New paradigms

[princec]

So, baegsi highlights a few of the demons that haunt us wannabes and it gets me to airing something that's been bugging me for a while. And Andy asks, do I ever take svero's advice? Which gets me to thinking about the kind of advice I get from svero and others.

I think, without a doubt, it's pretty hard to say I'm doing mostly everything well with what I've got. Website's fine, clear, uncluttered, straightforward - compare it to most other indie websites and it's a cut above the rest. I can say this because I didn't make it, all hail Chaz for his l33t skillz. We've got the guarantees, we accept payments by nearly any means through SWREG (although they can be a bit finicky). Games are OK, not too big to download, compatible with enough systems, available on the Mac. Price is par for the course too. Nagging is now being effectively done using random combinations of max. games and max. time played and crippling but I don't make enough sales to draw any conclusions at all. Everything's well and good, in reality, and over the last couple of years little nuggets of help and advice from all sorts of great people in this community have made it what it is today. It's by no means perfect but it's also a very, very long way from being crap.

So it's all great, except for one thing: not making any money at it. Not a bean of profit. I'm still down about $3k on the whole venture, not to mention all my free time for a couple of years, which hasn't pleased Charlotte one bit - and doubly so as my efforts have not even yielded enough money to buy her flowers in compensation.

That's the history to the thread. Now moving forward...

I'm not really seeing any improvement in the forthcoming years. Several things have happened to the indie games business which have greatly affected my chances of ever going full time. And maybe everyone else's chances, who haven't yet "made it":

1. The arrival of the portals. It is inevitable in any market as it matures that a consolidation occurs. The indie games market grew to the point where money made a difference, and people more interested in selling games than writing them are now in control of the purse strings. This happens in all industries, in all markets. I can live with that, except that it happened just as I got into the biz. Puppygames made a fantastic miscalculation turning up into a market that was just about to die: the "bedroom coder". 5 years ago I'd have been doing nicely in the burgeoning indie games market; now the traffic is being effectively siphoned off by huge portals and the novelty's worn off.

2. A big increase in competition, from everywhere. It seems that there's an awful lot of indies suddenly. It wasn't a very common occupation 5 years ago, but suddenly there are a lot of disgruntled industry vets on the scene, and let's face it, they've got experience, skills, and teamwork to help them out. My titles are way below their league. Right at the very smallest outfits like Pompom all the way up to much larger and more complicated stuff from Moonpod and those chaps writing Darwinia - they're all competing for the same pie, which ain't really getting any bigger. The slices are just getting smaller and the competion is getting fiercer. Then there's the fact that the games I like to play and write are somewhat overlapping the targeted demographics that retail titles are aimed at.

3. A downward spiral in originality. I've got nothing against unoriginal games, and in fact, my games are really blatant ripoffs of plenty of other titles, but more and more it would appear that people look for particular types of game specifically (eg. "asteroids", "pacman", "rts") and it's extremely difficult to interest potential customers in new concepts. It's not like new concepts grow on trees but if you're just a touch over the edge of "different" you've already got an uphill battle. And that's fine if you're more into making original games than money but sooner or later you've got to draw the line and ask yourself how long you can continue doing what you want for love when it's such a massively all-consuming occupation.

Now it occurs to me that the mistake I made was over 2 years ago but I haven't seen the wood for the trees. The mistake was to enter the existing indie games market in a particularly mainstream manner. That is, I fell hook, line and sinker for the Pavlina spiel - sell downloadable games based on a tiny % conversion rate and rely on huge traffic volumes to get enough money to sustain the business. Make $1k-$10k a month! Remember that? It seemed perfectly reasonable at the time. Except that there's roughly 100 times as much competition now in the same market. I make between $1-$100 a month, and this is after battling it out for over 2 years with 3 decent titles under my belt. So here's the mistake: nobody ever got proper rich muscling in on a saturating/saturated market and trying to grow their slice of the pie. There's room for a few big boys in there.

That's the market research bit most of us appear to be missing, or confused about. We've been asking the wrong questions - I've seen it time and time again. "How do I do market research for a shooter game? How do I know people will buy it?" when the question actually is, "Is there a market for downloadable game demos that convert into sales? If there is, is it growing hugely year on year or is it consolidating?"

And the answer of course is that there is a market for downloadable game demos, but that it is now consolidating and if you're not already fully established, there is no longer a reasonable place to enter it using the same old techniques.

It honestly doesn't matter what sort of game you write. Match-3 or hardcore shooter - the chances of success actually appear to be roughly the same. Even if I'm wrong by a factor of 10 it's not going to make a difference in the long run. I've actually watched my sales get worse and worse over the 2 years, instead of growing.

What to do about it all?

Well, I'll have to completely change the plan, because this one's had 2 years and 3 games to work out and it just hasn't really got anywhere. I need a new market that I can tap into with my existing skills and assets and goals. I can code, and that's about it, and the only thing I enjoy coding is games, so I need to create a new games market, or find a young and burgeoning market which hasn't been thoroughly exploited yet.

Any thoughts? I'll tell you what I'm planning in a bit after all the flames die down.


Cas :)

[Andy]

I need a new market

Again? So experiments with that BS Sun initiatives don't teach us to anything? :confused:

Guys were right when stating - some day he will make his million in one day if not die at first.

Exclude all spyware (not correct word but you know what I mean) from your titles. Make the correct build don't requiring that terrible downloads (before) and that hardware configurations, remove that Java where ever you can - just kill it at your site and in your games at all. Don't say to any suggestion - I don't care. Clean up your way to success.
Try this simple way - at least one time - spend some time on that - why not to give it a try?

