Josh the Whale | Project Review

My brothers and I really like video games, and we are trying to get to the point where we can bring our creative visions to life. The process of learning, building,  and refining has been great for us, and it’s not as easy as some may think.

The project “Josh the Whale” started soon after trying to land another app project for another children’s story book and not getting it. We thought that kids books might be the way to get the attention of local children’s book illustrators and writers, and so we began the search for a story. We wanted a project that we could use, not only to attract clients, but to also use as a template for future projects. We also wanted it to be something that we really cared about in order to motivate ourselves to create a good finished product.

This is really the reason that we chose Josh the Whale. Originally a short illustrated story that our older brother, Aaron Thorup, wrote when he was in the third grade, we thought that it wasn’t just a good story about self-worth and perseverance, but it also had a good selling point. Whales and underwater stuff seem to go well with children, so, not only were we planning on entering the kids entertainment market, but we also had an attractive theme that should sell.

So we started. The first step was to get a solid script, based on the original story, written to base all the programming and visual aspects of the game on. The rewritten story, and the script, came together pretty fast, and with Aaron’s approval, I was able to begin on visual concept, and Bryce was able to start working with Shiva 3D (our 3D engine).

Mainly because of a lack of experience on my part, we planned to have a finished product by December. Basically, we did not take into account the learning curve Bryce would have with Shiva 3D. Bryce was picking up the new API, which was quite a bit different from what we were using for our live wallpapers. So, it turned into 6 months instead. We also had other video projects mixed into that schedule, but overall it was just the amount of learning needed that extended the schedule.

Concept work began, assets were being built, and Bryce began building code to use those assets with. Some specifics of that work can be viewed in previous posts HERE and HERE. Though progress was slow, it was steady, and from the beginning to the end of the project, there were no real stressful moments in the production. Just allot of trial and error in figuring out workflows in relation to the programming and asset creation.

Only minor changes were made to script and the original sequence of the game during production. In fact, only one scene was taken out of the game for programming reasons. Here is a really basic concept image of that scene. It had to do with the whales jumping out of the water at night, and the player helps Josh jump high enough to touch the moon.

Recording the narration was fun. Bryce and I decided that we wanted to have Aaron do the voice acting for the narration. This was a great choice because Aaron’s voice seemed to fit right inside Josh’s world, and complements the whole feeling of the book very well. This also made the project feel allot more personal to me, turning it into a family project. Jacob helped us out with the recording in a quite room over at my Grandma’s and Grandpa’s home. We used Audacity for the audio, and it all came out beautifully.

A little side note about the audio recording, most of the interactive moments of the game were conceptualized when I was preparing a script for lines that needed to be rerecorded or new lines, our second recording session. I felt that the game wasn’t quite balanced enough between the strictly narrative moments and the interactive moments of the game.

The music was done by April Thorup. She is not a professional composer, but she did a wonderful job on the music. Her playful styling fit into Josh’s world so well, and keeps the app interesting for kids. When we first started to drop the music into the app itself, the feeling of Josh’s world completely changed. Suddenly this small lonely whale had a story to tell, not only by the narrator, but by the music as well.

When it came to testing the app during the project, we usually just had one of our nieces or nephews take a peek at what we had, and payed attention to their reactions. Because of this “bug testing” we knew from the start that children responded well to the visual style and game play. And, towards the end of the project, we had an official bug testing session, that also brought back good results from children, and assured that we had a solid app structurally.

The app icon and other graphics were interesting to put together. The original thought was to stick to the same icon template and banner styles that we had used for our previous live wallpapers. As you can see from the images below, they weren’t the most impressive images to look at. But, after sifting through Google’s and Apple’s quality guide lines, we decided to redo all of the graphics for the app, creating a simpler style for the icon and banners.

For the final steps of the project, like marketing, I was put in charge. Gathering information on review websites that tailor to the audience we wanted to reach was important, and putting together a trailer and other material to show the app in action was done as well. This moment was probably the most educational for us as a company, mainly because I had never really done any marketing before, and because we have learned that hiring someone to handle the marketing is probably the best way to make sure that it is executed effectively.

One of the huge pluses to this whole project though, was the cost. I believe that the cost for a Shiva 3D license was $200, which covered porting the game to bother Android and iOS. Marketing was about $1000, but besides that there was no additional cost to the project besides our time. We used open source software for all asset creation and editing. This includes Blender, Gimp, Audacity, and Inkscape. Software that we have allot of experience with, and are all great programs.

We have only just released this app, and we have had a really good responses from reviewers, family, friends, and strangers, so far. We are proud of Josh the Whale, and so thankful for everyone that helped make it a reality. It represents our commitment to making products that we can be proud off and that others can enjoy. It represents our first step into the game development realm. And most of all, it shows that even a small whale can do great things, our goal for the future.

Josh the Whale on our corporate page: http://goo.gl/lWhtT

Josh the Whale on Google Play: http://goo.gl/RQEXe

Josh the Whale on iTunes: http://goo.gl/kyTDD