Stefan Gagne (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} twoflower) wrote,@ 2008-02-15 13:30:00 |
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Something Fishy: Introducing The 7Seas Fishing Game!
For the last week, I've been blazing full speed ahead on a side project of ours...
It began when we were discussing what the hell to do with the 512sqm rental lot near the lighthouse. It never rents, or at least never rents for long, because it's at the furthest point on the island from anything hot and happening. So, we thought: Why not open a fishing pier?
There's a popular fishing game in SL already, complete with rods that earn XP, plenty of fish to catch, fishing competitions, and quests where catching a series of objects grants a reward. Nice, but...
* COST: It's expensive. The rods are L$1000 (US$4.05) because if you don't buy the "EPIC ROD" you may as well not bother; the others have distinct limits to what you can catch.
* BAIT: Once you have the rod, you need bait or the rod will do nothing whatsoever. Every casting costs 1 bait and 1 "epic bait" costs L$1.
* TIME/MONEY/FUN: It takes a long time to level up your rod, to catch anything worthwhile, etc... or to earn enough "points" to get a charm that minorly boosts XP. And time = money with the bait system, a lot of money when you consider my arcade games are L$1 a play for 2.5 minutes of interactive fun compared to 25 seconds of noninteractive fishing.
* FISH: The fish you can catch are useless. They're all copyright violating Pokemon recreations and things like that. You can't use them as display pieces because they're too high prim, and they're too huge to be wearable pets.
* FRANCHISING: Want your own fishing hole? You can have it... for L$2000 a month (US$8.08) and 200 free prims for them to come in and install the system for you.
So, adopting the same policy we took towards skeeball ("Do it better, cheaper, and less evil than the other guy is doing it and SL will beat a path to your shop") we're making the 7Seas Fishing Game.
* 7SEAS COST: Our rods are L$250 (US $1.01), considerably cheaper. We also have L$100 (US $0.40) rods which don't use XP or bait and can simply fish casually.
* 7SEAS BAIT: We have only one type of bait, and it's 1/5th of an L$ per casting. What's more, it's optional; you can switch your rod to baitless mode and fish as much as you want for free, although you can't earn XP or use earned levels in this mode (which improve chances at rare fish). You can turn this on or off regardless of how much bait you loaded, so you can conserve it and just enjoy some relaxing fishing for free, then re-bait for competitions.
* 7SEAS TIME/MONEY/FUN: The leveling curve we've designed will take you 3-5 hours and less money than you paid for your rod to "max it out". So you won't be grinding forever, and as noted, you can go into free fishing mode at any time.
* 7SEAS FISH: All our fish are wearable pets you can assign nicknames to -- AND you can put them in a variety of low-prim aquariums we've designed. Make sure you feed your fish and keep the tank clean! (or turn off the Sims-y features and just use it as a display piece.) We're also going to have other prizes than fish, including fishing gear and perhaps even some of our full products from the store.
* 7SEAS FRANCHISING: Our franchise kit is L$350, VERY low prim, and you don't need us to install it for you. It's even copyable so you can install it all over SL if you want to. It comes with a contest board so you can host fishing competitions. What's more, it includes a 7Seas Vendor... which kicks back 20% of every sale made through it to YOU. Yep, you can cash in on our inventory!
So, less money spent, more fun had, you get a bunch of fishy toys to play with, and you can even make money with it. What's not to love?
I'll have more about this in the weeks ahead, as the pieces start coming together. The lion's share of the coding is done, but there's plenty of fish to make, plenty of fishing rods to design, and so on. Beta testing will be done at Flotsam Beach once it's ready for a test drive. Fish on!
Oh, and in unrelated news, Guitar Hero: Aerosmith has been announced to the chirps of crickets (and to the sound of cash registers in the heads of Activision, who care less about the rock experience and more about milking this until the teat produces nothing but white dust). They're releasing "Dream On" for free this weekend for GH3, which means I have even less reason to buy it, since that's the only Aerosmith song I like. WAY TO GO
For the last week, I've been blazing full speed ahead on a side project of ours...