This is not my problem. So accept this as just my two cents OK?

[princec]

Ehh, Andy what are you on about?

Cas :)

[Andy]

Ehh, Andy what are you on about?

Cas :)

Cas that's you asked me: www.wildsnake.com

We have started online after you.
We sell more than 1-2 games per month.

And you know for sure amount of another links where to check what I was meaning.

[baegsi]

3. A downward spiral in originality.
...
It's not like new concepts grow on trees but if you're just a touch over the edge of "different" you've already got an uphill battle. And that's fine if you're more into making original games than money but sooner or later you've got to draw the line and ask yourself how long you can continue doing what you want for love when it's such a massively all-consuming occupation. Actually, that's my business plan :) I intend to be original and off-beat and use that as my advantage, so that's my untapped market (I hope!). I believe the only benefit of indie games is that they provide game experiences that nowhere else can be found. I can not and don't want to compete with highly polished games that barely have any other value than technical excellence. I'm trying to find a way on making the most out of my given restrictions and the only field I can compete is the game idea. However, coming up with something new is hard and there's still the development time involved, making this whole enterprise a long road, so I still have to prove that is a feasible concept and not merely my wish. (Maybe I should just find someone who is the opposite and wants merely work on the technical level while I work on the concept, but who really wants that? Well, if you spend some $$ then it's possible, but before that I have to be successful first, but that's chicken-n-egg %( )

Eager to hear your plans.

[Nonz]

Would be a lot easier if you are one of the few catering to a largely under serviced market... it's finding said market that's the hard part.

A couple of years ago who would have thought that 30-40 something women would be a major games demographic?

Maybe the new market will be bored pensioners, something where the hero get's to tell people what's wrong with the world then sits down to dinner before sun gets to near to the horizon. :D

Nonz.

[baegsi]

Regarding 1+2: I'm also basing my concept on the assupmtion that the overall market is growing. With the success of portals and the mulitple new offerings of new games (and the increase of broadband), I think more and more users will be attracted to this market. However, I have no piece of solid data that could prove this. You made the opposite experience, so its hard to prove...

[Norbyte]

You could blame the lack of PC sales on the portals and the increased competition, but aren't your games available on the Mac platform as well?

Ask yourself why your games aren't selling on the Mac.
Then, ask some Mac people what changes would make them buy your games.
Follow some of their advice, and before you know it you'll have yourself a "new market".

I know for a fact that Pavlina's figures are quite possible on the Mac alone, and even more possible if your games are available for Windows as well.

[princec]

To be honest I'm clueless as to why they're not selling on the Mac either. The weird thing is, Flux sold spectacularly well last year on the Mac, making several sales every day for the very brief period Pat plugged it on his site. He's recently rereleased it... and not a sausage. The game hasn't changed. He reckons it's because it says (C) 2003 on it but really that's just clutching at straws.

Whatever the reason, there's nothing wrong with the game(s) at all really, they're simply not selling enough to have justified their development, and continue to decline. If I put the biz head on and think about it for 5 minutes the conclusion is always the same: stop doing it this way, it's not working. Even with 3 games, a ton of marketing, and constant reminders of our existence all over the place, we're still not getting even a tenth of the downloads we'd need to justify the risk of developing games using the "thousands of downloads, 1% CR" strategy.

Cas :)

[princec]

Ideas are 2 a penny, so I've got no qualms about spelling out how I'm going to move forward.

I'm pretty much thinking that I want to provide much more benefit than I have been providing up until now in purchasing a game. Flux and Dudester's benefit is mainly that you get to see a bit more of the game and eventually cripples itself so you can't play any more. That turns out to be a crap upsell. Puppytron nags an awful lot and eventually cripples itself but never stops you from playing. Turns out that's a crap upsell too.

I got to thinking about it and the answer stares me in the face every day at work (haha). Soldat. Every day we all play Soldat. We've played it every day for over a year. We're totally hooked. But I'm the only one that's paid the $9 for it in the office. I get a cool star next to my name, a custom HUD, and I've got red jets. I paid to look hardcore. Woe betide you if you come across Super Dudester or Puppytron! For I will waste your ass with an MP5.

Soldat is free. You get everything for free. The upsell's terrible! But I thought that $9 was a bargain to look meaner and harder and more exclusive to my enemies.

So. Think think think.

I'm thinking I want to write Puppygames' Senseless Violence multiplayer deathmatch game, and I think I'll give it away for free. I also think that half of the interesting weapons will not be available to unregistered players. The other weapons won't be any more powerful - just cooler. I also think that you probably would like to pay to get medals next to your name, and have lethality stats displayed so all fear the servers which you haunt. I'm thinking you'll pay another $10 to form an official clan with a flag and clan stats.

This market is almost completely empty but bursting with growth potential. It's more or less online only 2D multiplayer hardcore but there are few games which actually fit the niche. Soldat, Zap. I didn't rate Zap much - very laggy, retro graphics just a bit too retro. A bit further afield there's Think Tanks, but the gameplay was pretty retarded and lacked any kind of feel.

You're thinking, so how is this different?

Well, I'm trying to focus much more narrowly on a market which we know for sure is nowhere near its potential. We're also thinking that giving away the game for free forever should ensure plenty of people play it all the time and keep that buzz going. Also I'm thinking there are a lot of Mac fans that don't have Soldat ;) And I'm also thinking that you'd definitely want to pay to use the weapons on your enemies that are unavailable to you which they are shooting at you with. And especially if you play for glory you'll want an account with stats and medals.

