Trials Evolution dev credits competitive nature of gamers in success on XBLA

The immensely popular Trials Evolution, which sold over 100,000 copies on Xbox Live Arcade in a day, has been enjoying that success thanks to a "few key elements" says developer RedLynx. The game is more about pushing out competitiveness in gamers, rather than relying on the frustrating "masochism" of trial-and-error gameplay.

Speaking to Gamasutra, RedLynx managing director Tero Virtala says that "In almost all RedLynx games, if you strip away the outside elements and look at the absolute heart of the game, it boils down to a combination of a few key elements."

"It's like in real life when you start practicing something very physics-based, like tennis or billiards, there is no limit how far you can develop your skills," he offers. "In Trials, it's also about your own true skill, not the skill of your avatar or game character."

While this does much to get gamers to work on their own abilities, less downtime between runs is definitely helping things along, acknowledges Virtala.

"The game is always showing you your friends' times, and that is incentive for you to immediately get back into the game and try and beat those scores," he said. "This time around, we even have your friends' runs showing in the game as dots bobbing ahead of you. It's amazing what a little competition can do as an incentive to keep people playing."

If anything, the game has one base principle according to the studio; it is a physics-based game. The title is meant to have "very little limitations," added to the immense amount of editing that can be done by the player in the game's Pro Editor.

All of this seems to have added up, as RedLynx has confirmed that title is rapidly approaching 500K units sold.