Tag: App Store

Nanashi 2.0

I released the first version of Nanashi on the App Store 7 years ago, it’s a turn-based strategy game. The game was relatively simple: a solo mode against an AI and a pass and play mode.

The most requested feature was an online multi-player mode with a leaderboard, but I never found the time to do it… until today.

I finally released the version 2.0 of Nanashi with an online mode and a leaderboard.

The app is available on the App Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/nanashi/id649608957

PLAYER VS ROBOT

Rules are simple:
– select your piece to see where you can play
– one square away (including the diagonals) and your piece is cloned
– two squares away and your piece jumps
– capture the pieces of your enemy by cloning or jumping next their piece
– you win if you own the most pieces at the end of the game

Play against a challenging AI or against a friend on your iPhone or iPad……or play online against strangers and rank up the leaderboard!

EDIT: The game has since been feature by GamesKeys.net in their Top Games To Tryout in October 2020!

From zero to the App Store in one week-end

Build a complete app from scratch in a week-end? Challenge accepted! I started the project on Friday evening and submitted the app for review on the App Store on Sunday evening. It was accepted during the night and live on Monday morning.

So what was there time to do in just a weekend? Actually, a lot:

  • SwiftUI: I experimented a tiny bit of SwiftUI before, but nothing compares to building a real app!
  • GPS based location is retrieved in the background, reverse geocoded and stored in CoreData
  • Forms: automatically recording locations is cool, but you sometimes have to go and manually add or edit visits, SwiftUI makes it particularly easy to create dynamic forms with very little code and handles pretty much everything for you
  • In-App Purchase with a paywall selling a non-consumable product to unlock some features like yearly / country reports and PDF export
  • PDF generation from HTML templates, and export using a SwiftUI wrapped version UIActivityController
  • Analytics and Crashlytics integration using Firebase
  • App Store preparation: finding a name, writing description, creating a logo, preparing screenshots, submitting the In-App Purchase product
  • Submission!

What kind of issues did I run into?

  • SwiftUI is fun, but sometimes it’s just really hard to do something really simple (like presetting two modals / sheets from the same view), and sometimes you simply can’t do something simple (like removing the disclosure indicator from list cells without generating random crashes)
  • Fastlane didn’t want to work on my machine, I wanted to automate the screenshots but couldn’t, but it’s ok, since there is only one language for now and the app only support the iPhone, taking screenshots manually wasn’t too long
  • Apple randomly disabled submission from the version of Xcode available on the Mac App Store, and obviously the error message when submitting was super obscure… had to download the next coming GM from the developer download center

Is the code clean? Hell no! But was it fun to do? Absolutely! I don’t know if this app will ever sustain itself, but I’ve to admit we live in a time where very powerful tools are available for us to experiment and iterate really quickly. I’ll definitely do this kind of challenges again 🙂

Link to the app: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/trvl/id1487340379

LASIDO: improve your sight reading

LASIDO is the first iOS application developed on my free time, it’s a simple music game that aims to help in improving sight reading. It’s available for both the iPhone and the iPad.

Since I’m not a graphic designer, I chose this ultra minimalistic design, the app focuses on its only feature with two modes:

  • training: unlimited time to understand and improve the reading
  • chrono: where user have to read the more notes he can in a limited 30 seconds game

Game Center is supported, so you can challenge yourself and your friends to get better at reading scores.

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LASIDO – 1.99€ – https://itunes.apple.com/fr/app/lasido/id613353673?ls=1&mt=8