Notes

Mini-minecraft more than A Carbon Copy

New Zealand is a strong country in music, film and literature, yet it has struggled to make an impact internationally in the video games market. Apart from the Wellington-based Sidhe Interactive's popular rugby titles and 1995's cult Megadrive classic Super Skidmarks, the list of Kiwi games that have received international recognition is a disappointingly small.



With contemporary, mass-market games involving multimillion-dollar budgets and the backing of international publishers with huge pockets, it's almost impossible for start-ups to gain an edge, particularly for console titles released via the off-the-shelf stores. With a limited selection of options for domestic developers are concerned, developers with an innovative idea have looked at mobile gaming as a way to make it into the game industry.



Hawke's Bay developer David Frampton is at the leading edge of this new wave of digital entrepreneurs. He's an App Store fan already, having made his mark with Chopper and its imaginatively named sequel Chopper 2. Frampton made headlines earlier in the month for the game that racked up more than a million downloads within three days. It went on to become the No. number one iPad app in 15 countries.



The Blockheads does not have an underlying story, a narrative structure or an overall goal. Blastermusic It's hard to pinpoint the "point" of the game. There's no princess to save or a hostile alien to repel or a plot to unravel. There's no high score or boss to defeat. The game is open-ended and you can explore and imagine. This blank, open-ended approach allows you to make of it what you will, take things at your own pace , and let your imagination run wild.



Although your muted protagonist has no personality, you'll soon find yourself concerned about the cube-headed protagonist because their mood is an essential aspect of the game.



Explore too much without sleeping or eating, and they'll be exhausted and hungry , requiring you to gather resources to create shelter and produce food. As you explore more of the virtual world, you'll come across materials that allow you to create elaborate palaces and more advanced tools.



The game is free to play but its addictive nature makes it an excellent fit for the "freemium" model that a lot of mobile games use. If you have the patience to wait for your blockhead to complete tasks such as building, mining and sleeping, then you won't need to spend a penny However, by investing in the game's currency, "time crystals", you can speed up the process and make more complex objects.



With all the talk about crafting and mining it's difficult to talk about The Blockheads without not mentioning the elephant in the room, another brainchild of an indie band of one man, Markus "Notch" Persson's extremely successful Minecraft. There's no denying the two games share a great deal in common, from the zany low-tech graphics to the emphasis on exploration, resource gathering and creative expression.



When Nelson Mail's Adam Roberts interviewed Frampton earlier this month, online commentators were quick to point out the striking similarities between the two games, inferring and insinuating that The Blockheads was little more than a "Minecraft imitation".



It's normal for people to be quick to draw this conclusion. While there's no doubt that Notch's game was an obvious source of inspiration for Frampton There's much more to The Blockheads that the other copies of cash-in-sploderware that is available on the App Store.



It's also unfair and lazy to rely on the similarities between two games as evidence of plagiarism. Video games, more than any other form of entertainment, build upon the previous works.



As technology improves and trends are more well-known, developers will continue to refine and improve their "work" and get inspiration from the latest games. Similar to how Space Invaders led to a wave of space shooters Super Mario Bros set the trend of side-scrolling platformers and Gears of War opened the floodgates for cover-based shooters, the unprecedented success of an indie blockbuster such as Minecraft will inevitably cause ripples in the industry. It's not plagiarism, it's advancing.



If you're an avid Minecraft fan and you're a Minecraft fan, then you're bound to love The Blockheads but it's more than just a copy. While Minecraft is best played with a mouse and keyboard, The Blockheads' 2-D version of the sandbox with a creative twist genre is perfectly suited to the mobile format and its use of touchscreen controls is well-designed and easy to use.



It's exciting to witness a Kiwi developer making waves within gaming's fastest growing sector. With three wins under his belt, it will also be fascinating to see what Frampton's Majic Jungle Software creates and develops next.



The Blockheads (iPad, iPhone) Majic Jungle Software. It is free to play.


My Website: https://blastermusic.net/