Just to keep you updated on what is going on here. Our plans for the next 1-2 months:

• New iPad retina update. Submitted to the App Store.
  
• iPhone release. Even before the iPad release we already received questions about iPhone support. And we don’t want to make you wait too long!
• New level packs with new cells. We read your App Store comments! You think you’ve mastered the war of tentacles already? Very good! You will need this knowledge. But be prepared to master something new…

Next 3-4 months:

• New multiplayer arenas, modes.
  
• Procedural generated levels?
• We’ll see…

As April 19 hits the globe, Tentacle Wars hits App Stores. It is in New Zealand and Japan already… And it will come to your country soon. If you like the game please don’t forget to recommend it to your friends!

UPDATE: Tentacle Wars for iPad – iTunes link

First Achievements:

• #1 Strategy game in Germany (it isn’t stable place, but we managed to make a screenshot)

• New and noteworthy in USA, UK, Germany, France, Russia…

UPDATE: Tentacle Wars HD has been approved for the App Store. To get instant updates about the game from now you can follow us on twitter.

Launch date: April 19, 2012!

P.S.: iPhone release is our highest priority task.

These are tutorial levels. But I think most of you who read this blog don’t need any tutorials

UPDATE: Note that I’m not the owner of gamezhero.com. Please contact gamezhero directly for any questions regarding this problem.

UPDATE (April 11): Shared levels will be fixed soon.

Thank You for understanding!

In any case I’ll keep you updated.

UPDATE (Oct. 10): I’ve got 24 suggestions from my publisher. Most of them are minor changes. But this should make the final game better. So I have to work a bit more.

UPDATE (Dec. 22): The game looks solid now. But everything is so slow during Christmas time. Merry Christmas!

UPDATE (Jan. 23, 2012): Happy New Year! Publishing of iOS game isn’t very quick process as I expected. So basically the game is done. Now it is publisher turn to bring it to the AppStore. I can’t wait to see it there!

UPDATE (Feb. 7, 2012): It feels like it lasts forever. But finally I see the light in the end of the tunnel. Thanks to everyone who is following this way with me. There are only few more steps! Waiting for March…

Six months ago Tentacle Wars was uploaded and featured on Gamezhero.com. I would like to share some stats about the game.

At this moment TW’s got more than 11 millions game plays worldwide. And it still gets about 15 thousands daily. Mochibot is here.

The major distribution events are:

• G – published and featured on the sponsor’s site – Gamezhero.com
• NG – published on Newgrounds.com
• Kong – published on Kongregate.com

The most interesting thing here (I was surprised) – to be featured on Gamezhero means a lot for the distribution. The game was featured also on Newgrounds and Kongregate. But the highest peak (see the picture) happened before NG and Kong. But wait! Gamezhero isn’t as big as NG or Kong (these are huge portals), but it did probably even more for the game distribution (at least not less). I’m not sure if Gamezhero did some extensive distribution work to make it happen. As far as I know they didn’t.

Sponsorship & Money

I’ve learned that you should always try to get performance deal. Performance is fair for both: you and sponsor. If your game becomes a mega hit with millions game plays – you get money for every million. You are happy – sponsor is happy. Because, as you know, game plays are converted into a sponsor’s portal visitors. If your game fails – you don’t get a lot of money. You aren’t too happy. But your sponsor isn’t happy too – no visitors – no money. This is obvious. But…

The most important thing here is that sponsors don’t want to risk and pay upfront a lot of money even if they really like your game. Since they never know if the game will become a hit or not. Sometimes you can get a bit more for a “bad” game in case of sponsor’s prediction mistake. But most likely you won’t get a lot of money upfront for a game that will turn into a super hit later. I think Steambirds story is very uncommon. Don’t expect this scenario. Or you should borrow good luck from Andy Moore

What’s next?

Play the TW level pack with smart purple microbes (TW: The Purple Menace).

Also read: Tentacle Wars coming to iPad and iPhone.

P.S.: Sorry, but this link isn’t the TW3 also. This is a demo of how to get additional visitors to your site. To calm you down: at least this is the game developer blog. Here you can read all the latest news about the Tentacle Wars development.

See you soon on iOS!

Guys, just moved the wish list to this blog post.

Please post links to your levels here: TW – User Levels.

The old wish list page is still available (if you miss it ). But I won’t update it anymore.

Here is my draft TODO list for the TW2:

• level editor
• microbes upgrades
• multiplayer
• bigger areas
• mother cell concept (Karl Schleifenbaum)
• moving microbes
• special microbes: capture one to get new abilities (Remi Scheffers)
• viruses: infect microbes and they start fight against everyone (Mateus Rodrigues)

P.S.: Your facebook posts and emails with ideas were moved here also (see comments).

UPDATE (Oct. 11): Guys, I’m working on Tentacle Wars for iPad at the moment. Sorry, no time to work on TW2.