Minigore

Minigore Episode 6 is available for iPhone and iPad!

2011-10-31T11:03:00.000-07:00

Kaamos Sound sent us this scary Minigore SFX making of video:

Latest News: EP6 could be one of the final updates we're doing for Minigore. It fixes some serious performance issues on iPad 2 & iPhone 4S and adds Bike Baron as a playable character. Content wise it's not a big update because our resources have been focused on getting Bike Baron & Minigore Zombies done.

Minigore Zombies is a completely new game which takes a few steps out of the dual-stick shooter genre by introducing melee combat. Technically it's much more advanced than Minigore and allows us to do thing which aren't possible on 1st gen devices. It's our most ambitious project to date with many moving parts.

It's our most ambitious project to date with many moving parts and it's also gonna be our next big release now that Bike Baron is out. Hopefully we can reach a similar reception with it!

PS. My last estimate was way off for the MZ release and that's exactly why I don't want to do any release estimates until the game is AT LEAST submitted ;)

Please no "when it's coming out?" questions :)

Zombie Santa Gameplay Video

2011-07-18T09:41:00.000-07:00

Latest News: Footage from the latest development version. I don't usually like to predict release dates but this time I'll make an exception. This is maybe a month away from being finished. Then it could be sent to Apple for approval.

We also announced a new game called Bike Baron. We're developing it with Aqua Globs creator Qwiboo - the programming muscle is coming from that side of the fence and we're mainly focusing on design and art:

Zombie Boss Gameplay Video

2011-06-27T18:11:00.000-07:00

Making of Level Editor - Part 4

2011-05-27T13:04:00.000-07:00

Latest news: This week we moved to new bigger offices! We also hired a new guy to work on the level creation, his most recent project was PS3 game Dead Nation :)

Let's get started with a brand new level editor screenshot. Tim made lots of tweaks and the pits are a new tile type:

Placeholder tile art by Heikki Repo

Kimmo and Tuomas added support for multiple simultaneous bosses. It means we can spawn five zombie Jerry Gores at once if we so desire!

Some of the remaining issues on zombie bosses:

1. They're still too deadly even though they already have a decreased ammo speed. Their accuracy needs to be decreased.

2. There's a few annoying situations where the bosses walk through each other.

3. Health bar height is not calculating correctly for some bosses - the reason is unknown at the moment.

4. Perhaps all of them could be scaled a bit bigger to make them even more menacing.

5. Spawn animations missing.

Grandpa & Grandma weren't quite as scary when they were alive!

Another thing Kimmo improved is collision physics: it works much better now when you bump into obstacles. In one of those old zombie level videos there is a vibrating camera motion when the player character is walking against the wall. After the fix it doesn't do that anymore.

DISCLAIMER: There's no release dates for any of this stuff. The best thing I can do is keep you updated on what's happening.

Making of Level Editor - Part 3

2011-05-16T08:55:00.000-07:00

Latest news: New "in-game" camera angle in Level Editor. Tim also coded in support for more tiles such as the sand tiles and low cliffs. It's easier to see the new things if you compare this new image to the screenshot I posted in part 2:

Placeholder tile art by Heikki Repo

Kimmo and Tuomas have continued their work on patterns and bosses. Here's a screenshot of Zombie Jerry & a bunch of zombies duking it out with John Gore:

They're able to take more punishment than just 3 shots.

That's the reason for health bars.

There's a zombie boss version of pretty much everybody. Though we still gotta ask permissions for usage of few of the visiting guest stars such as Hook Champ & Enviro-Bear... actually it would be Zombie Enviro-Bear :)

Death to the Impostor Bear!

PS. If you have any friends who haven't tried Minigore yet it's currently available for free.

Also our latest co-production Death Rally is on sale for $0.99! It's the number one game in over 40 countries!

Huge thanks for everyone who have supported us!

Making of Level Editor - Part 2

2011-05-07T20:26:00.000-07:00

Latest news:

Tim is working on a smart system which selects correct pieces for the terrain. The user doesn't have to place each corner piece by hand and it saves a ton of time. It takes half a minute to create the following scene:

You can drag those cliffs with a few strokes
Placeholder tile artwork by Heikki Repo

Doing the level geometry is just one thing, but levels also need enemies. Kimmo has been working on a wave system which allows us to define various attack formations for enemies and spawn them anywhere on the level. If you have played Super Stardust HD on Playstation 3 you know exactly what I'm talking about.

This screenshot demonstrates the circle spawning pattern

Line spawning pattern and the new faster joker zombies

Box spawning pattern and a chest full of souls

That's just a simple example what can done with it. There's controls for size, enemy count, location, offset, victory conditions and everything can be combined to create a very complex chain of events.

What's unique about regular and fast zombies is that they can spawn in two different ways:

1. They can crawl out from the ground. (Slower method)
2. They can be dropped from above by the Master of Puppets (Faster method)

All other enemies are dropped from above by the Puppet Master.

Jussi or I'll do part 3 when something interesting happens... Stay tuned!

Making of Level Editor

2011-04-18T14:52:00.000-07:00

We've been silent on Minigore blog for the last month. I've been busy with Death Rally promotion and Jussi has been on sick leave. Kimmo has his hands full with programming related tasks and handling the business side of things.

I have a moment to spare here so let's get you up to speed about what's going on:

On the programming side things are catching speed as the new programmers settle in and familiarize themselves with the code: Tuomas is working on enemy waves & boss characters - stuff that's related to the Zombies. Tim is working on the level editor and he's receiving plenty of help from the Cornfox guys.

The tile based level editor is something which started its life in early 2010. These were the first visual tests I did back then:

Wireframe

Textured Version

More visual tests from July of 2010. I recreated a town in 3d tiles from old SNES game called Lufia II. It's a similar tile system as in Minecraft. Most of the textures are from FF6:

Geometry

Textured Version

First screenshot of the actual level editor running on iPad. Visual target renders are more like a dream but working prototype is the first real step towards a faster content creation pipeline:

The problem with our current levels is that you need an artist and a programmer. With the new editor you don't have to be a programmer or artist to create something with it, it could be done by anyone who can use an iPad or iPhone.

The editor is gonna take a lot of effort to finish but once completed it could be the best thing to ever happen for Minigore!

Minigore HD hits the top 10

2011-03-09T09:30:00.000-08:00

Hi everybody!

I'm happy to announce that Minigore HD is in top 10 of the App Store games category, thanks for your support! Here's a pic:

And to clarify, we did submit both iPhone and iPad versions at the same time. iPad version of Episode 5 was approved yesterday. Unfortunately the iPhone version is taking longer time to be approved. We will continue to keep the iPhone version free until the update is out.

As for the future of Minigore: We're already working on the next update but we're not quite ready to reveal the features of that update.

Penguins, also on HD version!

2011-02-16T07:15:00.000-08:00

NEWS (MARCH 2nd) - Bugs are fixed and the update has been submitted!

Greetings!

At first, we would like to apologize for the lengthy pause with the blog updates. Kimmo has been very busy showing our new programmers the game code and we are getting good results. If some of you remember, we used to talk a lot about merging the code base with the SD and HD versions (iPod/iPhone & iPad) back in the day. The new release will finally get the HD version of Minigore up to date. It's been a long time coming and I'm sure many of iPad owners can appreciate this! To clarify, this means every new update we do, will update both SD & HD versions simultaneously!

The newest build has been beta tested and is almost ready for submission.

The new version includes:

-Elder Gore AI partner: Grandma is helping Grandpa out

-Penguin Mob: new squad-based gameplay!

-Emperor Penguin: this bird is tough as nails

-3 more Encyclopedia pages

For the HD version it means the following features in addition to the aforementioned:

Undead Jenny, White Gangster Gore, totems, kills instead of "score", kill multipliers, encyclopedia, hearts as health indicators, all kinds of optimizations, remade snow level, Elder Gores and of course wifi co-op multiplayer! The multiplayer works even between an iPhone and iPad :)

Also, if you haven't seen the Death Rally trailer yet, check it out! It's coming next month and it's looking even better than in this video!

Welcome to Hardland Store!

2011-01-27T06:15:00.000-08:00

Hi everyone!

We've finished the Hardland Store! We wanted to provide the possibility to get Minigore related merchandise to the fans because some people told us they can't wake up properly unless John is glaring at them angrily. We are now officially in the coffee mug business, hehe. At first it seemed like a strange idea, but the mugs turned out to be great! The print quality is good and we are happy with the designs. For now, there's 2 mugs with different kinds of prints for sale, which we have ordered ourselves to see that the quality is adequate to the standards in everything we do. We will add more stuff as soon as we have the time. Here's a pic showing the mugs:

You can find the store here: www.cafepress.com/minigore

Thanks to Leandro for letting us use some of his character designs as a reference for the store banner art!

We shipped the Minigore Monster Constest 2010 prizes yesterday! The happy winners should receive their prizes within 2 weeks, probably during next week.

As Timo said, we hired a new full time programmer (also called Timo :D ) last week, and one part time programmer this week and Kimmo is helping them to settle down to our strange working environment.

Encyclopedia is getting more pages! Here's a preview:

Contest Winners Announced!

2011-01-19T04:57:00.000-08:00

Greetings from snowy Helsinki!

We decided to wrap the contest up and declare the winners. A bit over 750 votes were cast and the winner was quite obvious after a few days. The real battle was for the second and third places. We even had some extra excitement when somebody tried to alter the vote results by cheating. However, we managed to keep the contest fair by monitoring the votes and with the help of our active forum admins. Without a further due, I'll announce the winners now. *imagine the drama drums here* The Grand Prize winners for Minigore Monster Contest 2010 are.....

1st place: Granny Gore by Cédric Philippe!!

*insert applause here*

With his amazing finger painting skills, Mr. Philippe dominated the contest and earned himself a shiny new Wacom Intuos 4 M A5 Wide drawing tablet! I'm sure we will be seeing some extraordinary artwork from him in the future!

2nd place: Sasquatch by Philippe Crifo!

*insert applause here aswell*

iPod touch 8GB (4th generation) just found a new home! I bet Sasquatch is nice and calm now for a while.

Yeti trying to smash Sasquatch out of the contest!

3rd place: Yeti called "Billy" by Tan Ming Ken

*applause time again*

This bowling monster who doesn't get cold during winter earned his creator a John Gore coffee mug and a poster signed by Timo, Kimmo and Jussi!

Thanks everyone for being part of this awesome and so entertaining competition! The contest entries we had in the forums are being moved to a new art section on forums as soon as I get it done. I hope people keep on posting their art and being part of this awesome community!

I'd like the winners to send me a private message on the forums with their complete address so that we can send the prizes to their new owners!

