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We recently had an opportunity to interview Vladimir of Triple Light Games. The indie developers have recently released their first iPhone title VernX, previewed here. We will have a full review of the game coming soon, but having spent some time with the game already, I can certainly recommend you check it out. – Robert
The Current Gamer: First off can you tell me about your development team, and how you got into game development on the iPhone?
Vladimir:The team consists of my brother and I. Programming is my department while Marko takes care of everything else. We consult on certain things but for the majority of the time that’s how things go. My brother would pitch me his ideas and I would start to implement them. Certain things had to be dropped from the process, you can’t put everything in at once. I am confident that over time we will accomplish all the stuff we set out to do.
The Current Gamer: Do you guys have a background in game development and can you talk about how you got involved in developing games?
Vladimir: We have absolutely no prior history in game development. The only background I have is making windows apps in the past 6 years, so there could be some programming experience there. When I started making the engine I had no idea what I was in for. Such a radical shift from apps to games was a great challenge for me.
The Current Gamer: I am really interested to hear about your inspiration for VernX. Where did you come up with the idea?
Vladimir: It came to me in a dream …. just kidding. I started experimenting with the iPhone SDK and one thing led to another. We figured out the core game play mechanic and decided to expand from there. Our main mission was to create a game that was fun for us.
The Current Gamer: I am especially impressed with the physics in VernX. Can you talk about the engine behind it, and how that all came together?
Vladimir: The physics were a huge hurdle. The VernX Physics Engine is built from scratch, as is everything else. The development process was hugely challenging, I’ve learned a lot from this experience. Some of the toughest days of my life were spent on this game.
The Current Gamer: You have talked a bit about some planned updates for your game. Can you give us some details on what to expect?
Vladimir: We will be adding 25 new levels in our next update. (10 challenge levels, 5 sandbox levels, 10 X-levels) . That will put the total number of levels at 70. [We have additional content planned through to the end of the year.] A lite version will also be coming out, the release date will mostly depend on the approval process.
The Current Gamer: What has been your biggest challenge in launching your first game on the iPhone?
Vladimir: Media coverage has been our biggest problem. That’s not to say that it was easy to make VernX. The community is skeptical when it comes to new iPhone games, but I can’t blame them considering how much shovel-ware is released everyday.
The Current Gamer: You have been very vocal about planning updates around your users feedback, can you talk about this?
Vladimir: We try to stay objective, there’s no point in making a game that isn’t fun. I’m hoping that users can point out things that are not that obvious to us. A different opinion is something I always look forward to. The users are important to us, they have the final say.
