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School’s Out Summer Sale

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Summer’s in full swing, but that doesn’t mean young minds can’t stay active!  Little Worlds Interactive and Test Tube Games have joined together with an amazing and award-winning group of game developers for the School’s Out Summer Sale, running from July 23rd – July 29th.  Check out the full sale with all 8 games at www.schoolsoutsale.com!

AgentHiggs

Agent Higgs $1.99 -> $0.99
Can you outwit the scientists and hide Agent Higgs?

by TestTubeGames

 

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The Counting Kingdom $2.99 -> $0.99
Magic, math and monsters – exciting game makes practicing addition fun!

by Little Worlds Interactive

Thankful for Teachers Giveaway

It’s nearly Thanksgiving and we have a lot to be thankful for here at Little Worlds Interactive. We’re thankful that the iOS launch of The Counting Kingdom has gone wonderfully, and we’re thankful for our amazing and supportive community.  We’re especially thankful for the teachers who work incredibly hard every day to help students be the best math wizards they can be!

To show our thanks to teachers we’d like to give back: between now and Friday Dec. 5th we’re giving away 5 free copies of The Counting Kingdom (on PC/Mac) to every teacher who emails us!

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Here’s how to redeem your 5 free copies:

1) Email us at hello@littleworldsinteractive.com with the subject line “Thankful for Teachers Giveaway”.  Please make sure you email us from your school account.

2) Verify that you are a teacher in your email.  You could link to your school’s faculty directory or email us a scan of your faculty ID card.

(PS – If you’re not in the US make sure you let us know what country you’re from! We’ll need this info to send you the correct copies of the game.)

Thank you to all of the amazing teachers out there, we hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

<3, The Little Worlds Team

The Counting Kingdom, Where “Learning is Fun”

It’s been only a few weeks since The Counting Kingdom launched on the App Store and the response has been amazing!  The game has been featured by Apple in the Educational and Kids categories, and is listed as a “Best New App”.  It has also earned a 5-star ranking from players, with over a dozen reviews from happy parents and teachers.  Please don’t forget to rate and review the game on the App Store – the monsters would be so grateful!

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Reviews have also been pouring in from all over the web – here are a few of our favorites:

“A delightful blend of tower defense, basic math concepts and cute graphics that should be a hit with any young gamer.” – Gamezebo

“Learning is so much more effective when it’s fun. It’s also better because it’s, you know, fun. That’s what works so well for The Counting Kingdom, a game that teaches kids all about the importance of addition – plus it’s actually a good game in its own right.” – 148Apps

Don’t have The Counting Kingdom yet?  This award-winning game would make a great present for any kid, parent or teacher!

Three IGC titles featured in Humble Bundles

The IGC is well-represented this week in the Humble Bundle, with three games across two of the current bundles!  Pay what you want while supporting charities like the Maker Education Initiative, Worldreader, the Mozilla Foundation and CodeNow.

The Humble Mozilla Bundle includes nine big name indie titles that can be played right in the browser.  This bundle includes two IGC titles:

AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! for the Awesome

Aaaaa! took place in an alternate 2011, where BASE jumpers leapt from the skies and executed stunts around the floating buildings of Upper Boston. This semi-sequel picks up six years later — the sport’s been outlawed, and you’re jumping as a form of protest. High in Earth’s stratosphere, you’ll thread a path through the rotating blades of enormous wind turbines. Elsewhere in the solar system, you’ll dodge asteroids above seas of lava, spray graffiti onto lunar government offices, and flip off Ganymede colonists — all in the name of peaceful protest.

Jack Lumber

A tree killed his granny and now he is out for revenge. Meet Jack Lumber, the supernatural lumberjack who hates trees, loves animals, and hates trees. Did we say that twice? The guy really hates trees, and boy does he have an axe to grind.

Use the supernatural powers of Jack Lumber to massacre the forest in this time-warping, line-drawing, log-slicing, pun-filled lumberjacking mashup! Bust out your flannel to muster the strength and burliness to solve the skill and logic puzzles (flannel not actually required).

