Black Country games team hoping for a hit with Inochi

Inochi is the brainchild of Ben Clark and his young team of programmers and designers at ForwardFor, based on Wolverhampton Science Park.

Aimed at youngsters from the age of seven and upwards, the 3-D game allows them to design their own Ani-Mech robotic characters to battle Rust King and his minions and save their home, Shine Planet.

Packed with features and quirky humour, the game has been in development for nearly two years but Ben, from Walsall, says it is now nearly ready.

"We will start Beta-testing later this year, and we will be asking local youngsters to get involved to tell us what they think of it," he said.

Beta-testing is the final stage of development before the game hits the market, allowing people to try the game out for free to ensure there are no 'bugs' in the system. Ben is hoping local schoolchildren will take part in process and is confident it will prove popular.

"So far everyone who has tried it has loved it, including people logging on from as far away as America."

The company is being advised by experienced Wolverhampton businessman Paul Coxhead, who is also a shareholder in the business.

Paul said ForwardFor had started out developing online training materials,working on the game as almost a 'hobby' project at first. As part of its vocational training work, the company had itself taken on 20 media apprentices – making it one of the biggest media apprenticeship training firms in the UK at the time – and, after they completed their course, kept seven who have now become part of the team developing the new game. Ben Clark said: "They are a really ace team. It was the football pundit Alan Hansen who said: 'You can't win anything with kids'. I completely disagree. You just have to see what we have achieved here. We wanted to build a team that would share our particular vision – a bit quirky, a bit different – and that is what we have today.

Ben is a computer graphics veteran, originally working for Wolverhampton pioneers Synthetic Dimensions before being head-hunted to join the BBC in Birmingham. But after the closure of Pebble Mill in 2004 he went freelance before joining ForwardFor four years ago.

After investing around £800,000 in the project so far, the company is in talks with a leading production finance house to raise the additional funding needed to get the Inochi Project on the market and into shops. Meanwhile the team, based at the science park's Technology Centre, expect to be ready to start final testing before Christmas with the aim of launching the game in February or March next year.

"We are really proud to be making this in the heart of the Black Country," said Ben. "It's a chance to show the world what we can do in the Midlands.

"We are aiming at youngsters from seven and up. We are making it so will work on laptops, tablets – including the iPad – and desk top computers. We'll also do cut-down versions that will work on mobile phones.

"We're not being ridiculously ambitious. If we can get around five per cent of Mochi Monster's user numbers, or even 1.2 per cent of Club Penguin, we will be a huge success. It's unique; there's nothing else like it out there. And achieving that these days is virtually impossible."

To find out more visit the website at www.inochiproject.com or www.facebook.com/projectinochi