It began when we were discussing what the hell to do with the 512sqm rental lot near the lighthouse. It never rents, or at least never rents for long, because it's at the furthest point on the island from anything hot and happening. So, we thought: Why not open a fishing pier?
There's a popular fishing game in SL already, complete with rods that earn XP, plenty of fish to catch, fishing competitions, and quests where catching a series of objects grants a reward. Nice, but...
* COST: It's expensive. The rods are L$1000 (US$4.05) because if you don't buy the "EPIC ROD" you may as well not bother; the others have distinct limits to what you can catch.
* BAIT: Once you have the rod, you need bait or the rod will do nothing whatsoever. Every casting costs 1 bait and 1 "epic bait" costs L$1.
* TIME/MONEY/FUN: It takes a long time to level up your rod, to catch anything worthwhile, etc... or to earn enough "points" to get a charm that minorly boosts XP. And time = money with the bait system, a lot of money when you consider my arcade games are L$1 a play for 2.5 minutes of interactive fun compared to 25 seconds of noninteractive fishing.
* FISH: The fish you can catch are useless. They're all copyright violating Pokemon recreations and things like that. You can't use them as display pieces because they're too high prim, and they're too huge to be wearable pets.
* FRANCHISING: Want your own fishing hole? You can have it... for L$2000 a month (US$8.08) and 200 free prims for them to come in and install the system for you.
So, adopting the same policy we took towards skeeball ("Do it better, cheaper, and less evil than the other guy is doing it and SL will beat a path to your shop") we're making the 7Seas Fishing Game.
* 7SEAS COST: Our rods are L$250 (US $1.01), considerably cheaper. We also have L$100 (US $0.40) rods which don't use XP or bait and can simply fish casually.
* 7SEAS BAIT: We have only one type of bait, and it's 1/5th of an L$ per casting. What's more, it's optional; you can switch your rod to baitless mode and fish as much as you want for free, although you can't earn XP or use earned levels in this mode (which improve chances at rare fish). You can turn this on or off regardless of how much bait you loaded, so you can conserve it and just enjoy some relaxing fishing for free, then re-bait for competitions.
* 7SEAS TIME/MONEY/FUN: The leveling curve we've designed will take you 3-5 hours and less money than you paid for your rod to "max it out". So you won't be grinding forever, and as noted, you can go into free fishing mode at any time.
* 7SEAS FISH: All our fish are wearable pets you can assign nicknames to -- AND you can put them in a variety of low-prim aquariums we've designed. Make sure you feed your fish and keep the tank clean! (or turn off the Sims-y features and just use it as a display piece.) We're also going to have other prizes than fish, including fishing gear and perhaps even some of our full products from the store.
* 7SEAS FRANCHISING: Our franchise kit is L$350, VERY low prim, and you don't need us to install it for you. It's even copyable so you can install it all over SL if you want to. It comes with a contest board so you can host fishing competitions. What's more, it includes a 7Seas Vendor... which kicks back 20% of every sale made through it to YOU. Yep, you can cash in on our inventory!
So, less money spent, more fun had, you get a bunch of fishy toys to play with, and you can even make money with it. What's not to love?
I'll have more about this in the weeks ahead, as the pieces start coming together. The lion's share of the coding is done, but there's plenty of fish to make, plenty of fishing rods to design, and so on. Beta testing will be done at Flotsam Beach once it's ready for a test drive. Fish on!
Oh, and in unrelated news, Guitar Hero: Aerosmith has been announced to the chirps of crickets (and to the sound of cash registers in the heads of Activision, who care less about the rock experience and more about milking this until the teat produces nothing but white dust). They're releasing "Dream On" for free this weekend for GH3, which means I have even less reason to buy it, since that's the only Aerosmith song I like. WAY TO GO
