In this morning’s New York Times, reporter Jenna Wortham speaks with a number of developers regarding the pressure they’re under to develop for the iPad. Among those developers interviewed? Igor and Marko Pusenjak, the brilliant minds behind Doodle Jump. In the piece, both brothers confirm that an iPad makeover is in the works for Doodle Jump, and they fill us in on why it wasn’t available for the iPad’s launch.
In this morning’s New York Times, reporter Jenna Wortham speaks with a number of developers regarding the pressure they’re under to develop for the iPad. Among those developers interviewed? Igor and Marko Pusenjak, the brilliant minds behind Doodle Jump. In the piece, both brothers confirm that an iPad makeover is in the works for Doodle Jump, and they fill us in on why it wasn’t available for the iPad’s launch.
“We wanted to wait until we had it (the iPad) in hand so we could see the game mechanics in action and make sure they worked perfectly,” says Igor Pusenjak. Like most developers, the Pusenjak’s weren’t provided advanced units for development purposes. And while all iPhone developers have had access to iPad development tools since late January, Doodle Jump relies heavily on tilt functionality – something that’s hard to tweak without a real unit in your hands for testing.
A few hours after receiving their units, they had an early build of Doodle Jump for the iPad up and running – and they quickly realized that they were right to wait. “There are a lot more technical problems than we anticipated,” says Marko. “It’s harder to control the shooting.” “People will be used to holding it with one hand and shooting with the other,” adds Igor. “We may have to rethink that.”
While there’s no confirmed release date, it seems clear that the iPad iteration of Doodle Jump won’t be available until it’s good and ready. With more than 3 million downloads of the iPhone version, expectations couldn’t be higher for its iPad rebirth.
