Two Weeks On: A Round-Up

It's just over two weeks since Mush was launched, so we thought it was time for a round-up of what's been going on!

The game is continuing to get a positive response on the Marketplace, currently sitting at #5 in the US and #6 in the UK under "Top Games". We seem to have divided the audience a little - in particular, we've picked up that a few players would like the game to be longer and more difficult - but overall, we can't complain about average ratings of 4.5 stars! Here are a few of our favourite comments...

"Great job guys this game is adorable BTW im a 17 year old guy who loves skyrim and BF3 and this game makes my heart turn to mush (in a good way ^_~)" - Player741572160

"The best game on WP! I am proud to be a WP user when I play this! The greatest use of an accelerometer or a touch screen I have ever experienced in a game. This is mobile gaming!" -  sizeXLundies

"Absolutely wonderful game!! Only thing that can make it better is more levels!! WP needs more games of this calibre." - NaturedPond

"I'm CloudLXXXV, & i approve this game!" - CloudLXXXV

"Great game. Super slick visuals. A fun and original platformer. Easy to pick up but be warned, very difficult to put down." - Pushie Slim

We've had a few more reviews too:
8.5/10 on PocketGamer.fr
77% on All About Windows Phone

And our favourite description so far:
"[Mush is] a sweet and sincere little snack that's charmed its way onto my list of the most delightful experiences Xbox Live on Windows Phone 7 has to offer." from Kotaku, where Mush was Gaming App of the Day earlier in the week!


Of course, much as we love the glittering praise, not every comment can be complimentary. Luckily, we know that criticism is equally (if not more!) important in helping us improve our games - not to mention keeping our egos in check - so all feedback is very much appreciated :)

That's it from us for now. We're having a Mango meeting tonight and will be discussing possible updates for Mush, so do hop on Twitter and give us a shout if you have any suggestions for things you'd like to see!

Over and out.

Develop Highlights

As promised, here are some photos of our highlights from Develop. Apologies for the slightly bad quality on some of these, it's definitely time to upgrade our photography equipment.

Despite the relentlessly horrible weather, we had a great time at the conference, catching up with a lot of the usual suspects on the indie game dev scene and also making some new acquaintances. We enjoyed checking out the indie showcase games, particularly gawking at Lume's beautiful artwork and racing our international squirrels. We'd also like to take this chance to say congratulations to all the award winners. :)

Kate enjoying a very refreshing paddle in the sea...

Ahmed managing not to get his feet wet...

Dan Da Rocha of Q.U.B.E. fame, leading a very interesting panel discussion...

...with a mystery guest (thanks to Kate's unrivalled photography abilities)...

It's Henry!

Managing to make sense despite being a little worse for wear...

People milling around...

Fellow Newport Alumni Toxic Games accepting the Indie Showcase Editor's Choice award...

Henry chilling at the end of an exhausting few days, engrossed in Neighbours...

Little does he know that he is also being watched....

What a pair.

In further news, we've enlisted some help from our knitting maestro friend Miss Cox to produce some prototype Mush-andise. Well, it's more for us than anything, but we will share photos of our progress and you can let us know what you think!

Finally, our artist Kate will be attending GDC Europe again this year, so give us a tweet if you want to catch up in Cologne!

Mush Day One!

Well, one day on the Marketplace and we've already had an amazing response :)

Thank you so much to everyone on Twitter for the awesome comments, and to everyone reviewing Mush on the Marketplace too - we love reading your feedback!

We've had a bunch more coverage in the games media (this article on Hookshot Inc. being one of our favourites...), and you can have a listen to us on BBC Radio Wales (around 2 hours 55 minutes in).

We've also been psyched to hear from some true fans - hope to have some pics to post up soon, and if anyone else has any fan photos or artwork, please send it our way and we will be more than happy to put it up here! We honestly can't get enough.

Also also, we're always talking here about what funky Mush merchandise we could make (it's been a bit of an obsession ever since we hand made these..) What about a Mush beanbag? Or a pom pom hat? Tweet your suggestions @angrymango :D
  

Press Coverage, Thank You's

Did we mention that Mush is out next week and we're super excited?!

Here's some of the coverage we've had so far...

