,000 downloads its first week—very impressive :-)
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Inconsolata Free Font →
In my opinion, the BEST font to use with coding. I have BBEdit, Textmate, and anything I use for coding set up to use this font. And guess what? It’s completely free to download and use.
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Corona SDK: In-App Purchases & Bitmap Masking
I wouldn’t normally disclose details on a Corona SDK development release, but yesterday, Carlos Icaza asked me to tweet about some of the new things added to the latest development build, so I take that as a thumbs up to start talking about it (and getting some anticipation built up, heheh).
Here are the main things that were added:
In-App Purchases
Bitmap Masking
Needless to say,...
4 tags
Tutorial: Path Finding in Corona →
A very nice tutorial that goes in-depth into a concept that’s very complicated (to me, anyway), but will surely come in handy for many games (the ideas are already popping into my head).
As a side note, the Tutorials+ websites are one’s that I consulted for various things in the past dealing with graphics design concepts, web design, etc. so it’s really nice to see Corona SDK...
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Ugly Bugs Approved and Ready for Sale →
Biffy and I are working hard to release 4 new games by the end of next month, and Ugly Bugs is the first of the bunch.
Keep in mind, we are maintaining a level of high quality despite the fact that these games are being produced very quickly (wouldn’t be possible without the Corona SDK).
Ugly Bugs is a simple arcade game where you simply aim and shoot the alien bugs as they come towards...
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Help Ansca! Take Their Corona Survey →
From the latest Corona email newsletter:
It has some questions on your Corona SDK usage to date, platforms you are using and our upcoming Premium Support offering.
If you use the Corona SDK, I highly suggest you take Ansca Mobile’s survey. The more they know, the better they’ll be able to serve their developers—and I know first-hand that Ansca is all about pleasing their...
