Baby Cupid on Facebook
It’s been on my mind for a while. “How do I get the messages out there?” … it is enormously rewarding every single time someone downloads Baby Cupid in the AppStore – it’s down right addictive. Every single day I log into my iTunes account to see how many times the game was downloaded and from where – some days I have many and some days I have none and I’m starting to wonder how can I get my numbers up? is it possible to make a commercial campaign which isn’t too intrusive but still effective? … to be honest, I have no idea. But, there is one thing I would like to try: I’ve decided to make a free Facebook version of the game and obviously hoping for a viral effect and that everyone who tries the free version wants to buy a copy for their iOS device. I know there are limitless possibilities through the social medias, which makes it all the more difficult to decide where to start – I’m betting on free stuff on Facebook to begin with – I will keep you updated on the result! … until then, if anybody out there has any good advice to share on the subject, PLEASE don’t hold back, leave me a comment instead 
Olivia’s Ride
It was actually never the idea that my kids should be part of my hobby game development. But when I did “Baby Cupid” I recorded Olivia’s voice and laughter and used this for the games main character. I know this sounds like an awful cliche, and it is! but looking at Olivia’s drawings I do find a lot of inspiration and ideas. When walking around with the baby-stroller and Olivia’s kid-sister Sofia, Olivia is standing on a skateboard-like contraption attached to the stroller. The other day Olivia did a drawing of herself on the “skate board” and I think it is absolute hilarious. The drawing has so much character and I can’t help smiling when I see it – so the only logical thing to do is of course to blow it up and paint it on the wall. It may sound difficult but it was VERY simple. I borrowed an old crappy projector, hooked it up to my laptop and projected a photo of Olivia’s drawing onto the wall. When I was happy with size and placement I spend 30 minutes outlining every little detail of the drawing with a pencil on the wall. After that I switched off the projector, put the laptop away and started filling out the pencil outline with black wall paint and a thin brush. I was good fun and it only took a couple of hours from start to finish.
The drawing also had another effect on me which is slightly more relevant to this site than wall paintings; I realized that I want this character to be the superstar of my next game. I have no idea what the game should be about, but I can somehow bring Olivia on a skate board into a game that has the fun and character of this drawing I’m sure it’ll be great fun … stick around for updates
The perfect gift
Christmas came and went. It was great! Though, for the first time in my 38 years of living I felt more like an adult than a child on Christmas eve – about time if you ask my mother and wife. We celebrated Christmas together with my sister and her kids and together with ours it was clear that Christmas in our family was finally passed on to the next generation. My oldest daughter Olivia gave me a very special present. In actual fact this present is from my wife but she was kind enough to give Olivia all the credit. Knowing how much I love Olivia’s drawings my wife found all my favorites and photographed them. Then afterwards she had each and every drawing retouched. In some cases there were more than one drawing on the paper, in other instances the paper canvas had to be extended or just “cleaned up”. Afterwards all the drawing was put into a beautiful matrix of drawings and framed. It’s now on the wall and lights up our living room. If you, like me, love your kid’s drawings but not necessarily having ALL of them hanging around the house this is a perfect solution. Thanks Olivia (Lisa).
The Baby Cupid site is up
Now that Baby Cupid made it all the way to the AppStore I’m struggling to find ways of making the world aware of the games existence. Hundreds of apps gets into the store every day and a new game does not live on the “new and noteworthy” list for very long. I’ve made a little home page (which is now also hosting this blog) to help promote the game. Check it out the official homepage of tipToddler games here: http://www.tiptoddler.com
Hopefully a place like this will be a good future platform for spreading the good word about fun games for young kids and toddlers completely free of violence, commercials, irretating links and in-app purchase options?
My first game is finally on the AppStore
It was a big day today. After days of struggling with the iTunes and AppStore approval process my first game was finally approved and is now available for all iOS users through the Apple AppStore – I’m thrilled and very proud! I guess this would be a good time for some reflections; why do a game? was it difficult? was it fun? was it worth it? would I ever do it again? … it was a ton of fun! it was challenging, it was something I had never tried before but wanted to do for a long time. Now, that it actually went from being a little funny idea into a real product on the AppStore I must admit that I’m itching to get started on a new and hopefully even more challenging project. I love the little niche I’m in – it’s fun to make games without violence and it’s been great to test Baby Cupid together with my own daughter who fits the target audience perfectly and I know for sure that my next game will also be for the youngest kids and toddlers. This project was most certainly worth both the time and effort. Not because I expect to get rich from sales but because I’ve found one more way to add fun and excitement to my life and entertainment for my kids.
Baby Cupid is almost done
The last few days I’ve been testing “Baby Cupid” on as many iOS devices as I could get my hands on and it really, really works! But without not really knowing what this next challenge will bring I’m sure that getting the game from my own computer, through the iTunes approval system and all the way onto the golden shelves of the AppStore will be quite tricky. As some of you already know the challenge I gave my self was making an iOS universal game, getting it to the AppStore and have somebody that I don’t know buy the game. So I guess it one down and two to go. While I’m struggling with binary build and pushing pixels and code over the Atlantic, here are a few screens shots from the game.
