Aug
19

Brag About Your Best Words in WordPop! for iPhone

By Todd (Admin) Posted in Smart Box Design | 1 Comment »

Our Latest Press Release.

Smart Box Design today announced that WordPop! for iPhone now has a “Brag” feature allowing players to quickly and easily email their family, friends, and co-workers their longest and highest scoring words. WordPop! requires just the right combination of word-building strategy, skill, and luck. Now over 60,000 players of WordPop! and Diet WordPop! can have “Bragging Rights” when they make that great high scoring word. This free upgrade is available now for download on the App Store.

“With over 60,000 downloads of WordPop! and Diet WordPop! our players are very dedicated to the game and love to outdo each other. Now they can quickly brag about their latest word and impress their friends” says Todd A. Sherman, President, Smart Box Design, “Additionally, bragging motivates players to do better as they attempt to out score each other.”

WordPop! has a Best Words list and a global Best Words list located online, but until now, players could not readily show off their Best Words. The addition of a Brag button within the game and on the Best Words lists solves this. When Brag is selected, a formatted email with the latest and greatest best words appears. The player simply decides who they want to impress and then send the email on its way.

WordPop! requires just the right combination of word-building strategy, skill, and luck. The 6 x 6 game board is filled with randomly selected and placed letter tiles. The object of the game is to clear the board by creating words. As each word is formed, the tiles in the word are removed and the remaining tiles fall to fill in the gaps, creating new word possibilities. Players need to plan ahead in order to clear the board and move on to the next round. Since the letters are randomly selected and placed on the board, each round of the game is unique, providing unlimited gaming experience. As players gain confidence and experience their word building skill naturally increases.

Device Requirements:
* iPhone, iPod touch
* Requires iPhone OS 3.0 or later
* 2.8 MB

Pricing and Availability:
WordPop! 2.1 is currently $0.99 USD (or equivalent amount in other currencies) and available worldwide exclusively through the App Store in the Games category. Diet WordPop! is Free.

WordPop! 2.1

Purchase and Download

Today’s Best Words

Smart Box Design LLC, based in Bellingham, Washington, creates exciting high-quality thinking games for mobile devices. Smart Box Design develops and publishes games for iPhone, iPod touch, and the iPad. The company’s games include the award winning WordPop!, Diet WordPop, WordPop! Volt, Triples, Farkle Dice, Word Watch and Word Monaco Solitaire. For more information about the company, visit Smart Box Design online. Copyright (C) 2010 Smart Box Design LLC. All Rights Reserved. Apple, the Apple logo, iPhone, iPod and iPad are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries.

Jun
18

June Contest – Win A Free Game

By Todd (Admin) Posted in Contest | 6 Comments »

Using the letters in the grid, find and submit a word that no one has found yet. The letters do NOT have to be adjacent like they are when playing on your phone or iPad.

5 winners will be chosen at random. Contest ends 6/25 at midnight, PDT.

Make sure to provide your email address so we can contact you if you have won.

Posting your word is a quick and easy. Remember only one word can be submitted per day.

Be sure to tell your friends and family members about the contest so they can play too.

Jun
02

How I have been using my iPad Recently

By Todd (Admin) Posted in Smart Box Design | Comments Off

I found Lost (the TV show) with my iPad. Even though I pay for cable television I find it difficult to watch a show on a regular basis as I am usually working or researching when the prime time shows are airing. I typically would watch Lost on Hulu in bed when I was too tired to do anything else, but that meant disconnecting my laptop from my office environment (my laptop is connect to my second monitor, video conferencing camera, printer, backup hard drive, iPod Touch, phone, etc.) and plugging it in my bedroom. Not that big of a deal, but then in the morning I had to reconnect everything for work. This only takes a few minutes, but that time adds up every day. Then along comes the iPad. I simply remove it from my stand, disconnect the charging cable, jump in bed, launch ABC app and I’m off watching Lost (10 seconds flat). Then after watching I jump online to see what other viewers thought of the episode.

I am going to miss Lost but I am sure with my iPad I will find some other great way to be unproductive before I go to sleep.

Goodnight.