BAFTA award-winning Windows Phone game Mush out next week - Edge
Dare to be Digital veterans see debut title published - Develop
The Xbox LIVE for Windows Phone title on July 4th is the adorable Mush from Angry Mango - WPCentral
Mush for Windows Phone coming July 4th - Go Windows Go
Mush will be released on July 4th - our pals at the University of Wales Newport

Award-winning Mush heading exclusively to Xbox LIVE on Windows Phone this July 4th - AppModo
Mush is coming soon to Xbox LIVE on Windows Phone! - Gamercast

And another bit of shameless self-promotion from Kate: Mush Launching On Windows Phone July 4th! - PlayXBLA

We've also had a great response on Reddit, thanks for all the lovely comments!

Over the next couple of weeks, we'd really like to share some stuff with you - not just us getting hyped, but also a bit of reflection on our experiences and what we've learned, both technically and personally.

But, before we get to that, there is something else we need to do. It really has been quite a journey, and one that we could not have completed without the support of a lot of people. We know these thank you's can be long winded, but we've been waiting to do this for two years, and ask you, just this once, to kindly indulge us ;)

In no particular order:

We'd like to thank the University of Wales Newport, for running an awesome course and setting us on the right path. To Barry Atkins, for helping us get to the BAFTAs and generally speaking a lot of sense, to our tutors Corrado Morgana and Richard Hurford for generally speaking a lot of nonsense and their ever-sunny dispositions. Thanks also to Mike Reddy, whose persistent emailing prompted us to get involved in events like X48 and Dare to be Digital.

Thanks to the University of Abertay for seeing the potential in us and giving us the vital launching platform to begin our careers.

Thanks to the Dare to be Digital teams of 2010. We hate to write in clichés (honest!) but you made the experience worth it, and we still miss you guys!

Thanks to all the members of the indie dev and games press community who have given us advice and encouragement, and helped spread the word.

Thanks to the UK Microsoft mobile team, for supporting us from the beginning and helping us to go from a student team with a prototype to a professional game development team.

Thanks to the team at Microsoft Studios, not just for giving us a commercial opportunity that we never imagined we would have, but also for your patient support and encouragement.

Special thanks to our families, who housed us and fed us through many late night sessions of caffeine-driven crunching, and the friends and loved ones who put up with all our stressing and obsessing.

Thanks to everyone who helped us out with translations, whose hard work has enabled us to release the game in six different languages!

And lastly, thanks to everyone who came to see us and play the game at the various events we've attended  - particularly the kids, whose delight made us smile when our optimism was all but spent.

You have each, in some way, been crucial in getting us to where we are.

4th July: Mush Release Announced!

Mush will be hitting the Windows Phone Marketplace on Wednesday 4th July!

We told you we had super exciting news, and boy, we weren't lying. We've been positively dying to tell you this all week, and now the time is here we can finally relax. Or continue bouncing of the walls like hyper children. Whichever.

Read Microsoft's official announcement and an interview with me (Kate Killick) here and check out our shiny new website!

Better still, it means we can finally unleash this beauty: feast your eyes on the official Mush trailer!

We also have a bundle of screenshots for you and, for any press reading this, head over to the press kit page for tons of downloadable goodies, including press releases, promo art and delightful mug shots. You can also get in contact with us at our shiny new address: press[at]angrymango[dot]com for any information or inquiries, or just to tell us to calm down.

Awesome Games Dev Show!

It's safe to say that the Wales Games Development Show yesterday was a hit! We had a great time - not only did we get to chat to our fans (and we did meet some real fans!), and watch some very interesting talks, but we also got to see a lot of what is going on in Wales at the moment. And it is a lot! We were certainly not the only ones surprised to find so many exciting things happening in the industry around South Wales, and we really hope that there are more events like this to bring devs together. There is definitely a buzz about Cardiff at the moment, and we can't wait to see how the games dev scene there grows over the next few years.

You can check out the photos on Flickr and Facebook - we were pretty busy in between getting to talks, manning the stand and checking out the other games, so if any other attendees have photos from the event, we'd love to see them!

Finally, thanks to the organisers for a great day and, it has to be said, a cracking buffet lunch.

Mush at E3 & Wales Game Development Show

Yes, if like us you were glued to E3 coverage earlier this month, you may have noticed one fuzzy little guy making his way on the scene! Unfortunately we couldn't make it over to Los Angeles – we're just too busy loving the wet British summer – but you can take a peak at the folks from WPCentral having a go here.

