Christmas Magic-al Storybook is now on MangoReader !

Hope this Christmas brings some good news for everyone, it sure did for us and the fans of L'il Pono. For all the people who do not own an iPad, the mesmerising tale of L'il Pono and The Magical Tree is now available on the awesome MangoReader website on PC and on the MangoReader App n the Android store !

MangoReader is a fantastic new platform that is going places with its interactive storybooks and the ability for users to create their own if they wish to. Christmas Magic has also been selected to be part of the Christmas Story pack which is also available as a separate app on the Google Play Store.

Here are the links for the Storybook on PC: http://www.mangoreader.com/#books/3114/christmas-magic

and on the Google Play Store: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mangoreader.thechristmas

So, get clicky on these links and get yourself and your family a warm christmas tale and gift your friends the best xmas gift in town :) !

For people, who want the full epxerience of the game and the storybook, the game app is available on the Appstore for iPad here: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/christmas-magic-+/id587804888?ls=1&mt=8
For people who don't game on the iPad, well, lets say soe awesome news is inbound in just a little more time : wink wink  :)! 

Christmas Magic + is shining bright on the Appstore !

Christmas Magic + , our little baby on the Appstore, is climbing strongly on the ladders of the AppStore ! We are getting steady downloads of around 500 per day (ain't that su-weet !) and steadily climbing. Also, its interesting to see the game performing equally well in non-english speaknig countries too, eg. China seems to like our game as much as the US, which is a surprise to us considering that a major chunk of the game is a storybook in English !

Add to that we have been recieving encouraging reviews and fan mails too.With the festive season in the air and Christmas cheer all around, we are getting messages from fans proclaiming the game as

"The Best Christmas Gift !"

Needless to say, we are feeling very proud of our game these days :) ! Hoping and praying it conquers more milestones as each day passes. More news and surprises will be out soon before the new year arrives !

Happy Holidays, everyone ! 

Spread some Xmas Magic :) : https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/christmas-magic-+/id587804888?ls=1&mt=8#

Christmas Magic + gets featured on the AppStore !

Hey ! Look at this guys :

Thats a direct screenshot from my iPad  !


Christmas Magic + has been featured on the front page of the "kids" section of the Appstore !!!

That is a massive achievement :^) ! We, at P.L.A.Y.-Games, are overjoyed and humbled by this special treatment from Apple ! It feels ecstatic to see our charming little game performing well and winning hearts all over !

Don't miss out on what everyone is talking about, download the game now ! its free to play and wins over everybody's hearts in a jiffy ! Let the magic spread around this christmas !

Download here : https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/christmas-magic-+/id587804888?ls=1&mt=8

Here's hoping we conquer more categories of the Appstore soon and make it to the front page of the main store itself ! Cheers and smiles ! :^)

Christmas Magic rocks the #BecauseWeMay sale !!!

Ta daaa ...Ta ..Daa......................!

Christmas Magic celebrates the #BecauseWeMay sale ! A group initiative of Indie developers to celebrate our independence to price our games as we wish ! The Base game is FREE and all in-app items are upto 70% off from 24th May to 1st June !

We have already hit MASSIVE download numbers on the very first day of the sale : more than 30 times normal  !  and we are already featured on the "Whats Hot" section of multiple AppStore's, under the categories "Puzzles" and "Family" ! Its time to celebrate and rock the world !

So, its parties, Free stuff and Celebrations all this week !
Grab'em all this weekend ! Don't miss out on any in-game item at all ! Go..Go.. GO !!! :D

Clickety-click here :
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/christmas-magic-+/id587804888?ls=1&mt=8

Be Cool ! Be Smart ! Be Magical !!!!!!!  and spread the word far and wide ! Christmas magic has arrived !

Be COOL ! B-) .......and Black Ops 2 Reveal !