If you didn't win anything this time, don't worry! We are planning a new competition to start sometime soon! Any suggestions for the theme?

PS. Please vote for Minigore in the Best App Ever Awards!

BestAppEver.com

Minigore Monster Contest Finalists!

2011-01-12T06:16:00.000-08:00

The moment you all have been waiting for is here! Here is the top 10 that made it to the finals! You may vote for your favourite(s) on the Forums. Everybody has 3 votes. You don't have to vote 3 different entries if you don't want to, however we wanted to leave this option if you have trouble deciding which entry to vote. Overall the contest was a great success and the level of the entries above any expectations. If by any chance you didn't make it to the finals, you shouldn't feel bad about it. We had trouble deciding which of the entries to pick to the finals, and had to leave out very well done pieces of art.

The descriptions for the entries were provided by the artists.

Enough talk! Get busy voting!

TOP 10

1. Cédric Philippe

Granny Gore

"You should never refuse a Grandma pie"

Encyclopedia

One day, when he was still an innocuous little kid, the poor young John Gore refused tasting one of her ever-asked clover pie, and she suddenly went insanely nut ! Since this fateful event, she almost disappeared from the common world. Very seldom, she could have been seen alone, at night, a bunch of clovers in her hand. Rare persons have also been claiming they had heard gloomy cries around midnight, nearby the graveyard…

Abilities

-Appears when a clover falls nearby her grave –to immediately catch it up- and haunts Hardland until you gun her down again.

-Pitilessly grabs any clover which crosses her path.

As soon as she gets three of them, she turns into a huge roaring grandma which trample over any living form, furries and yourself alike. You poor John Gore can only run away as long as she’s burning ! (the only means to lower her deadly headway is to hurt her)

-Runs away as soon as you wound her or when you’re on fire. And gosh, much faster than you !

-Heads for the graves at midnight and falls in gloomy cries for her lost beloved husband. You can gun her down NOW ! (about fifty bullets will do)

-Very seldom, she makes a delicious cake out of three clovers instead of mutate and shares it, which grants you a life up.

I also thought of something like when she sees a box, she catches the weapon and shoots at random, out of joy (mostly killing poor little furries), but I gave up the idea. No left clovers AND boxes for you is too much in my mind.

It seriously lacked some informations about Granny's pie. So here it is ! Granny cooks the pie and leaves it nearby, lurking around to see you, dear little John, tasting her present ! That's a touching moment where Granny looks pretty normal...

Now with all these furries hiding all around, it seems more of a vicious trap !

2. Kevin Barba

The Hunter

Encyclopedia

The Hunter is one of the richest and most private villains of all Hardland. His days are typically spent in the wilderness of the Amazon hunting rare and exotic animals. On this trip The hunter finds himself wanting the head of John Gore for killing the exotic Worm-Wolf and keeping it to himself. The Hunter has grown mad with jealousy and now finds himself hunting down John Gore. He trails John Gore through the hardland Forest tracking him down so that he can keep John as a trophy in his wilderness cabin along side other creatures that he has captured and killed.

Abilities

Hides behind rocks waiting for John gore to cross his path. When you spot The Hunter be sure to stay away long enough to collect a double barrel shotgun. This is the only weapon that can take him out. The Hunter can only come out once the 3rd Worm-Wolf has been killed.

3. Mike Groves

Juicebox

.......all things being equal, JUICEBOX is a fairly nice guy. The best way to get on his bad side is to harm any of the creatures that roam around his neighborhood. As it turns out, his strength and size is directly related to how many minions are dispatched in his general vicinity. The more baddies you whack on your way.......the harder this guy is gona be to take down (and the more pissed he's gonna be). Best to just take the long way around and avoid this situation all together.

4. Kevin Saunders

Flying undead spectral militant squirrels.

They live deep within the woods of the land of Minigore. They are known to stalk their victims from the tree tops and swoop down when least expected. Sometimes they also carry weapons, such as bombs made out of acorns and such, These creatures can be stopped by normal means... however since they are spectral and undead, they cannot be killed and will regenerate over a short period of time. It is just best to stay out of the deep woods.

5. Tan Ming Ken

Yeti monster "Billy"

Encyclopedia

Long long ago, a bowling master named Billy was obsessed about bowling. He was however never satisfied with the smoothness of his ball. No matter how much he polished his bowling balls, it was never enough for him. One day he had an idea to make a bowling ball out of ice; and knows the best kind of ice were the ones in the icy mountains. The villagers warned him of the dangers ahead, but he still decided to go on his journey, as something was clearly wrong in his head. He hiked for 3 days, and found some ice at the foot of the mountain. He began to carve, and finally made an ice bowling ball. Silly as it sounds, it did make some sense. He believed the ice at the top of the mountain must be the best. He continued hiking, and days went by. He never returned, and we all know why.

Abilities

-This Yeti Monster will hit over anything that moves with his snowballs. You are it's bowling pins that need to get out of the way.

-His snowball is able to eat up furries. The furries however do not die; they are freezed and preserved in the snowball untill the snowball explodes. And then all hell breakes loose.

-The only way to get to the Yeti monster is to destroy all the snowballs and furries as it acts as a barrier for the Yeti as well.

-You loose life by touching the Snowball or the Yeti monster.

6. Christian Gimber

Mr. Maguire

Mr. Maguire is a boss. He tends to the clovers and sows the seeds of new ones. He also guards them from abusers of their magic like John Gore. If the player leaves 3 or more clovers on the ground for too long, Mr Maguire shows up. He is protected by a huge fireball, but draws his power from the clovers. If you get rid of/use all the clovers, he loses his fire and is vulnerable to bullets.

7. Philippe Crifo

Sasquatch

Encyclopedia

Few are those who know that hundreds of Sasquatchs used to roam happily around the forests of Hardland. That was until the Furries appeared and started slaughtering them! Their instinct of survival forced them to become more aggressive toward other creatures, but it was too late, only a few managed to survive. Nowadays, they are believed instinct, but some say that a few may have survived...

Behavior

The Sasquatch used to be a very calm an peaceful creature. However, they became very nervous as a result of being slaughtered by hundreds. But as they are not violent creatures by instinct, Sasquatches will only attack if they get attacked first. For example, if John Gore or any other character appends to touch a Sasquatch, he would get hurt. BUT, if the manages to shoot the Sasquatch enough to make him mad, the Sasquatch would go on a killing spree, Slaughtering every Furry or any other enemies around him. As a result, the Sasquatch can be a dangerous foe as well as an useful ally.

8. Jimmy G Tan Jr.

Pyrobat

Ahh, the Pyrobat. Little darklings roaming the nights in search of their one true bliss: fire. Fire's warm. Fire's good. Fire's... strangely delicious (a tad too tart, but delectable).

Abilities

Their arrival is presented with smog coming from the incense burners the Pyrobats carry laying down a sort-of fog of war to your screen. Pyrobats come in packs of maybe three to five.

They swoop down for their primary prey: your torchlight. As soon as they've sated their fiery hunger, they move on to flaming furries (predator furries are too fast for them though). If left at it, these critters can put out all available fires in Hardland.

9. Leandro Aciar

EE-EE Barrel

Abilities

Chain Of Explosions:”throws a chain of monkeys ready to explode diagonally, horizontal, zig-zag and circular”

Pure Rage:”when defeated,EE-EE Barrel rushes at players for 1 last BOOM!”

Story

Deep in the jungles of HARDLAND lives a monkey with a obession for his favorite toy:"a barrel of monkeys"and one day DR.Metusalem went hunting with his igor and they laid their eyes on the marvelous monkey and monkeynapped it and begin to cross-fuse the 2 specimens creating the tall 20 ft monstrosity called:EE-EE Barrel!!! after that,DR.Metusalem left EE-EE BARREL in charge of his dark childhood domain...The Twisted Toy Shop!!!!

10. Anastazja Konczakowska

"Three Brothers"

They are three brothers living in the swamp. The biggest brother is carrying two other brothers on his head. He is the strongest and the most stupid of them. The middle one has the sharpest teeth and is carrying hammer. The smallest one is most dangerous because he can pretend bush.

First you have to kill the biggest brother and then you have to fight middle brother and after his death you have to face the smallest one fighting with the fork.

Holiday break is over!

2011-01-11T02:09:00.000-08:00

Kimmo and I were both on a holiday last week. Jussi was looking after the Sheep Mountain while we were away.

It's been exactly a year since I was on a holiday in another country. Compared to the dark and cold Finland I love the warm south. It's inspiring to get away for while and see some new scenery, and quite the scenery it has been! I snapped a ton of photos: (Btw. that's not Kimmo in the first photo)

In addition to photography we also went paragliding and surfing. They were awesome experiences!

Minigore related news: Three new encyclopedia pages are ready. One of them is the winner of voting: John Gore. The others shall remain surprises.

We've finally shortlisted the final 10 entries, the voting starts tomorrow!

Contest Deadline Reached!

2011-01-05T07:26:00.001-08:00

Hi everyone!

Minigore Monster Contest has reached it's deadline. We are currently trying to sort out the best 10 for the voting. There is about 200 participants in total and picking only 10 has proved to be a challenging task. We have been talking about the entries and for the most part we have also agreed which entries should make it to the final.

The voting will start Wednesday 12th of January and will take place on the Forums. For now we have decided everyone will get 3 votes (note that this might still change if we see a better way of doing this). So everyone who wants to vote also has to register on the Forums. 3 votes because otherwise some people would only vote for their own piece of art ;), and because I know it's going to be a tough choice which one to vote!

Anyway, I want to thank you all for participating in this. It was very enjoyable to see what kind of funny, strange creatures people came up with. I think I even fell of a chair once or twice because I laughed so hard. I also think this competition once again made the Minigore community a bit bigger and better place for all of us to be! I especially liked the way everyone was commenting, encouraging and criticizing each other in a good way!

Good Luck and Thank You!

Squad Based Gameplay

2010-12-30T09:53:00.000-08:00

Here's what Timo promised. A gameplay video of the penguins! As you can see the Emperor Penguin is surrounded by little helper penguins that give their lives to protect the Emperor! What devotion! Heheh... When playing the Emperor you can pick up more little penguins to help you and also protect you from the furries. As you can see on the video, Timo is picking up new penguins after he loses some of them. I find this game mechanic really entertaining myself! This is totally my new favourite character in the game. Wait till you see the Emperor's beast mode Martin!

Soon you'll get to play with the penguins as well if you bought the Elder Gore character pack. Enjoy the vid!

I'm happy to announce that we received the improved John Gore coffee mug yesterday to the office. It's looking really good and we are planning on launching the store around the end of January. Here's a pic from the back side of the mug:

Nice Huh!?