And finally I'm thinking that'll be the last game I probably write for years, and I'll just keep making it better and better and luring more and more people.

Cas :)

[Raptisoft]

Man, PrinceC, honestly... with the high quality of your games, both the rendering and the stability, I think there's only one thing you need to do to make enough to "justify" the excursion:

You gotta lose the Java, man. You're cutting yourself out of all the "making it" markets-- the market isn't closing in, it's just expanding so that PC/Win32 is everything. You need to get on the portals-- a lot of indies bitch about the unfairness of portals here, but I'll tell you this: if Hamsterball weren't on portals, it wouldn't have been worth doing either. All significant income from that game comes from elsewhere, not Raptisoft.

Why don't you take a month and port Flux to C++ and DirectX, just to make it 100,000% more compatible with most of the purchasing demographic's computers? It'd be a worthwhile experiment, wouldn't it? You took a month (or so) to write PuppyTron, why not just try a total Win32 conversion, for total compatibility, and see if it helps anything? I mean, try to get it to a state where NOBODY has to download ANYTHING extra to run the game-- not Java, not OpenGL drivers, nothing to worry about at all. Download, and run.

The idealism of java and portability is great... but you can afford a lot more idealism if you can get a breadwinner game out there.

[Dan MacDonald]

If I had to pick a single platform to release games for and I was unable to support any other platforms. I would pick the Mac in a heartbeat....

[princec]

Java's not my problem. Download any of my games and see for yourself. Got any Java problems? I think not.

And let's face it, plenty of people are doing just perfectly well with OpenGL. And plenty of people are doing perfectly well on the Mac. Hell, I've got the logs to prove it, as we all know. I've got hundreds of people playing my games, successfully, and an increasingly smaller percentage of people without OpenGL drivers. But that's just the problem - only hundreds, not tens of thousands, and I'm only ever going to make enough money to break out of the "hobby" stage by getting 100x more traffic, and all this traffic is being very fiercely fought for by companies with 10,000x more money and experience than I have.

My problem is that I'm being simply outcompeted in a market which is far too saturated to make it big in. I shouldn't have entered the market in the first place. It was the first and only bit of important market research I could have done and I bungled it. My games are fine, my site's fine, my price is fine, I'm just unable to compete with everyone else and GOK I've tried. So, I notice, is everyone else these days. There are loads of devs in here in the same position, and we've all mostly made the same mistake on day 1: we're nearly all in the same market!

I'll have the games on the portals at some point in the nearish future, but really, that's not the definition of success I really wanted to follow.

Cas :)

[princec]

My main focus is on the Mac but it's just dead as a dodo for some reason. It's really beyond me how things could suddenly change like this in 12 months but instead of moaning about the fact, I've decided to accept that things changed so quickly that it was very hard to predict and I need a new paradigm.

Cas :)

[cliffski]

consolidate your stuff.
Would I buy alien flux? maybe not. its fun, but im not into it enough to buy it. ditto puppytron. ditto dudester. but bung these games together and maybe I'm tempted.
I sell on average 1 copy of planetary defence a month, which sucks. But when I offer it as a half price add-on to Starship tycoon, I sell maybe 13 a month. Thats a BIG difference. people love a bargain. give em 3 games for the price of one. When someone goes to the alien flux purchase screen, offer them puppytron for $1 more. Even if they don't want it, they'll think its a bargain.
Its worth a try, I know this has worked superbly for me.

[mahlzeit]

I think princec's new "paradigm" is actually pretty cool. :) Definitively worth thinking about...

[Raptisoft]

Java's not my problem. Download any of my games and see for yourself. Got any Java problems? I think not.

But I do. Puppytron... I can't run it right off your site. I have to right click the link and download the whateveritis file onto my desktop. Double clicking that will then run the game properly. But right off the site, it won't work.

[Norbyte]

I did a quick search for Alien Flux on some Mac sites.

It seems you haven't updated your versiontracker.com listing in over 6 months.
I couldn't find Alien Flux at all at some sites like macupdate.com and Apple's Mac OS X downloads.
Many developers update their listings on these sites as often as every month!

It appears that you're turning down free publicity. Why?

[KNau]

Ah yes, how many of us prematurely entered the indie developer market based on the rantings of Steve Pavlina ;) Count me in!

Of course, I would eat my hat if Steve brings in even $1,000 off his site these days. If anything that's probably why he canned the book idea - his information is old. It's like reading books on e-commerce that were written before the dot com crash - where they advise you on the merits of Superbowl ads :)

I had predicted many moons ago that major retail muscle was going to move into the online market and surprise! - they have. But while the on-line market is being crowded out I'm seeing more and more retail opportunities become available. Just doing some fishing with distributors and I'm finding it easier to get retail placement than portal deals. There are more bargain type games on the shelves of my local Electronics Boutique than there are mainstream $70 titles.

Cas, pack up Dudester in a cute little DVD box (with whatever drivers it will need) and get it into stores at a bargain price. It just might work, especially if you personally negotiate to get it in Mac retail stores, maybe even a deal to have it pre-installed!

For me, I'm on my last derivitive on-line puzzle game. Once it's done I'm out of the on-line market and going retail with RPG / strategy / adventure titles because I've found there's just more opportunity and easier marketing to be done there. It really has become differentiate or die time because as a lone developer I can't compete in the art / flash department with Reflexive and the like.

[Andy]

Cas,

Please check the statistics for this specific thread - 33% of posts are yours. And that's after you've asked the questions. Doesn't that meant to wait and wish the answer when you ask a question or I'm dumb at all? :)

[tolik]

You are not listening, Cas.

