With typical Kiwi understatement, David Frampton says he's done pretty well selling games for the Apple iPhone.

In fact, his company Majic Jungle Software has sold more than 450,000 games. Its first iPhone game Chopper was at one point earning US$4000 (NZ$5300) a day and Mr Frampton was able to buy a house outright with its proceeds.

He says the revenue from Chopper – a helicopter tilt-game that he originally created for Apple Mac computers – is still earning him a good salary two and a half years after its debut and Chopper 2, which was released in July, has already been downloaded to iPhones and iPads more than 100,000 times.

After abandoning law studies and stints in retail, as an artist, designing weather graphics for MetService and working on displays for Te Papa's Our Space exhibition, Mr Frampton set up Majic Jungle in 2008.

He says it can be strange working from home but he relishes the variety that comes with being an independent software developer.

"With Chopper 2 I wrote the music and did the art, the marketing and of course the programming. I got to keep things all mixed up."

Majic Jungle's marketing has been in the form of interviews with technology publications, distributing promotional web videos and engaging with the active and passionate community of online iPhone owners and software developers.

Mr Frampton – who taught himself software programming – has taken on his brother to help support Majic Jungle's games and brew up its next successes.

Mr Frampton hopes they will include several applications he has developed for Mac computers and will be able to sell through an online Mac store, similar to the Apple App Store for the iPhone and iPad, from early next year.

"People are underestimating how big the Mac store is going to be I think. Most Macs probably don't have a lot of third-party software so everyone who has got a Mac is going to jump online and download something and if that goes well then they'll download a whole lot more. It's going to get so much bigger."

Also under development is a "unique" application that will let Mac owners access and update their Twitter accounts. Mr Frampton has plans for a simpler iPhone game as well as a computer game that could be controlled by a player's movements.

"I just want to keep coming up with cool stuff. I really enjoy coming up with creative ideas and things for people to play with and I can't see that changing anytime soon."

- © Fairfax NZ News