Download Here and Be Cool :) ! : https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/christmas-magic-+/id587804888?ls=1&mt=8
      So, guys n gals, how do you like it ? My new comic strip dedicated to Christmas Magic ! This was the awesomesauce that I had been cooking on my lightbox for a few days now and I feel delighted to present it to the world now :) ! The response on Facebook has been superb, with people sharing them around on their walls ! I'll have more of these coming for your wholesome consumption soon , while I also work on my new concept alongside ! Yes ! A brand new game is cooking in the hot hot oven of my head ! Hope I can share some details soon :) !

In other developments, our game, our beloved Christmas Magic was featured in the most popular iOS youtube channel called "TouchGamePlay"! :D Now thats a great development and people in the comments section sure seem excited there  !
Check it out here : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuAeC1_KeQo

Christmas Magic was also featured on "MobileGameFAQs" Twitter channel recently and on another youtube channel called "bbkbest" ! No idea who these guys are but " Guys ! Thanx a lot !" if I could meet you all, I would personally bake a super warm, super sweet home made cake for you guys and deliver it at your doorstep myself ! We need all the visibility we can muster for Christmas Magic ! Every little share counts ! The magic seems to be spreading on its own now as these are impromptu features not influenced by me or anyone in my team.

Also, in gaming news, the new COD has been unvieled, Yes ! Yes ! The BO 2, the much awaited , much touted sequel to BO,  and boy ! after ages of rinse and repeats of the same formula, Treyarch has decided to take a leap of faith and introduce something new here ! A breath of fresh air in a severely claustrophobic room ! He He !

Here's some interesting info I could find out about it :

"For the first time," he says, "player decisions will impact the story."
He explains that this will work in two ways:
Key decisions will have significance from a narrative point of view, but so will skill. How well you do will influence the narrative's outcome. Main squad members and villains' henchmen will live or die depending on what you do and how you do it.

Now thats cool ! Atleast that will bring in some incentive for re-playing the campaign !

Strike Force missions are sets of levels that will shape the outcome of the Cold War between the United States and China. They are non-linear, sandbox campaign missions.
They exist within the single-player campaign's main story.

Strike Force missions are like team-based multiplayer scrimmages — played by one player. The player is able to shift between all available soldiers and robots on his team on a battlefield. You could hop from a rifleman's perspective to a drone to a C.L.A.W. in a matter of seconds, and omniscient overhead view will allow you to give, what looks like, real-time strategy commands. Send this guy here, direct this drone to flank from the right.
The goal is to kill the opposing A.I.-controlled team and complete a series of objectives in any order. When a person dies or a bot is destroyed, it is gone, and you inhabit who or whatever remains. Run out of people or time, and the mission is lost.
We see a Strike Force mission on a shipping dock in Singapore. The mission is to capture the A, B and C points.
The Treyarch employee running the demo makes quick work of the opposition. One moment he's a soldier, the next he's a C.L.A.W. He's flying a drone, now he's a mobile rocket launcher called the Autonomous Ground Robot, or A.G.R.

I found the above part particularly interesting ! THis brings amazing amount of variety in gameplay of a single mission. All these optins of play exist inside a single mission and every player can play it in his own way, working out his own best soultions. Of course, all of this depends on how well the missions are set up and frankly, who knows, all of this might fall flat as COD fans usually might just want to shoot through the mission and get over it ! So much for ingenuity ! Ha !

  I hope people like the changes and the game works out for everyone , because I would love to see a COD that's not a replica of the COD that came before !

 The mulitplayer, the oh-so-loved MP, will have its own reveal and we'll dwell on it later. The only reason I am even mentioning a COD game in my blog is cos this one doesn't seem like a COD game ! Hows that :) ! 
Okay ! So time's up and me has got to get back to his lovely life of plucking flowers and tending to farm animals and singin with the wind....tra la la...la..la  ! Nothing can be farther from the truth but I have got to get back to working out my next game's concept and what can be more exciting than that ! C- Ya !

Breaking News, Concept art and Game Updates !

              Hey ! I am back with some behind-the-scenes concept art of Christmas Magic and some b-r-r-r-r-reaking news !