We are also exhibiting tomorrow at the Wales Games Development Show, along with our friends at Toxic Games and a bunch of other cool devs. If you didn't manage to nab a ticket in time, they have unfortunately sold out now – but for those who did, make sure you come over and say hello!

Finally, we have some very exciting news that we will be revealing in the very near future. We're pretty sure you'll be excited too :)

GameCity

The end of October is always a time we look forward to at Angry Mango - not for Halloween (although we are partial to fancy dress), but rather to the most exciting games industry event of the year: GameCity. For those who don't know, GameCity is an independent game festival held in Nottingham each year, and includes a variety of awesome events - from interesting and inspirational talks from big indie names, to street events that take over the city, to social evenings of crazy games like Joust and B.U.T.T.O.N.

This year, we were lucky enough to be showcasing Mush on the phone in the main tent for a total of five hours. It's always fantastic to get members of public playing the game, in particular seeing kids get so excited about it! For the first time, we were even handed some Mush fan art:

This inspired us to invite other visitors to draw some art on the blackboard by our display:

A huge thanks to everyone who came along to see us!

We also had a brilliant time taking part in other events, such as seeing the UK premier of the fantastically creative film Kooky, speaking on the Guardian gamesblog breakfast on Thursday alongside industry legend Richard Lemarchand (Naughty Dog) and my personal inspiration, Robin Hunicke (That Game Company), and watching Mush being played by Eric Chahi (From Dust)!

Sadly, it's all over now for another year. If you missed it, put next year's festival in your diary NOW - and Keep an eye out for the festival write up on the Guardian.

Mush is alive!

Yes indeed, Mush is alive and well and, what's more, it was officially announced as an Xbox LIVE title at Gamescom last month! Mush was showcased along with thirteen other titles, which you can read all about here, at the Windows Phone 7 booth and it has been featured on this awesome Xbox LIVE trailer!



The news seems to have had a pretty positive response from the media again (wpcentral, among others), and it's great to be back in the limelight, shown alongside such fantastic titles as Kinectimals, after beavering away quietly for so long! We can also tell you what it is we've been doing (other than completing our studies), such as adding a fresh new interface for the Windows Phone 7, those all important achievements and polishing a-plenty.

In the many months since posting, there has of course been two other very exciting events for us! Firstly, we had the privilege of attending the GAME BAFTAs back in March, which was a fantastic evening and a fitting culmination of our Dare to be Digital experience. Sadly, the only trophies we came away with were the complimentary chocolate BAFTAs, which were a bit smaller than the real thing but nevertheless very tasty, but a (belated) congratulations is in order for the Ones to Watch winners, That Game Studio. The second event was our win at BAFTA Cymru in May (that's BAFTA Wales for any non-Welsh speakers!), at which we received the New Media Award against competition from the BBC and Ethos Creative.

We promise that Mush isn't too far away, and more amazing updates will be coming your way soon!

We have a lot of thrilling news since the last blog post :)

After what seemed like a very long term last term working pretty solidly on Mush, with the aid of many energy drinks and the 24 hour corner shop, we managed to complete the game by the Christmas holiday and have a much, much needed break. Although the original plan was to submit Mush to the Marketplace in time for Christmas, we are currently discussing some exciting options with Microsoft, and unfortunately this has meant pushing back the release of the game.

We have also this week sent off a BAFTA goodie box!



As well as the phones and Zunes for the judges to play with, we included some promotional materials to help demonstrate marketability - hopefully the plushies will be as popular as they were at ProtoPlay! It also includes the brand new promotional video, which will be available for your viewing pleasure in the not too distant future...

And finally, if you've already bought your February edition of Edge magazine, you might already have found Mush in the preview section. If not, I would recommend it!

Progress and New Images

So we've been in development a good few months now and we've learnt to realistically schedule (and work unrealistic hours) but we seem very much on track.

Most of the progress has been behind the scenes with level design, phone integration and some tasty new features that we'll announce shortly.

Here's a concept piece for a new world theme:



And here's a new level select screen, giving a sneak peek of how many levels will be in the final version:

GameCity - The Lounge

Work is as intense as ever with the 10th December deadline beginning to loom. We've been mainly focusing on adding new content, creating some mega awesome levels and integrating a brand spanking new emotion to really mix things up.

