Dinomite Rexploitation
Based in Tübingen, Germany
iPhone 3GS upwards, Ipad
Android
11/02/2012
$ 0.99
€ 0.89
dinomiterexploitation (at) gmail.com
LSvsTADK is a score-driven action game that is based on the classic Snake. The game design has been inspired by other reimagined classics such as „Pac-Man CE DX“ and „Space Invaders Extreme“ as well as current casual gaming favorites like „Bejeweled“ and „Fruit Ninja“.
While the core mechanics don’t depart from the tried and true snake formula, the focus of the game isn’t just on surviving a level for as long as possible. The player is rather tasked to earn high scores by fulfilling level specific objectives. An intuitive combo- and chain-system allows for various tactical approaches to score as high as possible.
Complementary to the Story Mode the game features an Arcade Mode where the player can freely choose which combos to enable and thus experiment with different playing styles.
Little Snake is born into tragedy. Just moments after hatching, he finds himself surrounded by the carcasses of his family. Driven by his primeval nature, he sets out to seek revenge against the unknown foe and learns that the slaying of his loved ones has been the work of rogue dinosaurs. It doesn‘t take Little Snake long to come up with a plan on how to take on the gigantic foes: By going after their unborn offspring!
Gameplay
LSvsTADK started out as a side project to our regular student life. Our team consists of five friends who met in the department of Japanese Studies at Tübingen University (a typical background for software development in Germany). While we all share a general interest in videogames and the surrounding culture, it had never been a conscious goal to break into the development side of things. This changed once the concrete concept of LSvsTADK had been established and we were convinced that we could create a fun, challenging and mechanically sound game experience for handheld devices. We drew up a schedule and believed that the project could be finished within a month if we made it our main focus. Eventually, it took us more than six.
You have probably heard or read similar accounts by other self-made wannabes like us, but it's true – if you take game development seriously and hold yourself to certain standards, even projects that seem manageable in scope turn out to be a full-time job with long hours, no income and expenditures for licenses, software, founding procedures and test devices.
The overall experience, however, has been awesome! We have created a full-fledged game that we are not only confident in, but also – more importantly – we still like to play. A lot!
The team (from left to right): Roger Braun, Jiayi Zheng, Tim Schierbaum, Henrik Habermann, Henning Schlinkmann
We are excited to introduce LSvsTADK to a worldwide audience and hope that we can satisfy many a gamer’s urge for fast, retro-inspired arcade action on mobile devices. To reach a wider audience, an Android version and an update for iPhone 5 have been released in December 2012.
Of course, if the game should turn out to be profitable, we would really like to revisit Little Snake's story at some point or approach different, more ambitious projects. We certainly don’t lack ideas or motivation.
'Little Snake' may seem pretty easy and slow to an experienced gamer. Clearing the levels and finishing the game might not be too difficult at first, but it is a challenge to master the game's combo- and chain-mechanics and earn a competitive score.
In order not to scare away casual gamers, we decided to set the game's default difficulty to easy ('casual') and assign the more intuitive alternate control option ('type 2') when you first start up the game. The normal difficulty setting ('competitive') and the other control scheme ('type 1') represent the way we intended LSvsTADK to be played. In addition to the general 90° turns, the 'type 1' controls allow players to make instant 180°-turns. Be sure to try out this configuration – while it might require a little getting used to, we think that these controls have a great feel!
A combo consists of at least three of a kind of the patterned eggs. Once the third egg has been devoured the combo is activated and will be scored in after two seconds. If an additional matching egg is eaten before the activation phase is up, the activation timer is reset. The combo scoring is as follows: 5, 9, 15, 23, 38, 61 and so on. The combo scoring is displayed by golden points that fly from the right side of the screen to the upper center.
If an egg is eaten within two seconds after the previous egg has been devoured, you get a chain bonus of 2. This bonus is increased by 2 for every additional egg devoured. For example, if you eat 10 eggs staying within the time limit, the tenth egg will give you a score of 20 (2 for the egg itself + 18 chain bonus). Caution: A rotten egg will end any chain.
The developement of Little Snake has truly been a team effort where everyone contributed significantly to the different aspects of the project. In general, the division of labor has been the following:
If you have additional questions regarding the game or Dinomite Rexploitation you can contact us at:dinomiterexploitation@gmail.com.
You can visit the official homepage of LSvsTADK at dinomite-rexploitation.de.
