Here’s an interview from the Gameplayer/Paradox event we posted about a few weeks back. It’s from Swedish (Scandinavian) free gaming magazine Game Reactor, and it gives you the first glimpses of our new art style and character design. The folks over at the Game Reactor did a great job putting this one together, so kudos to them!
We will be posting Part 2 of our Character Design walkthrough in a couple of days, so be sure to check that out! If you want to see Part 1 of the design walkthrough, you can find it here.
Following up this week’s press update we also have a video from the finale of the Gameplayer and Paradox Interactive game development competition. It is in swedish, but since we are in such a good mood today we have translated a section of the video for your leisure. The part in question is the interview with us and the creators of A Wikiped’s Story, and the translation can be found below.
We just wanted to share a few things that has been written about Boingo with you guys. First up is an article from Super PLAY about the games that has received support from the Nordic Game Program. Super PLAY is one of Sweden’s largest gaming magazines, so that it’s of course nice to be featured in it! We have taken the liberty to highlight the part that mentions Black Drop and Boingo in the scan, which you can find here. Since it is in swedish we have translated that particular part for your convenience:
Boingo is described as a two dimensional platform/racing game and is being developed by Black Drop Studios. Boingo has previously been awarded to prizes at the Swedish Game Awards 2008 (Best Execution and Gamer’s Choice). When we get in contact with Peter Lübeck at Black Drop Studios he tells us what the recieved development grant means for the continued development of the game.
- With this development grant, and the feedback that we have received during the last year, we will do thorough upgrades of all the parts of the game.
Black Drop Studios, who is aiming for a broad demographic and the development of ‘interesting games’, is currently looking for a publishing partner to be able to finally release their Boingo.
Boingo Character Design Part 1 - The Missing Links
Saturday, February 14th, 2009
As we mentioned in our previous post we recently showed the first glimpses of the redesign of our Boingo character during a press event. We will reveal the new character here on the blog in the near future, but before we do that though we would like to show you how the character has evolved from the first sketch to the current version. The first batch will take us from the first ever sketch to the design we used in our first prototype.
Yesterday was quite a hectic day. We arrived in Stockholm around lunch time and went straight to Hotell Hellsten where the Paradox press event was taking place. After a number of announcements by the respective developers regarding the Paradox 2009 line-up it was our turn to talk about Boingo. During the brief presentation we showed some concepts of our main character redesign for the first time, with good reception. We will present the new look on the blog in the near future so that everyone else gets to see it.
After the event it was time for interviews so we went up to the bar to try and sort out the chaos caused by everyone trying to talk to each other at once. First up was radio show [gejm] by Uppsala Studentradio, quickly followed by norwegian gaming site Gamer.no. During the following hour we were interview by danish site Pixel TV, Gamespot UK, swedish site Gamereactor and british magazine PC Zone.
After the interviews we went from the hotel to Restaurang EGO for the Paradox Game Pub with food and drinks galore. After a couple of hours of mingling and talking to assorted industry people and press it was time for the announcement of the winner of the Gameplayer.se and Paradox Interactive game development competition.
We hope this will prove to be a great opportunity for you guys!
After the announcement we we’re interviewed by Gameplayer.se and they have said that they will publish videos from the event on monday, so be sure to check that out. Also if there is anyone reading this who has their own game project that they’re working on, don’t forget to enter the next cycle of the competition (Sweden only). Information regarding this should be made available on Gameplayer.se during next month.
We will be posting links to any interviews or articles regarding the event as we find them, so don’t forget to check back or subscribe to our RSS-feed.
Now for a stroll around the streets of Stockholm before going back to Karlshamn. So long!
Hello again and welcome to the new Black Drop Studios website! We have been working hard to get you this wonderful new source of information regarding everything Black Drop Studios. Make sure to spread the word, add your bookmarks and subscribe to our RSS-feed so that you won’t miss anything exciting! Also, if you are a Facebook user there is now an official Boingo Facebook Page that you can subscribe to. We will present exclusives on the page, so if you want to be the first to know the good stuff, be sure to sign up! Click the Boingo Facebook button on the right, in the If you want more-section, to get to the page.
And so for the latest news update:
We are soon leaving for our capital to take part in Gameplayer.se and Paradox Interactive’s game development competition finale. The day will consist of a press event and some interviews with various game media, we are not really sure of which just yet. During the event we will be showing some material from the new version of Boingo for the first time, so that’ll be great. The evening will be spent at Restaurang EGO where the prize ceremony will take place. Regardless of how the evening plays out, you can expect an update here on the blog telling you how it went.
And so a new year begins, filled with hopes, dreams and promises. We here at Black Drop Studios are full of hope because we are getting closer and closer to our dreams, and we are about to make you a couple of promises. The first is that we are going to be launching a brand new website on which we will be posting just about anything you might want to know about us and what it is that we are doing. We have a lot of plans for this site so stay tuned for a complete tour of our little company in the form of news, behind-the-scenes articles, Post Mortems and more!
The second thing is that we are working on some very interesting stuff right now, and we will doing a couple of announcements during the upcoming months. Don’t miss it for the world, or you’ll be very dissapointed!
And oh, Black Drop Studios wishes you all a Happy New Year!
We are very happy to announce that we have received a grant from the Nordic Game Program for Boingo! The grant amounts to 300 000 DKK, which is roughly $ 53 000, or 40 000 euro, and is to be used for development funding. This is of course an incredible opportunity for us, as it will allows us to take what we already have of Boingo and turn it into something extraordinary. We have a lot of exciting things planned for Boingo, so stay tuned for more updates in the upcoming months.
The people in the picture are, from left to right, Peter, Sofie and Alex from Black Drop Studios, and Erik Robertsson from the Nordic Game Program.
Our little Boingo prototype has once again made its way into a game development competition finale. Together with the two other finalists (see image above) in Gameplayer.se and Paradox Interactive’s game development contest, Boingo has the chance to win a publishing deal with digital distribution portal Gamer’s Gate. This is a great opportunity for everyone involved, and we are thrilled over all the positive feedback we have received during the competition. We would like to thank everyone over at Gameplayer.se for your inspiring comments! We would also a like to give a big thank you to Paradox for making this happen, we think this is a great initiative and hope to see more competitions like this in the future.
Feel free to check out the other entrants in the competition in the Paradox press release.
The finale takes place in Stockholm on January 29th, so until then all you can do is wait. Let the best game win!
