The new puzzle game “Christmas Magic”, a zen game that aims to soothe and relax the mind is out now and was released on the App Store on 3rd April 2012. The game is available for free only for the iPads. The game is developed in collaboration between Satbir Singh, Game Designer and Director; Anmol Thakur the programmer; Trevor Holm provided the music and Green Dot Digital Films who has handled the game art.
‘Christmas Magic’ tells a warm Christmas tale of an innocent little elf’s longing for his family, of magic that interweaves through life and of the eternal natural relation between all things living called “Love”. It has simple but engaging gameplay, set in a magical natural environment, immerses the player with its sights and sounds in a test of visual problem solving and improves his/her cognitive and pattern recognition skills. The puzzles start easy to help the player grasp it and then increase gradually in difficulty. Also, if you do get stuck somewhere, you can always use a Magic Pot to solve the puzzle for you. There’s also a rating system wherein if you earn 5 stars, you are rewarded with a hint which can be used in other puzzles.
Talking to AnimationXpress.com about the response of the game Satbir Singh said, “Christmas Magic was released on the App Store on 3rd of April and we had 400 downloads on the very first day! We crossed the 1000 downloads mark within a week without a single advertisement or a trailer! Now that we have a launch trailer out, the response is getting better and better each day as the trailer is spreading over the internet. We even received some amazing user reviews which you can have a glimpse at in the trailer.”
The game contains 24 puzzles, plus a fully illustrated story book with coloured art-work including complete voiceover. The game makes you delve into a mesmerizing adventure and unwind as you play puzzles. It took about 7 months to get this game from concept to completion.
When asked about the difficulty in developing the game Satbir Singh shared, “There was not one but two most challenging aspects in the game. One was getting the ambience right, which is paramount for a Zen game! It took time and constant to and fro between me and Trevor, the music composer, to get just the right kind of music: soothing, interesting but non-intrusive to the gameplay. Also, we had to work very hard to get the high quality paintings right for the Storybook in the game. After a lot of efforts that continued for months, we nailed it”.
“The second most challenging aspect was the technology! It was our first time making a game for the iOS. We decided on using the Unity3D engine, which is very good for its multiplatform support. It was indeed a time consuming and challenging task, but was conquered with ingenuity, smart solutions and pure hard work”, Satbir added.
Zen gaming is a relatively new term in gaming. According to Satbir, the front runner of Zen gaming right now is acclaimed game director, Jenova Chen’s “Thatgamecompany”, with their titles such as “Flow”, ”Flower” and the recent “Journey”! Zen Gaming is not about a particular gameplay mechanic, like say “shooters” are games which involve shooting, racing games focus on speed and mastering the tracks. Instead, Zen gaming is about the aesthetic, the relaxed pacing, and the ambience. Zen is when the game puts you in a “flowing”-relaxed state, where the game does not induce anxiety, does not pressurize you, but challenges you enough to keep the ‘flow’ going.
About the target audience Satbir asserted, “The game’s target audience is the family audience in the US and we got fabulous response from them. The game debuted with 400 downloads in the US on the very first day and to this day is spreading more each day via word of mouth. What has made us even more proud of the game’s quality is the fact that sales have picked up even in India! Another amusing fact is that the second highest downloads have been in China!”
The game is soon to be launched for the PC/Mac and Linux via the Google Chrome Store and Android version for appropriately sized tablets is in the works too. The team is also eager to start their next project for Playstation Vita.