Posted by Ross
Thu, 24th Jan 2013
Hi everyone. Welcome back to the Laughing Jackal Blog. It’s been really interesting hearing some of your thoughts on Trophies so thank you to everyone who voted in our polls or replied to us on Twitter with your opinions.
This week I thought I’d talk a little about our forthcoming update for the iPhone version of Hungry Giraffe which we are currently preparing.
So, what will we be offering in this update? We’ve got two new superb skins for you to use in your climb through the canopy, including a long-necked emu and a slippery snake.
And that’s not all as we’ve also added 15 brand new upgrades to aid you in your quest for the finest food you can eat. From extra hard hats to stronger chillies this update contains everything a giraffe could want.
Some of you may have noticed that Christmas has now ended :) and as such we will also be returning Hungry Giraffe to its classic look by removing the festive theme. So those of you who would like to try out the special Christmas version of Hungry Giraffe should hurry over to the iTunes Store before it’s too late. The iPhone version of Hungry Giraffe is still free, so what have you got lose?
However it won’t be free for much longer. When the next update is launched we will be switching Hungry Giraffe from a free to play model and will be charging 69p to purchase the game. I’m afraid that given the low number of people buying in-app purchases within the game, despite it being a popular title, we are no longer able to justify giving it away for free. This means that you have until the launch of the new update to pick up the best giraffe feeding game of all time. So what are you waiting for?
That’s all for now. I’ll be back next week but until then you can join us on our Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Google+ pages where we will be posting all the news from Laughing Jackal.
Posted by Ross
Thu, 17th Jan 2013
Hi everyone. Welcome back to the Laughing Jackal blog. :)
I’ve spent a considerable amount of time over the past week testing the Trophy system for one of our upcoming Vita games, causing me to take some time to think about Trophies and Achievements.
I must admit, when they were first introduced I was dubious as to the value of Trophies. After all, shouldn’t your sense of achievement come via the game itself?
However, since those early days I must admit I’ve come to enjoy trophy hunting and while I don’t base my gameplay or purchasing decisions around them (unlike one of our former producers!) I do find myself checking my Trophy score every so often and smiling when I see a message pop up telling me I’ve earned a Trophy.
Having spoken to a few of you over on Twitter and Facebook it seems like most of you enjoy them too, with only one person telling me that they weren’t really interested in Trophies.
As a developer we fall firmly on the ‘Pro Trophy’ side of the fence and many of our minis such as Hungry Giraffe include in-game achievements for you to unlock (Hungry Giraffe also featured in-game achievements in the iOS and PSM versions.) We also really enjoyed setting up the Trophies and Challenges in Cubixx HD.
Of course, the decision of whether to include Trophies is somewhat dependent on the platform chosen. Indeed they are required on some platforms.
A more interesting question is how hard Trophies should be to unlock and this question is why I took to Twitter. Most people who replied seemed to want either a mix of difficulties, with a few for the more casual player but some harder ones allowing pros to show off their skills. Lots of you wanted us to concentrate on the harder Trophies and there were a few comments asking us to avoid grinding.
But what do you all think? Were Cubixx HD’s Trophies too hard or just about right? Do you prefer a larger amount of lower value Trophies, or fewer big-scoring ones? Why not let us know in the comments or you can vote in these handy Facebook polls?
That’s all for now. I’ll be back next week but until then you can join us on our Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Google+ pages where we will be posting all the news from Laughing Jackal.
Posted by Ross
Thu, 10th Jan 2013
Hi everyone. I hope you all had a good Christmas and New Year filled with lots of gaming of course. :) Since this is the first Laughing Jackal blog of 2013 I thought it might be fun to take a look back at last year before mentioning a few of our plans for 2013.
There was a bit of a giraffe theme to 2012 as everyone’s favourite Hungry Giraffe made it on to three different platforms over the course of the year, starting of course with our first release of the year on PlayStation minis all the way back in February.
2012 also saw the launch of the Vita but while I got one upon release it wasn’t until the advent of PlayStation®Mobile that we got to take advantage of the new platform as we brought 3 of our most popular minis - Cubixx, OMG-Zombies and, of course, Hungry Giraffe - to PSM. All three games benefited from graphical upgrades, with OMG-Zombies in particular looking significantly better in its new incarnation.
After this excitement we again returned to Hungry Giraffe,making it not only our first iPhone release, but also our first ever free-to-play game. With a whole raft of new features included at launch (and even more introduced in our amazing Christmas Update )Hungry Giraffe is a must for all you iOS gamers out there. :) So, if you haven’t had a chance to check it out yet why not download it from here and give it a try?
We also finally managed to remove the Coming Soon button from the Store section of the Laughing Jackal website as we launched a range of stylish Laughing Jackal T-Shirts, which can be viewed here. At the time of writing the OMG-Zombies design is still our best selling T-Shirt but with 12 different designs to choose from there’s something for everyone (or at least everyone who fancies wearing some Laughing Jackal artwork. :))
That’s it for our look back at 2012, but I believe I promised you that we would be taking a brief look at some of our plans for the coming year. :)
In the near future we will be releasing another new update to the amazing iPhone version of Hungry Giraffe and this one will be jam-packed with new features and skins. We’ll be detailing exactly what will be contained in this update in the coming weeks so stay tuned. Of course it won’t all be updates, as we’re also going to be releasing our second iOS game: a new version of a Laughing Jackal classic.
Not that we’ll be abandoning PlayStation as we currently have three different Vita titles in the works, including of course the infamous “Mystery Game X”. So remember to keep your eyes on our blog for all the latest news from Laughing Jackal.
You can also join us on our Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and Google+ pages where we will be posting all the news from Laughing Jackal.