Minigore Monster contest is about to reach the deadline for entries. You still have tomorrow to submit yours! Then we will start to argue, umh, I mean discuss politely, which entries will be in the top 10. I have to say, It's a bunch of difficult decisions for us to make. Among the entries we received a really impressive piece of Fan Art! Here's John on a laptop by Adam Fairhead.

Thanks Adam! You can visit Adam's site here: http://fairheadcreative.com

Be careful with the New Year's rockets and firecrackers and have fun!

Three little things...

2010-12-27T11:49:00.000-08:00

I hope you all had a great Christmas!

1) This weeks bigger blog post and video will be about the penguins. It will also be about another gameplay addition that involves more than two playable characters on screen simultaneously!

Any guesses how the penguin thing is gonna work?

2) Cult of Mac liked Minigore Episode 4 icon! This is what they said about it:

We love the Minigore icon purely because it features a lovingly crafted picture of an elderly couple wielding a sawn-off shotgun and an uzi. However, it’s not just this Minigore icon that deserves to be recognized – with each update comes a new icon and every one of them has featured a great graphic.

It's great to see that people notice the icon. I put lots of work in each one of them and I can't wait to show you the next icon! It's very different from all the others :)

15 Best iOS App Icons in 2010

3) More and more great contest entries are being submitted as the contest is approaching the grand finale! The following entry was drawn on an iPad by Cedric Philippe:

I happened to stumble upon it in his blog over at:
cedricphilippe.blogspot.com

There's still time to submit your own entries and win an iPod touch or Wacom Intuos!

AI Controlled Player Partner for Elder Gore Pack!

2010-12-22T09:55:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas everyone!

We have been working to have an AI controlled character in game to help player to fight off furries. The character who is following the player can get the beast mode, weapon upgrades and has a health of it's own. If the player dies before the helper dies, player gets the control of the helper and can continue playing. This is a nice addition to people who don't have a stable WLAN and/or are missing a second device for multiplayer. You are of course allowed to play with the AI character even if you don't have these problems.

Many of the reported multiplayer issues are possibly caused by a poor WLAN connection. However we tested the build by walking to the 4th floor of the building when we had the router on the 1st floor and it worked fine. There was so much concrete between the router and the devices it's hard for me to imagine any worse WLAN situation, really. Anyway, since it seems the problems are there, we are going to try to find ways to improve the multiplayer over wi-fi so that it will work better. We have also been working on the multiplayer over Game Center and it's improving steadily. We even worked on a voice chat over GC, first working version done!

Thanks for everyone who found and posted bugs on the blog, it really helps. There should be an update coming January where we try to address all the most important bugs. As Timo said earlier, there's not going to be a submission before January because of the holidays. There's nobody to approve the submission at Apple, and we need a break too :)

MOUNTAIN SHEEP WISHES YOU HAPPY HOLIDAYS!!! Eat well, spend time with your family and be nice to Santa ;)

Multiplayer update is out!

2010-12-17T06:33:00.000-08:00

Feature list:

- Introducing cooperative multiplayer over WLAN.
- Co-op gameplay addition: Stay closer to your friend to increase the firepower.
- Tons of new John Gore dialogue and system that selects the comments randomly for each game to add variation.
- Elder Gore character pack. Grandpa and Grandma might be old, but they do know how to handle guns. More characters will join that character pack later.
- Full retina display support. Includes splash screen, menus, HUD & Encyclopedia. New cover art for encyclopedia.
- Hires level backgrounds from the iPad version. (requires retina display)
- It's raining snow on the snow level. (requires 3rd gen device or better)
- Many bug fixes and improvements: Bullets don't go through totems, new level emblems etc.

Let us know how you like and what you would improve in the comments! Revival gameplay seems to be a hot topic and we've discussed a few ideas about it. It would definitely decrease the waiting time if other player dies.

I'm guessing the iPad version could come out in January. App store doesn't accept new submissions during Christmas (23rd - 29th December) so we would have time to test it properly during that time and then submit on 30th for example.

New multiplayer footage!

2010-12-15T08:51:00.000-08:00

It's a new week again for us developers to bring you some news about the game. As you know we submitted the Episode 4. As we are waiting for it to go through Apple, I'm going to show you a video showing me and Kimmo playing multiplayer:

Some of the features are still under development and will be in further updates. We have already tested Game Center online multiplayer and it worked very well from Helsinki to London over 3g network. Still needs some minor adjustments and of course beta testing. This considered we are expecting online multiplayer to be ready quite soon.

Also got a nice surprise for you, some people have been asking about Minigore related merchandise and we are currently designing different kind of coffee mug themes. We actually ordered a few for quality checking purposes and had to make some adjustments. Here's a pic of the very first version of a John Gore themed coffee mug. The picture turned out to be rather dark on the mug. The next version we made a bit brighter and are waiting for the mug to arrive so we can check if it's "customer" ready. About the merchandise in general: We are going to go with a minimum profit to keep the prices as low as possible.

If you got some nice ideas about themes in the merchandise, it would be nice to know. We have already decided to go with John Gore and Elder Gore themes. We were planning to have t-shirts also, but the first version turned out to be of a poor quality and that's something we don't want.

Episode 4 has been submitted!!!

2010-12-10T12:11:00.000-08:00

We finally submitted the newest update with the local wi-fi multiplayer. There was some problems with the submission, since we had to hotfix the build about 6 times before we finally got it the way it was supposed to be. Let me just say that things are much more complex when multiplayer is involved.

Right now we have our fingers crossed that the update would make it through Apple before Christmas. It seems unlikely at the moment. We have received reports their approval during December will be uber slow due to many developers submitting updates & apps. There's nothing we can do about it, except to hope for the best.

Some brand new co-op screens featuring Enviro-Bear and Evan Hsu (Second screen has Xmas Gore & Santa duo):

Online multiplayer & bluetooth will follow in a later update!

Also as the Minigore Monster Contest is still alive and kicking, I must remind everybody that you still have the time to submit your entry! More info about the contest can be found from the blog post made WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 2010.

We also decided to extend the rules a bit (don't worry nothing dramatic) so that all the entries and artwork posted on the forums will automatically be considered for the contest. This means you don't necessarily have to post your work to the email (sheepcontests@gmail.com) in order to participate.

Some people who sent their entries have been wondering if we received their entry. Unfortunately we don't have time to reply to everybody. If you are unsure if we got it or not, check your email account's "sent" folder to see if it is there. If you can't find it, or don't know how to check, you can resubmit your entry to make sure.

The bringer of news is here...Episode 4 news that is!

2010-12-01T05:22:00.000-08:00

Remember some of the menus and other non-ingame things not being retina resolution? Now everything is! This and fixing the multiplayer, getting characters ready and adding three times more speech for John Gore (courtesy of Egoraptor of course) is what we've been doing the past weeks. Here's some insight to Ep 4 features!!!

Splash Screen:

Elder Gore characters are going to be in the next update! They are old, senile and GRUMPY.

They do create havoc with guns nevertheless:

Multiplayer co-op has entered a second beta build test phase. We nailed a handful of wi-fi bandwidth related bugs with utmost effectiveness and it's a lot more playable than before. Things are looking good! Unfortunately I don't know when the build is ready for submission but we are looking into a December release. We want the co-op be as smooth as possible of course.

Zombie Gore and Undead Jenny multiplayer shot:

The forums are a starting to be a nice lively place! We have a lot of members posting their art, discussing the game or just getting to know each other. We have about 35 topics revealing and discussing contest entries! I highly recommend the place! In case you haven't joined the forums already, you can do it here: www.mountainsheep.net/forums

Before Minigore there was RamMan

2010-11-27T03:38:00.000-08:00

Before John Gore we had a physics based game concept called RamMan. It was a game about blocky treasure hunter running around a level evading a monster. The player had no guns, he only had a grappling hook & slippery shoes. The grappling hook and his slippery shoes allowed him to swing around obstacles and make RamMan hit the obstacles instead. The gameplay was based around accurate timing and use of momentum:

The ancient beast who is chasing him is the RamMan. If you combine ramming and man that's pretty much what you get, literally :D

3d models of the characters that were modeled in Zbrush:

RamMan & the treasure hunter posing in their final form:

The temple is many floors deep. As you complete each floor the earlier floor will break into pieces and you fall on the deeper floor. Only on the deepest floor you can finally reach the green jewels of the statue and defeat RamMan by putting the jewels into his eye sockets.

Very blocky test scene:

Mockup of how it would have looked like:

I might have some video buried deep in the archives, I'll update this post if I can find it.

-UPDATE - Here's the footage I talked about:

DISCLAIMER: This is old and buried game which never made it into full production.

Multiplayer is just around the corner!

2010-11-25T03:17:00.000-08:00

Minigore now has around 1,5 million players worldwide! Amazing huh?! After we put Minigore free on App Store, the download amounts skyrocketed. We were expecting the downloads get bigger, but we certainly didn't expect this much!

New update finally came out, and the feedback has been very positive. I'm glad about this :)

We have started multiplayer beta testing! Hold your horses, everyone... I know how much you wait for Ep 4 to be ready. However, there is still going to be some fixing before we are ready to submit the update with multiplayer. Beta testers are currently working on the multiplayer aspect of Ep 4, but not yet the graveyard / zombies. Why? -You might ask. It's because we want the beta testing to be less chaotic. This way we can pretty much isolate the problems of the multiplayer without having to be concerned about the bugs in the zombies -part. Splitting Ep 4 into two releases isn't an impossible option either and in that case you would get your hands on multiplayer very soon.

New favicon for the Minigore forums:

Tons of Things

2010-11-17T05:55:00.000-08:00

Greetings, destroyers of furries!

I have tons of stuff to tell today. First of all, as some of you already noticed, Minigore is free for a limited time on App Store. Be sure to tell all your friends who might enjoy this awesome game! After putting Minigore free, we have raised the ranks and are currently #2 in free games US App Store and #4 in free apps US App Store. This is huge! For those who did not know, US is the biggest market many iPhone/iPod touch games have, and that is the case for Minigore too.

Secondly, the contest has seen many great entries so far. I only have a small complaint. I WANT MORE ENTRIES!!! I'm quite sure you have friends who would like to win an iPod or a Wacom! The competition also created something nice in it's own: The Mountain Sheep Forums. So be sure to register and chat with other fans, check out fan art, competition entries or just talk about the weather... You can find the forums at www.mountainsheep.net/forums

There's more! We submitted the new update of Minigore for iPhone/iPod touch! So you'll get to play White Gangster Gore soon. This build also has Encyclopedia with 3 pages on it. Also fixed the new achievements not always registering and the muzzle flash bug with the bushes. We also submitted HD version update with multitasking!

