Pocket God Ported to your Desktop

I know I know. I think Apple overloaded with new apps so our updates seem to be going through slower :( Something's Fishy is coming. But to tie you over, we have a surprise. A nearly identical port of Pocket God directly to your desktop.

>> CLICK HERE <<
It's still just a beta, so be kind.

Appvee Review

Some people might remember that Appvee reviewed Pocket God 1.0 when it didn't do much. It was NOT a good review and they expressed skepticism that we'd stick to our update promise. It ended up being a positive thing for us because we took it as a challenge that paid off! Here's there latest review. Thanks, Appvee!

One More Tap Review

THIS is a good review :)

"You know the usual news reports saying that people get bored with their iPhone apps and games, not coming back for a second time, or perhaps a third? Not so with Pocket God by the creative minds at Bolt Creative."

By the way, if you leave a comment stating on the Tap Website in the 1st to 10th place, the reviewer is randomly giving away a promo code.
>> One More Tap <<

ADDITIONAL NOTE: My apologies to everyone..especially One More Tap, I didn't read the instructions very carefully and screwed up their promo give-a-way contest when I mentioned it above. Here are the instructions in his words:

"One More Thing… I have an extra promotional code from the generous developer. I’m thinking of giving this away to a random someone who drops a comment in the 1st to 10th spot. Tell me why you deserve it and will you be a benevolent or vengeful God. Make sure to leave your correct email so that I can send you the code."

So if I created any confusion, I apologize...By the way. This is Allan and not Dave so don't blame him! :)

Updates, Optimization and Open Feint!

Hey guys...well, last week was the Game Developer's Conference and we met a bunch of cool people! By the way, the app most passed around was Flight Control so it was no surprise to us it jumped to number one! Kudos to them. Pocket God has been doing great and over a month in either the number one or number two spot which has meant GREAT sales and solidified the continued development and life of PG. The update-a-week is getting more and more difficult for a few reasons...

The game engine needs a bit of a tune-up. We have finally conquered file size issues but there's some run-time issues popping up (don't forget to restart your iPhone/iPod!), but before we can add anything significant we have to optimize the graphics engine to handle more features. Never fear, we are on it! Also, going forward we want to elevate PG with some major new features, including a stats system, and that will take a bit more development time than an average feature. Thirdly we are starting to integrate a beta of "Open Feint", a community chat/leader-board system., which is WAY cool, but we are unsure of how it will be received by everyone. As long as there is a wi-fi connection, people should be able to use it to chat with other Pocket God players. Also, our first release of this will include a kill-count board. Create an account and login (right in Pocket God), it will automatically start telling you how many islanders have bitten the big one. Very cool!

Anyway, we are still pushing weekly updates but trying to do it strategically in a way that doesn't interfere with our optimization to allow for bigger and better features. So if you can bear with us, we are trying to stay true to the streak we've had so far. There have been some amazing suggestions in this blog and the forums that I think we can use to accomplish this. The next few updates should reflect this. So if we haven't implemented one of the biggies (Tsunami? bigger world?), this is why.

"Something's Fishy" should be out by tomorrow. And we have just finished our latest "March of the Fire Ants"....which will be the first update with the new "Open Feint" chat and leader-board system. Be sure to let us know what you think of it.

P.S. I am behind on adding contest entries to Flickr! Tomorrow I will make it a priority!

iJustine is an app addict!

iJustine, an iphone-crazed woman who answers questions on her youtube channel, claims she is an app addict on her recent episode of ask iJustine, episode #5. While she shows the apps on her iPhone, one of them she plays is yours truly, Pocket God.


Take a look, and enjoy! Thanks Joey for the link.

The Dave Report: 1.11 Something's Fishy

Dave has been working extra hard lately, and the updates are getting more and more optimized. A new TouchArcade thread has been posted, and here is a summary:

"The new (animation) system is critical because the fishing animation is too big to fit in the game so we have to break it into parts to animate (Rod, Bobber, Splash, Pygmy, String) and have them all animate together seamlessly, we started the new system with the Tree animations in A Mighty Wind! but this update really pushed it.


About the actual update, of course its fishing, we wanted to add more of a game too it, but currently its an interactive fishing rod that the pygmy can throw in the water and catch fish with, the bobber is interactive, so you can drag it right and left. The shark can also grab the bobber and drag the pygmy into the water. This might be one of those features that we refine later on, because I think its really cool but we need time to make a good game out of it."

