- Developer name: Igor Pusenjak
- Company Name: Lima Sky
- Location:New York, US
- Apps at the App Store:26
- Company Website
About Dev:
Tell us a little about you, and your current company.
Lima Sky is dedicated to creating entertaining and educational, well designed iPhone apps, with a special focus on fun apps for kids. My brother does most of the coding, while I focus on design and business development. We have been present in the iTunes app store pretty much from its inception back in July 2008.
About your background: what did you do before taking up iPhone development?
It would be so much easier if I were able to, every time that I am asked the “what do you do?” question, respond with a single answer, but it would also make it infinitely less fun for me. So, here’s my shortened laundry list of the things that I have done and that I still do, in addition to the iPhone apps development, in no particular order, and as listed on my photography site, igorpusenjak.com: I am a photographer, multimedia artist, designer, technologist, pilot, and an avid sailor. In my increasingly scarce spare time I teach at the Parsons School of Design and enjoy traveling.
About your Work:
You’ve deployed 26 apps in the App Store, which is impressive. Pick 5 of your own favorite apps and tell us briefly about them.
It took countless sleepless nights and hundred-hour weeks to get where we are today. Split between two continents, we are de facto working 24/7, including holidays. Choosing favorites among your own is a tough call, so I will list some of our most popular apps:
Animals Memory Match (aka AniMatch) – To quote one of the reviewers, “This is a MUST HAVE APP for anyone with an iPhone and YOUNG KIDS…”. AniMatch is a take on the classic memory match (aka concentration or pairs) game. The goal is to uncover all the matching pairs of cute animal faces, and the twist is that each animal makes its sound when flipped, which gets all the kids to giggle endlessly. Surprisingly, this app has proven to be quite a hit with the adults brave enough to give it a try as its simple gameplay is dangerously addictive. (I say brave for two reasons; 1. fear of all things “cute”, but more importantly, 2. fear of being beaten in time and score by the younger players – the very same reason I once refused to play Wii Tennis with a five-year old.)
Eat, Bunny, Eat! – Just like AniMatch, this game is beloved by kids of all ages for its addictive gameplay, cute graphics, and silly sounds, but has also developed quite a following among the more “mature” adult population. The goal here is to catch the carrots that fall from the sky and avoid being hit by the falling tuna cans. This was the first game we released for the iPhone, and we knew we were on to something when we showed it to our mom and had her play it. She could not stop. And to this date, it is still her favorite.
iBubbleWrap! – The ultimate bubble wrap experience for the iPhone. Multiple colors, resizable bubbles, bubble size-aware sounds. This app has it all – unless you are one of those people who use bubble wrap purely and only for packaging. In that case I would suggest you stick with the real thing.
KanjiPop – With KanjiPop we wanted to bring some fun to reviewing, practicing, and learning the Japanese Kanji characters. You are presented with English meaning and/or kun and on reading for a Kanji character that you have to correctly identify. There is a timer, multiple levels, and hints; and with its immersive design KanjiPop has a feeling of a game. KanjiPop was built on the success of our Kanji flashcards app.
Crazy Frog - In “Crazy Frog” you get to control a silly frog character named Toncho (The name is an homage to our favorite childhood frogs from Tijuana Toads cartoon series, Toro & Pancho). Toncho is the king of his pond and eager to eat as many of the cute flying bugs as he possibly can. Everything would be bugs-and-roses if it were not for the deceiving little bees that sting when swallowed. It is a simple, yet surprisingly addictive and colorful game geared for kids but very much enjoyed by all of our adult friends that have gotten a chance to play it.
How do you go from idea to app? What’s the process?
The first challenge is to pick an idea from our extensive backlog. What follows is a pretty standard sequence of defining a feature set, sketching, designing, programming, user testing, etc. We adhere to many of the agile software development principles. Our process is very iterative, we work on a small number of predetermined features at a time, and release versions as often as feasible.
Any exciting stuff you are working on? Give our readers a hint of what to expect from you next.
We have just completed an exciting new game that I have mentioned above called “Crazy Frog”. It is cute, silly, funny, and addictive all at the same time and should be available in the app store soon. On a more serious note, we have been working for some time on developing a very unique new UI flow experience for our flash cards app.
Do you develop for other platforms? How do you compare the iPhone development platform with other platforms?
We currently develop exclusively for the iPhone.
Tell us something about how users are responding to your apps. What’s the most flattering comment you have received? Or the weirdest?
We love getting feedback from the people who have downloaded our apps. Positive feedback is a great indication that you are doing something right. However, we genuinely appreciate constructive criticism as well, which is a big driver for us to make our apps even better. It is quite interesting to see how the reviews for the same app vary across the different countries. Some of the most creative and funny comments we have received are from our UK customers in the UK iTunes store who have purchased (and loved) our “Eat, Bunny, Eat!” game. Here is one of my favorites: “(Eat, Bunny, Eat!) has already made its way around the pub with everybody trying to better each other’s scores and cries of “Eat, Bunny, Eat!!!!!” eminating around like the latest catchphrase.”- I can just imagine that scene at that pub. Or, another one: “Brilliant little app. If you can’t enjoy this you should get a doctor to check your pulse, you might be dead!!!”. Comments like these have the power to charge you up with an unbelievable dose of energy. It is really a transcending feeling to know that an app that you have developed is being played by someone on the other end of the world and is putting a smile on their face.
I guess the weirdest comment would be the one that was also written for Eat, Bunny, Eat! – “This game should go home doo a thousand push em ups and then eat a bowl of frosted flakes cause they are more than food they are GREAT!”. I am still not sure what to make of it.
About the App Store:
Name two iPhone apps you consider are cool, excluding the apps you’ve developed. What makes these apps stand out?
Urbanspoon and Shazam. Urbanspoon not only for its innovative use of the accelerometer, but more importantly for taking that step beyond just listing everything and actually making a suggestion, however random that suggestion might be, and Shazam for performing what seems to be a bit of magic by answering that seemingly simple question: “What is the name of the song that’s playing right now?”.
Any message to your fellow developers?
Keep up the good work!
