Switch Press Kit

Press Kit

Factsheet (Threye)

Developer Studio
Threye Interactive.
Based in New Delhi, India

Founding Date
18th September 2012.

Website
www.threye.com

Releases
Guardians of the Skies:

Operations Morning Glory
Rockets Away

Social
facebook.com/threye
youtube.com/ThreyeInc

Address
A-401, Plot 29,
Sector 6, Dwarka
New Delhi - 110075
India.

Factsheet (Switch - or die trying)

Website
threye.com/switch

Developers
Bharat Nag
Joshua Fernandes

Target Release Date
March 7th, 2017.

Target Platforms
PC, MacOS
Xbox

Estimated price
USD 9.99

Social
facebook.com/switchgame
twitter.com/switchdevs

Press Contact
bharat@threye.com
joshua@threye.com

Description

Threye Interactive is an interactive applications development studio based in New Delhi, India, doing venture works in the field of gaming, augmented and virtual reality, computer vision, natural user interfaces, and deeply engaged with the aerospace and defence industry.

History

Early History

Threye Interactive came into being in Sept, 2012, founded by Anurag Rana while chasing a vision to use computer gaming to achieve 'immersion' - a state in which humans can't tell whether he/she is experiencing reality or a simulation. The first clientele was an amazing ensemble - an augmented reality application for the Indian Air Force, space mission simulations for Team Indus - a company aiming to land a rocket on the Moon, and interactive marketing content on world's leading vodka brand - Absolut ! There was no exact plan, but an aim to keep pushing the limits of technology, especially which was available in the military and aerospace sector, and bring it to the masses in some form.

First Steps (2013)

Anurag kept looking for people to join on this journey, and the very first people to join were Bharat, and Sameer. And the trio decided to test their talents by working on a CGI short, a real story about an audacious helicopter gunship attack. Working without an office, the team met in cafeteria and decided on the script/pre-production, and without any prior experience or funding, produced their own CGI animation short - called Rockets Away. The response was overwhelming, and more importantly, the team felt they worked well together. The next target - a game.
Again, the team had no past experience in gaming, but got together over some tea and biscuits, decided the theme, story, approach, and just crunched its easy through the game development. The game, called Operation Morning Glory, was about an airforce pilot entering enemy territory to foil a nuclear theft underway. The game was self published via forums and received about 100K downloads via word of mouth.

First Major Break (2014)

The team expanded, Joshua joined. Some client works were undertaken in parallel to keep the studio ongoing. It was still a completely self-financed and bootstrapped studio. And then Indian Air Force came looking for developers to make its 'official' mobile gaming application. The game was on, there was an intense dog-fight between major national and international studios, and guess the last man standing - Threye Interactive.

The game, titled Guardians of the Skies - was developed over 9 months across 2014. The game was a tightrope walk, tested by fighter pilots demanding realism, yet to be made approachable to target audience of teenagers who didn't know a rudder from a propellor. The team must have done their work right because the game was released in an official ceremony by none other than the Chief of the staff of the Indian Air Force. And the player's response is best judged by the number of downloads... over 2 Million !

Project Pumpkin

While clientele in Aerospace and Defence expanded beyond Airforce to Army and Navy, the team decided it wanted to explore 'softer' side of gaming - the one which appealed to 'emotions' rather than just exploding stuff. In a 'Pixar' style brainstorming, a project was conceived, and launched on Halloween of 2014, and thus called Project Pumpkin. Outcome of this project - is Switch - or die trying.

Other Projects, could be checked out at the Projects Page.

Videos

Threye Company Video YouTube.

Images (download all as .zip)

Logos and Icons (download all as .zip)

Awards and Recognitions

More than 2 Million downloads for Guardians of the Skies across Android, iOS and Windows.
Guardians of the Skies featured on App stores - India, US, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Netherlands, Sweden, Spain and Italy.
Certificate of Appreciation - Best mobile gaming app out of India - Microsoft Tech Ed 2014, for Guardians of the Skies.
Winner of 'Made-with-Unity3D' and Microsoft Indie Program.
Made-in-India showcase on Android for Guardians of the Skies, August 2015.
Covered in Fortune India, August 2014.
Facilitated by Army Design Bureau and Confederation of Indian Industry for military simulation framework - SemSim, Dec 2015.
Keynote Speaker - PocketGamerConnects, 2015 Bangalore (unofficially, best 'speech' recognition by organisers).
"Possibly the best 'serious-gaming' development in India" - Unity3D team visiting the studio, 2014.

Description

In a world of alphabets, ‘I’ is suddenly alone. Where did all his friends go ? Was it because he became too self-centered ? Was it just.. I, me.. myself ? Come join him as he sets out on a journey to redeem himself.. an adventure across typographical lands, laden with traps and puzzles, and help him rescue and win back his once cherished friends. Come play, Switch - or die trying.

Switch - or die trying, is a leisurely paced 2D puzzle platformer backed by an interesting narrative, with the story and gameplay taken ahead via short levels that challenge the player to employ classic platform mechanics with a nimble ‘Switching’ twist, embedded in artistic and visually soothing environments.

Genesis

Project Pumpkin (Launched on Halloween, 2014) was aimed at making an emotional connect with the player. Games differ from traditional media that the player can change the outcome, he is in charge. And the player explores the game environment via the game character - in other words, the player transposes his identity on the game character, and thus become the character. And who can the player connect to best, who reflects his identity ? is it not I, me, myself ? Thus the central character of the game, is the letter 'I'.
Many ideas were explored while looking for a story which can connect with the modern player during modern times. Times where there is social media, but maybe not so much social life. Thus the game is about the letter 'I', who is now alone, thanks to his self-serving ways.
The rest of the game characters are alphabets, and the worlds are typographically derived. There is a level from the days of Egyptian Hieroglyphs, to European days of invention of the printing press (hey, its a game about alphabets, characters, ink !)
All in all, 'I' is in search to win back his old friends, the Switch is his transformation to that loving, all encompassing character, not to talk about the core game mechanic of switching between a small 'i' and a capital 'I'.

The game has been predominantly driven via creative vision of Bharat, and supported by Joshua's programming. Sarthak and Amrit have supported art and programming respectively, while Anurag has played the role of evil management. The game took most of 2015 to develop, and has been slowly finding its way out of studio and into user's hand starting from early 2016.

It is expected to be launched fully by Mid 2016.