Check out the full thread here.

ngmoco President wished he had the idea....

What a flattering endorsement! In a recent interview with the president of ngmoco, Joystiq asked Neil Young what games that ngmoco didn't make he would have loved to come up with. After saying great games like Fieldrunners and Aurora Feint, he said he wished he thought of Pocket God. More details of the interview will be on Joystiq in the coming days.

This NOT a good review

But it is kinda funny....MobileTechAddicts Review

I suppose the people who bought Kitty Kannon or enjoy your average Bugs Bunny cartoon should be turned in for animal cruelty. Don't worry, since we put this out, we get this kind of reaction sometimes. Some people just don't get (or like) slapstick comedy :) Summary at the bottom? "Do NOT Buy!" and then some jokester in the comments said "Thanks to your review I went out and bought it!" lol.

Video Review

Looks like its a little dated. The boulder is still a boulder and not a meteor, but a slick little review:

Mighty Wind Out

Thanks for your patience!

Apology and New Review

Well, we certainly are starting to get an idea about how much delays keeps people in anticipation! I am hanging my head in shame about it. Really sorry. We based our estimate on apple approval on the last few updates. But it seems that Apple can be unpredictable!. But its actually quite amazing they approve as fast as they do.

So, the second its up, we'll post again to let you know! In the mean time there is an interesting article here regarding the community aspect of Pocket God. They even call it an "iPhone Cultural Phenomenon"...We did that? SWEEET :)

ARS Technica Article

Pics of Islander Toy

Well, actually, it has more of a statuette feel with the 3d printing technology, which is very cool by the way. There is actually a process that manufactures the figure directly from a 3d model, colors and all. These pics taken in Dave's back yard! Pretty neat!

Mighty Wind Delay

Looks like Mighty Wind wasn't pushed through in time for Friday release! But be on the look out for it tonight or tomorrow. We hadn't realized updates could go through on weekends until "Hi, Dracula" went up on Sunday night. Also, I've uploaded the first batch of Desktop Wallpaper entries! Click the link on the right!

iPhone Savior talks to Dave...Appera completes Bolt Creative Profile

They've posted a very interesting article where Dave is interviewed and reveals much about the development and rise of Pocket God.

>> iPhone Savior Article <<

Also James at theAppera finishes up the Bolt Creative profile!

>> TheAppera Article <<

and for good measure, a new review!

>>App Chatter Review<<

Win a Limited Edition Islander Toy!

Create a desktop wallpaper for you chance to win a limited release Islander figure (design below)! The rules are as follows:

• Use your computer image editing software to create a wallpaper 1680 x 1050 with a Pocket God theme.
  
  
• Include the logo and that Pocket God is for the iPhone and iPod Touch for 99 cents on iTunes (see example wallpaper here)
  
  
• Be creative, funny, weird or all of the above. We will be judging on originality, humor and quality.
  
  
• Up to 3 entries per person.
  
  
• Original art is encouraged! However, you can also use any existing art you can find, as well as dig into our Pocket God art collection HERE. Please note: The art is PNG files, a standard in the industry, and can be imported into any image editor or drawing program including Photoshop and Illustrator.
  
  
• Facebook members add it to the Facebook Gallery and name it "Wallpaper Entry-[your name]-[entry number] or email to contest@boltcreative.com by April 5. Please note that accepted entries will be transferred to our Flickr Wallpaper Gallery. It may take a few days for it to be posted, so be patient.
  

Additionally, we'd also like to encourage everyone to do us a favor, next time they are in the apple store, come to our blog and click the link in the margin "Wallpaper Gallery" and select the image you created (or others created) and control-click it and select "Set to Desktop Image" from the drop down. Take a picture and send it to us! Check out Dave's pics from the Apple Store!

So get artistic and send us your desktop wallpaper masterpiece! And here's the design of the limited edition of the Islander Figure:


Note: this is the 3d model. The actual toy will be manufactured using "3d Printing" technology, which gives the figure a more grainy texture.

Dave Report from the Forums: 1.10

Here is a preview of the TouchArcade that was posted:

"So, this week was kind of a milestone for us, we released 10 updates in 10 weeks and our 11th update is in review right now. It’s kind of funny that our new update is about hurricanes because that's exactly what it has felt like since we started in January.