[Diodor Bitan]

Original post by KNau
Of course, I would eat my hat if Steve brings in even $1,000 off his site these days.

Considering the Alexa rating of dexterity, I'd start picking some seasoning :)

[goodsol]

Of course, I would eat my hat if Steve brings in even $1,000 off his site these days.

I hope you like the taste of hats. I recommend putting ketchup on it. Based on his traffic numbers, I'd be utterly shocked if he did less than $25,000 a month. That would be with a lousy conversion rate.


I can't compete in the art / flash department with Reflexive and the like.

OK, everybody gather together in a circle and hold hands. Now lets all chant together:

There is no correlation between graphics quality and sales.
There is no correlation between graphics quality and sales.
There is no correlation between graphics quality and sales.

As an extreme example, you shoulda seen the graphics of Steve Moraff's games (moraff.com) in the early and mid 90s. God, they were awful even by the standard of the time. But he sold a ton of them, he was one of the most successful shareware game developers of the time.

If there's one thing that all the most successful long term indie games seem to have in common, it's complaints about their graphics :)

[KNau]

The other thing they have in common is that they started 4 or more years ago. That doesn't apply to startups today, it's old advice.

[Diodor Bitan]

Original post by KNau
The other thing they have in common is that they started 4 or more years ago. That doesn't apply to startups today, it's old advice.

Trying to sell games based on graphics is so 10 years ago.

[mahlzeit]

The other thing they have in common is that they did lots and lots more marketing than most indies today. :)

[NuriumGames]

I do not want to brag about it, but I've made more than $2K/month from my site alone since the first month.

Launched the first game 3 months ago and sales are still strong. Last seven days sales from my site: (sunday)4-8-5-3-5-8-9(saturday) = 42

I work alone but it took more than 2 years full time to develop BreakQuest, so I think there is a market but you can't go with 6-month games unless you have something like an original puzzle.

[cliffski]

I've been looking at a few of the more successful titles here, including a quick scan of the nurium website. I've concluded that what distinguishes the good selling games from the poor ones is not polish, quality, originality or marketing as such, but its a case of value for money.

Ricochet has a huge number of levels which have great variety
Nuriums games look similarly packed with features
I've lost track of how many versions of soliatire thomas has now but I know its into the tens of millions.

The thing is, these games are selling for the same money as all the rest, so naturally they seem better value. I'm sure part of the reason that Starship Tycoon sells better as it's got older is that I kept adding more modules, more maps, more play modes.
Would pretty good solitaire sell well if it had only 5 games? I seriously doubt it. I don't even like solitaire, but when I tried the demo I was almost shamed into buying it, so overwhlemed was I by the sheer amount of *stuff* I would get.

Indies have got to realise that content does matter. 10 near-identical levels of shooting baddies is not worth $20.
just my observation, I'm hardly rolling in profits so what do I know? (although I did make $60 today :D)

[20thCenturyBoy]

I do not want to brag about it, but I've made more than $2K/month from my site alone since the first month.

Launched the first game 3 months ago and sales are still strong. Last seven days sales from my site: (sunday)4-8-5-3-5-8-9(saturday) = 42

I work alone but it took more than 2 years full time to develop BreakQuest, so I think there is a market but you can't go with 6-month games unless you have something like an original puzzle.
BreakQuest has generated loads of interest, on several forums I frequent it has got good mentions and people have said they bought it almost immediately. I would say it rates as one of the best current indie games.

The fact that it took 2 years of full-time work is telling (BTW did you do the art yourself?). That's a supremely long time to work on a single game. But it simply reeks of quality. It feels like it's worth $20. And like someone else mentioned, it has 100 levels. All totally unique. And it gives you a little screenshot of each level so you know what to look forward to. It has a story subplot. There are loads of clever physics effects and graphical touches. The other thing in it's favour is that it's a breakout clone. I believe breakout clones appeal to more people than straight shooters. Maybe they are simply more fun to play? Less frenetic.

With Flux and Dudester there is simply not the same amount of content. Chucking in a few different aliens is not enough. After a few screens of Dudester I knew pretty much what to expect for the other levels, and there was nothing to say "give me $20 for this please". As a tech demo for Java it is excellent, but it's not enough of a game to warrant $20 IMHO.

2 years full time. Say it loud. How many of us are prepared to do that with no guarantee of success?

[Hamumu]

So wait, does this mean that if I can get people to come to my site, I could be making $25k per month? Help me get more visitors quick!! I damn sure know my games give a ton of value for the money!

[svero]

Whatever the reason, there's nothing wrong with the game(s) at all really, they're simply not selling enough to have justified their development, and continue to decline.

With regards to the traditional things that people look at in games when reviewing how good they are your games are ok. Are the graphics good? Generally yes. Is the gameplay there. Yes. How about the sound effects? yep.. all ok. So it's a good game right? Right... sort of. Will it sell? Not necessarily.

It's my typical example (sorry I'm not trying to pick on your John) but another example of this for me is Hamsterball. I don't know how well Hamsterball sells in general, but I really liked the game and I didn't buy it. It had good controls, great graphics, sounds, the levels were really cool etc.. but I didn't buy it. Why not? There wasn't enough perceived extra value there for me as a customer. One of the main reasons was that I finished the game using the demo. I saw all the content. There were no more goals. Raptisoft has since limited it, and I think that helps a bit, but even then there doesn't seem to be that many more levels to explore or things to do in the game.

