Tag: Shortbreak Studios »

A new action game from Shortbreak Studios called Hellraid: The Escape is scheduled to be released soon, porting the upcoming sibling game for PC (simply called Hellraid) to iOS. In the game, a sorcerer has imprisoned your soul, leaving you to wonder who you are yourself, and how you could possibly rid the world of this evil. The game is a high-quality and well-developed game with great graphics, and hopes to be a fun experience as well even on top of its frightening story premise.

The game has a plethora of features, including a wide variety of challenging puzzles, the graphics quality of its PC brother, a world that's free to explore, intuitive controls, Game Center achievements and more. Hellraid: The Escape will also support play on a TV via AirPlay or an HDMI cable. The game will have free updates released over time and will not feature any in-app purchases.

Hellraid: The Escape will be available in the App Store for iPhone and iPad on May 15 for $2.99.

As its latest title comes with the unique proposition of helping a children's charity, we thought it time to learn more about Polish iOS developer, Shortbreak Studios.

Who is Shortbreak Studios?
Part of Techland, one of the biggest Polish game developers out there thanks to its work on titles such as the Call of Juarez games, Shortbreak Studios is made up of a core team of 9 passionate developers. A mixture of programmers, designers, level designers, artists and a producer, the company benefits from relying on Techland to work out the finances and allowing the team to focus on the creative side of things. As explained by producer, Pawel Rohleder, it means the combination of "the flexibility and creativity of a small independent development studio with the experience and knowledge of an established player in the gaming industry!"

Why should I remember the Shortbreak Studios name?
There are a couple of good reasons, so far. First of all, they made Sugar High, a game that perhaps owed a little too much to Tiny Wings but still proved to be great fun. More importantly, Shortbreak Studios has worked in conjunction with the Cape of Hope Foundation in order to create oncology clinic for children with Cancer.

How did Heal Them All come about?
Pawel Rohleder explains, "We have been supporting Cape of Hope for some time and it was our mutual idea to create a game about defending the organisms for mobile devices. We thought that fighting microbes inside the human body would be [a] very nice setting for a tower defense game as this genre is very popular on mobile patforms. Another idea was the freemium business model as we wanted to reach as many users as possible by offering a part of our game for free." Notably, Heal Them All is entirely free to try out with the full campaign unlocked for $1.99.

What's next on the horizon?
The team has lofty plans, with Pawel happily declaring the ambition that many hold, "Our main goal is to conquer the whole world with our mobile games!" At the moment, though, the firm is mostly working on two different projects that they aren't able to discuss just yet, as well as porting to other devices. Possible updates for their current titles are also in the works and currently being brainstormed.

Anything else I should know about Shortbreak Studios?
Pawel was all too keen to tell us just what he and the rest of the team love about iOS development.

Pawel: Everything! We enjoy every aspect of mobile game development and we put a lot of effort and passion into every step of [the] production process. We believe this is the only way to make high quality games. One of the most important…[parts] in efficient mobile development is rapid prototyping. Each prototype must convince us that this could be a GREAT game. We cancel the project if we do not believe in its playable demo. And the sooner, the better. The development process itself is also very interesting because of tons of small decisions that the team needs to make in [terms] of hard negotiations or just [our] gut feeling ;). Personally, I love the final stage of the development where all individual assets turn into a working product and our vision materializes into a real game. This…shows us that it was all worth the effort but…it always makes us come up with a lot of new ideas and changes that we could make to improve the final quality.

Where can I find out more about Shortbreak Studios?
We'll be keeping an eye on the company's progress. There's also its website, Facebook page, Google+ page and Twitter account.

Heal Them All is available now, for free. But do consider paying towards the full unlock, given where the profits are going.