This was a fun one to work on for me, the last few have been fairly heavy on the art side, but this one was mainly a programming effects based update. We have wanted to do Hurricanes for a while but I've been a little concerned that I wouldn’t have the time to do it justice, but once I got into it and created the initial algorithm for doing the whirlwind, everything just started falling in place and Sunday night it all just came together at the last minute like usual. I think you will like it, it’s pretty interactive and the pygmies look awesome when they are being whipped around in three dimensions."

Full Forum Posting

The APPERA makes Dave and Allan Developers of the Month!

The Appera is a very cool site to get to know the inside works of iPhone app and game development. James "Superbad/Oreo" Isabel recently came to us and asked for inside info on the making of Pocket God and we gave it to him. This is a multi-part piece, and the link below is to view part one! Thanks James!

>> CLICK HERE TO READ ARTICLE <<

Fox News Talks Pocket God!

I believe this is their pilot episode of mobile reviews and picked Pocket God as their first review! Be sure to click on the 5th star if you like the video!

iPhone App Reviews.net gives PG props!

Chris J at iPhone App Reviews revises his opinion about Pocket God! We actually got a kick out of his prior review...Even with criticisms, his sharp wit had us laughing. This time around he highlights the improvements we've made over the last few weeks and gives them a thumbs up!

"The key to Pocket God’s success lays primarily with the steady updates. Updates have been arriving about once per week, and there have been five updates since I first reviewed Pocket God, hence my updated review. These updates expand the capabilities of app and broaden the experience."

He also talks about the crazy blogging, facebooking and youtubing going on here. Thanks, Chris!

CLICK HERE TO READ!

iTunes App Store Promo!

Pocket God has arrived! Well, kinda....we are at least worthy of a promo splash on the app store! We are a little confused since we submitted this art to Apple in Europe, but we aren't gonna argue. Thanks, Apple!

Macworld Reviews Pocket God!

"The joy of Pocket God is discovering all the stuff you can control. Tap on an islander, and he responds as if poked. Tap and hold, and you can drag him up into the sky, spin him around as fast as you can, or fling him into the ocean water. Aim right, and you can fling the poor guy right into the volcano in the background. That starts the volcano smoking. Toss a few more islanders in, and... well, I'll let you find out for yourself."

Its a pretty cool review! Thanks, Lex Friedman!
Click here!

Hi, Dracula! Now Available

The latest update is up on the app store! In this episode, a mischievous vampire bat turns a sleeping islander into a rampaging vampire. The update was inspired by the app "iDracula" which we think is an awesome game. By the way, we are getting a lot of people saying their ipod is not compatible with Pocket God. iPhones and iPods SHOULD be able to get Pocket God, but they must have the 2.2 firmware upgrade! You should be able to get that from iTunes.

Pocket God goes Plush!

Eric Sazo is a Pocket God fan and made himself a really cool Islander Plushie and put it up on youtube! Very cool. Thanks for sharing Eric!



Note: I just caught a note from Eric on my Facebook account that he wanted to make sure people know his mom helped! What a good son! Great job, Mrs. Sazo!

iMac Carly shows current functions

Found this video on youtube which gives a nicely spoken overview of the current release of Pocket God, thought I'd share it for those who don't know about them. Thanks iMac Carly!

1.09: Hi! Dracula

1.09 has been submitted, a little late due to a crash...

"Hey Everyone, a little late today with the preview thread but today has been a really busy day. We needed to resubmit our Hi Dracula! update today, I'll talk about that toward the end of the post but for anyone who isn't sure about what the new update is about. Hi Dracula! is a homage to iDracula, the game that was sitting at the top spot while we were at #2. We really love the game and thought it would be fun to do something relavant and quick with this update.

Hi Dracula will have lots of cool stuff, if you tap the moon, a vampire bat will come out and bite a sleeping pygmy turning him into a vampire. the Vampire Pygmy will then throw all the other pygmies off the island until you boot him off or turn the scene to daylight. If the sun is in sunset position, he just gets worried and begs you not to put the sun up, if it goes to full daylight, he burns and then eventually turns to ash and explodes. We also added the eclipse this update, which will safe the vampire by shielding him from sunlight.

For the next update, here's a tease. We are going to do an old school pocket god update.

oh yea, about the resubmit. We found a bad crash bug in Sundays build, so I had to fix it today (thats why I was lurking). So Hi Dracula will probably be out a week from today. Maybe Monday night, Maybe Tuesday. We'll try and get back on track, but I think its safest for us to finish our updates and have them be ready to submit on Sunday night, but have Monday and Tuesday to test for crash bugs. I think Tuesday night will be our new submit date."

http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?t=6767

All your questions shall be answered

If you have a question, check the FAQ before asking it. The FAQ is below:


Q: How can I get all of the episodes?

