Atmosphir is a gaming platform and engine that allows users to easily create their own levels in a 3D world by painting basic elements into a three dimensional grid. After downloading a client application, users can play in their own levels, or they can visit the Atmosphir community website to play on any of the maps that have been uploaded by other users. The application is currently available in a limited beta with plans to release by the end of the year, and is available for both Mac and PC.
Users can choose from a number of palettes, including pieces of land, bridges, and hazard props that will threaten the in-game avatar with blazing fireballs. The application also includes a number of theme packs, which allow users to create some variety in their levels. The packs are currently pretty basic, but the site plans to release more exciting themes like “Pirates” and “Robots”.
As far as gameplay goes, Atmosphir seems to be very straightfoward, much like a standard “Mario Brothers” game. The player’s avatar can run and jump around each level, which allows for jumping puzzles and the stomping on bad guys, but that’s about it. Atmosphir says that the current iteration is just a foundation, and that it plans to implement far more functionality including multiplayer support, which it says it can seamlessly push to every user’s client through an integrated updating system.
Video
Atmosphir presented during Session 10 of the TechCrunch50 conference. You can watch its stage presentation and read the expert panelists’ reactions below.
Panel
Robert Scoble - That’s what i’m talking about!
Bradley Horowitz - It’s impressive. Are the games suitable to play on game consoles?
Atmosphir - Definitely, I was always into Nintendo (they’re looking at getting onto gaming systems, like the Wii)
Bradley Horowitz - whats the level of effort involved?
Atmosphir - We built an abstraction layer that makes it easy to port to different systems, port to Sony PSP, we’re testing for the iPhone.
Bradley Horowitz - I can see a business model where I make a game and there’s a rev share.
Robert Scoble - Single player or online?
Atmosphir - Currently looking to make mulitplayer, add multiplayer code on top.. The game features automatic transparent updates. If we add code, we can download that seamlessly to user… client updates automatically
Robert Scoble - Is making level collaborative? I’d like to collaborate with my son.
Atmosphir - Yes, you can collaborate. Right now you take a file, send draft back and forth.. eventually would like to design in same environmental, can also upload with edit unlocked tag.. Levels are small files, only around 100k for a large level.
Robert Scoble - are blocks interactive? Can you make it play audio when you land on a block?
Atmosphir - Right now there are interactive things we’re working on.. some blocks shoot you up. we’re looking at doing audio stuff.
Sheryl Sandberg - looks exciting.. i think collaborative looks good going forward.
Joi Ito - How big is the client?
Atmosphir - Around 40 MB.
Joi Ito - Seems like tradeoff between user scriptabillty and blocks. Running from start flag would get kind of boring… are you going to have just one category of users.. User game play… it’s going to be a weird problem.
Atmosphir - We’re interested in when people mix roles of games and genres.. We want to mix it up.
Robert Scoble - Where’s the violence?
Atmosphir - We want to keep it family friendly, maybe we’ll have more mature themes. For right now we’re taking a Nintendo approach… But a rocket launcher is on the way.
Congrats to Dave, Martin and the entire team for a great launch!
Sounds like a great concept, although not really my thing. It defiantly has some great potential and is establishing itself in a niche category. Great that off the bat it has MAC and PC support!
cool. where’s the techcrunch beta keys?
The underlying concept of user generated content in games is definitely happening, so the team is on to strong things there. There are very heavy weight challengers already underway like LittleBigPlanet for PlayStation 3 (http://www.gametrailers.com/player/36540.html) and Lego Universe for PC (lego building MMO, http://universe.lego.com/en-us/Default.aspx).
On the web space there are a number of drag’n'drop arcade game creators from EA, Microsoft and others (http://www.raphkoster.com/2008/05/02/snap-together-games/).
There is definitely momentum in this area, but with that comes well equipped competitors.
I have been following dave’s work for a long time now. I was blown away with this platform and concept. I love it and cant wait to get on the beta squad…
Robert Scoble - “Is making level collaborative? I’d like to collaborate with my son.”
Atmosphir - “Yes, you can collaborate. Right now you take a file, send draft back and forth..”
Lol. I can’t believe no one called BS on this response. By this definition, Excel and Text files are also “collaborative”. and we’ve been doing this type of ‘collaboration’ practically since the internet was invented.
Somehow I don’t think this is what Scoble had in mind when he asked the question.
Nonetheless, it does sound like a great product. Kudos.
You’re right, I totally agree Markus. I blurted out the first thing that came into my head - I should have instead highlighted the simple sharing of drafts through the play browser interface, but more so the true collaborative multiplayer design we’re working on.
Thanks for the feedback and support!
I know how tough it can be to be on the spot like that. Your response was perfect, I’m just surprised no-one said “wait a minute….”
Keep up the good work and good luck.
Thanks for the reply everyone, we will be working hard on this trying to satisfy the user demands.!
Martin..
Please release some TC beta keys
We will, sign up for the beta at atmosphir.com, because we are giving keys away very soon….
Cool stuff
Definitely cool stuff. Love to see more game making mixed with game playing. Kind of like a desktop version of LittleBigPlanet. For a Flash/web-based version of the same concept, check out Mockingbird (http://playmockingbird.com).
Q: Are you guys really just a two person operation? If so, that’s even more impressive (and inspiring).
Q: Have you given any thought to user created scripting of any sort?
Hey Markus -
1. No no, not at all - we’ve been fortunate to have a small but incredibly talented team of artists, programmers, QA, and designers. When you get into the Beta, make sure to check out the credits page.
2. Definitely a possibility. For the most part, we want to keep customization as simple as possible - sliders and visual indicators rather than hard lines of code. If a group of advanced users demand features like that, though, we’ll certainly try our best to open that creative channel as well.
Thanks!