Daniel Visser: You are most welcome! Wicked Witch Software is a small studio located in Melbourne's sunny outer east suburbs where most great game programmers and artists live! We have developed dozens of titles since 2000 across many platforms. These include high-end PC titles like Melodie mars, budget PC 3D titles such as Ultimate Jigsaw Puzzles and Ultimate Solitaire 750. Game Boy titles such as Aliens and Mary Kate and Ashley, then there is also the ranges of mobile and multiplayer mobile games we have made.
PALGN: Secondly, has it been an advantage or a disadvantage being an Australian developer? Do you find it harder to reach a worldwide audience from Victoria?
DV:Almost all of our business comes from overseas. We have clients in the USA, UK and many countries in Europe, and also Korea, China, Singapore and Malaysia. With the power of the internet we are able to do business all over the world with little problems. The Victorian government also supports our small game development sector which you may not get in other countries in the world. We are very happy to be in Victoria, Australia.
PALGN: Last year you guys released NRL 2005 and AFL 2005 for mobiles, can we expect to see more Australian content in the future? Such as successors to these titles?
DV:Yes, we have already released NRL and AFL 2006. We also followed these up with AFL Handball 2006, AFL Goal Kick 2006, NRL Superpass 2006 and NRL Field Goal 2006. All these titles are available from Telstra on most phones and feature all official teams and players!
Not quite Planet of the Apes in space...
PALGN: Are you able to tell us a little bit about Ned Kelly Deathmatch? How is it coming along? What platforms will it be available on?
DV:We have a grand design for a very artistic Ned Kelly game with a unique soundtrack, story and visual style. However the project has been put on hold due to lack of funding and investment. It is a serious project for us and something I hope we can get rolling again in the future.
PALGN: Can you tell us a little bit about the development cycle and the budget of a mobile game in comparison to a console game?
DV: Sure, a mobile game is in general, a lot smaller than a high-end 3D game, so the budgets and development cycle reflect that. Due to the speed that Wicked Witch can develop mobile games, I think last year we completed over 50 milestones. That means on average, there was a milestone every week!
However, as the phones become more powerful, we are seeing the budgets and development times grow. Games were 64kb in size and are now 512kb or 1mb in size. Some platforms out there are already looking at 10mb and 20mb mobile games.
PALGN: Aside from the website, when your mobile games are complete how do you publicise them? Recently mobile games have become extremely popular so how do you convince consumers that your titles are different and worth purchasing?
DV:Actually our website is more for corporate reasons – as well as our small gaming circle – and is not updated nearly enough! We use agents, phone carriers and other content distributors to sell our games for us, as luckily it is their job to convince the world how awesome our original games are!
PALGN: Obviously Wicked Witch love working with handhelds, do you have any Nintendo DS or PlayStation Portable projects in the pipeline?
DV:Yes, handheld titles suit the size of our studio very well. We are working on some PC 3D titles at the moment also, and have been working closely with the PSP and DS. However our PSP projects have not eventuated for reasons beyond our control. There is an excellent chance we will be delivering some DS titles next year.
Ned Kelly Deathmatch: A great idea.
PALGN:Can you tell us a little bit about War Monster? War Monster was the first MMORPG game for wireless mobile phones, is there a high percentage of users still playing the game?
DV:Sure, WarMonster is one of our old Game Boy titles that we have a lot of background on which makes it a fairly rich fantasy world. Fantasy worlds are a dime a dozen in the video games industry however and many games are released int heir own D&D / Tolkien-esque worlds. Our world is slightly different as it has an emphasis on players being able to play the monster classes and not just the humans. The MMORPG version of the game sort of grew as we developed r&d around networking mobile phones. Being huge fans of MMORPGs since Mud’s and Ultima Online (and now of course WoW) we ended up completing development on our own mini MMORPG. The game has been released in Hong Kong and various parts of Asia with moderate success. The game has been expanded to include many more RPG elements and to incorporate the influence of WoW. We are now gearing up to release an expanded version of the game in Korea and the USA.
PALGN: Can you tell us a little bit about the Vinyl fantasy series and the first game in the series Melodie Mars?
DV:Yes, Melodie Mars is a game we have done in conjunction with Christopher Coe of MediaNet Productions. The game series is based around being a DJ. There is an epic cyberspace storyline for Melodie Mars that the mobile games are loosely based on.
PALGN: What titles can we expect to see from Wicked Witch in the future? Will there be a greater emphasis on mobile games or will you be focusing on content for the next generation of consoles?
DV:It is not likely we will be moving onto next generation consoles anytime soon as our studio is a bit too small. However we have experienced staff with many years of developing high end console 3d games. We use this experience and apply it to our 3d PC titles and even to our wireless titles also. We will be maintaining our emphasis on our love of multiplayer gaming and will be bringing many quality games to mobile phones in 2007 so look out!
PALGN: In your downtime what other games do you find yourself playing?
DV:World of WarCraft and World of WarCraft...
Thanks for your questions, please keep an eye on the website every few months for updates and if anyone wants to – drop us an email !
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