Founded in August 2012, Loveshack is an Australia-based developer known for its debut title FRAMED, an award winning, narrative-based puzzle game where you re-arrange panels of a comic book to change the order of events, and change the outcome of the story.
After becoming unabashedly hooked on FRAMED when played the game at GDC, AdColony sat down with Loveshack Co-Founder Adrian Moore to learn a bit more about their team, their inspiration and style, and the lessons they’ve learned along the way.
The Team
Loveshack was founded with only three core leaders: Joshua Boggs the programmer, Adrian Moore the composer, and Ollie Browne the artist. In it together, the three all share design duties, “working as a group to map out the game’s levels, menus, functionality,” etc.
The team hired on Stuart Llloyed as a full-time animator, which Moore credits as playing a large part in making their game entertaining.
The team of 4 started out swimmingly together, but Loveshack eventually needed to expand, and hired an extra animator, artist, and programmer to get the game shipped in time and minimize crunch.
Why Mobile?
For Loveshack, the choice to create their first game on mobile wasn’t based on any platform loyalty: it game down to gameplay and audience:
“When we were planning FRAMED, our lead development platform was iOS and this was because we felt FRAMED would debut best on that platform.”
With over 1 million downloads so far and countless industry accolades, the decision seems to be paying off. So how do they feel about the mobile space?
“Mobile gaming is obviously going through a massive growth period though so it’s an excellent space to be in.”
Of course, this doesn’t mean every title Loveshack will create will be mobile or mobile only. Expect the studio to follow the platform that best fits their concepts. As Moore reminded us:
“we still consider ourselves just a games company, not a mobile specific games company.”
Style & Inspiration
FRAMED is a game with an artistic style unto its own. While Moore describes this as a vintage aesthetic, the game plays out like a film noir comic book puzzle, rich in stylized animations and brooding music. This trailer of the game offers a small example:
Of course, this doesn’t mean Loveshack will stick in the game noir genre, nor even comic book themed puzzle games:
I think from an audio-visual perspective, we’ll always try and create a unique world that sets itself apart from other takes on similar worlds. In terms of gameplay, we have an internal motto that is basically ‘if you can attribute an existing genre to the game, it’s not a loveshack game’. That’s obviously a tall order, but it’s something we feel we achieved with FRAMED and something we’ll hopefully achieve with our future projects.
With countless copycat games churned out by app factories, it’s a breath of fresh air to meet a developer so dedicated to creating unique experiences. Of course, delivering on this promise requires quite a bit of creativity and inspiration, so we asked Loveshack where they pull their inspiration from:
“We draw inspiration from a variety of sources including our favourite games, movies, books and albums. For FRAMED we were greatly inspired by Hitchcock movies and Cowboy Bebop, as well as the book Understanding Comics by Scott Mcloud which really informed the core concept of the game. Ultimately we draw inspiration from each other as we brainstorm ideas and develop them – we bounce off each other and help each other create better work.”
The inspiration is clear. The slick animations with beautiful frame color & contrast composition would easily make someone nostalgic for a marathon of Cowboy Bebop and Spike Spiegel. The suspense of sliding each frame to help your protagonist escape is akin to the on-pin-needles feeling of watching a Hitchcock film. Finally, the pacing shows true comic story telling mastery.
Lessons Learned
Launching a studio’s first title is never easy, and for Loveshack’s founders, the biggest lesson was learning how to operate without the confines and comfort of an working for someone else:
“Independence involves so many more things such as seeking funding, managing the books and striving to have your game be noticed – it’s a world away from simply working in one role inside someone else’s company.”
With their first game behind them, Loveshack expects their next projects to be a bit easier, with one small caveat: “games are never easy to make.”
Advice to New Developers
With their lessons learned in mind, we asked Moore what advice Loveshack could offer a new studio who is thinking about publishing and monetizing their game. Moore’s advice is to keep small, stick to your vision, and strategize your launch for discoverability and user acquisition:
“Keep the scope of the project small. Stay true to your vision. Try to engage with the platform holder before release to get an indication of a good time to ship the game. Don’t expect overnight success – even with a great game, discoverability is a real issue.”
Looking Forward
So, what’s next for the studio that revolutionized puzzle games? They won’t say. Fret not: another title is coming, and they promise “it will be something as fresh and original as FRAMED.” To find out what that means the second they announce it, fans of Loveshack may want to follow @Loveshackers on Twitter, as well as these members of their team:
- Adrian Moore, Co-Founder & Composer – @moore_adrian
- Joshua Boggs, Co-Founder & Programmer – @jboggsie
- Ollie Browne, Co-Founder & Artist – @hoodanger
In the meantime, Loveshack has a few other things to be excited about, including releasing FRAMED on other platforms, and, unsurprisingly, they’re “very excited about the new Star Wars movie.” May the force be with you, Loveshack, because the world needs more games from developers like you.
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