Some people might have encountered the launching of Minigore to end up to a black screen. This means there is not enough memory available for the game to run. You may have too many apps open simultaneously or may have used an app that leaks memory. Either way, closing other apps or restarting the device should help. We are going to update Minigore later this year to inform you with a popup if it has indeed run out of memory at start.

And because I finally ran out of breath and have nothing more to say, I let you guys enjoy a picture of John Gore taking a bath :D

Minigore Monster Contest! Big Prizes!

2010-11-10T16:34:00.000-08:00

We held a tagline contest last year where the winner ended up as a playable character in Minigore. Evan Hsu was the lucky one with his catchy tagline "Tiny creatures, Giant adventure!"

It's that time of the year again so let me introduce the next Minigore themed contest:

Click the poster for a hires version!

We would like you to design a monster that fits into the minigore universe. You can use whatever means necessary to make your fantastic creature. This includes digital painting tools like Photoshop or Gimp, traditional art tools, clay, super sculpey, matchsticks & glue, baking cakes, snow, ice sculpting, 3d software, Zbrush, pixel art, papercrafting, blood... maybe not the last one, but you get the point :)

If you plan to draw your monster with pen & paper just scan it or use your camera to take the picture. You must however add a text "minigore monster!" to one of the corners with the same type of pencil, pen or crayons you used to ensure us that the picture is indeed made by you.

Send the pictures to sheepcontests@gmail.com with a description of your monster, its name and its abilities. Also, add in your full name, your address and e-mail (if it's not the same you used to send the pictures). We need your contact information in case you win some of the prizes in the competition. Mountain Sheep will NOT use your contact information in any other way than to inform the winners.

We will pick 10 best monster designs and then we will create a poll out of them for everyone to vote your favourite. We will consider the following judging criteria when picking the 10 finalists for the poll:

1) Creativity
2) Technical skill
3) Effort (you get extra points for making the monster using extraordinary methods)

The deadline for submitting entries is 31st of December 2010 (12.00 (UTC +2 timezone). After we shortlist 10 entries the public voting will be held and the winner will be the design which gets the most votes!

We've got some awesome prizes for the winners:

1st prize : Wacom Intuos 4 M A5 Wide
Top of the line drawing tablet from Wacom. It's same model I used to create all Minigore art.

2nd prize : iPod touch 8GB (4th generation)
It's the latest iPod touch featuring retina display.

3nd prize : Minigore poster and a mug
Cool Minigore themed merchandise.

Everyone at Mountain Sheep is super excited about the competition and I personally can't wait to see what kind of crazy designs you guys & gals come up with!

UPDATE: I did a couple examples to answer few questions and to get you even more inspired to throw together some crazy designs!

Let your imagination fly! The monsters can be as tiny as an ant or as big as a mountain, it could be designed as playable character or it could be a boss, or just a regular monster. If you want to go the whole nine yards it can be put into elaborate setting with a moody background and other characters.

Discussion about entries Minigore Forums

Gangster in white

2010-11-08T05:57:00.000-08:00

Hello!

As briefly explained in my last post, theres a new update underway shortly and it includes the new playable character White Gangster Gore, here's the splash screen:

..And a pic showing all the health states of the White Gangster Gore (the final version has dual shotguns).

Also included first 3 pages of the Encyclopedia. And various bug fixes. We had some problem with the achievements in the last release, they have been fixed now. It was a bit tricky since when Kimmo made a fix for the lost dlc achievements, a new achievement related bug was born in the progress. This is pretty much how game development often goes, you never know what's going to break next when you fix something. The code for a game as small as Minigore is quite a bit of text and complexity (I think it's around 30,000 lines). ANYWAY, the update has entered another test phase, and will be submitted shortly.

I have some good news for everyone out there who would like to (or has already) design a creature in the Minigore Universe. Yes, it is time for a contest! I will make a new blog post on Wednesday describing the rules for the competition. There has been some rumors about having the latest iPod as one of the prizes ;). Here's a picture Timo made that might give you some ideas. I suggest you start warming up your crayons!!

EDIT: Added the picture of the health states and the in-game appearance of the White Gangster Gore.

Graveyard news

2010-11-01T08:22:00.000-07:00

Hey all!

We just started beta testing the next update of the game with Gangster Gore in a white suit, dual wielding shotguns. First version of Encyclopedia is included too.

This weeks blog post is about some polish on the future content: graveyard and the zombies. At the end of the post I will make a small Q/A -section from the questions I've picked from the comments and will try to shed some light on them. First here's some new screen shots from the zombie level. The chest you see on the pic is a "treasure chest" that will give you more kills. Also Timo changed the walls on the level shorter so that the enemies wouldn't get stuck behind them. Vlado used his magical programmer skills and shader technologies to make the blood look SUPER.

Questions and Answers:

Q1) What happened to the grenade ability that was going to be in ep 3?

A1) It didn't suite the gameplay fluently, so it became a grenade launcher instead.

Q2) What happened to Old Man Tackle?

A2) Timo says: Work in progress.

Q3) Why playing Sensei Evan leads to a message "Too skilled for leaderboards."?

A3) Currently we are going with a one leaderboard only and Sensei Evan is not balanced compared to other characters. Only a handful of people have managed to get Sensei and we think it would be a bit unfair for everyone if Sensei was the only character you could get to leaderboards with.

Q4) What's the point of the star system?

A4) At this point the stars are only showing the amount of time played with a character. There has been some ideas about how we could use the feature to make it more worthwhile to get full stars but for now we are not planning on implementing any of them. Personally I find this something that could be done after more important parts of the game are done.

Q5) What's the situation with the Ep 4?

A5) Getting there. Multiplayer needs more work. Next in line is a "revival mechanism" in Co-Op. No more exciting news, sorry. Kimmo is working on merging the iPhone/iPod version code of the game with the HD version code to make future implementing easier. Release date is NOT going to be November 2010. That's all there is to say about the release date for now.

Q6) Game Center support for older devices?

A6) Can't be done. Unfortunately it's not up to us (Mountain Sheep). Someone was hoping we could have OpenFeint working simultaneously with GC, but we are not going to go back to OF. This because it requires too much regular upkeeping from our part.

Poll. Patch talk...

2010-10-28T06:41:00.000-07:00

Hey!

After the release of the Halloween Episode the feedback has been mainly positive, we are happy about this. The two new dlc contect achievements not working properly is going to be fixed in the next update. The black screen bug is also being looked into.

Anyways, here's a poll about Encyclopedia. The first three pages will be Minotaur, Elder Gore couple and Jenny Gore. We'd like your opinion about what's after them!? Here's the poll:

Minigore Halloween Episode is out!

2010-10-26T15:20:00.000-07:00

It’s Halloween, everyone! Let’s see what we got in store for you this year!

- New playable character Undead Jenny who is as lethal as she is dead.

- New scoring system with multipliers.

- Minigore now fully supports Game Center and has removed Openfeint. Don't worry though, the new scoring mechanism will allow you to top the leaderboards once more!

- iPod Touch 4G support.

- Fixed flip screen bug on iPhone 4.
- Multiple graphical improvements, including muzzle flash for all weapons.
- Remade better looking snow level.

- Animated hearts as health indicators.

We've done some major changes in the game logic so if you have any issues please report them in the comments. Next version with the first three Minigore Encyclopedia pages is almost ready for beta testing, so testers be ready :)

Comic!

2010-10-25T06:38:00.000-07:00

Hello!

As everyone is waiting for the update to get through Apple (including us), I decided to publish something you guys have never seen before. A sneak peek to Minigore Comic. Yes, that's right. We plan to add it to the game bit by bit, just like Encyclopedia. The purpose of this is to have a way to tell the story behind the game in a nice looking, clear way. Just like Encyclopedia, the Comic will be included in future updates, not as an in-app purchase.

Here's the cover:

As you can see, Tim Mcburnie has been working on the Comic. He's doing a fantastic job! Just in case you didn't know his work before this, here's a link to his website. Enjoy!

Tim Mcburnie: Portfolio

Halloween Episode submission!

2010-10-19T06:23:00.000-07:00

Greetings!

It's again time for a weekly post. Got some good news for you! Here goes:

We have submitted the Halloween Episode.

Now it's really up to Apple if it will make it in time for Halloween but we have every reason to believe this would be the case. According to Apple they manage to review 87% of the updates withing a week. Even if Minigore falls in to that unfortunate 13% we still have about 6 days for them to get it done.

Many people were confused this being Episode 4, but It's not. If I have to give it an Episode number, I'd say it's like Episode 3.9x. This is what is included in this update:

-New playable character Undead Jenny Gore matching the Halloween spirit!

-Completely remade snow level.

-Kill multipliers, "kills" instead of "score".

-Gamecenter support.

-Retina Display support for iPod 4G.

-Various bug fixes (including the flip screen bug on iPhone 4).

Minigore HD for iPad will not get this update. We wish to update the HD version straight to Episode 4.

I hope you guys enjoy this version as much as I enjoyed testing it!

About Game Center being compatible only with the newer generation devices, we are aware of this. I'd like to be able to do something about it, but I really can't. We are following Apple's footsteps with supporting the newer gen and Game Center seems to be the way to go. It also works faster than OpenFeint. For the users of older devices, this is unfortunate.

Encyclopedia!

2010-10-12T04:04:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone!

This weeks blog post is about a new feature called the Encyclopedia. It's going to be implemented to the current game bit by bit each update adding some more pages. It's a book-like illustration of the characters and the enemies in the game. It shows helpful stats (health, speed, strength, etc) and some information expanding the Minigore lore and universe. Here's a teaser sketch:

The grandpa is my favourite :). The final Encyclopedia is in colors.

For the past week we have been busy testing and fixing bugs found in the Halloween Episode beta. The current testing team is really active and analytic and I'm happy to be able to work with them to make Minigore a better experience. This is also why I wasn't able to write on blog yesterday, the "BUGgers" keep me busy ;D

Multiplayer is taking so long because the game was not originally designed for multiplayer and the code had to be almost completely redone. Timo wrote about this before and it hasn't changed.

Someone also asked my highscore in Minigore. It's hard to say really because I've mostly played the new version with the "kills" instead of the old score method. That said I did get around 3500 kills on insane difficulty with gangster gore and about 5500 with Sensei Evan on insane difficulty. I suck, I know. :D

Cheers.

Halloween Episode

2010-10-04T05:25:00.000-07:00

Hey!

As the title says, we will call the next update the halloween episode. Some new features included:

New splash screen.

