Just two weeks ago we launched our first game, Shuttle Scuttle for iOS as a universal app for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad.

Shuttle Scuttle is now available for Mac!

Shuttle Scuttle is a fast-paced, retro-style shooter game with a mission. It’s the year 2285 and all is peaceful since the forming of the USSA (United Sol System Alliance). That is until Neptune station reports of unidentified spacecraft approaching. A hostile force is making its way through the sol system towards earth. Armed shuttles for asteroid destruction are the only defense crafts available. Seek out and intercept this hostile force before Earth becomes a target!

GAME FEATURES:

• 8-bit artwork reminiscent of the NES
• 14 tracks of original chiptune music
• 32 levels with 8 epic boss battles
• Astronauts to rescue
• Dozens of unique enemies
• Earn up to 3 stars on each level

Check out the Shuttle Scuttle page for more info, screenshots and video.

It’s finally here – Awaken 5!

Existing Awaken customers can “Check for Updates” within Awaken 4 to get Awaken 5 and new customers can purchase it from the convenient Mac App Store.

So what’s new and different?

• Rewritten from scratch
• All new user interface
• Support for multiple timers
• Alarm sound output device selection
• Alarm music now played by Awaken for reliability
• Volume adjustable per alarm
• Improved Apple Remote support
• All bugs reported in previous version corrected

One of the biggest problems with Awaken alarms in the past was that they relied on iTunes to be active. iTunes has turned into a much bigger application since Awaken 1.0 was launched in 2005. There were issues where iTunes would be busy syncing devices connected, slow to launch, interaction blocked due to an open dialog, etc. To solve this, Awaken 5 plays your iTunes music directly – without having to launch iTunes and rely on it to respond.

When building for the Mac App Store we ran up against a restriction which states that applications cannot request the user to enter their password to authenticate admin tasks. We rely on this for allowing Awaken to schedule wake up times so that your Mac wakes at alarm time. To get around this we separated the wake up scheduling function into a separate application “AwakenHelper” which you can download for free via the Awaken page. AwakenHelper runs in your menu bar and  takes care of waking your Mac and launching Awaken at alarm time if it isn’t already running. We also added the ability for this tool to power on your Mac. AwakenHelper will monitor your Awaken alarm database in the background and automatically schedule the correct wake up times.

We’ll be adding new features to Awaken for Mac and Awaken for iOS often. Please email us at support@embraceware.com with your feature requests! We’re also already working on localizing Awaken in more than a dozen languages – stay tuned.

Happy New Year everyone! You’ve all helped make 2010 awesome and we’re really looking forward to the new stuff planned for this year.

So, the Mac App Store happened – woot! There have been some bumpy developer stories regarding the transition to the Mac App Store. Based on that I wanted to let you in on what our plans are for Awaken 5 and the Mac App Store.

If you’ve purchased Awaken 4 you’ve been told that Awaken 5 will be a free upgrade for you when it becomes available – don’t worry – that’s still true. If you’ve purchased Awaken already and have a serial number you’ll be able to download Awaken 5 from our site and enter your serial number to validate it. That build will remain on the Sparkle update system. We will have another build of Awaken 5 just for the Mac App Store. That way existing customers and new customers will be treated fairly.

Once Awaken 5 is available we will no longer sell new licenses through our site – new customers will be exclusive to the Mac App Store. Existing customers will get Awaken 5 via the Sparkle system in Awaken 4 or use the download link we’ll have on our site.

So to summarize – existing Awaken 4 customers get Awaken 5 for free via the Sparkle update system or download via our site. New customers get Awaken 5 via the Mac App Store.

Let us know what you think about our plans – we put a lot of thought into it but still like to hear your feedback.

Regarding the progress of Awaken 5 – we’re 100% focused on that project now that the iOS version is mature. We’ll also be porting the new features from Awaken 5 for Mac back to the iOS version later.

If you’d like to see development updates on a regular basis – follow us on Twitter (@Embraceware) where I’ll be posting UI screenshots and other information.

If you haven’t checked out Awaken for iOS – get it today for just 99 cents! It’s a universal app for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad!

Awaken 1.8.2 is now available in the App Store. Many thanks to the many beta testers who helped out!

Here’s a list of what’s new in this release:

• Alarm and sleep timer fixes (critical).
• LED Flashlight improvements for iPhone 4.