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The “Get Your Learn On” Humble Weekly Bundle is all about the power of knowledge and features seven fun educational games.  This bundle includes one IGC title:

The Counting Kingdom

Get ready for magic, monsters, and math with The Counting Kingdom!

From writing simple spells to brewing bubbly potions, yesterday was just another day in your life as the Wizard’s Apprentice. Today, a horde of angry monsters is attacking The Counting Kingdom, and only you can defend the castle towers! Using your spells, potions, and the mighty power of mathematics, you must banish the monsters and save the kingdom!

Take up your tome of spells and save the castle in this tactical puzzler, featuring strategic tower defense gameplay across an expansive world map.

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The Counting Kingdom at Boston Festival of Indie Games 2014

If you’re in the Boston area, make sure you stop by the Boston Festival of Indie Games at MIT this Saturday!  The festival is a family-friendly event that celebrates independent game development in the New England Area, and includes a Digital Games Showcase, a Tabletop Games Showcase, as well as a number of fun talks and even an awards ceremony!

Stop by the Digital Games Showcase from 10-6 to say hi and play The Counting Kingdom, you can find us at table D04:

Little Worlds Interactive founder Jenna Hoffstein will also be speaking on two panels:

Early Access Panel: Get Involved with this Panel as it Develops

10:00 – 11:00 am, Theater (Stata 123)

A recent trend in game development is the concept of “Early Access,” where developers distribute their games in an early state in order to gather community feedback and bring in some money to help fund development. Some see this model as controversial and an excuse for developers to release their games in an unfinished state; others see it as a chance to get involved in a game’s development and watch it grow into a great product. This panel will follow a Q&A model, but instead of asking questions, the audience will be suggesting features and fixes to improve the panel. We will implement our favorites, which will likely result in silliness, but will also demonstrate, live, how the Early Access model is an iterative process in which both the developers and the community partake in order to make a better product.

The Next Generation: Making Games for Kids and Families

11:45 – 12:45 am, Classroom 1 (Stata 124)

Millennials who grew up playing games are now making games and having kids. Lets talk about games for kids: what there is, what there should be, and what there can be – with a little help from you! We are looking for developers and as many kids and parents as possible. Let’s talk game genre, educational basis, character types, diversity, and cost. If you’re a kid or parent who knows what games kids like, or a developer looking to crack the code on one of the biggest markets and make the gaming world better for the next generation, come join us!

Hope to see you there!

The Counting Kingdom at PAX Prime

We’re just a few days away from PAX Prime 2014! Nearly 10 years after the event was founded as a celebration of gaming culture, the event has grown to host over 70,000 gamers every year. As a proud member of the PAX 10 our bags are packed and we’re flying out tomorrow to exhibit The Counting Kingdom.

Stop by our table to play the game and speak with developer Jenna Hoffstein. We’ll also have a special deal for Steam keys of The Counting Kingdom – pay what you want! Help support the team by swinging by to say hi and pick up a copy, and as a special bonus you’ll get a hand-painted monster block. We have a limited number of these available, so make sure you pick yours up early.

We’ll be on the 6th floor of the Expo hall at booth 6203. See you there!

Jenna Hoffstein of Little Worlds Interactive is Featured Speaker at Casual Connect

Founder Jenna Hoffstein is speaking this week at two sessions during Casual Connect, the premiere event for the casual games industry:

Indie Entrepreneurship: Lessons from the Trenches

Wednesday 2:00 – 2:50, Imperial Ballroom

Indie is not just about a certain visual aesthetic or gameplay experimentation.  Indie is also about being economically sustainable and having the means to keep creating independently.  Thriving, let alone surviving, as an indie requires an entrepreneurial skill set (and tenacity) not often discussed.  This panel will explore the entrepreneurial side of “indieness” as we hear from four different indie studio co-founders and leaders.

Designing Educational Games for Fun: Throwing Out the Chocolate-Covered Broccoli

Thursday, 2:00 – 2:20, Imperial Ballroom

Educational games struggle, and often fail, to provide entertaining experiences while delivering high-quality educational content.  Instead of rewarding players with fun for getting an answer right, this talk will explore how to make the learning itself fun.