Awem Studio Blog

On January 4 Awem studio is celebrating its 8th Anniversary. All these years we worked hard to bring you griping, whimsical and captivating games. This helped us to establish ourselves as the premier casual game developer in Eastern Europe. Awem studio’s successes have come from supporting each of our member’s unique skills to produce original games for the whole family.

On behalf of our company, we’d like to thank all our fans who believe in us. You encourage us to go on and inspire to further improvements and consequently to new remarkable games. The best present for us is to see you playing our games again and again, to see your delight and never-ceasing interest.

2010 will be rich in events for our company as well as for our fans. There will be a lot of new games and bright surprises!

In celebration of our 8th Anniversary, Awem has prepared a special surprise: 8 Best Awem Games in one Bundle, exclusively for Awem users only.

Enjoy your favorite games, and thank you for been with us!

It was 2007, and we had just finished developing Cradle of Persia. So we asked ourselves: “What do we do now? What game should we work on next?” Since hidden object games had become widely popular, we decided to give that genre a try.

Getting Started

To begin with, we had to come up with some distinguishing features for our future game to differentiate it from the many other hidden object games already on the market. Because Awem doesn’t make “ordinary” games, we knew the game had to involve more than just clicking around. After discussing two different concepts, we collected all successful ideas and defined a setting. Due largely to the popularity of Cradle of Rome—and with the substantial help of our online community—we determined that our new hidden object game would be set in Rome.

At that point, we reviewed our assets:

• A fine setting, popular with most and familiar to all
• A nice concept
• An enthusiastic team

Meanwhile, programmers were busy with a new engine which could meet all the game’s requirements; our artists were working on the first locations; and the project lead had begun turning the concept into a full-fledged design document. The work was in full swing.



Design Challenges

At the initial stage of development our requirements were so high that both programmers got seriously stuck building the engine. But we did not lose our resolve. The forced delay gave us the chance to work out the design document and get rid of dubious features at an early stage.

When at last the programmers could show some meaningful results, the graphics were also ready. What that meant is that we now had built enough that we could share our work-in-progress with a focus group.

Its response was: "OK." Of course, we were not at all happy with "OK."


Design Improvements

To improve our game, we decided to add more characters, enliven dialogue, expand the story line, and (most important of all) introduce trading relationships and a market. Henceforth, as players found hidden objects they would earn coins which could be spent at the market. As they acquired more, their possessions would be displayed in their profiles. In addition, we decided to provide players with usable tools—an idea that received an enthusiastic response from our focus group.

Of course, all of these innovations compelled us to make changes to the interface—and as we did so, the interface became heavier and more complicated. Eventually, having experimented with numerous interface variations, we settled on the design you can see in the game today.




From Demo to Final Release

Little by little we refined our first demo version of the game and took it with us to Casual Connect Kiev 2008 . Despite the fact that the demo was a bit raw, we received warm and positive responses there, which boosted our enthusiasm for the project. What’s more, at the conference we received some valuable suggestions for improvements which we subsequently incorporated into the game.

After the trade show, we found ourselves snowed under with work—but to be honest, we faced it with pleasure. The release was at hand, after all, and we looked forward to our approaching holiday with eager anticipation.

The beta version of Romance of Rome was ready in March, but it completely failed initial testing.

At that time, we made the difficult decision to make wholesale improvements to the game—even if it meant we would have to postpone the release date for several months.

For starters, we rewrote the plot to make it more extensive while giving the heroes unique, recognizable characteristics. We also made the game more “grown-up” and serious (which didn’t deprive it of its humor and charm). We replaced straight blocks of text with bright and stylish comics. And perhaps most significant of all: We got rid of the market altogether even though it had taken central place in the previous version of the game.



Finally, after one-and-a-half years and two different budget increases—and in spite of numerous difficulties along the way—Romance of Rome was released on September 1, 2009.

What is Casual Connect?

Casual Connect Kyiv brings together the most talented and knowledgeable experts in the casual gaming field to further the casual games industry with the best of networking and learning. It’s the greatest event for all casual game developers which gives the possibility to boast about new games, get immense experience and positive charge. Every year Casual Connect Kyiv attends over 3,000 professionals of the casual games industry.

Awem studio has become a Gold Sponsor at the conference held October 21-23 and brings there five projects.

Awem’s Projects:

This year at the conference Awem is going to present two hidden object games: Golden Trails: The New Western Rush and Letters from Nowhere; a sequel to extremely popular puzzle game Cradle of Rome 2.


 


Golden Trails: The New Western Rush stands first in the list for beta test and will be available soon after the conference. It’s a Wild West hidden object game in which you take the role of a local sheriff and investigate a mysterious bank robbery.


 


Letters from Nowhere will let you dive into the atmosphere of mystery and unsolved issues. Who sends these unco letters? Why do they send them to you? What do they want? Be ready for dramatic and captivating story.






One more game we are going to present is The Island: Castaway. The Island: Castaway is a joint development of Awem studio and SahmonGames. It’s an action-adventure game with cinematographic plot. You’ll have to explore enigmatic island, find clues and solve more than 150 diverse quests.





Hope all the games will receive positive responses. I’ll report you how it was on returning home. Wish good luck to me and our games.

Recently we’ve made a close look to a beta version of Romance Of Rome game and made a conclusion that it requires two more months for improvements and polishing.

