One Man Left Studios Dishes Out Details on 'Tilt to Live'

Last week I had the pleasure of speaking with the folks behind One Man Left Studios, who geared my attention toward their debut iPhone title, Tilt to Live. Like many of the App Store's current offerings, Tilt to Live is an accelerometer-based, casual arcade game. But the convention clinging ends there. You control an unassuming white space ship by tilting your device, avoiding the hordes of red dots bent on your untimely demise. You're not totally outmatched, however. The playing field is littered with festive powerups such as the sucky vortex, and glacial cluster bomb. Tilt to Live also employs what is perhaps the most innovative feature I've yet to see in an accelerometer title. Taking note of the fact that iPhone gamers play in a variety of environments, the devs have packed in different tilt calibrations for regular, top down, sleepy and custom position play. That is, if you like to game in bed, the controls will be optimized for holding the device upside down. Radical dude.

From Tilt to Live's lol-tastic loading screens, to its bombastic soundtrack, it's a fresh, polished take on the genre. To be honest, I'm beginning to think that when it comes to iPhone gaming the term "casual" is tossed around a little too loosely - at least when it comes to difficulty. Tilt to Live is a pick up and play that quickly becomes a let go and die type of scenario.

One Man Left Studios was kind enough to break down the creative process behind Tilt to Live, and they even humored me with a few bonus questions. Check out our correspondence below:

Thumb Spree: First things first, who is One Man Left Studios?

One Man Left: One Man Left Studios is actually a two-man enterprise, operating remotely between Virginia, where Alex Okafor the Programmer resides, and Alabama, where Adam Stewart the Artist lives. We’ve been collaborating since high school on indie games for a variety of platforms. Our company birthday is July 2009; that’s when we decided to take this seriously.

TS: Tilt to Live is your debut iPhone title, one of many accelerometer-based games in the App Store. Were you inspired by any existing console or mobile games? How did you come up with the unique art and music design in the game?

OML: Geometry Wars has a mode called Pacifism, which we found really intriguing. It basically flips the game inside-out into an anti-shooter, where you lose the option of attacking anytime you want. We liked that evasive style of play and ran with it.

The humorous look and feel was kind of written for us when we settled on the name Tilt to Live, which started as a joke. We were whittling the tutorial down to less and less text, trying to make it as painless as possible, until eventually someone suggested it just say, “Tilt to Live.” We took it a step further and just made the instructions the title.

So all of the game’s artwork came out as blunt and obvious as the name. The red dots are bad guys, you’re the cliché arrow guy, and the pickups are just pickups. We didn’t skin it as anything, like a zombie invasion or whatever. That’s usually an attempt to inject interest after the fact. This is just bare naked gaming.

TS: Judging by your press email and the game description on your website, One Man Studios is a fan of comedy. How much of this humor is present in Tilt to Live?

OML: Hopefully a lot of it. We’re particularly proud of our award descriptions; they get pretty exotic. For instance, there’s a way for players to literally earn Our Pity. Plus the in-game combo descriptors are all really cheesy tilting puns like “SO inclined!” and “Easily swayed!” We had fun with it.

TS: The primary gameplay mechanic in Tilt to Live is avoiding droves of red dots. How did you decide on evasive play versus a shooter-oriented experience? Do you think this decision will cater more to a casual or hardcore gamer, or both?

OML: It felt like the shooter territory had been pretty well covered already. We abandoned shooting early on, opting for a “tilt-only” philosophy of interaction. So it’s easy for a casual gamer to pick up because the controls aren’t complicated at all, but hardcore gamers are going to be pleasantly surprised at how intense it gets.

The offense is still there, it’s just more opportunistic than in a shooter. Like “Can I get to that nuke before I’m completely overrun?” There’s no infinite machinegun to help with crowd management, because infinity is for wussies. (Thumb Spree side note: this is probably the best developer quote, ever.)

TS: Pending the success of Tilt to Live, do you plan to expand the game with future updates? If so, what might these look like?

OML: Yes, we’re planning on providing updates. There’s been a lot of back and forth about new weapons and awards. Maybe some kind of flail that whips around, or a doppelganger/decoy pickup that distracts the horde… A disease that turns them purple would be cool. We’ll see. New gameplay modes have been discussed, but whether we implement those will depend on how the game is received.

If I don't say so myself,  Tilt to Live will be well received when it crashes the App store party next month. It's currenty slated for a February submission to Apple at the casual-friendly price of $1.99. For more information on the game, be sure to check out www.onemanleft.com, or follow the developers on their twitter account.

Please note that this interview has been edited for brevity.

One Man Left Studios Dishes Out Details on 'Tilt to Live'