The Story of Mystery Math Town

Mystery Math Town, easily our most successful app to date, was originally conceived as a simple Halloween matching game to launch in 2012. Five months later in April 2013, our “Halloween” app hit the App Store with a front page “New and Noteworthy” feature and rave reviews. The success didn’t come entirely as a complete surprise. We had already released the popular Marble Math series of apps and we had been testing Mystery Math Town with kids, parents and teachers, so we knew we were onto something. For me, the “moment” came over Christmas break - my son, who was seven at the time, discovered a rough beta version of the game on my iPad and started playing...and playing...and playing.

Original Mystery Math Town concept art - simple matching

Working title: Scrollable Haunted House Logic Quest Environment With Doors/Elevators

I personally love Mystery Math Town. I love it because it is fun to play but I also love the story. The setup is simple, “Save the fireflies!” but on your journey you encounter the townsfolk of Math Town in the form of talking portraits and each of the characters reveals a little bit more about the town and the mystery you now find yourself trying to crack, along with some of their own individual peculiarities.

I spent some time writing screenplays in my 20’s and Math Town gave me an opportunity to try something cinematic with a kids educational app. My good friend (and Artgig Creative Director) Lis, designed the wonderfully atmospheric look of the game and managed to keep it spooky without getting scary. Lis illustrated all of the character portraits and handed them over to me to write their stories - all 27 of them. I have to say, I can’t recall working harder or having more fun in my entire professional career. It doesn’t matter if most kids never “get” that “Beans” McGuirk is highly suspicious of the cowboy, “The Outlaw” Jim McQuade (both apparently Irish), ever since his fedora hat went missing. And kids can certainly enjoy the game without ever tuning in to the somewhat one-sided budding romance between young robotics-engineer-in-the-making, Melody, and her Jack, who is more interested in beating Biff in a race, than Melody. What matters is the one kid who does get it.

iTunes screenshot concept with Melody portrait

In order to reveal the full story of Mystery Math Town, you must rescue the fireflies and collect all of the portraits in the game, which requires quite a bit of math. Alternately, you can just cruise through the initial level of play, tapping the portraits as you go and they will respond with one liners. My son kept going back to “Hank” (a crowd favorite), not because of the rich storyline but because he is just plain funny. Lis made Hank really easy for me - one look at his portrait and his prominent pompadour and I knew Hank wants to be Elvis. I imagined Hank as a guy who sees no value in math at all - all he really cares about is Hank: “I have so many fans, even a computer couldn't count them all, baby.” But the key to Hank is Steve - our Development Director, programming guru, resident drummer and as we now know, closet Elvis impersonator - he nailed the famous Memphis mumble with his voiceover and made Hank an instant hit, baby.

I mentioned backstory - all of our apps, except Shake-a-Phrase which is more of a utility app for story creation, have it to varying degrees. We like to discuss the backstory of a game even when there is no obvious intent to share it with the audience. Backstory is important for you to understand as a creator because it informs the decisions around the game you are making. I will leave you with the story of Mystery Math Town. Lis handed me a picture of Math Town, perched on the edge of the sea, and said something like “what do you think of this?”

Mystery Math Town

(1768-present)

As the story of Mystery Math Town goes, once upon a time, The Admiral (of Her Majesty's Royal Navy) became something of a specialist in hunting and capturing pirates. But one pirate in particular, known only as "The Ghost" eluded him. Eventually The Admiral chased The Ghost and his crew to the shores of what is now known as Mystery Math Town, and pushed the band of outlaws straight up into the hills, where they disappeared with their treasures, without a trace...until now.
Our ghost is the son/daughter of the infamous ghost pirate. The ghost pirate child is just hanging around town when the firefly mystery falls in his/her lap. Naturally friendly and curious, the little ghost is eager to help find and rescue the missing fireflies.
In the art collector challenge, the final painting you can collect to end the game is the infamous ghost pirate at the wheel of his ship with his little ghost by his side. It isn’t until you collect the final painting that the full story is completely revealed. 

We made a set of trading cards to tease the app prior to release

And that is the story of Mystery Math Town.

Happy Halloween.

Back to Bundles

A recent AppFigures article posed the question "Are App Bundles Living Up to the Hype?"

My answer - no.

We've had a featured app bundle, Artgig Family Math Pack (6 apps/$10.99), in the App Store since bundles were introduced over a month ago and sure, we've made some money, but the bundle has outsold only one of our standalone iOS apps, a lackluster iPhone-only title, in the last month.

Our 4 bundles all fall in the "Other" 20% with Android & Windows

I noted some early observations about bundles a few weeks ago in this post, when I realized the hefty file size of our featured bundle would be a rather large purchase barrier for some. But even then, I would expect there are enough people out there with some room on their iPads for discounted apps.

