Three developers who won Apple’s best app awards for 2022 – Times of India

Steven Chan, founder, GoodNotes
App: GoodNotes 5 (iPad App of the year)

Twelve years ago, when Steven Chan was studying in college, he felt the need to go paperless. The iPad was launched in 2010 — around the same time Chan was about to go to college. And thus GoodNotes was born with the idea of bringing handwriting to the iPad and changing the pen and paper experience. Chan says that he was genuinely surprised the app was liked and recommended by users to others when he actually launched the app on the App Store. “99% of our downloads are based on word-of-mouth publicity,” says Chen.

Good Notes 5 claims to have more than 19 million users in the world. Chan says that the arrival of the Apple Pencil changed the game for the app. “The Apple Pencil improved handwriting on the app and has helped expand our user base,” he says.

Amanda Schofield, Co-Founder, Drydock Studios
App: Wylde Flowers (Apple Arcade game of the year)

Set in the idyllic town of Fairhaven, in Wylde Flowers, you play as Tara, a young woman who’s fled the city after a tough breakup to recharge and reconnect with her Grandma Hazel. The best part of Wylde Flowers is that it relies on your decisions and shapes Tara’s life. “The

Wylde Flowers

experience is a bit different for everybody,” says Amanda Schofield, the co-founder, Studio Drydock. “It’s all about self-expression and self-exploration.” So you can farm by day as Tara and at night cast spells as a witch. There are as many as 30 characters in the game and the soundtrack of the game really stands out. As a studio, Wylde Flowers is the first mainstream game developed and it has landed the Apple Arcade Game of the Year. Schofield is delighted with the honour.

Jan Pytlik, Producer, QA Lead, HandyGames
App: El Hijo (Apple TV game of the year)

Apple TV isn’t the first name that pops up in your head when you think of games. And non-violence is certainly that catches your fancy when you think of the Wild Wild West. Perhaps that’s why El Hijo is a right fit as the Apple TV game of the year.
“El Hijo – A Wild West Tale” is “a non-violent stealth game in which you rely on the mischievous, playfulness of a young child.”

Jan Pytlik, producer, HandyGames, says that the idea came from the films of Sergio Leone — the man behind classics like

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

and the

Once Upon a Time

movies. However, those movies had too much violence. The developers made the game more playful by choosing the protagonist as a six-year-old.