'That helped it spread, because people thought 'this is great, it feels free'. 'In Temple Run, you earned things at a reasonable pace: it was really generous with how many coins were distributed on the path, and that resonated well with fans because we weren't trying to nickel-and-dime them every step of the way,' says Shepherd. This time round, there are two virtual currencies – coins and gems – which can be both earned through play and bought using in-app purchases. Imangi also put a lot of thought into how to make money from Temple Run 2, based on lessons learned from the first game. Other new features include a different power-up for each playable character so their differences are not just cosmetic. Hence the zipline, and a later section where you leap into a minecart and race along a track tilting to steer clear of dead-ends. 'If the tilts and touches and swipes are the language of the game, we wanted to expand on the vocabulary: to have more things you can do with those actions, says Shepherd. Which is not to say Temple Run 2 is a pure rehash. Shepherd said Imangi worked hard to keep Temple Run's familiar swipe-based controls intact, as players turn, jump and slide their way through the game. Take a step back and rewrite the game from scratch, taking the lessons on what worked well and what didn't work so well in Temple Run.'ĭeveloped on the Unity platform, the new game's visual leap forward is obvious, right from the first five seconds when players whizz down a zipline in a lush 3D world. 'The original is an awesome game, for what it was, but we wanted to do some radically different things, and improve the graphics, so we knew we'd have to start afresh. 'We'd been focusing all our company's efforts on Temple Run with updates and new content, but we kinda ran into a barrier,' explains Keith Shepherd, who co-founded Imangi with his partner Natalia Luckyanova. The sequel has been in development since March 2012, though.

The first game was released in August 2011 as a 69p iOS title, but a switch to freemium the following month lit a fire that still burns bright: Temple Run was downloaded 2.5m times on Christmas Day 2012 alone.

Flonga games temple run 2