Postmortem
The Sandbox The Sandbox is not a top grossing title, so in the end we have probably earned just about what we spent in development and marketing. But the game is unique, fun and accessible. We do run a lot of contests and promotions on our Facebook page as part of our community management, and we believe it works quite well in as much as we have succeeded in growing the Facebook page to over 45,000 fans.
Development: What Went Wrong Working with third party SDKs is not always easy. Usually when we found ourselves with a broken game, it was due to some little black box doing its thing in a way that, for example, made our game rotate and stretch when entering the IAP screen. What’s worse, it’s hard to
We love to feature the kickass productions of our players on YouTube! Some have even created piano melodies, light shows and animated pixel art that we could never have imagined ourselves.
We also had some trouble when a new iOS version or iDevice was released just a few days after one of our game versions went live. We couldn’t foresee how, for example, the iPhone 5 screen would change our game. (It turns out that The Sandbox is very affected by resolution changes due to its game-play). In addition, one of our biggest challenges was the lack of programmers working server-side. We had to cut a lot of features when we found ourselves unable to find experienced backend developers, and we got some nasty bugs when working with part-time coders.
The Big Surprise
prevent this kind of behavior. Often the cure was to simply change the SDK for another similar one—if one existed—or to remove the feature entirely. 26 Casual Connect Summer 2013
In mid-December, 2012, we were hit with a big surprise. Unbeknownst to us, The Sandbox was included on iTunes’ BEST OF 2012 list in the “Hidden Gems: Games” category. We weren’t informed we would be there… until we were! The future of the IP now lies in the hands of players. If they keep wanting more levels and elements, we will continue to make them.
Many have asked us for a PC/Mac or Web version. We’re listening, and we’ve submitted an enhanced version project to Steam Greenlight, for example. We do believe that we haven’t yet reached that tipping point where the title is so popular everyone knows about it. Can we reach it? Hell, yes! And maybe The Sandbox 2 will be a nextyear project, when the next generation of devices will allow us to deploy more intense physics. (We already have developed more complicated features, but because they lag on older devices we have decided not to include those features in order to maintain positive user experience.) We also look forward to raising the graphics bar by multiplying the number of pixels on the screen. The lessons we’ve learned is that the road to success is a road paved with obstacles, unexpected events and tough decisions. But with perseverance, a good organization, a focus on quality, and a bit of luck, it can lead to great success! ❉