Carcassonne supports local network multiplayer via Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Make sure Wi-Fi and/or Bluetooth are enabled on your device and follow these steps:

• One player choses “Normal Game”, then “Local”, then “New Game” and waits for others to join his Lobby.
• The other players join via ”Normal Game”, then “Local”, then “Join Game”.
• There is no step three

When we said you can interrupt your Internet Games at any time, you no doubt figured out this means that you don’t have to play a game in a single go – sometimes there are other things you have to do. You get on the train, you get off the train, you’re playing in your office, your boss comes in, and you have to chuck the iPhone into your desk drawer.

That means that games can sometimes take a little time to complete. Hours, even. So what do you do while you’re waiting for your friends to make their moves? Play another game with someone else, of course. 

Which is why we wanted to make game switching as fast and comfortable as possible. The Resume Game Lobby shows you can all of your running games, and lets you see at a glance if anything interesting is going on. 

Of course, we also notify you when it’s your turn in a game, so you can use the notification to jump right to where you’re up next.

And on top of that, you can switch games from the in-game Settings screen by choosing “Next Table” to get you to the next game where it’s your turn.

So whether you want to complete a game in one sitting, or whether you’re killing time on your subway ride, we’re confident we have you covered.

PS: We apologize for the cheesy headline. We just couldn’t resist.

We already mentioned that Carcassonne will have three sorts of multiplayer: pass-around, local network and Internet.

The most challenging of those, of course, is the Internet mode. On the iPhone, and even on the iPod Touch, networked games have to work seamlessly and must be very interrupt-friendly. At least that’s what we’re thinking.

With that in mind we designed the Internet mode to support push notifications to alert players when it’s their turn. That means you can make your move, quit the game, browse the web, read your mail and will get an alert when you’re next. Of course you will see the other player’s moves upon re-joining the game.

We support a “quick matchmaking” variant against equally skilled strangers and - of course - games between friends. Initially you invite (and “friend”) them via email, after that you can add them to games within the game. 

Last but not least Carcassonne has text-based chat for networked games so it’s easy to talk to your friends (or taunt them).

PS: The main problem in terms of the Internet gameplay currently is that it works far too well and distracts us from developing, because we play the game too much. :)

We will release the game in all country-specific iTunes AppStores, so if you can buy apps and games with your iPhone and iPod the answer is yes.

While we have all the multiplayer bases covered, sometimes there’s still need for computer players, of course: We are happy to launch the game with 8 different artificial inteligence players, each once different in behavior and play-style.

To fit into the medieval world of Carcassonne we picked these eight characters:

The Count and The Countess

The lords of these parts. The Count and Countess are a pair of smart, versatile players who are well-rounded overall. Although if you ask the Countess the Count is a little too well-rounded, owing to a few too many late-night banquets.

Maid and Servant

The salt of the earth, the hard-working Maid and Servant are what keeps the kingdom running smoothly. They both play basic, sensible, if a little unimaginative styles.

Juggler and Fortune Teller

The traveling folk. Wherever there’s a circus, you can find these two. Their style is weird but effective, just keep an eye on your valuables if you want to play with them.

Witch and Warlock

The dark and reclusive practitioners of the arcane arts. These two mysterious characters are viewed with respect and fear throughout the kingdom. Challenge them at your own peril.

Personally I think Toby did a great job giving each one of these a distinct personality. I hope you will have heaps of fun competing with his creations.

DFTBA, 
Martin

We will ship 1.0 with the basic tile set of the original Carcassonne.

Adding expansions is high up on the agenda, and we plan to offer them as in-app purchases once they are ready.

Yes. There will be multiplayer. Lots and lots of it.

The most basic multiplayer support is for those that only have one iPhone or iPod with them: Passing the device.

The second kind of multiplayer is local networked play: You and your friends can connect to each other using WiFi or Bluetooth (Don’t worry, you don’t have to setup up anything - it just works.) and play against each other using multiple iPhones or iPods.

Last, but certainly not least, there is Internet play. You can invite friends to play via the Internet, or join a quick game against random strangers on our servers.

One of the most pressing questions answered first:

We will start by selling the iPhone/iPod version for the introductory price of $4.99 (3.99 EUR) this May.

We will begin work on the iPad version right after that and make the app universal - i.e. update the game to run natively on the iPad as well. Once the app is universal we will end introductory pricing and sell the game for $9.99.

So if you buy early, you essentially get a discount on the version that runs on iPhone, iPod and iPad. We hope that’s a fair deal.

Hi guys.

Martin here. I thought I’d let you know that we are making good progress on Carcassonne for iPhone (and iPod Touch) and are nearly “feature complete” now! We will have to spent a few weeks on polishing the game, but we’re getting really close to having it ready and are very very excited about that! (We hope you will be excited too.)

We decided to start a dev blog for Carcassonne to show a few new bits and pieces and answer the most burning questions in the meantime. I will of course also link to here from out Twitter and Facebook accounts.

Oh and above you can see one of the first pictures of the German localization. We plan to release both english and german versions for the iPhone and iPod this May.

Keep being awesome!

Martin