AuroraFeint
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Aurora Feint's Danielle Cassley to return with Avengees
Danielle Cassley is a name we haven't heard in a while. She, along with Jason Citron, was one of the original founders of Aurora Feint, the game that turned into a social gaming service called OpenFeint that was eventually sold off to a Japanese social network (and will soon be closed). Citron was with the service for quite a while, even after the acquisition, but Cassley left soon after OpenFeint's first successes. Now the creator is returning to iOS, with a studio called Red Bird Studios, and a new game called Avengees. There's not much information about the game just yet, other than the trailer below, but Cassley says it's a physics-based puzzle game, where players will play single player levels to then unlock items to use in an asynchronous multiplayer set of battles. The look is fairly unique, but we'll have to wait and see how it all comes together -- the game's set for release in the next few weeks. It's unlikely that a game like this will blow up into a project as big as the one the initial Aurora Feint game became (not to mention that the App Store is a very different place than it was when Aurora Feint first appeared). But even before Aurora Feint became a gigantic social network, it was a solid quality game, so it's good to see Cassley back making a new title.
OpenFeint PlayTime brings cross-platform multiplayer gaming to iOS, Android
Looks like options for iOS gamers are only expanding. Not only has Apple just announced the new Game Center, but Aurora Feint has just announced that its OpenFeint social network will soon enable interconnectivity between iOS and Android. The service, called OpenFeint PlayTime, will allow multiplayer gameplay between both platforms -- in addition to matchmaking, game servers, and real-time voice chat during gameplay. If you're a developer, and you're interested in adding cross-platform multiplayer to your next game, hit up the source link to apply for the private Beta. And now you'll have to excuse us -- we were in the middle of a rousing game of Bomberman Touch 2.
360iDev: Game Jam creations
Tuesday night at the 360iDev conference in San Jose, around 60 developers gathered in a room on the eBay campus around 8pm as security locked them in for the night (one developer joined the group via Skype -- that's him on the big screen above). Their goal? A game jam. Before 8am the next day, they would put together working prototypes of games, either based on their own ideas, or revolving around the night's theme of "Tiny." Not all developers were there to make new games -- a few were there to work on current projects or offer up their help to others. But up until 2am and beyond (that's about when I chickened out and let them work), the room was full of developers punching away on their keyboards, writing code, designing art, and, well, developing. I originally thought that it was just a lark; a fun project that gave everyone an excuse to spend the night on the eBay campus. But no, this was serious stuff -- apparently at least one App Store game has its origins in past game jams at these conferences. So while developers were just testing their skills at putting their ideas into motion, it's possible that we may see some of these prototypes show up on the App Store eventually as working products. After the break, we'll provide a look at what a few developers were up to at Tuesday's game jam.
