One would think that a PSP ad parodying iPhone games would be the last source to inspire a new iPhone game, but that's what happened exactly with former Crystal Dynamics programmer Bradley Johnson who decided to bring "Lame Castle" to reality after seeing it in a PSP ad.
After writing code for Lara Croft: Guardian of Light, Johnson got fed up with the constant job stress and overtimes and decided to start his own development studio: Be-Rad Entertainment. He was working on another game prototype when "after about 2 weeks of work my buddy sent me an e-mail with a link to a PSP ad and wrote, 'We should make this game."
"In the ad they're making fun of what looks like an iPhone. The guy in the ad is holding his phone with a game called Lame Castle on it. Once I saw that I wrote back and said, 'Yes, we're going to make that game.'"
The ad showed nothing of the game but a logo, but that didn't stop Johnson from grabbing the Lame Castle domain name and working on an initial prototype.
"A week into development we had a pretty decent prototype," said Johnson. "A week after that we found an artist and a sound guy and started plugging everything in. A couple weeks after that we were in the final stages of polish. It's been a very quick development cycle, but it's been quite smooth."