New start menu background:

And a gameplay screenie with some new stuff on it ;) However I'll let you guys guess what's new here! *BWHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAA!!!*

EDIT: Removed the contact request, because it was no longer needed.

Update Details & Promo Codes

2010-09-27T06:59:00.000-07:00

There's several things we are throwing in from Episode 4 to the latest update, it turned out to be not so small update!

Let's start with how the beginning of the game looks on each version:

(Click for full-size comparison)

1. Scoring system reworked. "Score" has been changed to "kills".

2. Multipliers. You get more kills for bigger targets and blowing up the fur bombs when other enemies are in range gets you even more extra kills. Beast mode gives double kills.

Multipliers, hearts, muzzle flashes and kill counter:

3. Remade snow level. It has different layout and everything from trees to bushes is covered in snow. Remember the original Kid Gore? This is a change of similar magnitude.

4. New difficulty selection. Probably my favourite in terms of wow factor. The camera is zoomed way out to give you a better view of the level.

5. Unique muzzle flashes for all weapons. For now it's just a visual flavour but in Episode 4 it is used to communicate co-op weapon efficiency for each player. The closer players get to each other the bigger the muzzle flashes & faster the fire rate. It's made to encourage cooperative play.

Dual-wielding machine gun with the new muzzle flashes:

6. Hearts for health visualization. They are displayed in the top left corner. If the character has 5 health states you don't have to remember how each one looks.

7. Clover pick-up and slots right where you pick up the clovers. Makes it easier to see how many you have because it's displayed where the action is at.

Game Center related changes:

1. Achievements through Game Center with prettier achievement icons.

2. New leaderboards with less clutter and faster response time. OpenFeint leaderboards are gonna be removed.

Let's not stop quite here, then there's the bug fixes:

1. Retina display enabled on iPod touch 4. We got ipt4 at the office and it's working beautifully on it.

2. Flip screen bug fixed on iPhone 4 and iPod touch 4. This one should remain fixed until Apple rolls out the next device with different resolution. ;)

3. Sometimes fire direction got stuck, it shouldn't do that anymore.

Kimmo is working hard on finishing the Game Center implementation, then the update should be ready for testing & submission.

We get some new promo codes for each update. Most people who read this blog probably already have the iPhone version, in any case here's 40 promo codes for the iPhone version you can share with your friends!

Please leave a review on iTunes if you use one :)

EDIT! Looks like all promo codes are taken, I'll clear this space so you don't have to scroll so much EDIT!

Info about the bug fix coming up!

2010-09-26T16:07:00.001-07:00

There's detailed info about the bug fix update coming up in 24 hours!

In short: we put in a lot more stuff from Episode 4 into it as you can tell by looking at this screenshot:

Jussi has been in fever since middle of last week so I might be the one doing the post if he's still feeling ill today.

Game Center

2010-09-20T04:49:00.000-07:00

Hello.

We are currently working on the flip screen bug fix affecting iPhone 4, other models should not be affected. The fix itself shouldn't be too hard to make, we just hope it goes through Apple swiftly too. We plan to release support for Game Center at the same time. This naturally means the leader boards will be reset as we change the current system to kills instead of score.

As a side note, we are not trying to offend/disrespect/ignore anybody by releasing an update that does not benefit people with older generation devices. Making the game support Retina display is very important for the future development of the game as the amount of older devices will become smaller. In the Retina display update there was also a bug fix that DID benefit everybody. Especially the owners of older devices. The explosion of the crates lowered framerate and sometimes crashed older devices. We changed the explosion so that it is no longer as demanding on the hardware.

Retina display and framerate support for iPod touch 4 is being made too, we just got ipt4 to the office.

Retina display update is out!

2010-09-17T16:23:00.001-07:00

The update should be available for download in the coming hours!
US iTunes is already showing the new icon:

The icon features Kimmo's favourite character "Easter Bunny", everyone else at the office would rather jump off the window (1st floor) than play as that character ;)

The update adds support for retina display (iPhone 4 only) and faster frame rate on iPhone 3Gs, iPod touch 3rd gen and iPhone 4.

UPDATE: We don't have iPod touch 4 at the office yet - it seems like the hires mode doesn't activate on it, also it's possible the faster frame rate doesn't activate either. This update was submitted around the time when iPod touch 4 was introduced so it's gonna need a new update to add support for it.

There's a huge difference in the level of detail between normal and retina versions:

For some reason JPG artifacting is more noticiable in the left side image, but other than that it's a fair comparison. I took the left side screen shot on an older iPod touch and the right side capture was done with iPhone 4.

You can download the update here: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/minigore/id324016249?mt=8

bharter: Thanks for mentioning the missing link!

Mo-mo-mo-MONSTROSITY!!!

2010-09-14T05:13:00.000-07:00

Hello for the second time blog followers!

First of all I have to say I'm quite astonished about the amount of fan posts here on the blog and also on Touch Arcade, where I registered to view the beta testing forums. And boy.. believe it or not, the amount of ideas, opinions, bug reports, expectations and all kinds of chatter from the past 1,5 years is making my head spin. I think I was dreaming of Minigore last night too. For a person like me who is quite new to this community the information is a bit overwhelming. However, I think I'm getting a grasp of this :D. That said I'll try to answer some questions I noticed on the blog.

So there's a lot of questions about the release of Episode 4. I understand people are waiting it like there's no tomorrow but unfortunately I won't guess the release date. I'm saying "guess" because there's really no way to know. If I throw a date out of nowhere it is most likely to be inaccurate. It will be released when it's done.

About the totems... changing the difficulty setting midgame with the totems will not be possible. The dynamic difficulty made the multiplayer code too complicated and had to be changed. You choose the difficulty at the beginning of each round. Once you have chosen a difficulty, it will be set to default to new rounds until you choose a different totem.

There was also a question if there's going to be new enemies and the answer is yes. Timo has been pulling all-nighters for awhile and I really wonder if he sleeps at all. Please note that this is probably not going to make it to Ep 4, since the content for that is pretty much decided and we are focusing on finishing the update before adding new features.

I have the great honor to introduce to you, the making of: Metusalem's Monstrosity!!

And the Final Version:

Pretty nice, don't you think? :)

Oh yeah, about Game Center. We here at Mountain Sheep are really excited about the GC. We wanted to see how well it starts and we are pleased so far.

P.s. Now I know where my snacks are disappearing to... It's the mysterious "Timmo" character I'm sure. I wonder if he lurks in the office closet and comes out at night to devour my peanuts!!!

Greetings from the Sheepland!

2010-09-08T03:48:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone!

As some of you already know, Timo wrote on the blog earlier that Mountain Sheep had hired some new staff for various tasks and jobs. So here I am! :) My work here at MS includes viewing and commenting the blog every now and then among other things. Nice to be here and I hope I don't forget to mention some things about Minigore as it is a bit new game to me still. I've been spending some time studying the game and reading past posts and comments and I hope I don't miss anything important. If I do, have mercy...

So, as my first post here I'd like to introduce the Totems as a new feature. The totems are going to be present when you start the game and by shooting one of the three you will choose the difficulty setting you would like to have. After the selection the Totems will disappear and the hordes of furries will come as before. I think Timo made a great work with them and I think it's a nice improvement to the old choosing method. Here's a pic:

Also as you can see this shot also introduces some other changes. Instead of showing clovers at the upper left corner there will be health shown in the future. This mainly because some characters are not going to have only 3 lives but 5. This new health system will be used in the upcoming multiplayer. This will make it easier to see the current situation without having to remember the changes in the character models. The clovers will be shown at the center of the screen when you pick up one and then they will vanish until you pick up another one. Also the place where the score used to be will be featuring kills from now on. The kills mechanism works a bit different compared to the score before. When in beast mode you will be given a 2x multiplier for the furries you kill, so instead of the old system you get twice the "score" during beast mode. Also for killing the big furries you get more kills than from the small ones.

As a new member to the community and to the Mountain Sheep I also wanted to offer some promotional codes for you to use. By using the code you will be able to download Minigore HD on iPad for free. It would be nice if the people fast enough to get the code would also write a bit of a review on iTunes about it, thank you very much :). If you use a code, also make a comment telling others which codes are used so people can pick up theirs without the unnecessary trial and error method :)

The Codes:

1. 9PPMERHPFWKW

2. KR7K693JXEAH

3. PH9PTANRWY3H

4. R7NAMPL94TWW

5. 94JMM4RPMK6F

6. FNXP7PXL73TL

7. HJTK3TKJKE3L

8. MFTJPHF7HKFF

9. 6J73HHWHAPAR

10. 4YA33W4FEJXW

Peace!

P.s. Almost forgot. Update for retina -display and improved frame rate is in review. The improved frame rate IMHO is a big update and substantially improves the enjoyment of this game. Frame rate affected models: iPhone 3GS, iPod touch 3rd gen, iPhone 4.

More Jenny Gore Artwork

2010-08-22T13:03:00.000-07:00

Jenny Gore demonstrating her Sheep Launcher skills:

...and this is what happens when you run out of sheep:

The latest Jenny Gore 3d model showing all three health stages:

Sheep Launcher ingame model:

Forest level with a lake:

DISCLAIMER: This is not content for Episode 4. I just wanted to share this stuff to let you know we're not dead :)

Zombie Evolution

2010-08-01T08:14:00.001-07:00

Metalbear wanted to see some more technical art stuff so I thought I would post this. It shows the evolution of the zombie 3d models:

Click the image for a closer view.

To continue with the technical stuff: Recently we updated our 3d model exporter. That confused the level collision code so it's gonna take a day or two to fix the bugs. We updated the exporter because there's new optimization features which could help us improve the framerate quite a bit. Also when we return to the office on Monday the multiplayer optimization marathon continues...

Introducing Jenny Gore

2010-07-31T19:18:00.000-07:00

Jenny Gore is the short-tempered daughter of John Gore. When angry she can be more frightening than a pack of giant furries!

While all the animation is done we're not completely finished with her and this is where you can help! Jenny needs a voice. User "Mat_rix_007" over at toucharcade.com suggested Rina-Chan as the voice actress and I quite like her work: http://suzumiya-haruhi.net/

So let's hear it, who would be the perfect voice actress for Jenny?

SLIGHTLY OFF TOPIC

There's this cool browser based game called Minecraft and I decided to do official John Gore skin for it:

If someone else has been infected with Minecraft fever here's the texture file which let's you run around as mr Gore: http://www.mountainsheep.net/minigore/MinecraftJohnGore.png

More detailed instructions here

Multiplayer menu

2010-07-06T06:04:00.000-07:00

We're putting finishing touches to the user interface. Here's a picture of the menu:

I personally like the zombie level emblem. Maybe I should make the other two level icons similar and remove John Gore from them, what do you think?