          So, lets roll ! This image you see up there was pivotal in the development of the concept of the magical tree. Before this we had tried many concepts, some were very unique indeed, but it was this image where, for the first time, we felt we were nearing the vision for the tree. A simple tree, not too high fantasy, not too alien or spooky.....a sense of mystery around it, yet charming and inviting ! Of course, this is not what you finally see in the game, cos we went through numerous revisions and little corrections before finalizing the tree's concept art. The final image will be featured some other day, some other time  ! A little mystery is fun :) !

Otherwise, we have been busy working on the first update for the game. Finally, the update got done last night and has been uploaded to Apple for review. Hopefully it will be live soon !The main changes that have been made are:

• We have made graphical improvements so that it runs better on iPad 1, as we were getting reports it was crashing on first gen iPads. We are still not sure if the crash is fixed or not. I hope it is.
• Also, added support to earn in game goodies like Magic Pots for free by sharing the game on Facebook and Twitter 
• Fixed some text errors ! Yes ! Even after taking so much care that the game is perfect on launch, a small textual error crept in and has been fixed ! Now, you can enjoy the game ni all its dictionary-perfect glory :D !
• and numerous other little fixes which only programmers would care about, so lets not talk about them !

      Thats that, as far as updates are concerned but  what you need to wake up and notice for now is this :

"Christmas Magic has taken the top spot and "Breaking" into the "News" section of GamingXpress.com ! "

Need I say more, just have a look at the shiny, glossy, squeaky clean screenshots on that page :D !:

http://www.gamingxpress.com/newsitem/items/Free_Zen_game_Christmas_Magic_available_for_iPad.html

Yes ! L'il Pono's mission to take over the interwebz is working out neatly. Soon, he will be more famous that all those famous celebrities no one cares about and only likes to read about (wink wink !) ! Pono's innocent face and the warm smile shall conquer every heart, mart, bits, bytes and websites out there !

"
 L'il Pono is all set,
To conquer the mighty internet !
Tra La La...La La !
.....
"
 :D
 and dispelling the mystery right now, here's what the final art looks like :

Ain't that suweeeet !!!!!

Will be back soon with some awesome stuff i have been cooking up on my drawing table ! Hoping you guys will like it and it will set the internet a-blaze !
This is Renegade Singing out !
:)

Click here to download the most popular game on the App Store : Christmas Magic ! :)

L'il Pono sighted on AnimatinXpress.com's front page !

L'il Pono is getting famous(see the new shades he got !) and is in the news again ! Our dearest App Store gem "Christmas Magic" featured as the main story on AnimationXpress.com ! Woohoo ! :D Chk it out !

Free Zen game “Christmas Magic” available for iPad !

                    L'il Pono is going places and is destined for big things in life ! Pono's current mission is total dominance of the App store and the interwebz .........and he will use every weapon of mass communication possible ! Including his killer shades !

In case you still haven't checked out Christmas Magic , here you go:

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/christmas-magic/id483085364?ls=1&mt=8

         Just click on the link above and bask in pure magic !

Now, I have to go control the paparazzi ! :)

The P.L.A.Y. Song :D ! Creative outbursts celebrating 2 weeks of Christmas Magic !

                   

      Christmas Magic has completed a splendid 2 week run in the wild wild web and me and my mates are going head over heels over the achievement ! We have learnt a lot regarding the patterns of downloads on the App Store and the power of "Word of Mouth" publicity. We have not put into action any marketing campaign as of yet and still the game is being downloaded each day, surprising us and positively delighting us each day ! Soon we'll have reviews and articles on various websites. At least we are trying to get them on websites, when they'll finally appear is God's own free will. We are doing as much as we can, but being Indie has its own limitations. Not having an evil corporation funding you means you gotta believe in the motto "Slow n Steady wins the race !" :)

                        Another amusing fact that has emerged from the download stats is that China is a huge market for iPad games. We had no idea about that and since our game has a story book in it in english, we were surprised to see the number of downloads in China rivaling those of the US of A.  Guess the gameplay rules above all and the relaxing Zen gameplay and the charming ambiance of the game is breaking cultural barriers and sweeping everyone off the floor !

