Vertically Integrated Dynamic Game Studio

Q: Hello Daniel, and welcome to our Feature Stories. Please tell us a bit about yourself and your background.

I have been in the gaming industry since 2010. My first job was being a tester at Bloober Team in Cracow. Soon after I began working as a designer for Engineering in Empire: Ancient Egypt. I have worked as a level designer on Bloons game for PSP and 3DS. In 2012, my colleague from Bloober, Hubert Mroz, and I teamed up with an idea of creating a hidden object game. After creating a prototype for Artifex Mundi they decided to publish a game with us.

Our first game was 9 Clues: The Secret of Serpent Creek which was published in September 2013 for PC, and soon after for iOS, Android, Windows Phone and other platforms. Afterwards we began working on 9 Clues 2: The Ward where we used CrazyTalk for character animation.

Q: Here is a walkthrough on your video game 9 Clues 2: The Ward, where your team used CrazyTalk for the lip-syncing dialogues. How did you discover CrazyTalk and what made you decide on using it?

I heard about CrazyTalk from someone on the Artfiex Mundi team during the end of Serpent Creek's development. After seeing what the tool could do I decided that it would be perfect for our next game. With 9 Clues 2, we wanted to achieve better character quality and animations during dialogues with the player, in order to get the player to be better immersed in our story. In Secret of The Serpent Creek there was no lip-sync and all the animations where pretty basic which was ok, but the quality standard back then was way higher than that. CrazyTalk helped us achieve that standard with in 9 Clues 2 game.

Q: Compared to other software, are there any mayor advantages for video game developers to use CrazyTalk software?

Since the software is very user friendly it does not require a long learning period, nor a particular set of skills. In my opinion any artist or designer can master it quickly while working on it. This makes it very useful for developers who work in small teams and on small budgets. Using CrazyTalk is a great way to add value to a game in a cost effective way. Plus, CrazyTalk is really fun to work with!

Q: We see that your Studio has several others games like Harry Hook, and The Secret of Serpent Creek. Tell us a little about your games and what makes them so special with their hidden items?

My aim as a producer and a designer at Tap It Games was always to tell an interesting story. Our team has come a long way since we began working together back in 2012 so the visuals, music and story in our hidden object puzzle adventure games get better and better. Also, since most of our team is made of hardcore gamers, then both our 9 Clues games are gloomy and scary, even for HOPA games standards.

Harry Hook is currently being developed. It's going to be a point-and-click adventure game about a detective who has to solve a mysterious suicide of a famous race driver, while struggling with his delusions and guilt. It's a great story and we are still looking for the best way to tell it.

Q: Are there any future game/projects that we can look forward to from TapItGame Studios?

Right now I am working with my team on a HOPA game for Artifex Mundi, called Crime Stories: Crimson Lily which has an open beta as we speak.