Puckit! gets a Winter Remake

As Christmas approaches, the festive spirit is in the air, with twinkling lights and decorations in the streets and stores. The holiday season brings a perfect opportunity for game developers to create themed content, and that's exactly what I've been working on for my game, Puckit!

I celebrated over 100.000 plays for my game Puckit!, on Crazy Games a couple of weeks ago, but the traffic is stagnating. Crazy Games will hold a winter event in December, and all games that implement a winter theme will get featured on their home page. It's a great opportunity, and I have been busy creating a Winter Adventure event. It's all about ice, snow, Christmas themed levels, and Rudolf the Reindeer enemies.

Redesigning my Game Cover

It's also a great opportunity to redesign my game thumbnail. The current one looks like it's been created by AI, and it has, partly anyways. I ordered an AI to create an image of pucks flying through the air directly above the surface. I then created my own design as a replacement for the pucks made by the AI.

Here's the original image by the AI

And here's the image with my own original pucks layered on top. I think the image looks nice, but people will spot that part of it is made with AI.

Instead of relying on AI, I decided to capture the essence of the game using the elements from the game itself. When you see the game cover, you should be able to guess what the game is about. Puckit! is similar to an air hockey game, and we have to destroy other pucks.

Taking Inspiration from Other Games

I took a look at existing game thumbnails on Crazy Games under the "casual" category that I liked.

They all have one thing in common. They display the main Character, or the main mechanic in the game, which makes it easy to guess what the game is about. I wanted to create something similar. The thumbnail of the large purple ball was my main inspiration. It had some depth to it that I liked.

I started sketching my idea in Affinity Designer, and my first draft looked like this

I was quite happy with how it turned out, but it's a bit flat or pale. Something is missing.

I noticed a different Thumbnail on Crazy Games having some "speed lines" and smoke (see the excavator). Even though it's a still image, it looks like it's moving. I really liked that, and added it my Thumbnail as well.

It feels a lot better already, but it wasn't enough. I asked for feedback on the Crazy Games Dev Discord server, and got some thoughtful and good advice, plus an example. The first advice was to mirror the thumbnail, displaying it from "left to right", which will make it easier and faster to read. Another advice I got was to add additional speed lines on the puck itself. Here's the final result.

A bonus point with this layout is that labels on Crazy Games won't cover the Puck anymore, as they are added to the top left of the image. Here's how it looks like on Crazy Games with the "updated" label.

With this new thumbnail, I hope to attract more new players.

The Winter Advent-ure

I'm a big fan of Advent, the countdown to Christmas. I come from Norway, and we have a culture of opening an advent calendar. It's usually a chocolate behind each door, and we're getting more and more excited to celebrate Christmas on the 24th. I decided to add 24 levels for the occasion.

Day 1 is unlocked from the start. It's possible to unlock the next level by completing the current level or watch an ad. I added this as an attempt to increase ad revenue, and still keep the player invested in the game. It's a solution that helps player advance to the next level without getting frustrated.

I also added an ice puck, which shatters nearby enemies.

Play the Winter Update of Puckit! now and show your support with a thumbs up 👍 and a heart ❤️. It really means a lot to me.

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Happy coding, and may your games be a hit! 🎯