Hill Climb Racing: Difference between revisions
”Hill Climb Racing” was developed by Toni Fingerroos, a self-taught Finnish programmer who was 29 years old at the time of the game’s release. Prior to the game, he started writing software at the age of ten. He was intrigued by car racing and wrote ”Ralli 94” and shared it with his friends. At that time, when he thought that games were developed by firms and not by people, he named his own hobbyist firm Fingersoft.{{cite web|url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/fingersoft-finds-simple-is-profitable-1391523498|title=Fingersoft Finds Simple Is Profitable|last=Rossi|first=Juhana|work=[[The Wall Street Journal]]|date=February 4, 2014|accessdate=July 24, 2019}}{{cite web|url=http://www.helsinkitimes.fi/business/12409-turning-his-business-around.html|title=Turning his business around|last=Teivainen|first=Aleksi|work=[[Helsinki Times]]|date=October 18, 2014|accessdate=July 28, 2019}}
”Hill Climb Racing” was developed by Toni Fingerroos, a self-taught Finnish programmer who was 29 years old at the time of the game’s release. Prior to the game, he started writing software at the age of ten. He was intrigued by car racing and wrote ”Ralli 94” and shared it with his friends. At that time, when he thought that games were developed by firms and not by people, he named his own hobbyist firm Fingersoft.{{cite web|url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/fingersoft-finds-simple-is-profitable-1391523498|title=Fingersoft Finds Simple Is Profitable|last=Rossi|first=Juhana|work=[[The Wall Street Journal]]|date=February 4, 2014|accessdate=July 24, 2019}}{{cite web|url=http://www.helsinkitimes.fi/business/12409-turning-his-business-around.html|title=Turning his business around|last=Teivainen|first=Aleksi|work=[[Helsinki Times]]|date=October 18, 2014|accessdate=July 28, 2019}}
A decade after his first game, Fingerroos revived the Fingersoft trade name as a professional studio that programmed games for [[Nokia]] mobile phones. Fingerroos described he “failed at that quite miserably.” He since pursued other occupations, all with unfavorable outcomes. One of them was working with Pixolane, a game studio, and spending his money on developing a [[PlayStation 3]] game called ”Rust Buckaneers”{{rp|243}} that was ultimately cancelled as the studio wasted its seed money, which caused him to accumulate debt. Another was repairing and selling sports cars imported from Japan and the United Kingdom, which also drained his personal savings. Fingerroos returned to and revived again Fingersoft in late 2011, where as the company’s sole worker, he designed a photography application every few days to see whether some of them would turn out to be successful. One of these apps was ”Cartoon Camera”, released in February 2012 and having quickly amassed over ten million downloads. The app’s profitability strengthened Fingerroos’ confidence, helped him pay off debts, and secured the creation of his next project, ”Hill Climb Racing”.
A decade after his first game, Fingerroos revived the Fingersoft trade name as a professional studio that programmed games for [[Nokia]] mobile phones. Fingerroos described he “failed at that quite miserably.” He since pursued other occupations, all with unfavorable outcomes. One of them was working with Pixolane, a game studio, and spending his money on developing a [[PlayStation 3]] game called ”Rust Buckaneers”{{rp|243}} that was ultimately cancelled as the studio wasted its seed money, him to accumulate debt. Another was repairing and selling sports cars imported from Japan and the United Kingdom, which also drained his personal savings. Fingerroos returned to and revived Fingersoft in late 2011, where as the company’s sole worker, he designed a photography application every few days to see whether some of them would turn out to be successful. One of these apps was ”Cartoon Camera”, released in February 2012 and having quickly amassed over ten million downloads. The app’s profitability strengthened Fingerroos’ confidence, helped him pay off debts, and secured the creation of his next project, ”Hill Climb Racing”.
Fingerroos said he spent 16 hours a day for a couple of months developing ”Hill Climb Racing” in a compact bedroom before completing the project. The sound assets were [[Crowdsourcing|crowdsourced]], and his friends and acquaintances drew the visuals. As Fingersoft’s business manager, Jarkko Paalanen, states, the visuals were intentionally drawn to be “naïve and childish”, as part of the game’s character.{{rp|243}} Bill Newton (probably William “Bill” Newton), the game’s protagonist, was drawn as a sketch by Fingerroos’ partner Pai Turunen. Fingerroos then photographed the sketch with one of the company’s earlier camera apps and modified it for the game’s inclusion.{{cite…