Developer Q&A: Octavian Stirbei From PLAYMOD3

Developer Q&A: Octavian Stirbei From PLAYMOD3

We recently had the opportunity to ask Octavian Stirbei, the founder of PLAYMOD3, some questions about the company, as well as their plans and inspirations. PLAYMOD3 are the creators of Brave Beak (free, App Store link) – a fun physics-based puzzler which we recently reviewed.

1.  What was your inspiration for creating Brave Beak? What motivated you?

Our game designer is a flight fanatic, he has all this miniature planes that he collects, so he thought why not make a game about flying, but with a twist. And as the trend on the App Store was to have a bird as the main character, we’ve decided that’s definitely something we should focus on. Furthermore, the being in love, fight for your sweetheart theme was little approached back when we first had the idea and on top of that, we wanted a game in which the character doesn’t get stopped by obstacles, he just flies and nothing can get in his way. Except the exhaustion, of course, but we all need a break sometimes.

2. How is business in general? 

I can’t say it’s great, but I’m not complaining either. I mean, the whole iOS development idea started out more as a hobby, I had a day job in 2009 and was working on games at night when I got home. Until late 2010, when Ionut got onboard (the game designer and long time friend), I never thought I could actually do this for a living. So I’m very optimistic about the business, this is just the beginning of what PLAYMOD3 has to offer.

3. Are you working on any other apps? Anything interesting in the works?

Right now our main focus is Brave Beak and getting it to the top, where it belongs. We have great episodes coming up and there will be some surprises that I will not be mentioning just yet. However, I can tell you that Brave Beak will have extraordinary adventures along the way and I hope it’ll be able to share it with as many players as possible.

4. What has been your biggest success so far?

I’m hoping Brave Beak will be our biggest success. So far, we have developed only niche games that have been appreciated in their own category: Bastards for FPS fans and before that, Huebris for hardcore puzzlers. They both had their time in the App Store, got featured by Apple and received great reviews from users.

But for me, success is when you reach Top 10. That’s when a game can be considered successful. And that’s what I’m hoping to achieve with Brave Beak.

5. And your biggest obstacle?

The first year has been a real challenge because we were new to this, we had no marketing experience whatsoever, we just enrolled and hoped for the best. But in time we’ve gathered some experience and now we’re on the right track. I guess once you acknowledge that, all obstacles fade away or at least, you don’t see them as such anymore.

6. And advice you’d give to other app developers, or people who’d like to get started?

Be innovative, believe in your work and keep the updates coming. For those who’d like to get started, it’s no sack of gold, but it’s quite an adventure.

7. Where do you see your company in the next 2 years?

On the App Store, of course. For now, PLAYMOD3 is a team of five enthusiastic people who are giving their best to bring great games to this wonderful platform. In 2 years, I’m sure we’ll have at least one “successful” game though…per year.

8. Anything else you’d like to add?

Download Brave Beak! You will see that it is not what everyone thinks it is. It is much better. And FREE on the App Store.

We hope you enjoyed this insight into the work, inspiration, and background behind one of the many great developers in the App Store, and we’d like to thank Octavian and PLAYMOD3 for taking the time to answer our questions.

We’ll work to provide you with more interviews like this in the coming weeks. Stay tuned!