Your games are the same way. In Flux there's no perception of how much more there is for me to do and how much more gameplay I'll be able to wring out of it before I've seen everything the game has to offer or it gets hard enough to frustrate me. Dudester also seems pretty short. And puppytron is essentially just a small game. None of them have much in the way of content to explore. The perceived value for a purchase is kind of low. If I'm going to get my credit card out and buy a game I want to get another few weeks at least out of the thing. I always get the impression with your games that I might play a few more days and it will be over.

You argue that I, as a player, should be motivated by highscores. I don't think it's enough for me, or most people to break out the credit card.

For you next game why don't you look at it the other way around. Think of the market first and the game second. That doesn't necessarily mean you go off making an arkanoid clone (although probably not a bad idea as far as sales go!), but really taking a hard look at what has sold and trying to incorporate more of those elements into what you do. Games like jewel quest seem to offer the player huge amounts of content, and really all they do is introduce small changes as the game progresses. But there are lots of little map locatoins to visit and new little twists to explore as the game moves forward.

[20thCenturyBoy]

The other thing I wanted to say is this. It's very difficult to break into any industry which has a low barrier to entry. The lower the barrier, the more people there will be doing it, and the harder it will be to stand out and be successful. And making indie games has a low barrier to entry. More and more people have powerful computers, there are plenty of free (or cheap) programming and content creation tools. Coding is not the elite pastime it was a few years ago. There are plenty of books and websites on all sorts of gaming subjects. All you need is time. Lots of it. And there are plenty of people with lots of time. Kids. Students. Single, childless adults. People without full-time jobs. Being able to spend 2 years full-time on a game is a supreme advantage. Being a part-time indie these days is tougher than ever.

[svero]

There is no correlation between graphics quality and sales.

If there's one thing that all the most successful long term indie games seem to have in common, it's complaints about their graphics :)

Interesting statment. I think it's true in the sense that poor graphics do not necessarily equate with poor sales, and great graphics don't equate with great sales. However I think there is a correlation between graphics quality and sales. That is to say.. take a game that sells well, and make it look nicer, and I believe it will sell better. You can do the experiment yourself if you don't believe me. Remove all the nice card sets from PGS and replace them with a really crappy looking set and see if sales are exactly the same. I expect they'd go down a bit.. not sure how much, but I'm pretty sure it would have some effect.

[tentons]

I do not want to brag about it, but I've made more than $2K/month from my site alone since the first month.
The difference is that the game is good and not another clone. It diverges significantly from the now tired breakout style. It's worth people's time, and so it sells.

It's not about graphics quality, graphics point of view (2d, 3d, top-down, side-scrolling), when you release a game (4 years ago or yesterday), game genre, or what tool you program with. It's about creating a game that stands out from the crowd and delivers entertainment.

If you're not getting sales, make better games.

[Vectrex]

personally CAS I think the idea of you making a soldat type game makes me wet. Your gfx and sound and hardened gameplay techniques would suit an online game like that really well. Now I've never contributed to the 'what's wrong with AF' threads so here goes :D About AF, SD, PT, I would never buy AF, I would think about buying SD and might just buy PT. The key thing missing with all 3 is levels... yes levels. Scenery specifically, there's nowhere to go, nowhere to hide, no emergent strategy from the game elements, no tight game mechanic decisions, no combinational gameplay based on the tight and deliberate mixing of different weapons/enemies, no scope for delayed strategies, no satisfaction and strategy from the weapons (main due to a fast fire rate, pissweak strength and fiddly/single enemy precision). Doom 2 is one of very few games that does all that (no I've never played any other fps as tight in design). A game like soldat also has all of that and the online part, so yes I would very much like a soldatish game from Puppygames!!
btw the little shop in puppyinvaders makes that game I swear, it makes it feel 'personal' and drives you through each level regardless.

[Andy]

Ehh, Andy what are you on about?

Cas :)

And again... :)

Cas you forgot to activate the screenshot sections for all games at your website. :(

[baegsi]

I like the new paradigm. I'd also like to see you doing more portal compatible games, because, as already mentioned often enough, you should have all abilities to make a real winner. But as you also said: you are not interested in puzzle games. Question here (which I haven't answered myself yet) remains: what should have higher priorities? Should I only do that kind of game I play myself or should I adapt to the current market and (at least at the beginning) concentrate on what really sells?

Regarding the new paradigm: could work out very well. Although it requires much more patience, I guess, to make substantial income. When you have the resources to do so, go for it :)

[svero]

I think its also a bit of a beggars cant be chosers scenario. As cas pointed out, he has no audience, no money to speak of, just starting out, etc... The decks are stacked against a new indie. So maybe in the beginning it's best to try and work within the confines of the market as it exists until your company is on more solid footing and then you're in a position to take more risks. As indies we aren't told what to make, but we do have to deal with the reality of the market and our ability to reach the market.

[baegsi]

I work alone but it took more than 2 years full time to develop BreakQuest, so I think there is a market but you can't go with 6-month games unless you have something like an original puzzle. But that's not a valid business, IMO. If you have to make a living you can not afford to develop 2 years fulltime, and if you do it part-time, it probably takes twice as much time, and its really hard to motivate oneself so long until you see any money when all you want to do is being able to live on your own.

BTW: that's really a nice font you use for your buy-bottons. If you don't mind asking: whats the name of it?

[svero]

Why not develop 2 yrs full time? Plenty of very valid businesses have cycles that long.