A couple of weeks ago, in a moment of inspiration, I deactivated our Classroom Fun bundle to make way for a new Halloween Math Mysteries bundle. You can create as many as 10 bundles but you can only have the same app appear in up to three bundles and we hit the limit. The Halloween bundle is also our smallest with just two apps and it's nearly a 2 for 1 deal.

App bundles only

I suppose the thing I like best about bundles is how easy it is to create them - you can literally create a bundle in a matter of minutes.

I know some kids app developers have experienced greater success with bundles than we have. I've also heard from developers who have pulled their bundles because they felt the discounted bundles were cannibalizing sales. For us, our combined bundle sales equal that of a single average iOS app.

How's that for hype?

App Bundles of Joy

If you’ve been to the App Store lately, you may have noticed some new bells and whistles (iOS 8 app preview videos!) and some search enhancements that should contribute to improved app discovery. Perhaps the biggest visible change for developers is the introduction of an entirely new product category - the app bundle. App bundles allow us to construct app collections to sell at a discount. We just have to name the bundle, drag and drop apps to appear in the bundle, and write a description - the rest (screenshots, keywords, etc) is automated. We were one of a handful of lucky developers to get picked for an App Store bundle feature. Our Family Math Pack includes 6 of our apps and it appears in two splashy features, “Introducing App Bundles” and “Kids App Bundles,” in the U.S.

Obviously, app bundles have the potential to significantly increase revenue. Thanks to bundles, some of our developer friends have reported doubling sales overnight. That has not been the case for us. When bundles appeared in the App Store nearly two weeks ago, our featured Family Math Pack was priced at $12.99. But after analyzing the first week of lukewarm sales and taking a look at what others were charging for similar bundles, we adjusted our price down to $10.99 (nearly 40% savings). We also went back and revised our bundle descriptions to include terms like “award-winning” and “discounted.” In hindsight, I think it’s most likely that our customers need more space - as in, iPad hard drive space. The 6 apps in our Family Math Pack require over 1GB to install and if you don’t have the space, you don’t get the apps. It’s also possible that our kitchen sink app collection for a range of ages (3-12) is not specific enough to trigger the “got to have it” impulse.

This isn’t to say bundles have disappointed. We are selling enough bundles to equal sales of an average single app. The very existence of bundles raises the likelihood that your apps will be seen. Even if a customer doesn’t purchase your bundle they may discover an app they wouldn’t have seen otherwise and that could lead to a sale (I have a hunch that this is happening with our apps) - and that’s the point, isn’t it? And if they really like that single purchase, they can always come back later to “complete” the bundle, at a discount.

Back to School With Artgig Apps

It’s that special time of year, where everything smoothly and seamlessly transitions from the carefree summer of fun to the new school semester and a more "regimented" approach to learning.

We think Artgig Apps provide just the right amount of learning and fun.

Here are some Back to School updates to help prove the point:

For starters, we just updated Mystery Math Museum to include all new characters you can unlock in the Art Collector Challenge. You’ll earn a portrait for your gallery with each completed challenge, and you’ll want to hear what these quirky cartoons have to say. The update will be available in the App Store next week.

Stan, the rapping mummy, needs help. What rhymes with sarcophagus?

And you may notice a family resemblance in this photo.

We’ve also updated all of our app icons to include a little blue “Artgig” bug, so it’s easier for you to find our apps in the App Store and on your device. You'll see the new icons in the App Store next week, along with the Mystery Math Museum update.

Finally, we’re planning some App Bundles that will launch soon to give you the biggest bang for your Back to School buck!

All You Need is (Apple) Love - One Month in the App Store...

It's been about a month since we launched our latest kids app, Drive About: Number Neighborhood, and we were fortunate enough to hang around the App Store features the entire time. It's always good when your launch day looks like this:

  

 Even France showed us some "amour."

You never know how long the love will last though, so the Thursday App Store refresh becomes a major focal point of the week. The last app we released, Mystery Math Museum, was also featured at launch but was quickly moved to the back of the shelves. Drive About did double the business of Mystery Math Museum in the same sample time period.

Mystery Math Museum Launch October 2013 (iPad only) - 11/15 free promo

Drive About launch June 2014 (Universal iPad & iPhone)

It's really good to see our localization efforts pay off with substantial downloads in Russia, accounting for a little over 11% of total sales.

Tragically, the French "amour" did not translate to significant downloads - just over 1% of total sales. And our efforts to appeal to Brazil with a Portuguese version of the app fell flat - it's almost as though the entire nation was preoccupied by something else over the last month (we are investigating...)

Overall, I have to say I'm happy with the launch.

I was concerned about releasing the app in early June when most U.S. parents are transitioning from school to summer routines, but the results clearly demonstrate that all you need is (Apple) love.

Now, how to bundle that love for iOS 8...

2014 Parents' Choice Award Winners - Mobile Apps

We're really pleased to announce that our Mystery Math Museum app won a Parents' Choice Award.

While perusing the list of 2014 winners, we were also pleasantly surprised to see that World's Worst Pet, the app we developed for Curriculum Associates, also won.