Evil Knight gameplay video

2010-07-03T12:05:00.000-07:00

Evil Knight has went through several revisions and we're starting to be quite happy with this latest version. This knight is the character which we will use to introduce melee combat into the world of Hardland.

Check out the video below of him running around and evading furries:

Multiplayer gameplay video

2010-06-29T00:37:00.000-07:00

This is the very first video of Minigore's co-op multiplayer!

What other multiplayer modes would you like to see in addition to co-op? Deathmatch or "capture the Santa" anyone? :)

Minigore Episode 4 Dev Diary

2010-06-23T19:38:00.000-07:00

We know there's lots of eager fans who want to know what's happening with Episode 4. This gameplay video might shed some light on the current state of the update:

As you can see the zombies are working quite nicely, object collisions work properly and the level art is nearly final. Some sound effects are missing and the music is being worked on. Co-op multiplayer is not visible in the video but even that one is coming along nicely :)

Episode 3.9 is out!

2010-05-12T14:30:00.000-07:00

Countdown to Episode 4 has begun!

Fur Bomb: This fiesty furry is a hazard to you, itself and other furries alike. It will go totally nuts if you shoot it! Starts a chain reaction if you make it detonate near other Fur Bombs!

Auto-aiming: New option that puts John Gore in charge of the guns and lets you focus on surviving and dodging furries.

Predator Furry: Completely rebalanced! Starts off easy and builds up to a super-intense final. You will be able to survive longer - but how long?

Inferno: Easter is ancient history, but the Easter Bunny still brought an Easter egg! This secret lets you jump straight into the Inferno! X marks the spot...

Episode 3.8 submitted

2010-04-22T05:56:00.000-07:00

Episode 3.8 was submitted yesterday. It contains the following:

HD-certified graphics:
-The completely redone artwork brings you as close to the HD experience as you can get on iPhone and iPod touch!

Restore your kills based on OpenFeint achievements:
-If you reinstall the game or install it on another device, log on to OpenFeint and the game will automatically restore your kills based on your achievements. Note that the game cannot know the exact number of kills you had, just the kills it can award from your achievements.

Other improvements:
-Weapon recoil effects for all characters.
-Made it possible switch performance-intensive “3rd generation effects” (bullet shells and fence) on and off.

Visual comparison of Episode 3.7 and Episode 3.8:

Get your kills back based on your online achievements

2010-04-18T07:50:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I replied to some people who suffered from data loss, had deleted the game and only reinstalled it after the new update was out. In this case the game has no way of knowing that you actually have suffered from data loss as there is no evidence (a save file) of it left.

We discussed what we could do about it and arrived at the same solution I hinted at in comments. Upon logging on to OpenFeint, the next update will check if you have an online achievement but no corresponding local achievement. If so, you will receive the cost of the character in kills. This ensures you get the correct amount of kills. You can then use those to unlock any characters you want.

Hopefully this will remedy the issue for the rest of you out there. We will look into restoring your local scores from OpenFeint in a later update. If you see any loopholes with the kill restoration scheme (being able to choose different characters than you did before does not count), please tell us in the comments. Cheers!

3.7 fixed update is out

2010-04-17T03:31:00.000-07:00

The new update with 100 000 extra kills and unlocked characters for those of you who posted their achievements online is now available. See the previous blog post for instructions.

NOTE: This update is able to grant you extra kills and unlock your characters if your game contains a save file from the buggy Episode 3.7 (v1.27). If you are updating from Episode 3.6 (v1.26) or earlier, your save file is from an earlier version. If you deleted Minigore and are installing the latest update from a clean slate, you don't have a save file at all. The extra kills and characters can be granted for anyone who experienced a data loss and has a save file from the buggy Episode 3.7 (v1.27) when updating to the latest version.

Mountain Sheep is grateful for your patience and wishes you happy gaming. We will be submitting a new graphics improvement update next week, so stay tuned!

The fix

2010-04-12T19:16:00.000-07:00

The new update with a fix to the data loss bug and inability to save has begun its journey. Let us hope for a swift passage.

This is how we will thank you for your patience:

1. Anyone who suffered from data loss will be granted 100 000 free kills.
2. If you used OpenFeint, the next time you log on all the characters for which you had an achievement will be unlocked, as well as the next most expensive character you didn't yet have an achievement for (if any). For instance, if you have achievements for Jerry Gore and Zombieville Guy, you will get access to those two characters + the next character, Hook Champ, regardless of whether you had them unlocked previously or not.

We recognize this will not make it up for everyone (particularly those of you who don't go online), but hopefully it helps alleviate things at the very least. The bottom line is the update is on the way, so bare with us a little while longer!

Unlocking premium characters you have bought

2010-04-09T00:43:00.000-07:00

There seems to be a little bit of confusion as to how in-app purchases are unlocked in Minigore and when it can be done. Let me walk you through the process.

You can reunlock any premium characters you have already purchased for free and you can do it right away. That is to say iTunes won't charge you twice for downloading the same content. Use the "BUY NOW" button to unlock your premium character and when asked for your credentials, log in with the same iTunes account you used to make the original purchase. iTunes will then tell you have already bought this content and can download it for free.

Please note that for anyone who is running Episode 3.7, Minigore will not be able to create a save file and will have all the characters locked again the next time you start the time.

The fix is already implemented and we are now working on ways to make up for lost data. The update will be submitted in the next few days. Thanks for your patience and understanding, folks! Again, truly sorry about the data loss.

The save file bug

2010-04-08T11:09:00.000-07:00

Sincere apologies on my behalf, as well. :( We, as not only developers but also fellow gamers, know how painful it is to lose your scores, kills and characters (though DLC characters you can always download for free) - something you've worked very hard to get. The fault was in build finalization process. We implemented anti-cheating measures a couple of episodes back which rely on matching version numbers. One of the version numbers was not updated and it caused the game to completely reject new save games. It pains me how small an error can cause such wide-spread havoc!

I just now finished coding a save file loader which takes a different approach to anti-cheating to make sure this cannot happen again. Also, now whenever there is trouble loading a save file, the game will not overwrite your save unless you specifically instruct it to. This means if the game is ever unable to load the save file, you will not lose progress and any bugs causing the failure can be remedied in an update without a loss of data.

I'll move on to unlocking the lost characters based on OpenFeint achievements now. Sorry guys! We'll make this up to you with even better updates.

Don't update to Episode 3.7!!!

2010-04-07T11:31:00.001-07:00

There's a save game bug in Minigore Episode 3.7 - Don't update and wait for a fixed version!

If you already updated:

1. You won't lose your In-App Purchase characters!

2. Also it should be possible to recover your unlocked characters through OpenFeint achievements.

3. Normal, Hard and Insane difficulties are already unlocked on first playthrough on Minigore HD - we'll add that change iPhone/iPod version so you don't have to grind through earlier difficulties.

4. As a final change we might give for example 20 000 kills at the start of the game that you can spend on any character.

Free upgrade to Minigore HD for 50 fans

2010-04-02T14:29:00.000-07:00

In celebration of iPad's U.S. launch tomorrow, we decided to let 50 of our quickest fans in the U.S. upgrade to Minigore HD completely free of charge today!

Requirements:
1. You own Minigore on iPhone or iPod touch.
2. You are based in the United States.
3. You have a working PayPal account.

You need to send us your:
-OpenFeint ID
-current online highscore in Minigore for Single-player survival (Episode 3.5)
-PayPal-enabled email address

Send the information to the following email address with the topic "Minigore HD free upgrade":

The first 50 will receive instructions on how to get your free upgrade. Only people meeting all the requirements and sending all the required information will be considered. Godspeed, my friends!

Minigore HD has arrived!

2010-04-01T16:06:00.000-07:00

The best-selling iPhone action game makes its long-awaited High Definition appearance!

Can you survive the onslaught of furries in the dark wilderness of Hardland?

- 14 unique playable characters

Guest stars from App Store hits Zombieville USA, Hook Champ, Sway and Enviro-Bear 2010.
All premium characters included for FREE.
Egoraptor returns as the voice of John Gore – wait till you hear the all new Zombie Gore open its mouth!

- Unmatched set of features

Razor-sharp HD-experience – graphics carefully redone from ground up to exceed all expectations!
Accessible touch2go controls – simply point where you want to walk and let John Gore handle the guns. So easy grandma could play!
Dual-stick shooter controls – the original Minigore experience on the iPad. For ultimate precision.
Multiple dynamic difficulty modes – be warned: insane mode is not for the faint-hearted!
Crystal – online leaderboards and achievements.
Day and night cycle – Hardland is never going to be the same again!
PlayHaven community – access tips, announcement and more.
Automatic saving – enables true pick up & play gaming.

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/minigore-hd/id364238135?mt=8

PS. Episode 3.7 was submitted before Minigore HD but latter was approved faster. It's probably because of the DLC in Ep 3.7 which makes the approval last a bit longer.

Minigore Easter Celebration!

2010-03-31T01:55:00.000-07:00

We're having an Easter sale to celebrate the latest Episode!

Episode 3.7 was submitted on Monday and here's the feature list:

Two completely new characters:
-Zombie Gore (this fellow can’t seem to shoot straight)
-Easter Bunny (one like you’ve never seen before, courtesy of Dr. Metusalem)

New enemy:
-Predator Furry (lurks in the bushes!)

A whole host of improvements:
-Bullet shells
-Improved controls (use up the whole screen)
-Larger play area
-Prettier shadows
-Hardland map (level selection)
-Dozens of bug fixes

Painting Minigore levels

2010-03-02T22:16:00.001-08:00

The next episode is in beta testing! It features this zombie fellow below:

This is a bit different blog post...

I though it would interesting to show a timelapse footage of how I paint the level textures.

The only maps you've been able to play so far are the forest and it's snow version. This is one of the levels that I've been working on behind the scenes while waiting for the coding side to catch up:

I've also changed the forest level quite a bit since Episode 1, adding small details and refining certain areas. It's gonna get yet another layer of polish:

Snow forest gets similar treatment:

As I said above, Episode 3.7 is in final beta testing now! It includes new gameplay that will make the gaming experience fresh again :)

Best action game

2010-02-14T09:48:00.000-08:00

Minigore went on to win the award for Best Action Game in the Best App Ever contest. It also got the second place in Best App for Middle School Kids and Best Use of Social Gaming Platform Game categories. Thank you so much everyone for voting!

Newcomer

2010-02-07T16:26:00.000-08:00

Time to introduce the latest addition to the family of furries - the Predator Furry. Sam, a shoutout to you for the name.

