I think these are for Tilt to Live on the iPhone. Can someone check for me?

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We heard some resistance early on regarding Outwitters‘ lack of a single player campaign, and our reply at the time was that matchmaking would be there to keep people engaged. It was vague because we hadn’t hammered out the details yet. Our goal for this game is to create something more like a competitive sport (for lazy people), and the way we hope to realize that goal is with a nifty League System.

Sure, Outwitters will support pass n’ play games, or unranked online matches between you and your friends, but the meat of the action is in the leagues, where a whole world of blood-thirsty strangers will be clawing their way to fortune and glory. Mostly just glory.

When you first start your league career, you’ll play a few games as an unranked wildcard, hopping between some “best guess” matches to determine which of the 5 tiers fits your skill level. Once your fate is decided, you’ll be placed in a division of (roughly) 100 similar players.

Winning your league matches nets you points, allowing you to climb the ranks toward a possible tier promotion. Losing matches subtracts points, pushing you toward the bottom of the stack (and possibly into the dark depths of the Fluffy League). You’ll hold a separate rank for your 1v1 league matches and each of your 2v2 partners. You can even tackle the 2v2 Leagues with random partners, if you’re looking to scout for free agents.

Progress Report

This week we’re working on implementing the League system into the alpha version of the game. It’s been a lot of work for two people, but we’ve always been a little more ambitious than we probably should be. The 2011 release date we were shooting for is looking a little shaky at the moment, so I hate to say it, but Outwitters will likely drop closer to the end of this year if we make it at all. Rest assured that if we have to delay, it’ll just mean more more features & better gameplay.

We’ve been sitting on more than a few worthwhile fan art pieces the last few weeks, so how’s about a post? Today’s selection came to us from Kyle, a US Marine currently serving in Afghanistan, who enjoys writing comics when he isn’t in real & immediate danger. My favorite panel is definitely the last one, where Link looks surprised, but not terribly upset.

Click to Enlarge

Your Artwork Here

For his time and effort, Kyle is getting the item of his choice from our Tilt to Live store. If you have some One Man Left fanart & are over the age of 13, send it over to contests[at]onemanleft.com. If we like your stuff, we’ll post it and send you a free item from our shop.

With last week’s tournament out of the way, all of One Man Left Studios (both of us) are shifting focus back to Outwitters. Alex is making steady progress on the asynchronous stuff, so now throughout the work day we’ll get little push notifications that it’s time to take our turn. Still having some weird bugs now and then, like spawn points mysteriously disappearing or, my personal favorite: “Bombshell is overpowered, because the game crashes if I kill it”. Right now these buggy alpha games are only working on iPad, rotating between Alex, myself, and a local friend. Release date is still the annoyingly-vague “2011”, until we get past all the hard stuff.

In the sound department, Whitacker Blackall (our Tilt to Live composer) has been chipping away at some of Outwitters’ music and sound effects. Check out this take on the Feedback‘s anthem:

“The top 5 got their choice of prizes. I came 6th. Fml.”
– Jo5hman, the Almost Not Quite the Best Tilt to Live Player on Earth*

Ladies & gentlemen, it has just come to our attention that we’ve left one of our winners unrecognized! We awarded prizes to the Best Tilt to Live Player on Earth* and Not Quite the Best Tilt to Live Players on Earth*, but in some wild lapse of judgment we failed to recognize the Almost Not Quite the Best Tilt to Live Player on Earth*. Congratulations, Jo5hman, for this impressive feat! You win a blog post in our Hall of Champions, commemorating your impressive title. You were mighty close to almost the top, and we salute you. Prize over.

In other news, I’m pleased to report that Becca’s faith in humanity remains intact! Jo5hman, you owe her a thank you for this post. In fact, if you don’t thank her WE’LL LOSE OUR FAITH IN HUMANITY. How do you like them apples?

And on this, the 27th day of August in the year of our Lord, 2011, a champion arose from the rabble of common men*. A hero forged from concentrated greatness*, his perfect* tilting wrists chiseled of some unbreakable mineral not heretofore cataloged by science. Wielding the maddest skills on the face of planet Earth*, he accepted our Game Center friend request and rode into iOS history. Let us never forget his name:

cookienut
with 212,875,900
The Best Tilt to Live Player on Earth*

But what is a winner without 86 losers (68 of whom actually tried today)? Let’s not forget our runners up!

Not Quite the Best Tilt to Live Players on Earth*:
2nd: xBoReDoM
3rd: Fleshman92
4th: PresidentPistachio
5th: 2bol
Click here to see how you ranked among the 69.

We’ll be emailing the winners next week to collect shipping addresses and whatnot for your prizes. HUGE thanks to everyone who entered and competed, we had a lot of fun putting this together, and we hope you had fun playing.

*According to a small, but totally official sampling taken by One Man Left Studios on August 27th, 2011.

Here’s our current top 15 scores (includes some from yesterday that may be dropping off). As a side note: it seems to us that these scores take a while to propagate to other devices. So just because your new highscore shows up instantly on yours, doesn’t mean it has made it to mine. Try not to cut it too close to 10PM Eastern, or your score might not make it in!

Here’s a screenie of the best Code Red scores so far this week from our Tournament contestants. Wait, did I say the best scores? I meant the best scores BELOW our mysterious top ten.

As of the time I started writing this sentence, the First Official Tilt to Live Tournament is full. Beyond full, actually, but I threw as many of you as I had in our inbox into the mix. All friend requests have been sent out through Game Center, so just accept yours and get practicing (your free soundtracks are on the way). On Saturday, August 27th, unleash hell!

When this clock says it’s 10PM on Tournament Day, I’m taking a screenshot of the best scores THAT DAY (not this week) and someone will officially be crowned the “Best Tilt to Live Player on Earth*”. You’ll have your work cut out for you against fierce competitors like “Toilet-Paper”. It won’t be the floor he’ll be wiping with you.

The Tournament Roster is officially full! Better luck next time.

Dust off your iPhones/Pads, boys & girls, because we’ll be holding our first-ever Tilt to Live Tournament on Saturday, August 27th! Entrants will compete in Code Red on the iPhone version of TtL (you could also play on an iPad if you dare), racking up the highest score possible by 10PM, Eastern Time in the US.

All entrants will receive a free digital copy of the TtL soundtrack, the best 5 players get the item of their choice from the TtL Store, & whoever comes out on top will receive this handsome, one of a kind “Best Player on Earth*” t-shirt (you can opt for a coffee mug or poster if you want). We’ll also officially declare the winner Best Tilt to Live Player on Earth* on this blog, permanently etching his/her accomplishment into the bowels of history. If you think you’ve got what it takes, just read the official rules below!