Playable Pipe Mania Mobile / Pipeline Builder

[pLeet]

 

Hey guys,

 

It's been a while, but today I'm coming with some news: my new Android game Pipe Mania Mobile. 

 

Pipe Mania Mobile is the second game I published on the Android Play Store. It is a remake of the famous Pipe Mania, also known as Pipe Dream in the U.S., one of the classic arcade games from 1989.

 

 

Pipe Mania Mobile is an arcade game where the player has to create the longest pipeline using random pipe sections stored in a queue. The better he gets, the trickier the game gets: liquid is faster, player has less time to plan his pipeline, more obstacles is placed on the grid, and so on. The player will have to place pipe sections on the grid quick, but he will have to plan his pipeline before any move: one false move will make him loose time, and might get him overflowed.

 

My first game Link It !, while fun to make, was too simple. I wanted to build something more complex, and hopefully more fun and replayable for the gamers. Being a fan of retro games, I naturally decided to go for a remake of an old-school game that I could play right on my phone, without the need of any emulator, and with some extra gameplay mechanics.

 

For this project, I decided to go for the MS-DOS version of Pipe Mania. All of the graphics are based on the original version, but are hand made by myself. I also added animation that was lacking from the original version (one way pipe sections for instance). For the gameplay and score management, I used this documentation to be as close as possible to the original version. The background musics come from @Eric Matyas, and the sound effects from freesound.org.

 

As always, I'm looking forward to see what you guys think of it, and any feedback is welcome! I know the game seems a bit hard, specially for those who are not used to this kind of game, yet it's how the game is meant to be: old school games were hard, that's why they were so entertaining!

 

UPDATE :

Pipe Mania Mobile has been replaced by Pipeline Builder, you can download the new game here : https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.awali.pipelinebuilder

[eins]

Oh boy, i played that game so much as a kid. The remake is really good and graphics and controls are perfect. I dont remember it being quite that hard, but i guess i was a lot quicker back in the day. 

However, there are two things that i dont like about the game:

1. I think the background music does not fit at all. The original one didn't have music, and i would really prefer to play it that way (only sound effects and little music snippets at the beginning of levels).

If there has to be music it should at least more like chiptune music to fit the era the game is from (at least in my opinion).

2. The app propts me to connect to google play every single time i open the main screen. I have no interest in 'sharing my score between devices' or any of that stuff and its just annoying.

 

Anyway, really great job!

[pLeet]

Thanks a lot for your feedback @eins, it's always a pleasure to read such compliments and an external vision.

 

Your two points are really pertinent indeed. I'll add the possibility to stop/mute the background music if the player doesn't want to ear it or want to play is own music. As for Google Play Games Services, I'll only display the warning once when the app start, and not everytime you get back on the main menu.

 

Thank you again, I hope I've brought you back some good old memories !  

[pLeet]

Update time !

 

Google decided to suspend my game for violating the impersonation policy without any warning or explanations. My guess is that the graphics are too close to the original game, as well as the name. So I decided to publish it back with some new graphics, a new name, new soundtrack that fit a bit more to the old 8 bit feel of the game, and some other fix and improvments.

Sadly, as Google suspended my game, I couldn't update it, and had to publish it under a new package name, meaning all players will have to manually download it. If you wish to give it a -new- try, here is the new Play Store page : https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.awali.pipelinebuilder

 

Here is an example of the new graphics (low quality sorry, I'm at work right now and don't have the original file) :

 

Feedbacks are, as always, welcomed !

[Ainz Ooal Gown]

Nice Work! Love games like this, I will give it a shot in my tablet when I get in