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A-steroids on Underworld for Android, in-game currency, and getting around Apple's restrictions

Where there's a will

A-steroids on Underworld for Android, in-game currency, and getting around Apple's restrictions
As well as being controversial in terms of its initial subject matter, a-steroids' drug selling game Underworld is also pushing against Apple's restrictions in terms of what you can and can't do on the App Store in the cuddly form of its eventual release Underworld: SweetDeal.

The original plan had been to have a free game with money made using an in-game currency that players bought with real cash to gain special attributes.

As Andrey Podoprigora, a-steroids' head of studio explains however, Apple doesn't allow this on two levels: micro-transactions for free games, or using proprietary in-game currencies.

Pocket Gamer: At the moment, you can't sell in-app micro-transactions for free games, so how do you hope to get around this?

Andrey Podoprigora: I don't think that's a problem for Underworld: SweetDeal. When we launched the game earlier this year, it was free-to-play with optional paid features.

Now, with in-app purchases, we'll introduce different versions of the game: free and various paid for premium.

Everybody can start playing completely free of charge; both versions are the same in terms of functionality. When you want some boost to your game performance, you purchase a premium version and get access to in-app purchases.

The greatest part is that when you buy the premium version, you get handful of boost items right over, for the dollar that you paid for premium.

[Actually, there are three paid for versions of Underworld: the normal 99c version, a $1.99 version which gives you the re-equipment upgrade, and the $4.99 version that gives you 100 UW points.]

What are your plans in terms of the conversion rate of UW points to dollars?

Right now, 100 UW Points cost $5. It's much cheaper wholesale.

The thing is that in the upcoming version of Underworld, we are moving from UW points to paid feature packs. We had to do that because of Apple's restrictions. A quote from the guideline, you cannot sell "in-game credits exchangeable for virtual goods".

The difference between points and packs is that before you were getting bonus items in exchange for UW points, and now you are going to buy bonus items itself. For example, small protection pack gives you four hours of full police protection. The bought items are stored in your inventory and activated manually when you need them.

How big a concern is the lagging of iPod touch owners to update to OS 3.0?

In Underworld, 80 percent of our total active players have 3.0 or a newer firmware. If we count only iPod touch players, about 60 percent of them are having 3.0 and higher.

Clearly, iPod touch owners aren't updating as fast as iPhone people, but it's not that bad.

How do you think developers can overcome the backlash from some gamers about micro-transactions?

I don't think a micro-transaction model is so much different from a common model in terms of relations with your customers. Be honest with your players, make everyone happy with your product and... that's it!

How significant do you think it would be for Apple to enable in-app transactions for free games?

Many games and applications could definitely benefit a lot from this. What is more important, the customer would benefit even more.

This year we've seen a lot of massively multiplayer online games getting to the top of the App Store, which clearly means there is a demand for mobile MMOGs on the iPhone and iPod touch.

And there is a proven best practice for massively multiplayer gaming in terms of free-to-play with optional micro-transactions. Considering this it's rather strange that Apple still doesn't offer in-app purchase functionality for free applications. Even though the App Store has established a reputation as a truly innovative market.

However, I think there are many ways to get around this now. For example, you can do it by implementing free and paid versions of your product, with the paid one to reward a customer just for buying it.

Will you be running in-app micro-transactions for the Android version of the Underworld?Right now, Android Market doesn't offer in-app purchase functionality. In the currently developed Android version, we will offer the same thing as in the early App Store: paid UW point packs that are distributed as separate applications in the Android Market.

You can follow a-steroids via its blog or twitterfeed.
Contributing Editor

A Pocket Gamer co-founder, Jon is Contributing Editor at PG.biz which means he acts like a slightly confused uncle who's forgotten where he's left his glasses. As well as letters and cameras, he likes imaginary numbers and legumes.