A: An episode is actually an update to the previous game. For example, if you have episode 8, you will get everything from episode 7 and below. The episode title displayed at the start up is the name of the newly added feature.


Q: Do I need to buy new updates/episodes?

A: No, you do not. Once you purchase the game, all updates come free of charge.


Q: Where can I find a review for Pocket God?

A: When you click on the logo in iTunes, a customer rating will appear. Also, pocktgod.blogspot.com and twitter.com/pocketgod mentions each review that is known to us.


Q: Why doesn’t my icon in iTunes match the one on my iPod/iPhone?

A: The icon in iTunes is updated every week, with the one that was used in iTunes the prior week being shifted to the iPod. Theoretically, the iPod icon will be one behind the updates. We want to do a stellar job on the icon and don't want to rush in the process, or end up delaying the updates.


Q: Can I make a review for Pocket God?

A: Why, yes you can! When you do, send us a link and we will put it on the blog, along with the Twitter account.


Q: Pocket God slows down/crashes on my iPod, is there a problem?

A: Don’t panic! Pocket God uses a lot of animation, using a lot of memory in the process. Homebrews, like clippy, backgrounder, and springboard customization apps will cause the app to run out of memory. This also occurs for jailbroken phones as well. Some have reported success in safe mode, but people should stop these app from startup.


Q: I need Pocket god info! Where do I find it?

A: You can find all the Pocket God info you need at the following:

Pocketgod.blogspot.com

Twitter.com/pocketgod

Facebook.com/group.php?gid=61725594788

Youtube.com/boltcreative

And the Youtube videos keep coming!

More video love on youtube. This one features some of the new stuff. The weird thing is that, again, hair band Europe's song "the final countdown" is used. I'm not sure what the connection is, but thanks, Gazzy46!

Leo Laporte's App Pick of the Week; Other Podcasts

Leo Laporte, formerly of TechTV, recommended Pocket God as his App Pick of the Week in the podcast, MacBreak Weekly. Touch of Gaming Episode 22 reviewed Pocket God, saying "there is no reason for you not to buy it at 99 cents". Stay tuned for more podcasts and reviews as they come in.

Touch of Gaming: http://touchofgaming.com/
MacBreak Weekly: http://twit.tv/mbw130

New update!

Idle Hands is now available in the app store and we've just submitted "Hi, Dracula!" which should come out end of week or early next.

In case you haven't noticed with Idle Hands, there is a new menu that allows you to turn certain functions on and off. There were many complaints that the island was getting too crowded, or the gravity was annoying in certain situations, plus various other similar issues, so we wanted to install a menu system that turns things on and off and gives you way to access certain functions. This menu will eventually have categories and drill-down menus, but as yet there isn't enough to warrant that. Also you MIGHT notice, if you leave them alone, the islanders are now doing other things besides staring straight ahead. They might wave at you, they might look around in curiosity, or even get a little gassy. Dave also spent a while on the gravity situation. There were a LOT of complaints that the boulder (now a meteor) and coconut weren't affected, so he did a really cool job of fixing that. Try turning the island upside-down with the meteor, watch it drop off..turn it back right side up and it comes back!

And today marks week 2 in the number one spot! We can't believe we're still up there as our expectations have been more than exceeded! Thanks everybody for the fantastic word of mouth. I'm still playing catch up this week but will make an effort to read through all the most recent comments. We've definitely created a monster with the blog/facebook/youtube/flickr accounts and its a lot for us to keep up on. We really appreciate your participation! -A

Apple Approved Update But iTunes Not Updated

Hey guys, don't ask me why but there's a weird delay. Usually how it works is we receive notice that the update is approved and then we update our info and within the next couple hours the actual binary is in place for everyone.

I see we have a ton of emails and comments to field and will get to it later today. We did another late nighter getting an update together which has been submitted. Both Dave and I have other projects taking our time today but I will get to the comments tonight or tomorrow morning.

Also there are submissions for the fan art Flickr! Thank you! I will update that too later as well.

Fan Art!

Pocket God enthusiasts get artistic! These are really amazing! If you have an artistic impulse for Pocket God, definitely help us add to the gallery! Special thanks to Tom Fratelli, Tom Fagan, Masgroomes97, Palfince and JC Tapper!