[baegsi]

Why not develop 2 yrs full time? Plenty of very valid businesses have cycles that long.Of course, but then you'd need proper funding to legitimate this development time and the game has to sell very well in order to make a decent profit (2 years development time + profit ~ 100K ?). Nobody would give it to you (except private sources of course, but they don't count). You can not predict that kind of success for a one-man indie show. It's possible, but it is a very high risk, and IMO not a feasible one, if you only talk in business terms, not what you love to do etc. Correct me if I'm wrong :)

Edit: to put in another way: if you have 2 years development cycles, I don't see the indie advantage anymore, the "ability to adapt to changing markets" etc. You are slow and sluggish as any big dev studio except that you don't have any reserves to fall back on

[NuriumGames]

The fact that it took 2 years of full-time work is telling (BTW did you do the art yourself?). That's a supremely long time to work on a single game. But it simply reeks of quality. It feels like it's worth $20. And like someone else mentioned, it has 100 levels.
I did the art except for the intro/end comics.

It's a long time, but I think that if I had made 2 games of one year each would be selling less. The game is having very good comments and think word of mouth is working for me because the game has a lot to offer, if I had put 50 levels instead of 100 the game could have been ready in about 15 months I think people would like it but would sell much less.

The lower the barrier, the more people there will be doing it, and the harder it will be to stand out and be successful. And making indie games has a low barrier to entry. Being able to spend 2 years full-time on a game is a supreme advantage.
Entry barriers are dynamic, and the indie games one is going up. Spending 2 years in a game is an advantage against the people that can't spend that much, but it is not an advantage against people like Reflexive, PopCap and others that have a relatively powerful financial support, like it or not we're in the same business.

But that's not a valid business, IMO. If you have to make a living you can not afford to develop 2 years full time, and if you do it part-time, it probably takes twice as much time, and its really hard to motivate oneself so long until you see any money when all you want to do is being able to live on your own.
Most companies loose money during the first few years, you do not make a company and expect it to support you in a few months. You need to invest something to get a return in the long run. I had some savings and a cheap living (at my parents home) so I was risking my savings and two years of work.

I know that most people just can't stop working for two years and keep going. Well, I could and I did.

A shareware business is still a cheap business with a low entry barrier, for example would you want to run a simple bar you would need a much higher inversion.

Yes it is very hard to get motivated for that long time, nobody said it was going to be easy.

BTW: that's really a nice font you use for your buy-bottons. If you don't mind asking: whats the name of it?
All fonts used in my game are free from Brian Kent:
http://www.aenigmafonts.com/

This one is Acknowledge:
http://www.aenigmafonts.com/fonts/images/ab/acknowle.gif

[Air]

Heading back to the original post princec, I personally find your overall analysis to be entirely correct. I don't think it's a stretch to say that you've been one of the more active and inspired business startups here over the years. You've tried new things, done market research, and intentionally both over-analyzed and under-analyzed markets and information in an attempt to see things from as many angles as possible. And, as you noted yourself, it hasn't seemed to help you much.

It honestly doesn't matter what sort of game you write. Match-3 or hardcore shooter - the chances of success actually appear to be roughly the same.
This is almost true because there will always be exceptions to the "rules for success" that seem to invalidate even the most thorough analysis. There's never a purely concrete solution to any problem who's equation involves other people (in this case, customers / consumers). There are a thousand subtle variables that can all have a major or minor impact on the success of your game, many of which we might not have control over or be even entirely aware of. I know motivational speakers (Pavlina included) love to preach about being in control of your destiny, but its not really true. 100 million people, most of whom harvesting separate agendas, cannot all be in control of their own destiny. A goofy analogy I like to use: If one of my life's goal is to meet Arnold Schwarzenegger for brunch but one of his life goals is to not meet me, who's will wins? Arnold's because he has money and resources (and security guards), or mine because I'm a bloody obsessed nut? Odds might be in his favor, but if I'm lucky and my timing is right, it just might happen anyways. It might happen on my first try, or it might take several tries. It might never happen.

To take the analogy a step further, my obsession could create opportunity for someone else: Let's say Arnold decides that he needs an extra bodyguard because some creepy dude has been following him around. What if that body guard happens to be someone who's goal is to be an Arnold Guard? He can try to maximize his ability to be hired, and can hope for the best, but he can't make Arnold hire him. He needs my help for that, and if I never go about trying to fulfill my dream, that body guard might never realize his either.

There's something to be said for maximizing the potential and taking advantage of opportunities as they present themselves, but the concept of one "creating" his own opportunities, to me, is painting an unrealistically pretty picture of life. Thus some other person could do everything you've done in almost seemingly identical nature, but could meet much more success thanks to the actions of others whom he has no direct control or influence over. If you think the use of Java has hurt your sales (I can't say whether it has or not), it could be said that Sun's ineptness in promoting Java has been a major player in your lack of game popularity. That's no fault of your own and to have predicted it years ago when you started would have been nothing more than the luck of a coin flip.

So what's all this mean?

I dunno!
Seriously. I'm just rambling. I should reserve things like his for posting to my blog. heh. I think its unfortunate that you've not had any success, but I don't think its your fault either. Just continue to be prepared, and when opportunities open up be sure to make the best of them. So what's this new market you've dreamt up? Or is it going to be on the hush-hush to protect your exclusiveness and chances of success? ;)

- Air

[princec]

If you think the use of Java has hurt your sales (I can't say whether it has or not), it could be said that Sun's ineptness in promoting Java has been a major player in your lack of game popularity.
Actually Sun have been very helpful to me on the one hand, giving me tons of exposure. But on the other hand the very technology I rely on has been something of a pain in the arse in some respects. I've reached a happy equilibrium with Java now though, so it no longer figures as being relevant to my games or business particularly. I just use it because it's easy these days. I gave up on Webstart after doing a genuine experiment with it that showed me it dropped conversion rate through the floor.

