The makers of the very popular productivity app Clear for the iPhone have just released a new app and it is not what many people expected. Realmac Software has partnered with Impending to deliver the virtual pet app Hatch.
The incredibly cute virtual pet is not like other apps and it stands apart from the rest for several reasons. It has been designed to solve a particular problem and that is that your smartphone cannot love you back. However, with Hatch that issue has been resolved in an adorable way.
The co-creator of Hatch, Phill Ryu, explains that, “The smartphone is the 21st-century pet, and we are just making that crystal clear with Hatch. A great pet relationship is already there, and we’d like to bring that out.”
The animation style used in the app is also quite appealing. It brings back memories of a person’s childhood and is created in a manga style to give it a cute and imaginative feel. Ryu talks about the animation and says, “I think [the animation style] almost feels more alive in Hatch to have your imagination fill in the blanks between David [Lanham, Hatch’s co-creator and animator]’s frames instead of a computer smoothly rendering and interpolating every frame and pixel smoothly.”
Ryu continues to say that, “We wanted that same visceral reaction you get when you see a really cute helpless puppy or kitten … the kind where you can’t help but stoop down and start cooing, awwing, your voice pitching up.”
The game developers have developed many features to increase the cuteness factor including the pets ability to lick the screen. Ryu says, “[That] was by far my favorite feature of Nintendogs, and made me squeal in delight the first time I experienced it. We stole that from the best.”
The app is currently taking submissions for reservations before it is released this year on there website.
Source: Fast Co Design