| Pocket God | |
|---|---|
 | |
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Developer |
Bolt Creative |
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Platforms |
iOS, Android, Windows Phone 7, Verizon Wireless |
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Release date |
January 9, 2009 |
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Genre |
God game |
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Maturity Ratings |
ESRB: E, PEGI: 3+, Apple: 9+ |
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Customer Ratings |
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Pocket God is a god game developed by Bolt Creative, in which the player manipulates an island and its inhabitants. It was originally released for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch on January 9, 2009, and later released for Verizon Wireless on September 1, 2010, Android on December 1, 2010, and Windows Phone 7 on December 4, 2010. The closed beta for the Facebook game was announced December 1, 2010.
Gameplay[]
Pocket God is a god game in which the player takes the role of an omnipotent being who rules over an island and controls everything. The primitive islanders, known as Pygmies, are subject to the player's god powers. These range from benevolent powers, such as giving the islanders a fishing rod, to destructive, for example summoning a hurricane, or simply entertaining, such as levitating the Pygmies. Built-in features of iOS, the iPad, and iPod Touch are used, such as the accelerometer to simulate gravity and earthquakes. Most of these features can be toggled on the game's menu bar. The "March of the Fire Ants" update also added a new feature known as OpenFeint, where players can access chat rooms, leaderboards, achievements, and announcements during gameplay. Pocket God was ranked number one on iTunes for at least six months.
One of the game's most notable features is the regular release of updates introducing additional content. The episodes A New Home, Dead Pygmy Walking, and The Pyg Chill added additional islands to the game, which can be toggled from the menu bar. The Fun n' Games until A Pygmy Gets Hurt update added mini-games for consecutive coconut bounces, consecutive shark snaps, underwater skewer, pygmy bowling, and hurricane zaps. The Ooga Jump update added the first crossover minigame, Ooga Jump, which was followed by a Harbor Master crossover. In the Idle Hands 2: Caught With Your Pants Down update more idle features were added to the Pygmies when they are not in use. Also, Buddy Challenges were implemented with OpenFeint. In the Good Will Haunting update, a downloadable content store was added with changeable skins for the T-Rex. Other packs, such as the Halloween, holiday, and alien themes, have since been added.
Pocket God is updated often with new 'episodes', a themed update that adds new features to the Pocket God world, such as new islands, items, or minigames.
iOS version[]
As of May 31,2012, forty-five episodes have been released for the iOS version of Pocket God. The current update is titled "Dance Dance Execution"
Controversy[]
The game was subject to controversy when some Pacific Islanders and anthropologists protested to Apple Inc. claiming the game was racist. The game's creators defended the game, saying "it depicts no specific race or nationality." Pocket God programmer Dave Castelnuovo got in touch with one of the original Pacific Islanders and came up with some compromises: The islanders would be called Oogs instead of Pygmies, and the Moai statue would be replaced with a statue of an Octopus God.
In other apps[]
As part of the effort to promote Pocket God, the developers engaged in cross-promotion with a number of other developers. This promotion saw a number of updates where new themed features were added to "Pocket God" and in return the related apps added Pocket God themed updates.
Three apps have featured the game as a direct result of cross-promotion. The addition of Doodler to Pocket God resulted in a new version of Doodle Jump being released on May 22, 2009 which allowed users to play as a Pygmy from Pocket God. To unlock the Pygmy, players must change the high score name to one of the characters from Pocket God: Ooga, Booga, Nooby, Dooby, Klik or Klak.
The second crossover was with Harbor Master on August 8, 2009 where Pygmies replaced the normal boats in the path drawing game.
The final cross promotion saw a new test added to "Moron Test" with a Pocket God theme to it, which characters from the Moron Test were featured on a new island and minigame within the Pocket God universe.
Two other apps have featured the famous Pocket God characters within their games. The Creeps released an update allowing pygmies as characters.