How we make games at Boop Arcade
By Edgar Sargsyan ·
Boop Arcade is a small website of free games made by one developer in Armenia. It started with a single game and grew one update at a time. Here is how the games are made, and the ideas behind them.
Phones first
Most people who play on Boop Arcade use a phone, and many of those phones are not new or expensive. So every game is designed for a small touch screen first: big buttons, controls that work with one thumb, and text you can read without zooming. Each game is checked on a small Android screen before it is released. On a computer the same games work with a keyboard and mouse.
Ready in a second
A browser game should start as fast as you can tap. The games are small, load quickly and do not ask you to download anything or to create an account. Once you have played a game, it keeps working without internet, and you can add it to your Home Screen, where it opens full screen like an app.
Original games and original art
Every game on the site is designed and built here, with its own original artwork and sounds. Some games belong to well-loved genres, such as block puzzles, number puzzles, endless climbers or one-tap flyers, but each has its own rules, its own characters and its own ideas: tiles that watch your swipe in Boop 2048, sleepy critters in Boop Sort, the fever in Boop Drop, a camp that grows floor by floor in Boop Camp.
Fair to the player
A few rules guide every game. Every level of Boop Sort can be solved. Every tunnel in Neon Arrow has a free way through. The first rings of Boop Drop have no thorns, so new players can learn safely. Ads, where a game has them, are optional: for example, you can choose to watch one to keep going after your last life, but you never have to.
Updated all the time
A game is never really finished. New levels, new looks, new challenges and fixes come out often, sometimes several in a week. Every game has a "What's new" window that lists its latest updates, and the Updates page collects them for all games, newest first.
Shaped by players
Many updates start with a message from a player: a level that felt unfair, a button that was hard to find on a small phone, an idea for a new look. If you have an idea, a bug or a question, write to hello@booparcade.com or follow @booparcade on Instagram, where new games and tournaments are announced first.
Two languages
The site is in English and Armenian. The games themselves are in English, with simple words and icons, so that they are easy to play wherever you are.
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