May
20

iPad Game Submission – Rejected

By Todd (Admin) Posted in Smart Box Design, WordPop, development, iPad | 4 Comments »

Last week, on May 13, we submitted an update to WordPop! iPad to Apple. We were excited about this new release because it supported landscape. Players would be able to enjoy WordPop! Volt on the iPad in all orientations. I personally really enjoy playing in landscape mode a bit more than portrait as I find holding the iPad horizontally easier.

After a week, we heard back from Apple, the update was REJECTED. To quote Apple, “The iPad Human Interface Guidelines state that only one popover element should be visible onscreen at a time. On launch, and when the user taps the “Add Player” button, and additional popover is displayed for the user to enter a player name. Screen shots are attached for your reference.”

My team and I are aware of the one popover limit but the second popover is a dialog which I did not consider in the same class as a popover. Additionally, Apple had approved the two previous submissions of WordPop! Volt which has “Add Player” working exactly the same way.

Apple has been very good to us in that they usually provide a screen shot and description of what is wrong.

The fix is straight forward, we need to remove the first popover “Change Player” when “Add Player” is selected. This should be done any second now and we will resubmit.

Lesson learned, it does not matter what Apple calls the widget being used in the iPad User Interface Guidelines, only one “popover” at any given time.

Update: May 24, 2010 – We resubmitted WordPop! Volt. Below is a screen shot on the change. This new look conforms to the iPad UI guidelines.

Apr
08

Sneak Peek of Landscape Mode of WordPop! Volt iPad

By Todd (Admin) Posted in Jim Patterson, Smart Box Design, WordPop | 3 Comments »

Jim’s recent hand-off of the title screen for landscape orientation. To be released in a few weeks as a free upgrade for all.

Apr
07

Spring Contest – Win A Free Smart Box Design Mobile Game

By Todd (Admin) Posted in Contest, Smart Box Design | 34 Comments »

Using the letters in the grid, find and submit a word that no one has found yet.

5 winners will be chosen at random. Contest ends 4/12 at midnight, PDT. Make sure to provide your email address so we can contact you if you have won.

Posting your word is a quick and easy. Remember only one word can be submitted per day.

Apr
02

The Day Before my iPad Arrives

By Todd (Admin) Posted in Smart Box Design, iPad | Comments Off

My thoughts about how I think I will be using my iPad. I plan to review this post in a month to see how reality compares to the dream.

What I am really looking forward to is email, which is silly for such an expensive device.

I typically wake up pretty early in the morning and check my email on my iPod Touch. If there are emergencies, I get up, if not I try to sneak in another 30 minutes.

In some cases I bring my laptop to bed and do email on it. But then in the morning I need to set it back up in my home office, not a big deal but it gets tiring. The irony of all of this is the recognition that although a laptop is portable the iPad is even more so because of the weight and form factor.

I often tweak my web pages late at night in bed too, fixing a page here and there (nothing serious as I need my large screen for real work) but if I could do simple change to text or styling with the iPad that would be great. I will have to wait and see if there any FTP apps for the iPad.

Watching Netflix will be big for me. My wife and I watch a lot of movies together but we have very different tastes in TV shows. I am more apt to watch Dr. Who or Lost. So I watch a lot of those shows on my laptop. Having the iPad for that will be great.

I often go to Seattle for the day and I just need something light. Email, light word processing, maybe look up a store or get directions in Google Maps. The iPad will be great for that. There are tons of free Wi-Fi spots in Seattle or I can use my friend’s Wi-Fi at their house.

Lastly, playing games and reading books will be great.

I can see using my iPad as my third screen and have HTML5 or CSS reference material up when I am working on my web site.

In addition to creating my own iPad games I contract as a Project Manager / Designer and I am currently working on a few iPad apps for a client. Having a real device to test on will be a pleasure.

OK, let’s see how I wind up using the iPad over the next month.

Mar
15

WordPop! for iPad – Who’s iPad is it?

By Todd (Admin) Posted in Game Design, Jim Patterson, Smart Box Design, WordPop, Wyatt Webb, iPad, iPhone | 3 Comments »

The iPad is being marketed as a very casual device as demonstrated by Steve Jobs on stage while sitting on a couch. The only way he could have looked more relaxed would be if he was in a t-shirt and boxers drinking a beer. His point was well taken by many including my team, the iPad will be used in the living room, den or some other communal space. This makes the iPad a shared device. Let me say that again, unlike the iPhone, which you might loan to someone for a brief moment, such as a friend at a coffee shop, the iPad is meant to be a shared device.

