Arcade games differ from the rest in their interface, simple and understandable at first glance. As a rule, these games include a top list of the best players and a high score leaderboard, which motivates all players.
Often, the main goal of a mobile arcade game is to get the largest score. The gameplay of such games is cyclical, so playing them for a long time may become monotonous. The multiplayer mode, on the contrary, provides you with real rivals, so the game process starts to be much more fun.
If you are choosing the genre of a game application to develop, an arcade game will suit you the best. It requires simple gameplay, graphics, lack of a difficult balance in the case of strategies, which you are going to appreciate. The only thing you have to bother with when updating are the graphics and the addition of new levels and achievements. After all, the same picture combined with repetitive actions will quickly get boring for the audience.
In the highly competitive market of arcade games, it will be quite difficult to get on top. But, if you manage to do this, you are going to reach a very wide audience.
The Specific Nature of Arcade Games
Technopedia defines arcade games as kind of “games for rent” with short levels for maximum fun and minimum effort, fast-growing difficulty for excitement, and utterly accessible controls for convenience. The main goal of such games is to hold a player’s attention as firm and long as possible. At that, the essential difference from “big” games here is that arcade products almost exclusively feature:
- Simple game mechanics with intuitive controls;
- Emphasis on pure gameplay rather than story or content;
- Level-by-level increasing difficulty.
Teamwork Is the Key to Success
The success of Melior Games’ arcade game development comes from a combination of several good ideas mixed with stunning graphics. This is teamwork of specialists from various fields – designers, programmers, artists, engineers. There are several stages to joint creative work.
Arcade Game Development Stages
Concept Development
The goal is to create a detailed project document that fully describes the future business product with an initial study of all its aspects. It formulates the tasks of performers at all levels so that the investor has an idea of what they put their money into. Special tools such as Confluence are used to obtain up-to-date information on product development and document correction.
Often, arcade game development is based on old popular concepts. Theoretically, you can go this way, but it is simpler to interest the user with a new game that has the chance to become a new hit.
Programming
To write code for a mobile arcade game, our developers use various programming languages. The choice depends on the gaming platform and, in turn, determines:
- arcade controls functionality;
- game design concept;
- implementation of the arcade idea – bonuses, obstacles, enemies, collectibles, etc.
Arcade Game Prototyping
What looks attractive in the concept may not be interesting to users. You need a prototype to get your expectations confirmed or refuted, as well as to check the mechanics. The prototype is not the basis for project implementation – it is only a temporary infrastructure for testing the main ideas and, once used, has no practical value.
Teaser
Once the minimum viable product is ready, we start preliminary user testing. Game teasers of the beta version are posted on various websites, social networks, and forums. Those who wish to take part in testing the game are invited to fill out a questionnaire indicating found errors, general impressions, comments, and other useful user experiences for developers. All the information received is carefully analyzed, and the developers make the appropriate code correction.
The Decisive Test
At this stage, the developers determine the optimal arcade difficulty level for the average user. In other words, the arcade game is adjusted so as to provide an opportunity for the gamer to get carried away with the gameplay without being defeated a minute after the start. This, of course, does not guarantee that the arcade will reach the top, but it creates a favorable impression on the average user.
That’s all – now your mobile arcade game is ready for release. With the right marketing and a competent monetization model, it will definitely meet your expectations. To learn more, feel free to contact us for all questions related to creating and promoting applications. Melior Games team is always ready to help you with arcade games or any other genre!
