Game Development 101 - Beginning Android Games - page 61

Dragon, Fly! illustrates one phenomenon very well: often, specific mobile game genres turn up
on iOS. The original creators do not often port their games over to Android even though there
is a huge demand. Other game developers can step in and provide the Android market with an
alternative version. This can also totally backfire should the “inspired� game be too much of a
rip-off, as seen with Zynga's take on a game called Tiny Tower (by NimbleBit). Extending an idea
is usually well received, while blatantly ripping off another game is usually met with acrimony.
Max Payne (see Figure 3-8 ), by Rockstar Games, is a port of the old PC game published in 2001.
We include it here to illustrate a growing trend of AAA publishers taking their old intellectual
property and porting it over to the mobile environment. Max Payne tells the story of a policeman
whose family was murdered by a drug cartel. Max goes on a rampage to avenge his wife and
kid. All of this is embedded in a film noir-style narrative, illustrated via comic strips and short
cut-scenes. The original game relied heavily on the standard mouse/keyboard combination we
are used to using when playing shooters on the PC. Rockstar Games succeeded in creating
touchscreen-based controls. While the controls are not as precise as on the PC, they are still
good enough to make the game enjoyable on touchscreens.
Figure 3-8. Max Payne, by Rockstar Games
The action and arcade genre is still a bit underrepresented on the market. Players are longing for
good action titles, so maybe that is your niche!
Tower-Defense Games
Given their immense success on the Android platform, we felt the need to discuss tower-defense
games as their own genre. Tower-defense games became popular as a variant of PC real-time
strategy games developed by the modding community. The concept was soon translated to
stand-alone games. Tower-defense games currently represent the best-selling genre on Android.
In a typical tower-defense game, some mostly evil force is sending out critters in so-called
waves to attack your castle/base/crystals/you name it. Your task is to defend that special place