This fiesty little furry is quite different from the rest of the pack; it won't come straight at you. This one hides in the bushes, stalking on its prey, moving from one hideout to another until it's ready to make the plunge. I tell you, it is fast like you have never seen before. Predator Furry is exclusive to the Insane Mode, so anyone who is yet to unlock it, start honing those skills because this mad creature is guaranteed to test them.

Back on the map

2010-02-05T11:01:00.000-08:00

Who is? John Gore is, of course, and not just on any old map. He's on the map of Hardland, quite literally. You all sworn survivalists will be treated to a number of exciting new things as the game starts expanding in levels and game modes.

You can see from here you will have access to the familiar survival in all of its flavors. Once you tap on any of the emblems, a preview thumbnail will open up and the emblem animates. A second tap will take you to the selected level or game mode. There are also a few hints of things to come on this map. The emblem in the bottom right corner looks an awful lot like zombies, but whatever could the fourth emblem be? Time will tell, I suppose.

We are also planning on adding experimental game modes - they may be completely out of line or outright crazy, like a fat John Gore rolling around using tilt controls (just an example), but the bottom line is we want to try out new things and share them with you without the need for them to be completely refined. These game modes will be marked with the title "Experimental".

P.S. For those who thought we were dead, Minigore was dead or that they were dead themselves, fear not - Dec 20, 2012 is still only coming up and we didn't crawl into a hole either and abandon you. :) Some of us were in the UK for business, some on holiday in Africa and some simply working on things behind the scenes.

A mighty surprise

2010-01-20T13:15:00.000-08:00

Mountain Sheep is currently in London and we have some good news as more people are joining our iPhone team to work on Minigore. I'll tell more on that in a later post, but here is something completely different I bet most of you didn't see coming!

The battle between John Gore and Guerrilla Bob is on. For real.

Episode 3.6 hits the App Store

2010-01-14T07:41:00.000-08:00

Man, Apple is getting so quick with approving these updates that we can barely keep up with the blog posts! Some of you may have already noticed that Episode 3.6 is out which introduces Hook Champ as a new playable character:

...and adds special traits for three characters. Here is one of them, Sensei Evan, blasting away with dual grenade launchers:

Sensei gets these right from the start. The other specialities include Gangster Gore's dual-wielded machine guns and Ninja Man's speed boost when receiving damage.

Other changes include improved environment and character animation - all the characters breathe and bushes and trees sway in the wind.

Finally, the bug with in-app purchase characters having been unlocked by default when you updated from Episode 3 to Episode 3.5 is now addressed. After you update, all premium characters will appear locked and as the info screen advices you, YOU ONLY EVER NEED TO PAY ONCE for the characters. If you purchased them before, just tap the "buy now" button and log in with the iTunes account you used the make the purchase with originally and it will unlock the character for free. If you didn't purchase the character before, then you have to pay for it.

In short, in app purchases in Minigore work just like the App Store - after purchase, you can download the characters for free over and over again. Episode 3.5 can be considered a "free preview" of Kid Gore and Gangster Gore for anyone who experienced the bug. :)

Also, Episode 4, the multiplayer episode, is constantly in the works and we are likely to submit one or two more smaller updates like 3.6 before it hits the store.

Top three characters

2010-01-08T07:23:00.001-08:00

These are the three characters that came out on top in the voting! Gangster Gore, Ninja Man and Sensei Evan will be getting special traits for the next update. Our dear friend, Enviro-Bear, already received his trait in Episode 3. He starts out with the shotgun, but is unable to carry a torch at night and cannot dual-wield.

Gangster Gore will be dual-wielding machine guns by default. Can you guess what Sensei Evan and Ninja Man do?

New year, new voting

2010-01-05T10:57:00.000-08:00

There have been a lot of ideas floating around in this blog and on the Playhaven forums, as well as emailed to us. These range from dual-wielded machine guns for Gangster Gore to an absolute clover-fest for Santa (who is, consequently, very very fond of the clovers). We figured it's time to see which character's trait you want included in the next update.

We will keep John Gore the way he is which is the reason he is not included in the voting.

Minigore New Year's Episode submitted!

2009-12-22T15:49:00.000-08:00

Episode 3.5 has been submitted for App Store approval!

-Gangster Gore: a more sinister side to John Gore... what dark secrets lie in our hero's past?

-New guest stars: not only do Lizzy and Ninja Man from Sway make an appearance, but the Zombieville guy from Zombieville USA sets foot in Hardland, as well.

-Dual wielding: see what kind of havoc you can wreak with double grenade launchers! Or double shotguns!

-Kid Gore redux: re-done Kid Gore complete with new voice. To thank you all for the support, Gangster Gore is now included in for free for everyone who purchased or will purchase Kid Gore.

-OpenFeint 2.4: much improved user interface, location awareness and lots more

Dual wielding

2009-12-17T18:54:00.000-08:00

We wanted to wait until the new OpenFeint comes out (which should be any day now) and decided to add dual wielding into the game while waiting.

Oh, who's the little guy? He's non other than Kid Gore, now cooler than ever! In case anyone's wondering whoever Kid Gore is -- he is the young John Gore. Upgrading Kid Gore is our way of showing gratitude to everyone who's supported us by purchasing his character. In this next picture you see him wielding the grenade launcher and a shotgun. Yes, you can wield them in any combination you like and it's supported by all characters... except Enviro-Bear (since the bear is, well, one-armed and all).

The final big surprise of 2009

2009-12-10T15:43:00.000-08:00

Want to end 2009 with a bang? What if you found out we are about to submit Episode 3.5 for approval? Cos we are! That's right, and what Episode 3.5 brings you is many new cross-promotion characters.

Zombieville guy from Zombieville USA:

Lizzy the lizard from Sway:

Ninja Man from Sway:

All these cool characters are unlockable using the kill currency which I bet you all have been saving up like mad trying to reach Sensei Evan. These new ones you can unlock a fair bit easier than Sensei, though. :P

There are also two super secret characters we'll reveal a bit later down the line...

During the holidays we're gonna recover a bit from the hard year of work and come back as energized as ever to continue work on Episode 4. 2009 has been a great year for Minigore and all of you guys deserve a big thank you - and let's make 2010 even better!

Minigore Christmas Episode is out now!

2009-12-06T20:46:00.001-08:00

Thank you Apple for the swift approval process!

Work is already underway for Episode 4, which includes even more cool stuff! Lizzy and Ninja man from Sway and a third secret guest star. It also comes with entirely new level and... monsters!

Christmas Episode launch trailer!

2009-12-04T07:46:00.000-08:00

Christmas will never be the same again.

Minigore Christmas Episode submitted!

2009-11-24T09:44:00.000-08:00

Episode 3, The Christmas Episode, has been submitted for App Store approval!

New features:

- Enviro-Bear as a playable guest star
- New playable characters: Jerry Gore, Evan Hsu, Xmas Gore, Sensei Evan, Kid Gore and Santa
- New boss unit Wormwolf who comes in several sizes
- Grenade launcher
- Upgradable weapons
- Day & night cycle
- Snowy forest level
- New voice acting by Egoraptor (Jerry Gore and Santa)
- New achievements
- New sound effects
- PlayHaven community features

Even zombies run from Evan...

2009-11-20T19:39:00.000-08:00

...for a good reason:

Introducing Evan Hsu and grenade launcher

2009-11-19T05:58:00.000-08:00

As some of you know Evan Hsu won the Minigore tagline contest with his creative entry "Tiny creatures, giant adventure". The main prize was getting made into the game as a playable character, well here he is:

...but wait, what's that in his hands?! Oh yes, a grenade launcher! You wanted grenades and let me tell you a grenade launcher has plenty of those!

Next we'll reveal what happens to Evan when he gets his hands on some clovers...

From Mini Gore to Minigore

2009-11-18T19:06:00.000-08:00

One year ago, if you searched for Minigore you got about 100 search results and Google actually suggested perhaps you were looking for "mini gore". This is what it looked like:

Today, it knows better than to suggest you might be looking for creepy photos of Al.

We did the math; Minigore is 10 000 times better than the miniature version of Al Gore. Duh.

Next up we present Satan's... sorry, we mean Santa's beast mode!

2009-11-16T08:36:00.000-08:00

He goes absolutely wild when he overdoses on clovers and that's exactly what happened here:

How many clips does it take to save Christmas?

2009-11-12T18:57:00.000-08:00

Minigore Episode 3, Christmas Episode is shaping up beautifully. In addition to Wormwolves, upgradeable weapons, grenade launchers and day/night cycles there is a huge batch of playable characters coming up. We'll show a picture of each one here on the Minigore blog.

First up is Santa, the very definition of Christmas. This ancient protector of peace in Hardland was so busy pacifying furries he didn't even notice the photographer taking pictures.

Sun sets on Hardland

2009-10-27T16:27:00.001-07:00

When does the Wormwolf sleep? At night, like everyone else, and that is exactly when the reckless shooting most bothers him. It really is very dark out there and John would be in so much more trouble than he already is if he didn't bring a torch with him. Heck, all he needs now is a pitchfork!

Then again, it's probably best to stick to the ol' boomstick when it comes to getting rid of them Wormwolves.

Code for the Sheep

2009-10-22T06:19:00.000-07:00

Update available

2009-10-21T02:38:00.000-07:00

A new update for Minigore rolls out - go claim yours from the AppStore! Do that especially if you like to play with the screen flipped and/or suffered from the update freeze bug. The new things in this update include:

-Update freeze/flip screen bug fixed
-Improved Furry Sense, shows you ammo and clovers
-Extended battle music, 33% percent more goodness
-OpenFeint 2.2
-Minor fixes

Enjoy!

Jump!

2009-10-20T15:45:00.000-07:00

As I told you a few days ago, Wormwolf, the Episode 3 boss has a few tricks up its sleeve it uses to confuse its prey. This is the first one them: not only does it move entirely by what reminds constant jumping, it sometimes leaps so high into the air that John is actually able to escape by running from underneath it. Take a look.

It is surprisingly agile for a big, heavy worm...wolf. There are many rumors around the supernatural abilities of this beast and one of them has Wormwolf suddenly developing such abilities in the 1980s after being subjected to a nearly fatal dose of Van Halen.

Introducing Wormwolf

2009-10-18T12:43:00.000-07:00

Next week we will be learning all about the headline of Episode 3, Wormwolf. Today it's time for an introduction.

Wormwolf is one of those creatures that confuses you with its radical hairstyle and harmless appearance. Normally a vegetarian, if Wormwolf finds its sleep disturbed by loud noises, which there seems to be plenty wherever John Gore goes, it forgets all about its normal eating habits, finds the culprit and barely even leaves the bones behind.