We receive many letters from you, our beta testers and fans, asking about the release date. Thanks for your interest and collaboration. We are concerned about the quality not the date that’s why the launch is set back to June.

We’ve made a video preview of the game which you can see on Facebook . It’s just a demo and I’m afraid the final version of Romance Of Rome will be quite different. The changes won’t be considerable though. Hope you’ll like the audio and the cartoonish style in plot representing. There will be no market anymore (as it's written in Romance Of Rome Preview) and you won’t see the whole city as you load the game. Intrigued? I'm too.

In continuation of my first blog where I wrote about all innovations awaiting you at awem.com I think it’s time to share with you our game projects.

This year will be rich on games from our studio.

Keeping the tendency we also head for Hidden Object games. Awem is planning to launch at least 3 seek-and-find games. The upcoming one is Romance Of Rome. It uses a traditional approach to the genre and, at the same time, has lots of challenging puzzles and original twists to entertain you.

At the same time Awem employees are working on Wild West hidden object. Players go on the world of bandits, bank robbery, secret maps; plunge into adventures... Passionate love, treachery and a rush for wealth - all these await you.

Who doesn’t love mystery? I adore it. This led us to the game with stories and enigmas in it. Our new hidden objects game will be made in the best traditions of Stephen King’s science fiction. After all, what better motivation for playing a game than finding out what happens next?

At awem.com we keep an ear closely tuned to the feedback from all of you, our fans. There was one message we heard repeatedly, loud and clear, “We love Cradle Of Rome, but are you going to release Cradle Of Rome 2?”

We are sensitive to the needs of our fans and yielded to your requests. I’m excited to tell you that we are currently working on the game. Cradle of Rome 2 will meet you with an enhanced city and the amount of innovative bonuses. We have been designing and furbishing up the city for the whole month and I’m very proud of the results.

Finally a few words about Dream Big: Reverie Manor. Just in case you don’t know it… The game turned out long, it includes several top genres (hidden object + time management + simulation). Dream Big will be launched this year too.

Mac games - Being inspired by the success of Cradle Of Rome for Mac in the nearest future we are planning to released Cradle Of Persia and Star Defender 3 and 4 for Mac OS. Just for you. Enjoy! Soon after launching PC version of Romance Of Rome the game will be available for Mac users too.

We have been working hard to bring you all of these cool new games. If you aren’t already a newsletter subscriber, you should think about signing up. Why? Well, all new awem games will be exclusive at awem.com for a month. So don’t miss out. We’ll send out e-mails to let you know of all the great releases.

Last year we started a great re-design of awem.com. Having launched the beta version of the site (with cute sparrows if you remember) we realized that it’s a huge part of work that flows into infinite innovations. So we put out heads down and went into work. The results are before your eyes. Now I’d like to tell you what is hidden so far.

• Playing Awem games you can simultaneously develop your own profile. Why not publish your new rank or scores you get? Are you a guru in Star Defender 4? Boast about it on our site.
  
  
• You probably read about upcoming games from Awem studio. Right now we are busy with plugging into them a new system that will give you the possibility to earn various trophies and points and publish them on awem.com. Having finished with the new games we’ll modernize the already existing.
  
  
• We’ve decided to introduce our own currency on awem.com. It’s the so called “Awem points”. What’s awem points? How to earn them? Why do I need them?
  
  
• Every registered user can earn Awem points. Awem.com will reward you each time you Create your Account, Log In, leave a comment, rate a game etc. for any activity on the site. They are accumulated. With Awem points you can participate in The Best Profile contest held weekly, receive ranks starting from “Beginner” to “The Game Expert”. The most active user will get one of Awem games for free.
  
  
• We have far-reaching designs and have already launched a beta version of so called “casual social network“. Where you can compete with each other, chart, make presents etc. Right now we are busy testing it.
  
  
• Announcement for all Awem and casual games fans!
  
  We are looking for Beta Testers! What you should do?

- Simply play our new casual games holding a mouse in your right hand and a pencil in the left,

- Complete a form with brief but better detailed commentary on the game,

- Receive a free copy of the game at the end.

On the 4th January Awem studio celebrated its anniversary. 7 years have passed since Awem was created. It had its rise in a remote 2002 as an unknown company with the first game Pacboy and consisted of only 1 person.

Currently our team consists of more than 25 employees and steady grows year in year out. As I reflect on these 7 years I can confidently say that our efforts were not in vain and now we are proud of such products as Star Defender 2-4, Cradle Of Rome, Cradle Of Persia, Aquitania.

We did and continue doing our best to make qualitative and exciting products. Cradle of Rome for example was accepted as the Best Puzzle Game of 2007 and Cradle of Persia received a prize in the nomination ‘Best production values’ in Innovate 2007. This year we are going to release more new titles. Dream Big: Reverie Manor, Romance of Rome, Cradle of Rome 2 are just a few to name.

I want to thank all our users for being with us and feedback all these years. We value each of you and in 2008 decided to improve and re-design our site to fill it with the best games all over the world. Our support service and moderators on the awem forum pay attention to each letter and personally deal with every request. We try to meet your requirements and 2009 will be the year of even greater improvements and surprises.

Thanks everybody for being with Awem studio and loving our games.