Pinoy-made ‘Rowan McPaddles’ is a rip-roaring endless rower

Challenging endless runners can be ridiculously addictive; just ask the millions of gamers worldwide who got hooked on “Flappy Bird” a couple of years ago. The genre has evolved since then, paving the way for titles that are none too shy about putting remarkable twists on a tried and tested formula.

Enter “Rowan McPaddles” from Philippine game development studio Monstronauts. This newly released game puts you in a tiny boat, swaps out lanes for turbulent rapids, and throws in a hungry shark, just for kicks. Like the best endless runners out there, it’s got the same magic that makes you want to keep playing no matter how tough things get.

Endless rower

In the game, you play as the eponymous Rowan McPaddles, a mustachioed rower who braves the Bad, Bad River to become the next social media sensation. Of course, he’ll have more than treacherous currents to worry about; the river is rife with dangers, like cranky crocodiles, vicious hippos, and sharp rocks – not to mention he’s being chased by the aforementioned shark. Rowan isn’t alone in this endeavor. You can also play as any of the several unlockable characters, including a merman and a backstroke enthusiast.

“Rowan McPaddles” uses interesting systems that come together to help make the game feel fresh amidst all the endless runner clones out there.

“While not the first of its kind, we made sure that ‘Rowan McPaddles’ did away with traditional endless runner systems (such as lanes) in order to bring our players an experience that was ours alone,” said lead game designer Eleazar Joshua Lim.

The control scheme and physics give you the feeling you’re rowing a boat (or swimming, depending on the character you’re using). The satisfaction after successfully navigating the obstacle-riddled river therefore always feels earned, and that much more rewarding.

“The controls took time to pin down, as we knew we were carefully balancing fun and frustration,” said Lim. “If we messed up with the controls, then the game as a whole would just be a frustrating mess. It took a lot of time and effort, but everything was worth it!”

In addition to rowing, you can perform fancy stunts at the height of your jumps. There’s even a fictional in-game social media site called “Rivr,” which your characters use to share their adventures with their “followers.” Followers help you gain coins you can then spend to win prizes or buy upgrades.

One of Lim’s favorite features is the camera, which is used to take snapshots of the action. The camera can be rotated, allowing you to find the angle that best captures the scene.

“Our players are always surprising us with the creative pictures that they take, and it’s wonderful when you see people actually take the time to line up the perfect photo,” said Lim. “Some even go as far as to come up with clever captions!”

The balance between fun and difficulty was always a key consideration for Monstronauts when they were developing “Rowan McPaddles.”

“The original idea was to create an endless runner that is fun in a challenging sort of way,” explained Lim. “Titles like ‘Flappy Bird’ or ‘Dark Souls’ gave us many hours of frustrating enjoyment, and we thought the endless runner genre could use a taste of that formula with our own little ‘Monstronauts’ twist on it.”

Rivers and potions

Understandably, Monstronauts is excited about the launch of “Rowan McPaddles.”

“We’re eager to share our vision with the world!” said Lim. “Our projects are the result of hard work, imagination, and heaps of coffee, so it’s always with a bit of pride that we release our games into the wild.”

“Rowan McPaddles” is in fact Monstronauts’ second game. The team honed its game development skills with its first effort, “Potion Punch.” 

“Back when we were working on ‘Potion Punch,’ we were so caught up with releasing it that we skipped over some polishes. Spoiler alert: it didn’t do well. It wasn’t until we did a major overhaul to make it a better game that it started pulling in a wider audience. Also, due to the way the game is structured, we had a lot of difficulty catching up with how quickly the players were going through our content. Often, our players would finish content that took two months to create in less than a week.”

Despite such hurdles, “Potion Punch” did quite well, and was featured on GMA News TV’s “Ang Pinaka” as the second most popular Pinoy-made mobile game. — LA, GMA News

“Rowan McPaddles” is available for free on iOS and Android. Facebook.