I'm the award winning game designer of Guitar Hero and Slope. I’ve been a soccer fan my whole life, and now I'm making a mobile soccer game as easy to play as foosball. Follow my journey!
Kickabout launches in Europe & The Americas + 5 more teams & 5 star reviews!
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I’m very excited to announce that Kickabout is OUT NOW across all of Europe and The Americas! I've cover more on that in this newsletter, as well as recap a whirlwind week since Kickabout launched in UK/US. Let’s dive in! EU & AMERICAS LAUNCH Kickabout is OUT NOW in EU / The Americas! Thanks to the reddit community who enquired when they could get in the EU. I’d been holding it back because Kickabout is English language only, but realized I was being overly cautious; I should get it released ASAP for prospective players everywhere. I also encountered lots of South Americans at WWDC over the last couple of days who tried to download it on the spot and were unable to… so it released across all of The America’s today too, just in time for the first match of the World Cup in Mexico City! 5 MORE TEAMS! Coincide with this availability expansion, the first Kickabout update just went live with 5 new teams to unlock! Welcome to party Sweden, Switzerland, Austria, Turkey, and Ukraine! Like all teams in Kickabout, each has it’s own combination of CPU playstyle and difficulty level, so these are not just cosmetic additions! Hope you enjoy playing with them as much as me in this first update. Full global availability (inc Asia and Africa) will follow in 2 weeks time on 6/25, along with even more teams. 5 STAR RECEPTION! Kickabout has received an overwhelming positive reception since launch. Thanks to everyone who left ratings and reviews! Ratings like these help drive visibility and downloads on the App Store, giving solo developers like me a shot in a highly competitive marketplace. PocketGamer called Kickabout’s design “ingenious” in their coverage, saying “It seems to strike a perfect balance between anarchic arcade fun and genuine competitive depth”. My jaw was on the floor. Check out the full piece here: https://www.pocketgamer.com/kickabout-table-football/out-now-on-ios/ Communities I posted to on Reddit also got into Kickabout, saying some lovely things, and being a wonderful source of early feedback (inc those EU availability requests!). WORK ROUND UP Solo indie dev isn’t all dev work and watching the reviews roll in of course, it requires pro-active marketing. Recently my effort's have included…
Learning and networking at WWDC As if my launch week wasn't busy enough already, Apple held their annual World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) so I dropped by Cupertino to check out it out. I was there mainly to network and learn from other indie devs on the App Store at fringe events, and got a lot out of it in that regard. “Dub Dub” - as regulars call it - also doubled as a good dry run of the Kickabout promo materials I’ve been making for all the World Cup games & events that will be happening across SF. I decided to go full gorilla marketing mode on the apple keynote line, handing out loads of Kickabout postcards and chatting with hundreds of people waiting in line for the big event. Some waited for over an hour to get in, and I was sort of surprised security didn’t kick me out (one staffer actually came over and gave me props for the hustle). Some people wanted to take photos with me when they found out I was lead designer of Guitar Hero. Most were devs, but there were media in there too, including YouTuber Marques Brownlee who got my postcard and as he arrived late to check in. The most excited people for Kickabout were, of course, Europeans and South Americans. I told them to sign up for this newsletter, and promised could play it on their flight home - so I'm very happy to provide that access today before the conference wraps up! Takes a village And somehow ALL of that happened in just ONE WEEK since 1.0 launch / my last newsletter. Crazy! Next I'm prepping the 1.2 release on 6/25, expanding access to Asia and Africa as the World Cup kicks into gear! A big THANK YOU for all the supportive notes, photos of your people playing Kickabout 1 and 2 player, and most of all for the reposts and comments on social media/chat threads. That helps a ton. It’s also been a lot of fun seeing the competition heat up on the Game Center leaderboard. Kickabout is a new high score ⚽️ game on iOS! 10 points for scoring a goal, 1 for hitting the post, and bonus points for skill shots like “Goal off the post!”. x2, x3, x4 multipliers for raising CPU difficulty raise risk & potential points reward! Get Kickabout on iOS from the link in my bio #kickaboutgame #leaderboard #ios If YOU want to support Kickabout / my ongoing solo dev effort, some EASY ways to lend a hand:
Bye for now, and see you on the leaderboard! Rob |
Rob Kay
I'm the award winning game designer of Guitar Hero and Slope. I’ve been a soccer fan my whole life, and now I'm making a mobile soccer game as easy to play as foosball. Follow my journey!
Hello! I released a new update for Kickabout today, so let's go over what it adds and do a nerdy 'behind the scenes' on how this content was created (AKA live ops). Firstly, welcome 🇪🇬 Egypt, 🇮🇷 Iran, and 🇳🇬 Nigeria! Kickabout is NOW AVAILABLE WORLDWIDE, so I had to add these powerhouse ⚽️ nations to Kickabout. Each team plays in their famous colors of course, but also play differently as CPU opponents too! Egypt and Iran defend deep, hitting on the break, while Nigeria’s pace and power will...
I’m thrilled to announce that Kickabout has just released on the App Store! In this newsletter I’ll cover the final push, and what it took to get this solo developed game finished for release. Let’s dive in! MARKETING Wrote the store page (inc US and UK variants, coz “soccer”) Created the screenshots for iPhone and iPad Created the store video for iPhone and iPad Choose App Store search keywords (ASO using Astro for those who know) Made trailer and press kit (trailer, screenshots, promo...
Hello! As Kickabout’s June launch approaches, I’ve been on a big production push which I’ll cover in this newsletter. First though, let’s kick things off with a bang by announcing the 35 Kickabout launch teams! Here are the national teams you'll get to play as, and against, in Kickabout (grouped by region): National Teams Home Turf Heroes: USA Mexico Canada Samba Legends: Argentina Brazil Colombia Uruguay Ecuador Chile Asian Engines: Japan Australia South Korea New Zealand Singapore Euro...