We will be looking into all things John has to go through when dealing with Wormwolf next week. It's not a one trick pony... worm... wolf.

Minigore v1.11 submitted

2009-10-12T04:28:00.001-07:00

Immediately following the release of the new update, we decided to take Episode 2, add in the fix for the flip screen bug, include a few extra goodies and submit a new update. A new version of Minigore (dubbed v1.11) was submitted on Saturday.

-flip screen bug fixed
-added clovers and ammo to Furry Sense
-extended battle music
-OpenFeint 2.2
-music stops when OpenFeint is opened to work around the occasional music playback issues with OpenFeint

In the meanwhile, remember, if the game is unresponsive after update or if you accidentally select "flip screen" from the options, delete and reinstall Minigore to solve the issue.

Do not flip the screen in Episode 2

2009-10-10T03:12:00.000-07:00

Do not flip the screen in Episode 2. There is a bug in the game which causes you not being able to control it after you do.

SOLUTION: Delete the game and reinstall it.

Episode 2 is out!

2009-10-08T14:53:00.001-07:00

The wait is finally over - get the update while it's hot! Thanks everyone for your patience. Now go enjoy the game!

Testers

2009-10-07T03:42:00.000-07:00

We have handed out a bit of over 70 beta spots thus far. People who have already received it have been notified. If you haven't received a confirmation of your acceptance into the beta program yet, fear not - we still have spots to fill.

Cannot believe this!

2009-09-26T18:49:00.000-07:00

It has happened again. The submission for Episode 2 came back rejected due to a corrupted binary. We could blame this on bad luck, we could blame this on conspiracy, personal incompetence or even our dear friend Santa, but what we cannot do is stand by watching the hard work we have put in Minigore and its updates bounce around in what seems like an infinite loop between us and Apple. These updates should have been out there for you guys to play ages ago! We realize we can't change the past, but we can shape the future and that's exactly what we are going to do now.

We want to give you the possibility to play the new Episodes ahead of time before they are released on the AppStore and contribute to the development of Minigore in a way that goes beyond commenting on the blog. We are going to do that by opening up 99 new spots for beta-testers. This is not going to make up for all the delay in bringing out the update, but I am sure it is going to make 99 Minigore fans very happy. We want to show you that despite any hardships and regardless of the number of rejections, Mountain Sheep is holding onto the promises made.

So send us the UDID of your iPhone or iPod along with information of what device you have, how much you play and your age to the address above. Active members of the Minigore blog, top Minigore players based on the online leaderboard and Touch Arcade's Minigore thread contributors will get a priority, so make sure to mention who you are if you are involved in one of the aforementioned.

Lastly, Episode 2 has been re-submitted and every measure taken to ensure it's free from corruption. We are also trying to arrange a fast lane for it in the approval process.

Zombies and John

2009-09-15T10:23:00.000-07:00

I'm so glad it's zombies and John and not like Zombies and... me! These little creeps are looming on the Minigore horizon and have got their entire family with them. I, for one, will be taking my railway engine (well, actually it won't be mine) and getting the hell out of here well in advance. Oh, and the railway engine is because the depot is going to be a pretty quiet place when everyone is running for the, yes -- boats and ripping each other to pieces before the zombies even have a chance! Well, luckily John is sticking around as you can see here. He looks determined.

Episode 2 is in the pipe as some you might have read from Minigore Twitter along with a fix to the OS 3.1 music problem. I was able to fix it in a bit over one day after submitting, so we took it and resubmitted on 11th (for those wondering, we did submit once on the 9th, as well, but felt music was important enough to warrant a fix).

I want to let you guys in on something we are planning and I also want to get some wild ideas from you on something.

Let's talk about our plans first. We are going to introduce a new mode in the next update! The new challenge mode gives you a possibility you test your survival skills against a predetermined number of furries. It's complete with online leaderboards, of course, so it's going to be ranking the performance based on time.

Now, about the wild ideas... you guessed correctly, it's the zombies. If you could have the zombies do just one thing, what is the thing you always wanted see them do? The only requirement is that it significantly impacts the way you play against these brainless fellows. Other than that, it can be anything you want - maybe it will involve crowd behavior. Permission to go crazy officially granted!

Episode 2 rejected, submitting with more features on the 9th

2009-09-07T05:17:00.000-07:00

After four weeks at Apple's, the update was finally given a verdict. It is not the good news we were expecting and as bad news it is not quite as controversial as we envisioned. Episode 2 was very simply rejected for crashing at launch on one of Apple's test devices.

We have fixed a crash bug during the development of Episode 3 and are looking at a few more potential offenders for the re-submission of September 9. The re-submission will have Episodes 2 and 3 bundled together with the exception of the grenade which will be fine-tuned for gameplay and comes out with the next episode. I will update the episode tracker at the top of the page accordingly.

Our list of things that take four weeks currently looks as follows:

1. Fly 11 times around the world
2. Milk 18000 cows
3. Launch Minigore

While all of the above are a fun way to spend a month, let's hope we can tick the last one off the list with the next submission!

Plan of attack

2009-09-03T03:13:00.000-07:00

With Episode 2 fumbling about in the dark trying to finding its way out of Apple's approval maze, we have made the decision to take the following from Episode 3, bundle it up with Episode 2 and resubmit on Wednesday next week:

-Achievements (expert and insane)
-Big Flamefurries
-Gameplay improvements (you can now hit a furry standing right next to you)
-Miscellaneous bug fixes
-OpenFeint 2.1 (it looks a lot nicer!)
+
-Furry Sense
-John Gore with the headband (third health)
-full save and restore of game state
-faster firing rate on the shotgun

The above features will be ready for Wednesday (September 9, that is). Episode 2 may still come out before that; we won't be canceling it until right before resubmission.

Where'd the furries go? Just swayin'.

2009-09-01T14:17:00.000-07:00

Our friends at Illusion Labs have just released a new update for their hugely cool physics adventure Sway, and guess what - John Gore is in it! If you still don't own the game, I suggest you get yourself a copy right away. It's a great one!

Extraordinary fan-art

2009-08-29T11:20:00.000-07:00

Every now and then you come across some great fan-art. This one is not only awesome, it's pretty unusual, too. Gupu, the mastermind behind it, has even given instructions on how to make one of your own and suggests you start with the larger one if you're new to papercrafting.

Another version built by Hmar9333 based on Gupu's instructions. Moody lighting in this one:

John Gore caught hanging around the PSP

2009-08-27T04:38:00.000-07:00

What, is Minigore coming to the PSP? John Gore has been seen running around recklessly and hibernating them poor furries over here.

Rumor has it there's going to be helluva lot more furries on screen and while the game is definitely Minigore, there is something distinctly different about it this time around...

On Episode 2

2009-08-26T05:41:00.000-07:00

Yes, we are waiting. No, still no word from Apple. Yes, we did submit on the 6th. C'mon Apple, it really shouldn't take three weeks to approve a simple update! People want updates, we have them, and they are taking forever to emerge from the other end.

What's your current mood - feeling insane already? That's the one on the right.

Vote on John's new ability

2009-08-15T02:40:00.001-07:00

Things are looking very infernal in Episode 3 right now. Oh, what do I mean? Two new enemy types have been implemented: the Flaming Furry which runs very fast and the Giant Flaming Furry which spawns furries of the fiery kind. When you set the difficulty to insane, things get very infernal indeed.

Today's topic is something different, though. To celebrate 100 000 sold units of Minigore and to give John a fighting chance against the infernal furries, he is going to learn a new ability for Episode 3. The new ability is something that we are planning to make unique for each character in a later episode. The ability is activated by double-tapping the right pad (the one you shoot with). It's always available and you can use the ability as many times you want, but it will take a certain amount of time to reload.

Contender number one: Power dash. Power dash literally makes John dash towards the enemies and get out of tight spots while causing damage. John will slice through the larger furries and knock off the smaller ones.

Contender number two: Grenade. John gets a new weapon he can toss into a pack of furries chasing him. The grenade will bounce a few times after landing and explode after a few seconds or on contact with any of the furries.

Vote for your favorite! Also, note that the details of an ability may change slightly during implementation according to our internal play-testing.

UPDATE: This time around the winner wasn't as clear as before, but still the grenade ended up a gathering the majority of votes and did that by a pretty wide margin. Therefore Episode 3 will contain the grenade as a new ability for John Gore!

Episode 2 submitted, episode tracker available

2009-08-10T07:35:00.000-07:00

As some of you may have noticed from our Twitter, Episode 2: Thousands of them... one of you was submitted last week. I'm hoping it is going to be available later this week!

We also added an episode tracker as a sticky post of sorts on top of this blog where we are posting what's going on with each episode. Voting and discussion takes place in the actual posts as usual!

Another thing people have been suggesting is we release new episodes more often than initially planned and that's exactly what we are starting to do right now. Instead of a huge co-op update, we already submitted the second episode as mentioned and we'll also release a third one before co-op goes live. It's going to bring you all kinds of flaming furries and an insane mode for those who feel expert is too easy! Probably some other stuff, too, so let me hear what you'd like to see next and I'll see if we can make it fit into the update!

Let's vote, folks

2009-07-30T14:40:00.001-07:00

With Minigore loose out in the open, we can finally ask your opinion on stuff!

We have the radar, the third health (John Gore with the bandana), automatic saving and loading of the game and all new OpenFeint version in. Should we sit on these features until co-op and achievements are done or release the update right now so you can start enjoying it?

UPDATE: The final verdict is over 80% of you want us to submit the update now! I'm sending out copies to our testers now and submitting as it as soon as it gets cleared.

MINIGORE IS OUT!

2009-07-29T19:17:00.000-07:00

Minigore is OUT! Get it while it's sexy! http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=324016249&mt=8

Dinner time baby!

Remember, this is only the beginning - there's a journey of crazy updates ahead and you get to vote on the content! :)

Enviro-Bear in Minigore!

2009-07-28T15:13:00.001-07:00

I've got some great news to ease the pain of waiting! You get to play as everyone's favourite bear in the upcoming co-op multiplayer update: (No, it's not the South Park bear...)

Minigore gets great reviews

2009-07-24T03:07:00.000-07:00

ZTGD got their hands on Minigore and awarded it 9/10 and the Editor's Choice! Go read all about it! The game was submitted to Apple earlier this month and it is going to be available for $0.99 on the AppStore soon.

Minigore HD on PS3 or Xbox 360

2009-07-20T16:20:00.000-07:00

If you had to choose, which platform would you like to see Minigore on?

There's a poll you can vote on at TouchArcade: http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?t=19500