The story begins in the Barnes and Noble at The Grove in
Los Angeles. Peter had wandered in to escape being dragged into the
Anthropologie store two doors down and sought
shelter in the iPhone programming books section. Standing there browsing the books
beside him was Lawrence. The two got to talking, and shared stories of some
of the things they were each working on at the time. Before leaving they exchanged email addresses
and mentions of possibly working together on a project in the future. A couple weeks later
design and pre production began for Bomb Squad Patrol, a bomb disposal maze game
for the iPhone and iPod touch. The rest as they say, is history.
Lawrence is a fantastic Illustrator and Animator that is fluent with Maya and
all sorts of 3D modeling techniques and tools. He has been doing this through his own company
Zonesight for over 20 years. He has owned the art and visual design for
the game from the begining as well as created all the music and sound FX that
give it that sweet, funky vibe we have all come to secretly groove out too when we
think no one is watching.
Peter is a developer and has been programming mainly for Windows for over 12
years. He bought his first Mac about two years ago solely with the intent of
learning how to write apps for the iPhone and too hopefully one day start making some
fun games for certain mobile devices. His first app was Hullabaloo, you can check
it out
here if you're curious.
Back in college he had written a demolition derby game and put together a few
cool DirectX concepts but aside from that, a tremendous desire to learn, and two previously
failed attempts at making an iPhone game he also had little experience in the field.
There are obviously a lot of challenges when taking on any project of this scope
and when depending on others to follow through with you till the end. Most of
us don't have the staying power to cross the finish line and Peter has often described
game development as a gradual incline that suddenly turns into a vertical
ascent. They can both assure you though, if you can tough it out till the apex it is worth
the view.
Before closing it will be good to speak a little about the help and resources available
to others that might want to attempt a similar journey, you are certainly not alone
in your ambitions.
Obviously there is a virtual cornocopia of books and websites dedicated to
nothing less than developing art and games for the iPhone. Here are
some of the ones that Peter used to get the ball rolling.
Peter and Lawrence would love to hear all about your experiences or hear your thoughts on
theirs,
please check out the
blog and go posting crazy with whatever's on your mind.
As the last point above mentions and this whole story illustrates; even complete strangers can turn out to
be your needle in the haystack, and you usually find what you're looking for
when you're not looking for it.
"Good things happen when you meet strangers." - Yo-Yo Ma