The last few days we've been showcasing in the lounge down at GameCity in Nottingham. Having regular Vietnam-style flashbacks of ProtoPlay and intensely trying to sell the game to 5 year old's as if they were games industry veterans was an interesting experience. Note to self, this is no longer a competition and kids don't dig elevator pitches. All the same, everyone seemed to enjoy Mush and we got to meet some great people.



The highlight of the event for me had to be seeing Keita Takahashi playground designs. That and working with Studio Output in developing the Mush brand and how we should approach our viral video campaign.

Also, keep your eyes open when looking through Edge. There should be a delightful upcoming surprise.

Lots of Exciting News

It's been quiet here on the Angry Mango blog for the last few weeks, and whilst I'd like to tell you that we've all been having a nice relaxing break, putting our feet up and watching Neighbours, the reality is that there has been little downtime in which to recover from the emotionally draining climax of Dare to be Digital. So here is an update of what has been going on behind the scenes and, more importantly, the plan for the coming months.

With four of us now back in Newport for third year, this week has been one of planning and scheduling. The new goal in mind is now finishing and releasing the game, which involves not only reworking some aspects of the prototype but also introducing an entirely new emotional theme and mechanic. With a shiny new level editor, a phone development model, a strict schedule and as close to nine to five working hours as possible when juggling final projects and dissertations, we are confident in aiming for a Christmas release.

Thanks to Microsoft we have had some awesome opportunities to get involved in industry events such as the WP7 developers conference in London, PDC 10 in Seattle and, excitingly, the WP7 UK launch party. We are also investigating the possibility of attending Game City 2010, which is a free public event, so we will keep you posted on that.

And there is yet another exciting piece of news! With all this professional experience we feel we have reached the logical point at which to officially open as a business. At these early stages we are still researching seeking advice from various sources, but it is pretty certain that within the next few weeks Angry Mango will be a legal company.

That's all for now, since we need to get a good night's sleep for a full day of work tomorrow - and every day - until the end of time. We will leave you with this lovely video interview in which Henry, Greg and Dennis chat to Ubelly.

We won!

We won! The first ever mobile phone game nominated for a BAFTA Ones to Watch award is 'Mush' for the Windows Phone 7. It's also the first mobile phone game ever to win Dare to be Digital.

It's been a fantastic experience and we've really enjoyed the rollercoaster ride.

We're now pushing on with development and planning to release for the Windows Phone 7.

Thanks everyone for the support!

Huge Response!

We never expected to have such a huge response for our current game in production 'Mush'. It spread like wildfire, one website got a hold of our promotional video, that soon spread to 3 websites, then to many more. Not only that, quite a lot of people on Twitter started to link our video or websites that have covered us. It feels great to be making this game and to have such a huge audience previewing it and wanting to play it.

This has created pressure for us as we do not want to let anyone down. We have our fears that people will not like it, but with the amount of good comments on our promotional video and many websites that have covered us, it gives us great hope that whoever will play our game will enjoy it as much as we have enjoyed making it(and still are!).

We would just like to take this time to create a thank you list for the websites who have covered us!

Develop-Online - http://www.develop-online.net/blog/125/Dare-Blogs-Angry-Mango

WMPoweruser - http://wmpoweruser.com/mush-another-extremely-pretty-windows-phone-7-game-in-the-works/comment-page-1/

1800Pocketpc - http://www.1800pocketpc.com/2010/08/03/windows-phone-7-games-mush.html

MobileTechWorld - http://www.mobiletechworld.com/2010/08/02/mush-for-windows-phone-7-locoroco-mixed-with-rolando/

Mobility Digest - http://mobilitydigest.com/mush-for-windows-phone-7/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+FuzeMobility+(Fuze+Mobility)

PC Applications - http://www.pcapplications.info/windows-phone-7-games-montage

Everythingwm - http://www.everythingwm.com/mush-an-emotion-filled-windows-phone-7-game/2010/08/03/

Week 7

Midway through week 7 and Angry Mango progress is still good, although a little behind schedule. Having aimed to complete gameplay by the end of week 6, we still have a few bits and pieces to get through before it will be possible - the new deadline is now Friday.

So, whilst programmers continue to work on physics objects and exporting from the level editor, the artists have been getting on with sprucing up the levels, sorting out the parallax and that sort of thing. We also had a sound recording session yesterday which involved some very silly sounds that may or may not make it into the final game...

