One of the very best iOS games in recent memory is the super minimalist and super stylish Hundreds, by Adam Saltsman (best known for Canabalt) and Greg Wohlwend (of Gasketball fame).
And it's apparently a hit; as Joystiq notes, its creators have reported that the 100,000the copy was sold this past Sunday. The occasion was commemorated in the from of a blog post by Saltsman:
"I don't want to downplay, for us, the financial importance of this success; we basically went broke making Hundreds so it's a pretty big deal that it didn't flop. That said, even if it was the kind of money where we could go buy sports cars or whatever (and it's not!), there is this other, at least for me way more important thing going on, which is less about finances and more about "holy crap, one hundred thousand people have played Hundreds"…
… We have gotten emails from folks saying "you know, I don't usually play games, but…" and "I was enjoying the game but now my kids won't give back my iPad" and so on. Folks who haven't played a game since Tetris are trying out Hundreds and liking it. And we're getting this response for a minimalist game that we made utterly without compromise. Every value we had going into this project we carried all the way through to the end, and in spite of that, or, I am tempted to think, because of that, Hundreds is resonating with more people than we ever allowed ourselves to imagine."
The success of the game is notable for a number of reasons, though near the top of the list is how the asking price is $5. Anyone who has enjoyed the game will tell you that it's worth far more than that, but given how the average price of a game is a dollar, and how are turning towards the freemium model in hopes to turning a profit, a five dollar iOS is definitely a tricky sell.
Saltsman's blog post also emphasizes how risky iOS development is, and being an indie developr as a whole. Large publishers can afford to make huge mistakes. But when it's just one or two people doing everything by themselves, the stakes are much higher.
The blog post also notes that an update is pending, to address some iCloud bugs. Plus, and Android version is in the works.
