On March 15 Studio Resident James Parker from Opposable Games gave a fantastic Lunchtime Talk about their recent multi-screen mobile game Clockwork Racers. Last year, Opposable Games released Clockwork Racers, an iOS racing game with a twist. The game allows players on multiple devices to compete against one another with a single shared screen for competitive racing fun with an old-school flavour. James joined us to speak about navigating the uncharted waters of multi-screen mobile gaming, and the challenges and solutions they have found.

Opposable Games

Opposable Games is made up of six talented games developers and designers. They formed after meeting at a Games Jam in the Studio in early 2012. The brief of the Games Jam was to create a family friendly game for the living room, which used people’s existing devices as controls. Opposable Games won with their game Clockwork Racers, and went on to secure funding from Abertay University to help them develop the model of the multi-screen game further. Abertay University's prototype fund provides grants for small companies that are developing their own games or other forms of interactive digital content – you can find out more on their website.

Clockwork Racers

Clockwork Racers, their debut game, is a celebration of the best top-down racing games that children will love and adults remember fondly.  From the chalkboards of the classroom to picnic rugs and lab benches, players compete to be the fastest around the miniature world of clockwork toys – either in time trials against friends via Game Center, in single player mode against the AI racers, or facing off against friends and family in the unique multi-screen, multiplayer mode

Connecting via Bluetooth, Wifi and Airplay, up to four players can connect to the game with their own handsets to control the console style racing on a single shared screen, challenging one another around the track and competing in fastest-finger mini-challenges.

Challenges

James explained one of the biggest challenges they faced with Clockwork Racers was the language around the ‘multi-screen’ experience. It’s hard to explain and market a game when people don’t understand the concept. To combat this problem they started to hold demos, and found that as soon as people saw the game being played they understood the multiscreen concept.  

Another problem they found was just making Clockwork Racers available on iOS. James said they decided to focus solely on developing for iOS because it is a prevalent platform, with a large existing audience. He also explained that at the time of developing Clockwork Racers they believed that Apple would make a significant move for the TV market, meaning that lots of homes would have a large device that they could view Clockwork Racers on. As of yet, this hasn’t been the case, but they’re in a good place if it happens in the near future.

James also spoke about the difficulty in designing the controlers for a touchscreen device. Unlike normal console controllers, using a device with a touchscreen means there’s no physical feedback. It means players have to, at first at least, split their time watching the main screen and getting to grips with the controls. James explained they designed multiple controller interfaces so people could experiment and find out which ones they find the easiest.  

Why bother?  

It’s been reported that by 2014 the average US household will have between 5 & 10 connected screens. This is huge market, and industry leaders from Nintendo to Microsoft are starting to explore multi-screen experiences. With reports of the ‘console’ market dying, it makes perfect sense to replicate this experience with technology that people already have and use. It also means that you can make gaming much more of a social occasional, families and friends can get together to play the games. As James said multiplayer games are more fun when you can punch the person next to you in the arm when they beat you.

What now?

James explained that the reaction to Clockwork Racers has been really positive. They have gained a good amount of press and a steady amount of downloads. They are now planning on making the multiscreen technology available to other game developers to help boost the multiscreen market and grow awareness. They are also working on a new game Deadbeats and are looking at running pop up arcades at events. They are trailing the first arcade tomorrow at Watershed for Filmic 2013: Tron + Man vs Machine After Party.  Come down to the Watershed bar at 10pm to have a go.

You can find out more about Opposable Games, and follow their progress on their website here: http://opposablegames.com/