Itis possible that most of our readers may not be familiar with your company, could you give us a bit of its background?
Well, we are located in Tokyo, Japan and have eight employees. The company was established in 1994. Besides Cookieis Bustle, we develop two other non-game products for the Japanese market.
Was this your first Macintosh title?
Yes, it was the first game that we released. However, it is Multiple platform title.
Violent games tend to be the norm these days. Itis refreshing when a game like Cookieis Bustle hits the market. Who created the design document for Cookie?s Bustle?
I created the design document and story concept for the game. During development I also handled planning and control. To tell you the truth, Iim not so happy with the direction that most developers are taking these days. It seems that too many games lack story and are created solely to show off technology (i.e. graphic engines.) Very few games have a well-thought out concept and rich story. We used themes such as courage and love in Cookieis Bustle to bring the player into our world. Although the main character is only a 5-year old girl, she shows a great amount of spirit and tries her best to make her dreams come true. I think these traits are universally appealing.
Is the target audience for Cookieis Bustle children?
No, not at all! Although the character and graphics are very appealing to young gamers, a wide range of people have purchased the title. In fact, weive had a great response from the Generation-X age group.
The main development tool was Macromedia?s Director. Why did you choose Director and not C/C++?
This was our first experience with Macromedia Director for a commercialized product. The first reason we choosed Director was for its multi-platform capability. Although C++ is fairly portable, we found Director to be extremely effective and time saving for this project. The second reason involved the game assets. Our CG and sound designers were able to provide art and audio to the development team in a timely manner. This improved our development time significantly.
You can read the rest of this enlightening interview, as well as find more information about RODIK Inc. and iDev Games, at the iDev Web site.