We are sorting out promotional material for Protoplay so that we can get it sent off to the printers in time for the exhibition. Aside from leaflets and posters, we have a few top secret ideas in the pipeline that will hopefully help draw in the public interest.

Finally, it has been a good week for getting out of the house, with a dolphin spotting trip on Sunday, in which we unexpectedly actually saw dolphins and hopefully gave some coherent interviews to the Channel 4 guys. We are looking forward to attending the ceilidh tomorrow night - or at least, I am, if only for the hilarity of the guys having to dance around in kilts..

Nearly complete!

So, we're halfway through week six and we seem to be right on schedule. We've had it drilled into us all through University that games never stay on schedule and to stifle ambitions is a sacrifice for the greater good. Fortunately our ambitions remain unstifled, we have loads of solid foundations for expanded development and the gameplay is feeling like it will work nicely. By the end of this week we should have a completed game.

All three levels have now been built, with the first level now fully optimised and tested. All puzzle elements have been developed and can be assigned by the designers' in the level editor. Animations, physics, movement, camera, culling, and just about everything (except parallax integration, that's due for the end of the day) has been fully implemented for the core gameplay.

We have a weekly video blog that still needs editing but we'll upload it shortly, consisting of video footage of gameplay, workflow and the bespoke tools designed for the game.

The next three weeks are probably going to be the most vital in terms of honing gameplay, tweaking levels and making a game that's fun and instantly accessible. We're all really looking forward to the end result and we'll keep you posted on this blog in the weeks to come.

In the meantime here's a couple of screens:

An updated boat design:



The happy level in the editor:



The sad level in the editor:

Animation-orama

It's been another busy, busy week here in Dundee. Luckily I have just enough time to bring you all the latest before getting back to our new, stricter schedule.


Art! Animation has been the word of the week, and between us we have essentially completed all the character animation for the game. Here is but a small selection:



Blimp Enemy






Mush Animations



Happy Boss (moustache not to be included!)

Today we drew up a complete task list, including a re-evaluation of all our assets so far and where improvement can be made.

The programmers have been beavering away as ever. Dennis has implemented Zune controls for the menu as well as a collectables system, which we hope will bring replayability to the game, and offer that extra something for the completionists out there. Ultimately, it will probably also tie in to Microsoft achievements on the Windows phone.

Greg has been continuing work on the game objects, ticking various things of the list, such as flying enemies and a rotating windmill, the latter of which proved to be quite an obstacle.

Meanwhile, Ahmed has been continuing the quest of the level editor, adding physics functionality which will help us greatly when it comes to testing and tweaking.

Music production is also underway, outsourced to a professional friend of Dennis'.

And finally, the most exciting news was of course Federer's shocking defeat in the quarter finals, although sadly both the mens' and women's finals were disappointingly straightforward.

Progress Update

It's been a week since our last blog post so here's an update on our progress.

I have been working with the physics engine and gameplay mechanics.
I finished creating many of the objects that will be used in the game, including doors, rotating platforms, blowers(that blow you away when you are close), water and interactive switches. I have also integrated the emotion input with the character - it now switches sprites, changes size and behaves differently depending on the emotional state. I also manualy created a small test level because...
Ahmed is still working on creating a level editor.
A lot of effort has gone into it, but the amount of time we estimated it would take to finish was way off. Most of the functionality is there, but we still need the ability to read the level data, including physics data, from a file and generate the level from that in the game.
Dennis has focused on the GUI and gamestate management.
There is now a menu system that the user can navigate. Collectable objects were added and a prite appears on screen when the user collects them, then dissapears a few seconds later. The gamestate management will allow us to move from the menu to the game itself, and load level data when a new level is reached.
Henry continued his previous work.
Many more sprites have been created and the character design has progressed. GUI and menu sprites were made. An early version of the level editor was used to place sprites and evolve the level design.
Kate carried on her work from before.
A previous version of the level editor was used to create levels and design puzzles, more sprites were created.

Asset Progress

Henry and I (Kate) have been continuing asset production. We've been working on the highest priority assets and have completed the majority needed for the first two levels.

Meanwhile, the programmers have been busy finishing the level editor and beginning work on the functions of the individual assets - so far, we have a blowing creature that blows Mush across the screen when he is floating or in water. Another important piece of progress is that we can now import a sprite and automatically generate a collision object from the sprite.