Good for us, makes us float with glee :D !

             So, while I was floating around in thin air, smelling sweet perfumes of the fresh spring season, I came up with a song ! Yes ! A song :) ! A song about us gamers, about us game -makers ! Our thrills, excitements, bravado's and laziness !!! Yes, the master of  Zen gaming says we must encompass all aspects of our existence in one perfect song of celebration and present it to the mighty world !

Lo and behold ! Get glued to your monitors, touch your touchscreens and clickety-click your rodents, cos here I present :

The P.L.A.Y. Song !

(Or the song of the gamers n devs !

BTW, the song is to be read in viking voice, complete with all its hoarse sound and proud pronunciations! it has a wonderful effect on the perception of the song ! wink wink !)

Pirates and Princesses

Legends and Lore !

Aliens and Archstones

 Yikes and Roars  !

We sail for the distant lands,

Treasures and Shores,

We slay mighty Monstaars,

We sail some more !

We sail through the hardships,

" All Hands to the Oars !!!"

We date sweet Mermaids,

 Their beauty so pure !

We are  Messy, Ho ! Grimy, Ho !

Grumpy and sore ,

Loot Magic from Everland,

We are hungry for more !

HO ! Ho ! Ho ! Ho !

Rawr ! Rawr ! Roar ! Roar !

Swing ! Swing ! Bang ! Bang !

Swish ! Swish ! Snore ! Snore ! 

We are denizens of Everland,

We never do our chores,

We are gamers , game makers,

Level up n Xplore ! 

Level up n Xplore !! 

C'mon dear Pirates,

My grumpy Ol' mates,

Let’s conquer this Everland,

Let’s claim our Fates !

OMG ! Meh ! meh !

Woot Woot ! For the Win !

let’s unleash those pranky little

 devils from within !

We are pirates, we are zombies,

we are  soldiers, we are  kings,

we are anything thats fun,

we are ideas with wings !

We are denizens of Everland,

We never do our chores,

We are gamers , game makers,

Level up n Xplore ! 

Level up n Xplore !! 

C'mon dear Pirates,

My grumpy ol' mates,

Let’s conquer this Everland,

Let’s claim our Fates !

Level up n Xplore !! 

Level up n Xplore !!

:)

There, there, I can hear the applause all around me already !  By the way, this song can also be enjoyed inside Christmas Magic in the "Extras" menu. Along-with the song you will also find the best part of the game, our mighty names : in the credits ! 

Do check it out on the appstore : http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/christmas-magic/id483085364?ls=1&mt=8

And if you are the  kind of person who loves to watch before he plays, here's what you need :  

Signing off for now ! Will be back with more interesting stuff soon ! :)

Christmas Magic is out ! Celebrations,Jitters,aftershocks and opulent outbursts of a game designer ! :)

Aha ! Its been a long busy time working on Christmas Magic, our mighty game for the iPad, and what do you know : ITS DONE NOW :D ! Yes ! Finally the game is done and out on the App Store now, ready to be devoured and swallowed whole by each and every one of you out there ! :

Link to 'Christmas Magic' shining bright on the AppStore ! Click on Me Now ! :)

( There, see, after having seen this amazing painting from the game, you have to click on the link ;) ! if you haven't, don't worry, I'll provide the link at the bottom of the post too.)

 and just like every game developer/artist/parent, I was jittery about how it would be received by the world wide web of people from all walks of life : Appreciated/Ignored/Detested/Raised an eyebrow at/ Screamed at like mad men or Worshiped like an Inca Goddess ! 

