Gizmodo’s Developers Cubed series offers a behind the scenes look into Australia’s up and coming dev scene. This week: We talk to Morgan Jaffit of Defiant Development, a man who knows the dangers of not getting ahead of yourself.
Who are you and where do you work?
My name is Morgan Jaffit, and I’m one of the founders at Defiant Development.
Why do we know you? What have you created?
We’re a small Australian indie developer and publisher. On the development side, we’ve just released Heroes Call, which is a (pretty awesome) action RPG for tablets and mobile. On the publishing side, we’ve helped Brendan and Shawn get Ski Safari out to the world, and it’s done fantastically well. An update for Ski just came out today, in fact!
What platforms do you develop for?
Primarily mobile and tablet, due to the scale.
What are you working on right now?
More content for Heroes Call is our focus right now, but we’ve got our eyes on making a great RTS style game for tablet. That’s a pretty exciting space, I think, without many really good entries so far.
What do you think about the rise and rise of App Stores? How has it influenced your titles?
What’s your favourite app that you didn’t create?
I love Hero Academy. Still play a lot of it.
What phone do you use? Why?
iPhone 4, because I’m deeply embedded in their market now. I own so many apps there’s a huge inertia in changing.
What advice do you have for budding Aussie developers out there?
Make sure you’ve got enough resources to make 3 apps, rather than 1. You learn so much in your first outing, that you can make your second and third far better than your first. It’s all about improving with every step.