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Preprogress of Taxi Traffic Jam

Name:	Anders Linder-Noren
Date Posted:	Jul 10, 2007
Rating:	Not Rated
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Blog post

Wait, what's that?

Yeah, after some reasonable thought I have a preliminary name to the game. Taxi, because it's a taxi, and traffic jam, because it's a traffic jam ;) I have done some research, and there is to my knowledge only one game with this game mechanic that has nice production values and actually sell - but it isn't on the portals, so I see a opportunity to fill that void.

I've had another discussion with the artist about a expanded amount of art, and it seems that my fear was unjustified. 40 cars, tiles for backgrounds a roadmap with cities ended up around $300, a price that I am very comfortable with. The artist will provide me with some example art of two cars this week, so I can make sure it's what I need. I'll ask if he will approve me posting the cars here, but that shouldn't be any problems.

In other news, my throat hurts and I have caught a cold. I have a suspicion that my girlfriend snatches the covering when she's asleep... bastard ;) I'll be returning home from my vacation in a couple of days though, and after that I will fully concentrate on progressing with the game.

A interesting read for all of you: blog.newsweek.com/blogs/levelup/archive/2007/06/19/kathy-vrabeck-sheds-light-on-...

Seems like the big boys are coming to play with us.'

Recent Blog Posts

List:	07/10/07 - Preprogress of Taxi Traffic Jam 07/07/07 - Requesting your opinion on design and production values 07/03/07 - Starting on a side project 07/01/07 - Game and company progress 06/14/07 - Playing tetris and making progress 01/24/07 - Future yesterday, website today, TGB tomorrow 01/20/07 - Working on the website 01/06/07 - Long time, no blog

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Phil Carlisle (Jul 10, 2007 at 08:42 GMT)

Anders, sorry to break it to you, but I highly doubt a rush hour clone would get onto portals anyway. I'm sure they get a billion of them.

Unless you have stellar production values and a unique take on the thing, I'm not convinced you'll get them interested.

Anders Linder-Noren (Jul 10, 2007 at 09:06 GMT)

I don't think stellar production values are required, niether is a new take - I have seen one (1) game in the indie game space with the rush hour mechanic. There are countless of online games with it, true - but none of them is a complete game with roadmap, particle effects, serious polish etc. I don't see why they wouldn't accept a rush hour clone, when countless new match-3's are constantly added.
Edited on Jul 10, 2007 10:30 GMT

Joshua Dallman (Jul 10, 2007 at 19:17 GMT)

Hack It (website) is an example of an indie game with a LOT of polish based off a simple traditional physical game (those sliding grid games). I don't know how well its done with regard to sales figures, but its had a hard time finding publisher interest. The gameplay is just too simple and offers to little. No matter how much polish you put into a vidgame version of Rush Hour you will meet the same challenge. A pig with lipstick is still a pig. This could be a fun project, and a great learning experience, but I wouldn't expect to get it on portals or make revenue from it.

J Sears (Jul 10, 2007 at 21:09 GMT)

I've spent a lot of time thinking about the sale point of casual games in the past few months (just to be clear this is all just my own thoughts no figures or stats) and I've run into that thought many times with ideas I've had. The thought that it probably will be very tough to sell.
The biggest reason for this is I feel a big chunk of casual gamers have the same personality with money, and that's very tight. They won't want to spend a penny if they never have to. And with a huge number of websites with free web based java/flash etc games I think that makes selling a casual game tough no matter what.
Add to that being an unknown individual with no connections at portals, that will always make getting your game into a portal difficult.
Start your own website, sure now getting enough traffic to that site and getting some sales out of it, also very difficult. Especially if the only feature your website has is one casual game that is a pay to download game.

Maybe casual games already have the money making aspect the way it's going to stay, advertising. Maybe even the download games should be free but should run ads above or below just like the website ones would. But like I said just my thoughts. And I don't say any of these to lower your dreams any, it's just that I share your dream of getting some casual games to sell and in all my thinking of how's it going to be possible I haven't come up with a good way yet

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