Goalie rocks a lacrosse app
Toronto’s Pat Campbell stops real and virtual shooters
Toronto Rock backup goalie Pat Campbell doesn’t play many lacrosse games, but the veteran netminder has developed an app for that. Recently, on itunes, Campbell launched Shooter Lacrosse. It’s the fruit of his other job — he’s a computer software designer when not dressed for National Lacrosse League duty at the Air Canada Centre or around North America.
Campbell concedes that lacrosse is a niche interest in a gaming landscape dominated by giants such as Madden football and, in Canada, all things NHL. But it’s a market he may have cornered, since his is the only “lax” game in the Apple apps empire of ipad, iphone and ipod touch.
“Things are picking up steam,” the goalie says coyly, refusing to divulge his “top secret” sales count since the March 3 launch.
Campbell describes his app as a realistic, first-person, 3D lacrosse experience that will be continually upgraded with audio, visuals, gadgets and tricks, included in the $4.99 price.
Shooter Lacrosse is set in the field version of the game, not the arena “box” discipline played in arenas. A player can be the shooter or the goalie.
“I created the entire world — the stadium, the crowd, the field, the players, the nets, everything, as if you were going to see an actual lacrosse game,” says the 34-year-old, who backstopped Brock University to four straight national Canadian university championships in field lacrosse.
“I put my cameras where sightlines would be for players. For the goalie, specifically, the stick you’re seeing in front of you, the field, the players shooting, that’s exactly what you see when the player is coming in on you.”
In May, a multi-player component will be added through Wi-fi, cellular and Bluetooth technologies, so that “you can be the goalie in Saskatchewan playing someone who’s shooting on you in Toronto in real time,” says Campbell. Commentary after every shot (“You can’t beat Sweet Feet” is an oft-repeated line from Rock teammates when Campbell stops the ball) is the voice of Campbell’s cousin Andrew Lauzon, a Toronto music producer. Lauzon also created the music and sound effects.
Campbell, who’s played in four Rock games this season, is working on a second lacrosse app, one that caters to the box crowd: fighting.
He’ll call it “Drop the Mitts.” There are no draws, no shots, no great saves. The whistle goes, “and they just start fighting (with) firstperson perspective.” Campbell’s foray into the gaming world was prompted by two things: a sudden serious illness and the fact that his family’s computer business, EASI.CA, was looking to offer more software properties. The13-year NLL veteran was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease in 2007, when he was playing for the Ed- monton Rush. He took time off from the NLL and, unsure of his health and lacrosse future, enrolled in computer programming at Niagara College in 2010. There, he envisioned his lacrosse app during a class project when he animated a lacrosse stick. Through changes in diet and sleep patterns (at least eight hours nightly), Campbell tamed his Crohn’s and resumed his box career with the Rock in December 2010. (He was part of Rock NLL championships in 1999, 2000 and 2011.)
The goalie estimates the overhead for Shooter Lacrosse at about $65,000, a sum that includes his schooling, advertising and capital investment costs.
“This is certainly not an industry where you’re (typically) going to make money off one game, but hopefully this will open a lot of doors to making those first-person perspective sports games,” Campbell says, adding he’s currently creating an X-box Live Marketplace version of Shooter Lacrosse.
“(The app) is still not fully developed. I keep loading enhancements, so . . . people haven’t seen all the rewards of it yet.”
Campbell plans to roll out upgrades regularly this summer and to continue to work on other game software. But in the real world, he remains focused on the Rock.
“In the short term,” he declares, “I have no plans to stop playing lacrosse.”