So what's this new market you've dreamt up? Or is it going to be on the hush-hush to protect your exclusiveness and chances of success? ;)
Basically this: I am no longer aiming to sell games, I'm going to sell glory and cool, and I'm not targeting it at the downloadable games market (though I'll still be delivering my wares through downloadable games). I'm not targeting the single player market any more either, I'm going after the exclusively multiplayer market. I'm going to effectively write a free game, which I give away for nothing, and then I'm going to sell the ability to use add-ons which you can see other people using, and also stats registration, and clan registration. I'm not going to sell "game" any more, just cool things that go with the game. Even t-shirts.

Cas :)

[Air]

Awesome. So you're going to turn games back into a social event. :) A good strategy in that it also targets game players who are considerably more accepting of and sympathetic to the idea of actually paying for your products. Socialites are, by nature, more giving with their money than non-socialites (who's personalities tend to be focused on frugality and independence from living costs). Actually it's better than that too. By offering games free, you appeal to the non-socialites as well-- people who, despite being not-very-social, can be a great boon for spreading interest word-of-mouth-style and giving your game an active competitive base of interest that will help attract people who will be more interested in buying things.

- Air

[Nonz]

Might I suggest that selling weapons upgrades for your game be done cautiously?

I vaguely remember a game that tried this tack (no links I'm afraid and I can't even think where to start looking but I did see a review on X-Play) and the difference between a paid upgrade and normal weapons was so large that people just didn't bother playing. They had these huge online worlds available where you could have detonated a tactical nuke and still not hit anyone.

Aside from that I think it's a great idea and no doubt you'll be doing a fair bit of research on it.

Nonz.

[Bmc]

just for the records, someone mentioned cas doing games for portals and cas not liking puzzles.

he wouldn't have to make puzzle games. any game can be casual if simple rules are followed.

[princec]

I hate casual games. Period. So I can't see myself writing one. Besides, that's very much "old paradigm" - attempting to cream off a living from a tiny conversion ratio based upsell of a demo. What I want to do is give away a big game for free but make all the best stuff, the stuff you can see other paid up players using as they frag your ass, all the cool stuff - cost money.

Cas :)

[cliffski]

good luck Cas. I think your idea is a good one, but I also think it will be tough to slave away and make a good enough game for free without losing motivation. Might well be worth it though.
I think you could do well making games like puppytron and selling the java applets.

[Chris Evans]

Unless you make a great game with mass appeal, there definitely feels like there's a glass ceiling for new Indies in terms of direct sales.

I'm definitely going to be trying something new as well. My next game is going to be based off a subscription model. I've run subscription services on the Internet before and the great thing about subscriptions is that they're cumulative. If you only have average 15-20 new customers the first 2 months, by the second month you'll have a total of 35-40 monthly sales. Even if you only get a couple dozen new customers a month, as long as you retain your earlier customers, you'll have a solid stream of income within 6-8 months.

The key is keeping your customers happy and giving them something new. If you can retain customers for at least 4-6 months, then you'll eventually be able to do well even with a low volume of traffic and new customers.

So I'm going to attempt to translate this subscription model to my upcoming game. I don't have much to lose, so I figure I'd try it now. Currently it seems only big MMORPGs use the subscription model. But I think smaller scale games could work with this model as well.

[Anthony Flack]

I'm not sure if I really understood the relevance of the stalking Arnold metaphor, but I enjoyed it anyway.

Cas' idea reminds me of a similar one of my own... I had an idea for a multiplayer game, and of course with multiplayer games you want to encourage the demo players to be active online players, otherwise your game will die. So you don't want to restrict them too much, and yet you still want them to register. So I considered having all demo users forced to use a smelly tramp avatar, with their user name set to "Freeloader" or something like that, and let psychology and peer pressure do the rest.

I like the idea of selling merchandise, too. Concentrate on getting puppygames known and popular rather than on making sales... and then start flogging your merchandise. Works well enough for Homestar Runner, apparently. Puppygames' art is certainly stylish enough to make for desirable merchandise.

And for the record, I tend to agree with Svero - Flux, Dudester et al just don't have enough of registration incentive. The demos were great, but I didn't feel like the full versions would be all that much better. Also, they all caused some problems on my machine, which is fairly uncommon (almost all games work fine). For example, Dudester seems to have its background missing (judging by the screenshots at least - all I get is a plain colour). And both Dudester and Puppytron suffered from periodic slowdown... several seconds of smooth movement, followed by several seconds of stutter. Even though the games still "worked", it did kind of ruin it for me. I wonder if the logs reflect this at all?

[Jay_Kyburz]

Java's not my problem. Download any of my games and see for yourself. Got any Java problems? I think not.

Perhaps the point is not the technology but the way the game is accessed.

It's been ages since I played one of you games, but if I remember correctly, you click on a link and the Java launcher opens and downloads the game. Perhaps people are perceiving your game as a Flash or Shockwave like product as a result devalued. Nobody pays to play web games!. Perhaps you are making it too easy for people.

Have you considered bundling it up in a regular installer and making the game "feel like" regular software that people are used to paying for.

[Promaginy]

I've got hundreds of people playing my games, successfully, and an increasingly smaller percentage of people without OpenGL drivers. But that's just the problem - only hundreds, not tens of thousands, and I'm only ever going to make enough money to break out of the "hobby" stage by getting 100x more traffic, and all this traffic is being very fiercely fought for by companies with 10,000x more money and experience than I have.