           Thankfully, the reaction is somewhere between "Appreciated" and "Worshiped like an Inca Goddess" ! Phew! The 1037 people who have played it and others who have  seen their friends play it on their shiny iPads(thoughts of stealing the shiny thingie might also come to mind :P) or watched the "oh-so-amazing !" trailer have all appreciated its good looks, great production values, sweet story telling and deeply relaxing and unique gameplay. (A lot of credit goes to Trevor Holms for composing such a mesmersing OST for the game!) A true testament to this appreciation from people, apart from the 5-star ratings, reviews and comments, is the fact that most, almost 50%, of the downloads have happened because of recommendation from friends. Yes ! When we launched the game on the 3rd of April, 2012, we did not have any marketing media ready with us. For the first 3 days, the game was visible in the "New Releases" section of the App Store and we got 600 downloads during that time, but soon it got buried in the flurry of 'newer' new releases. Ever since then, all the downloads have been a result of people telling their friends, their friends telling their friends and so on ! Well, there might have been some who hated the game so much that they recommended it to their arch enemy/nemesis hoping he would die of shock n boredom , LOL , but you get the flow :D ! He ! He !

              This is very very encouraging for us, the whole team, as it means that people who have played it are loving the game and find it worthy enough to be associated with their reputation and hence, are recommending it to others. There is no bigger satisfaction than that for a game designer: the fact that the little idea, the thought that once came in my head, which I trusted, banked upon and nourished, shared with my friends and asked them to believe in it, is finally being loved by the world! Believed by the world ! My little walk in the imagination, a stroke of emotions from my heart on an idle afternoon, a moment when an illusion tried to force itself into the real world inside my head has evolved into an amalgamation of shapes, sounds and colours, of names, places, longings and fullfillment,  that is as real to players now as any other place and person in this physical world ! People talk of L'il pono and the Magical Tree to each other ! People smile when the Tree surprises Pono, get excited when magic starts to flow from Pono's fingertips! They help him out in fulfilling his innocent wishes for a Christmas night and feel the warmth when love flows on the magical night !

   Putting a game out in the App Store is almost like sending your child to school. You have nurtured that little one from when he did not exist to now and now you send him off to the world. Will people like him? what will his teachers say? will his classmates like him? will his teachers like him? will he perform well? Have I brought him up well? Will I be a proud parent ?!
           Ah ! The jitters ! but now its all over !All the anxiety, the fear of judgements is all gone... All that has settled around me now is tranquility and a contended smile :) ! The child has turned out to be a prodigy, his teachers love him, his classmates love him and he is performing really well on his own !

What is needed now is more efforts from us parents ! what is that, you say? Well, marketing, promotions and visibility ! Not for the children in schools heh heh ,but for our game. The first step towards that has been taken and I present to you, Ladies and Gentlemen, Guys n Gals and all the hep n happenin' synonyms for males and females ..........

The Launch Trailer !!!!

The launch trailer in all its ridiculously sharp 720pHD awesomeness  :) ! 

Check it out  :

Watch it, love it , like it , comment on it and spread it all around the net !!!

My burst of happiness has brought about this magical effluent and opulent post of mine after a long time in slumber. I am generally happy these days  and ,well, exhausted, but happily exhausted ! So, you will hear from me again........ and when I am back I will bring around some goodies that can otherwise be accessed only from the game , just for you right here :D ! Till then enjoy the game, if not the game, enjoy the trailer, its just as awesome as the full game .....!!!!!

Link to 'Christmas Magic' shining bright on the AppStore ! Click on Me Now ! :)

First Steps into a Magical World !!!

Hey guys,
We, me and Anmol, have been officially Laughing Mango Games now for quite some time now .
We have been neck deep into making our first game for the iPad since the past many months now and today my first puzzle became playable :) !!!!!! Albeit, its still on the PC and inside our puzzle editor made by our resident genius Anmol, but its a moment of triumph for us and can't express enough about how happy I am right now. Finally, my sketches, drawings and words have taken their first breath of life ! Incubation is almost over, its a living and breathing entity now ! Wow !!!! :D Yoooohoooooo !!!!!

Can't wait to share more stuff with everyone! Here are two screenshots of the puzzle editor. The first one shows the unsolved puzzle, while the next shows it alomst solved and done !!!


























The game is called "Christmas magic" and will be on your devices, mesmerising you all on Christmas ! Oh ! Don't worry about how it looks right now, we'll have worked our magic on it by then :wink: :wink: ! Till then just wait wide eyed and with a smile as big as Santa's sleigh itself ! :-D