After 12 days in the top spot, StickWars has dropped to #2 in the overall paid app rankings. However, the 1.2 update was sent to Apple last Wednesday and should be live this week, and I’m expecting a great user response. Hopefully it will get bumped back up to #1!
In any case, it is still the #1 game, and I’m still working around the clock on bug fixes and enhancements. I just completed a massive graphics overhaul that ended up with the graphics look exactly the same (with maybe a few compression artifacts), but the game now runs around 20% faster. I went from using 160 separate png files for all the animations to 8 atlas sheets in the compressed pvr format. Now I can work on adding some cool fire particle-effects, since I can spare the processor usage needed.
I just finished my finals at college and am graduating in a few days, so StickWars is now getting all of the attention it deserves. There are some really cool new features coming, some ideas that are new to the genre but I think will really make it fun. I’ll give a hint: if you like the idea behind ‘Bowman’, you’ll love the new wizard spell 
.
Also, after realizing that like 80% of the google searches for StickWars that land on my website contain the terms “cheat codes” I’m going to satisfy those people who don’t have the patience to put in the time to get to level 30 before trying out all the cool powerups. This will be a surprise, with hints posted on my forums.
All these new improvements will be included in version 1.3.
#1 by zainad on May 5th, 2009
congratulations !!!
how many downloads???
#2 by Eric on May 7th, 2009
In total, a lot
.
#3 by Nathan on May 9th, 2009
where do u get cheat codes? how do u use them??? O.O
#4 by Nimrodhunter on May 10th, 2009
Are
Updates free? When 1.3 coming out?
#5 by Eric on May 10th, 2009
Updates are free.
Read http://johnehartzog.com/2009/05/stickwars-13-update-status/. Hopefully 1.3 will be live by Friday.
#6 by Parry on May 11th, 2009
The game and graphics are fantastic. One complaint which i have about version 1.2 is that once you reduce the troops to better manage the cashflows( which totally makes sense) they just disappear. In other words all the time whcih was spent in making prisoners has gone a waste. I think once the troops are reduced they should be made prisoners again so that they could be re allocated to either archers wizards or repairmen.
thanx
#7 by Eric on May 11th, 2009
I thought about doing this, but I have to balance the need to keep the game fun versus making it too easy. If you could change things completely from round to round, you wouldn’t put a lot of thought into spending your prisoners, since you could just re-do everything in later levels. This way, you get ‘better’ at the game after you play a few games and learn the best strategies.
#8 by Chuck on May 16th, 2009
It would be cool when you pick up a guy and smash him into another guy killing them both
#9 by Eric on May 16th, 2009
I could certainly work on this, if more people would like to see this.
#10 by ciaran on May 17th, 2009
hit one guy into another killing them both!!
#11 by Eric on May 17th, 2009
Okay, enough people asked. You’ll see this in version 1.4
.
#12 by Shane on May 20th, 2009
How abouy adding another Tent catipult tent where u get five people tofether and they launcha catipukt that would be cool!!
#13 by cole on July 7th, 2009
what are some cheats and how do u use them
#14 by Eric on July 8th, 2009
You can find all this info on the forums at http://johnehartzog.com/forums
#15 by james on July 17th, 2009
how do i get cheat codes
#16 by Eric on July 19th, 2009
Visit here http://johnehartzog.com/forums/showthread.php?t=123.