Note: if I somehow miscredited, please let me know in the comments. Thanks!

P.S. There was a request for the high res icons 512x512. You can find them HERE.

P-P-P-Pocket God!

A fan wrote us a little song.

Click here

Defending the Coconuts!

Okay, so this is the video made me laugh very hard. Blurry, yes, but not only is Ryan K. completely maxing out on the craziness of pocket god, but he set it to an 80's hair band song, Europe's "the final count down"....this appeals to every level of awesome IMHO. Do us a HUGE favor. go to his youtube and give him props. Thanks Ryan K.!

ATTENTION! Another Delay

We submitted on Monday (as opposed to the usual Sunday), which in the past meant it came out on Friday, but it looks like it didn't get pushed through yet. I mean, I can see why Apple would make us a low priority. After all, we're only the number 1 app in the U.S. Store! For now anyway. Sorry everyone. I was really anxious for it to come out because we want to see how people feel about the menu system before we expand on it. By the way, there has been concern that the menu stays open. It does not. the triangle in the upper corner opens it and closes it.

Another feature that I keep forgetting to mention is that we're starting to include persistent preferences. All your settings (if you left it with the shark turned off and the storm clouds up) are remembered after you close Pocket God and open it the next time. We are setting it up for new features, like customization, so its just the beginning.

We're going to try to make sure this next update goes in on Sunday so we don't have two delays in a row. Look for "Idle Hands" on Monday and give us your thoughts! Don't forget everyone....every update is free, so if you buy it today you get all the subsequent updates. Here's a sneak preview of the new icon. If you see this in the iTunes App Store, the update has gone through. (Not on your iphone or ipod, that will change to the Shark icon).

Cool Review

Thanks for the awesome review, Dereck!

Bon Jovi and Pocket God

Pocket God in a blaze of glory!

1.08- Idle Hands

"Testing went a little longer this time so it went out Monday night instead of Sunday. This means that it will probably come out on Friday instead of Thursday.

So, this update was mainly a house cleaning update, we added a new menu that we will build on over time that allows you to disable any features that are getting in your way (sound, earthquake, boulder, etc). Over time, we will build each of the items into categoires so we can swap the boulder with some other island hazard, or swap the shark with something else like a sea monster. there has been some debate about the location of the button that opens the menu, so it would be great if you post your opinions when it comes out (like there is a chance that you won't ).

The other main update was to add gravity to all the other objects on the island, so the boulder, shark, and coconut all get affected by the tilt controls. and we fixed a bunch of the bugs that have been posted as well. btw, it really helps us when you find and post bugs for us, we keep a list of items and fix them whenever possible."



Check out what people are saying and what else Dave had to say at:
http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?p=115957#post115957

Iphone savior pleased by Pocket God

Check out the good review received from them:

www.iphonesavior.com

And the Pocket God T goes to...

Our "Get Your Face on the Book" contest is over!!

1st place- Christian Dos Reis Brandao- 30 referrals
2nd place- Aaren Smith- 23 referrals
3rd place- Clayne Scheidigger- 16 referrals
4th- Nicola van Koppenhagen- 5 referrals
5th- Calum Stewart- 4 referrals

Winners will be notified shortly!!

The Appera Congratulates Pocket God!

Very fun announcement at theAppera.com here:

CLICK HERE!

Add Another Review to the list...

http://www.touchmyapps.com/2009/03/02/pocket-god-in-review-a-very-good-source-of-laughter-especially-during-these-times/

A great review everyone should check out!

Holy cow! Pocket God #1 app on iTunes!

Who knew a bunch of hapless island creatures could kick so much butt? After stalling at number two for about week, somehow we hit number one in the U.S.. Again, who knows for how long, but we'll take it! To all the kids (and adult kids) who've been giving us feedback, suggestions, criticism, praise, thanks for helping our iPhone app! We're a little overhwelmed by the sheer volume of suggestions/wants/fixes but we're definitely listening! This next release, we're starting to gear Pocket God up to handle more features by adding a new user interface menu which will allow you to toggle on and off your god powers, plus we fixed some gravity issues. These seemed to be very important to a lot of people. Just for fun (and to give the artist something to do), we've also added new personality elements to the islanders. The screenshot above is a sneak preview and the release won't be out till late in the week. Going forward...Besides new god powers, in the works is a stat/point system so don't worry, Zach! Thanks again!