So where are we at for now? Well we are still ticking along with updates for the game, so if you have any ideas make sure you flick them our way.

Otherwise the Zombie killing continues as normal. Except some of the scores recorded times are insanely more hardcore than I ever expected back in the days when we where balancing.

Let me add when the zombie apocalypse hits I am looking some of you guys up to help me out. mike3622’s time of 82:00:31 on “Meat is Murder” especially blows my little mind. I’ve played a trillion hours on that level and I would have said that was impossible until I saw it. So good work.

Anyway guys keep on playing and enjoying Zogma – and as always, your feedback is appreciated! 

As Rex touched on in his blog, piracy has been a real head and heartache. While we knew from other dev’s reports piracy was pretty rampant across the store; seeing the metrics for ourselves, and watching them happening to our release was still a real kick in the guts. We are a small dev house and those numbers really hurt. Rex has gone through the numbers in some detail, so if you are interested in piracy and the iStore be sure to read over his blog.

Other than that things have been pretty good. We have tracked pretty well and are really moving up all over the world. In fact as I write this now we have just pushed into the top 100 games in Finland!

Reviews have also been very kind, which is honestly a massive relief. We have worked and slaved and slaved and worked to get Zogma as polished as it is now and while we knew we loved it and our families and friends loved it – seeing complete strangers give Zogma 4 and 5 star reviews never stops being a blast! It is a great feeling to have people we have never met play and enjoy something we are so proud of.

Just to be selfish and vain (my hero is Nelson!) it has also been superb to see people like the little parts of the game I worked on!

So if you are reading this, thanks very much for all the support. And please don’t stop here, if you have suggestions or recommendations for ways to improve or change Zogma, please flick them our way. Jumbo exists to make things for our fans and genuinely want to hear what you all think!! You might just see your idea in our next game or update

With the pro’s however, come the cons.

Zogma has been beset by a horde of “zombie pirates”, I.e. those who appropriate Zogma illegally. Whilst piracy is nothing new to anyone (with a number of industries being devastated by it daily), it’s a bit of a blow for an Indie company to be pirated so quickly and so extensively over something which, at the end of the day, cost less then a cup of coffee. Some interesting stats:

• Had 4,500 unique players for Zogma within the first 24 hours, of those less then 5% were legit copies. 95% piracy rate in <24hrs! That’s better then MW2 and Crysis!
• On average these pirates are playing 3 – 5 games a day (good to see they’re enjoying it!)
• Most of these pirates are still very active participants in our Plus+ community. With almost none converting over to legit.

I’ll elaborate more on the statistics in a following post.

In a perverted fashion the above is nothing short of a complement. To see the illegal underground pick something up so enthusiastically is a testament to the strength of our product. Disappointing that after the “try before you buy” (cheaper then coffee, you don’t try that first) argument a number use, they haven’t actually purchased it. For a small Indie house that’s spent the last 6 months in Dev these sales are quite crucial and this is the type of thing that can send people out backwards.

To our faithful followers and legitimate consumers, our many thanks for your continued support. Keep loving the game and we’ll keep the updates coming!

To our cohort of pirate followers (you know who you are!), for shame my good man, for shame.

Buy it HERE

Yes freshly deceased lads and lasses, Zogma: The Tactical Zombie Survival Simulator is now available via the App Store and boy are we excited. After 6 months of hard work we’ve finally released this puppy, I hope you all enjoy it.

Can we strongly suggest you make a trip their now and get your hands on what is possibly the greatest zombie game released today (maybe this month, maybe even this year..)! Make sure you set up a Plus+ account and get competing globally to see if you’re the best survivor out there!

I’d waste your time talking more about Zogma but that’s just biting into your play time.

Enjoy and remember to review the game!

Nothing much used to rise around here, other than the corn that is…

The spill at the local Plant change all that though. The dead are up and about and are more rowdy than a bunch of good ole boys after the rodeo. Pitty they also seem hungrier than a spring hog.

The Clayton brothers have headed out to Aunt Maud’s. They’ve boarded the place up and mean to do their best to stay out of the food chain.

For this level we pictured a typical, even clichéd part of small town USA overrun by the risen dead. You know the type of town. It’s the one where the quarterback’s father died at Khe Sanh and now he juggles his college ball aspirations (though he secretly wants to be a poet), his cheerleader girlfriend and his part time job that pays to keep Dad’s Mustang on the road.

The level itself is set out on a farm (hence the name strangely), where a bunch of survivors have holed up awaiting help that just aint coming.  As they desperately wait for the welcome thump of a gunship’s rotors they begin to notice their recently dead friends and relatives shambling towards them across the mown cornfield…

So grab your shotgun, chuck Wichita Lineman on the record player and put those undead down like you would a mad dog!

Zogma: The Tactical Zombie Survival Simulator represents the collective effort of  a number of individuals, the gaming community, friends, family and everyone else who’s contributed over the last 5 months. Has it been worth it? Hell yeah, but ultimately that’s for you guys to decide!

We set out to develop an addictive game, immediately accessible to both hardcore and casual gamer alike. The game had to have style, flair and a fair whack of attitude, all under 10mb (good things come in small packages). We feel we’ve achieved our goal quite nicely .

So get ready guys, those undead aren’t going to kill themselves now…

So tell your family, friends, workmates, nemesis, whatever - to get ready for some awesome zombie slaying action…

For us here at Jumbo, Zogma has been a brutal hard slog over six months of burning the midnight oil and working on Sundays; a day clearly meant for drinking…

So how do we feel to have reached this point? Well the coders and marketing types are obviously incapable of feeling – but I am pretty nervous. We have worked so hard, run surveys with our friends and family, undone entire parts of the game; all to get it working the way we want – and we are really, really proud of our baby!

So why the nervousness?? The thing is I just want everyone else to like it too!!

In even better news, to increase your booom a frugal player is also able to upgrade their grenade type twice. Firstly to a tasty nail bomb and secondly a…. well I better leave something to be found in the game!

Grenades also open up a few extra strategies; for instance is it worth taking a few shotguns? Sure they don’t do a heap of damage… but they will let you keep the recently dead away with their knockback until your grenade cool down has popped.  I’d go on and on, but Zogma is getting close to release and soon you can all find out for yourselves!

Although the Tank isn’t the quickest of the dead, the punch he packs will see of a survivor in seconds; even if you have barricades up. To make matters worse a Tank is able to soak up more incoming fire than a dug in King Tiger.

Ascetically the Tank is similar to the Shooter; it’s once human body twisting and warping as the plague turns it into something alien and terrible.

In Zogma the shotgun plays a special role. While it doesn’t do the most damage in the world, it does both slow and knock back the incoming undead – putting vital distance between succulent human flesh and gnashing zombie teeth. In the hands of a good player the shotgun will buy you the time you need to let your machine guns and sniper rifles put the undead back in the ground.

While this game design stuff is ok; more importantly nothing beats tearing apart the stumbling undead with a 12 gauge blast. So make sure you buy a shotgun.