What does this mean for WordPop!? We’ve concluded that WordPop! will be shared among family members or friends, thus we will need a sign-in. This will allow several family members to start and play their own games and it will allow individual players to save multiple games. This is fantastic feature. One game could be played with the goal of getting the highest score ever on Medium Level while another game could be dedicated to making high scoring words for the Global All Time Best Words List. Even better, another game could be saved for a child who wants to practice making words (we’ve heard from several parents they use WordPop! in this way). Another advantage of having a sign-in is we can get a name up front for the High Score and Best Words pages.

I for one can’t wait until Wyatt finished with sign-in as I too want to play several games at once each with a different goal.

Sign-In Peek

If you are a developer and thinking of having sign-in make sure to plan this up front as it is a complicated feature if not thought out early. You will want to list out which items are saved per player and which items should be global, such as posting scores to our server. If you would like further information about our sign-in flow, please feel free to email me.

Look for more peeks into our development of WordPop! for iPad in coming blogs. Please share this blog and follow Smart Box Design on Twitter.

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Mar
10

WordPop! for iPad – When to Use iPad UI Elements

By Todd (Admin) Posted in Game Design, Jim Patterson, Smart Box Design, WordPop, Wyatt Webb, development, iPad | 2 Comments »

WordPop! for iPad  – When to Use iPad UI Elements

The iPad Human Interface Guidelines describes split view, popover, modal dialogs, toolbars, keyboard and other readily available user interface elements built into the iPad. Usually productivity applications will by default use many of these UI elements, but what about games? Games designers typically create their own dialogs, tool bars, menus etc in the same style as the game itself with custom art and code.

Suspension of disbelief is an important psychological factor of game play. The more the player buys into the game environment the more engaged he or she will feel. Using iPad built-in UI elements chips away at this because they use the OS look and feel and reminds the player that they are playing a game. I like to think of it this way, if I am watching a movie and during an action scene the leading man suddenly turned to me and asked if I was enjoying the movie I would no longer be caught up in the moment and would enjoy the movie less.

In designing WordPop! for the iPad, Jim, Wyatt, and I had to decide if we would use the iPad UI elements or create them from scratch and if we do use then when and where? We decided to use several built-in elements for the following reasons.

1.    They are quick to implement.
2.    They are flexible.
3.    They are stable
4.    They are agile
5.    They are already compatible with the hardware

We decided to use the toolbar element. The toolbar will hold New Game, Preferences, Word List, Help, and About Us. Since all of these items are not part of the immediate game flow the suspension of disbelief is minimized.

Look for more peeks into our development of WordPop! for iPad in coming blogs. Please share this blog and follow Smart Box Design on Twitter.

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Mar
09

WordPop! for iPad – Button Placement

By Todd (Admin) Posted in Jim Patterson, Smart Box Design, WordPop, Wyatt Webb, development, iPad | 2 Comments »

In my last blog I briefly explained the concept of flattening the design and gave an example with the description of the new game statistics board. The next layout decision was where to place New Game, Preferences, Word List, Help and About buttons. These buttons need to be quickly accessed when needed but are not the focus during game play.

When playing WordPop! the player’s focus will be centered on the middle third of the iPad. The player’s eyes will especially be focused on the Check button which is used to enter each word.  Two additional buttons, Undo and Rotate are near the bottom of the iPad screen. The statistic board is near the top of the iPad and has several buttons associated with it.

nav-buttons.jpg

After trying several mockups, New Game, Preferences, Help, Word List, and About buttons were placed on the bottom. When they were placed at the top of the iPad they were fighting for attention with the statistic board. Placing them on the left or right was aesthetically unpleasing, unbalanced with other elements and worst of all, made them too noticeable. Placing them on the bottom was the right fit. However, they were now too close to the Undo and Rotate game buttons. Jim Patterson using his design and layout skills rearranged them slightly up and to the right. This harmonized the design.

As we continue to add detail and features to the game we will continue to check and double check the layout.

Look for more peeks into our development of WordPop! for iPad in coming blogs. Please share this blog and follow Smart Box Design on Twitter.

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