Sub-$20 price points can be okay.

[OremLK]

With my first game, Core Fighter, I started out following the conventional wisdom and pricing the game at $19.95. I'll go ahead and admit that I didn't sell anything for several weeks, the entire time I was selling the game at that price.

Then it hit me that I was essentially competing with Xbox Live Arcade and Steam, both of whom offer many games targeted at essentially the same market (hardcore gamers) for around $10. And almost all of those games have much better production values than mine. What's more, my target market is probably mostly comprised of poor college students, to whom money is as much of a concern as the trouble and trust involved in purchasing something on the internet. Why would they pay $20 for my game? I wouldn't, in their shoes.

So I decided to change the price, and cut it all the way down to $7.95. Almost immediately, sales picked up; I've been selling an average of one copy a day since, and although that's still not very good, and I don't know if it will keep up, selling any copies at $8 is a lot better than selling nothing at $20.

My only regret is that I'll never know how many sales I lost during those first few weeks when I sent out the press release and did my initial marketing push.

The lesson I've learned is to just assess it on a game-by-game basis. It all depends on who you're trying to get to buy.

[Sybixsus]

Can I ask what time periods are involved here? IE: How long were you selling it at $19.95 and how long have you subsequently been selling it at $7.95 for?

[HairyTroll]

What's more, my target market is probably mostly comprised of poor college students, to whom money is as much of a concern as the trouble and trust involved in purchasing something on the internet.

An obvious question perhaps, but how much income are you expecting to generate from poor college students?

[OremLK]

An obvious question perhaps, but how much income are you expecting to generate from poor college students?

Not much. Not much at all.

That's why none of my subsequent games will be targeted at them (at least, not only them).

Can I ask what time periods are involved here? IE: How long were you selling it at $19.95 and how long have you subsequently been selling it at $7.95 for?

A few weeks at $19.95, and less than a week now at $7.95. We'll see if the pattern holds, I guess, but so far it's been a big change.

[JoshuaSmyth]

Thanks for posting your experience, it'll be nice to see how you do a couple months down the track. I've been thinking about doing a shareware 2D shooter even though I know the market is getting pretty crowded esp with virtual console/ XBLA and a lot of really good freeware games.

Its nice to know before going into it what your sales might be like ie Don't bet the bank on a 2d shooter :)

PS In your case I think that your system requirements are actually having an effect on sales, I play a lot of 2D shooters and have bought 3 different indie shooters over the last year, so I'm effectively in your demographic but unfortunately I can't play your game.

[Sybixsus]

A few weeks at $19.95, and less than a week now at $7.95. We'll see if the pattern holds, I guess, but so far it's been a big change.
Given that it's only been a few weeks, could it not also be that it just took time for the press releases to be picked up, people to write about it, people to read about it, those people to blog about it and finally someone else to read about it, download it and buy it? In which case, maybe they'd have bought it at the old price too?

I only ask because when I've released games without a mailing list to sell to, I typically sell a handful of games on the day of release, and then nothing for about three weeks, and then the real sales kick in.

[Sectarian]

With my first game, Core Fighter, I started out following the conventional wisdom and pricing the game at $19.95. I'll go ahead and admit that I didn't sell anything for several weeks, the entire time I was selling the game at that price.

Then it hit me that I was essentially competing with Xbox Live Arcade and Steam, both of whom offer many games targeted at essentially the same market (hardcore gamers) for around $10. And almost all of those games have much better production values than mine. What's more, my target market is probably mostly comprised of poor college students, to whom money is as much of a concern as the trouble and trust involved in purchasing something on the internet. Why would they pay $20 for my game? I wouldn't, in their shoes.

So I decided to change the price, and cut it all the way down to $7.95. Almost immediately, sales picked up; I've been selling an average of one copy a day since, and although that's still not very good, and I don't know if it will keep up, selling any copies at $8 is a lot better than selling nothing at $20.

My only regret is that I'll never know how many sales I lost during those first few weeks when I sent out the press release and did my initial marketing push.

The lesson I've learned is to just assess it on a game-by-game basis. It all depends on who you're trying to get to buy.
************************************************** ****
Ok so now your selling your game for $7.95 and its selling like wildfire, increase the price to $9.95
in your next batch runs, 2 bucks more isn't going to hurt your sales and should this work you now know what price range you can start at and besides don't worry about X-box and ps2 they are in a class by themselfs.
:)

[JoKa]

A press release can result in sales spikes during several months, depending when and where the news is spread. So it's a good idea to vary prices, like some other guys suggested. You could try all acceptable price points and keep each price for some weeks at least. After the first cycle, start the next one with the most promising prices.

[OremLK]

Yeah, I'm not done experimenting, but I'd like to try this price point for a little while and see if it keeps turning out sales for me. It's possible that I would've gotten the sales at the higher price point, but I have no way of knowing for sure, and it seems to have followed very closely on the price drop. But I'll raise it again later if the pattern continues and see if it causes problems.

[Jack Norton]

A good tecnique is to sell first couple of games at lower price, so you get more newsletter signup/loyal customers, and then gradually release bigger/better games at higher price :)

[RinkuHero]

I know this isn't about feedback for the game itself, and I haven't played your game (only watched the video) but that game looks extremely "cheap" to me (no offense intended), so it probably makes sense that it'd only sell at such a low price. Typical freeware shooters have higher production values than that. Unfortunately people often base whether a game is worth it or not on the production values, not the gameplay.