If its true what others have pointed out that your games do not have the greatest value per dollar, then people will not talk too much about your games. Word-of-mouth advertising is reported to be the best way of generating traffic and sales and only happens when people find percieved value. I think you have nothing to lose to follow the suggestion to bundle your games and promote them as a retro-pack or something. There is a groundswell of interest in those types of games.

Good luck!

[Anthony Flack]

Speaking of word-of-mouth... how many people here have played Doukutsu Monogatari (Cave Story)?

Quite a few by now, I expect. I've had two people independently message me telling me I had to play it. And I'd already been playing it before I'd heard from either of them. No advertising to speak of, beyond this.

And speaking of retro packs - I noticed on the subway yesterday there were ads everywhere for a new PSP game... consisting of Pac Man, Ms Pac Man, Galaxian, Galaga, Dig Dug, Rally X and New Rally X bundled on one CD. The funny thing is, it's probably the first PSP release I've seen that I'd really be interested in. I guess I'm not the only one, considering the ads were all over the place.

[Vectrex]

I had a good game of soldat yesterday and it's way cooler than I thought the first time I played a while ago. He definately shouldn't let you customise your player at all though until you pay. There's very little noticable difference as far as I can tell between registered and non-registered versions.

[princec]

Oh but there is :) I've got red jets, and a star next to my name. Ph34r me! For I will pop a Ruger-shaped round in your head from a great distance.

Cas :)

[princec]

Ah now, naughty naughty, posting without checking first ;)

Cas :)

[baegsi]

And finally I'm thinking that'll be the last game I probably write for years, and I'll just keep making it better and better and luring more and more people.Cas, do you intend do have a subscription based model or would it be a one time payment? If the latter, I'm wondering how you plan to get a steady income stream, because sooner or later your game will reach a peak, don't you think?

Would be interesting to know how many registrations Soldat has. I'd say, those kind of games can be pretty much compared to donation/merchandise-driven software. I don't know if there are many examples that make a substantial income, does someone know any? Spybot comes into my mind, I believe the author got quite some amount. But the thing is: Spybot serves a real need, its probably much easier to build a fanbase this way.

[princec]

I've got 3 plans to make money out of the game:

1. The good old fashioned approach of selling extra features; that's the usual conversion rate thing. The game will always be free forever but the cool stuff will be available for a onetime fee. Cool stuff means interesting weaponry in this case.

2. Clans. I plan to charge another one time fee to officially register a clan. Clans have a home server, but they can invade other servers and "pwn" them. So there should end up being a lot of clan rivalry. Will be keeping clan stats. Hopefully the nerd factor will be quite compelling enough to lure another $19.95 out of people. Especially as I'll probably make a few more goodies available in the game for clan members.

3. Merchandise. I've been thinking about selling tshirts and mugs and hats and stuff for ages. This is probably going to be my first stab at it for definite.

Cas :)

[baegsi]

Do you or someone else have any example of a similar business model that worked? It doesn't have to be games, even not software, but I think it would be easier to estimate what's needed to be successful and what could come if it's been done before.

Merchandising. I have absolutly no idea how willing people are to pay for that. I guess, one need a really good brand and fanbase in order to make substantial money out of it. How well? It sounds cool indeed but difficult to predict.

If you don't mind nagging you more: how long to think you will need to set up the game and servers etc and how long do you think it will take until you could make a living from that (or how long are you willing to hang on)? The reason I ask is I guess it's going to take long time, maybe 2 years including development, until it could start to pay off. With that kind of model that is hard to predict, you need much motivation.

What I'm trying to say is: right now you can, as you said, hack a new game in six months. Once you have it, you don't have to think about it much more. You already learned a lot and you can make any kind of games. If it doesn't sell, you can try to make a complete different game next time. The new model needs much more work and stamina to make it a success and it's therefore more difficult to drop it.

I'm just rambling here. If you really want to make it because you want that game become real, of course you should do it. But if you only do it because you don't have success right now, it could be that you just change the dependency on portals against dependency on convincing users to pay for something that is free, which takes more time than convincing people to pay for something that is not free.

[baegsi]

I found one by myself (it's not a game): http://www.happytreefriends.com/, chances are high you heard about them. They built a loyal fanbase over the web with free stuff and sold DVDs and merchandising and made it a huge success.

[princec]

You've been reading my mind!
"Senseless Violence", as the game is currently codenamed, involves cute furry animals blowing each other to bits, and yes, the merchandise is going to try to appeal to people who like Happy Tree Friends (I bought the DVD - beware! It makes your face ache badly from laughing after about 3-4 episodes)

Cas :)

[Daire Quinlan]

You've been reading my mind!
"Senseless Violence", as the game is currently codenamed, involves cute furry animals blowing each other to bits, and yes, the merchandise is going to try to appeal to people who like Happy Tree Friends (I bought the DVD - beware! It makes your face ache badly from laughing after about 3-4 episodes)
Cas :)

Actually theres an idea right there, happy tree friends the game. From what you've written before, your problem has always been exposure. Teaming up with happy tree friends and using their characters to make some wacky completely violently OTT game would surely benefit both parties ...

D.

dammit. I wanted to watch some of the episodes on the site, but the entire site is irretrievably broken on Firefox, and Internet explorer keeps on crashing whenever i try and install flash. aaargh.

[princec]

It'd be good but fraught with complexities which I probably don't have the time to deal with... I'm still a part-time indie dev and probably always will be.

Cas :)