From the Parents' Choice Foundation:

As a Parents’ Choice Award® winner, you’re a member of a very select group. Fewer than 20% of the products submitted to the Parents’ Choice Awards program receive any level of commendation. It’s an honor that doesn’t come easily; you should be very proud of your achievement.

Indeed we are!

Get Mystery Math Museum For Free - Friday, Nov 15

If you haven't downloaded our new app, now would be a good time to do it.

Mystery Math Museum will be free for one day only - Friday, November 15.

Or you can go to a real museum but I seriously doubt they will let you keep any of the exhibit paintings for your gallery.

Tell your friends...

Download Mystery Math Museum For FREE - Friday, Nov 15

Mystery Math Museum: App Launch In Pictures

App Store Featured Best New Apps All Categories - Front Page

Our new app, Mystery Math Museum, appeared in the App Store right around the stroke of midnight last Thursday. We timed the launch to coordinate with the weekly App Store refresh and our Halloween marketing push.

The App Store update is always a nail-biter on launch day. It's one thing to go through the Apple approval process and get the "Ready For Sale" green light but it's another thing entirely to get picked by Apple for an App Store feature. I switched my desktop iTunes to the UK store a couple hours ahead of the usual 4pm est refresh to look for any clues that might hint at what to expect when the US store is updated. And last Thursday, I was encouraged to see Mystery Math Museum featured in the UK, so I let myself dream a little...

#99 out of 500,000 iPad apps

When we finally got a look at the freshly stocked US App Store shelves around 4:20pm we were thrilled to see Mystery Math Museum selected as a featured "Best New App" on the App Store front page.

Today Mystery Math Museum is ranked #99 in all iPad apps.

That's 99 out of half a million.

Launch charts #11 Education, #99 Top Overall, #15 Kids, #4 Kids 6-8

 Yeah!

Mystery Math Museum is Now Available in the App Store!

Mystery Math Museum Is Here!

If you like Mystery Math Town, you’re really going to like the sequel.
Featuring a brand new town with 8 themed museums to explore and an entirely new cast of quirky characters (along with some old friends), Mystery Math Museum is truly an epic math mystery.

And...we’ve added division to the math practice options.

Get Mystery Math Museum in the App Store

Mystery Math Museum Video Trailer

Mystery Math Museum is coming Thursday 10/24 to the App Store

Mystery Math Museum Is Here!

We got the news at 11:38 this morning.
Our new app, Mystery Math Museum, is 'Ready for Sale' in the App Store.
But you still can't have it...yet.
No, that would be rushing things and we try not to do that around here.
We really much prefer to plan our app launches rather than release them all willy-nilly.
After all, we've spent months crafting this game and it deserves a proper release.
We're not planning to make Mystery Math Museum available in the App Store until Thursday, next week.
That should give us enough time to share some promo codes with reviewers we've been talking to, and hopefully generate some buzz before the game appears in the store.
So if you write about kids apps and you want to try Mystery Math Museum, let us know.
The rest of you will just have to wait just a little bit longer.
Hang in there - we think you'll agree, it's worth it.

Mystery Math Museum is Coming to the App Store Thursday 10/24!

Mystery Math Museum Trading Cards - Collect Them All!

With our new Mystery Math Museum app set to launch for Halloween, we thought we'd give you a little treat while you wait.

It's a whole new set of virtual trading cards, featuring all of the quirky characters from the game, just like the set we made for Mystery Math Town.

We're releasing the cards on all of our social media streams so watch Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest and collect them all!

Mystery Math Museum - Video Sneak Peek

You know what it's like when you're walking around a museum all day and you just want a nice, soothing place to rest your tired feet and maybe have a snack?
 
Yeah, so do we.
 
Each of the museums in our upcoming Mystery Math Museum kids app offer a comfortable lounge to relax, because even math detectives need a break every now and then.

Mystery Math Museum Coming For Halloween

Mystery Math Museum is Coming This Halloween...

The spooky sequel to Mystery Math Town is coming to the App Store this Halloween.

Mystery Math Museum features an all new town made up of 8 themed museums and an entirely new cast of quirky characters to collect for your gallery.

And...we've added division to the math practice options.

Get a sneak peek here:

Mystery Math Museum

App Icon Showdown - (A New App From Artgig Apps)

iOS 7 arrives today and soon we'll see shiny new and colorful iPhones hitting the streets.

We've been busy testing our apps on the new platform and prepping for the new Kids App category, and I'm pleased to report that our apps are iOS 7 ready.

(Pause for applause)

But that's not all.

I have even bigger news to share this morning.

We've been busy making the sequel to our best selling education app.

If you like Mystery Math Town...

You're really going to like Mystery Math Museum.

It's scheduled to launch next month for iPad.

But first we have to pick the all important app icon.

We've narrowed the design to two options.

Which icon do you like best - the Artist or the Queen?