best times of the year to launch?

[Robert Cummings]

With retail, this is obviously the run up to christmas/holiday season... but with portals, I bet it's a different story altegether.

What are your theories/thoughts?

[terin]

If I had to pick a date that would be "best" for an indie would would be either right before or right after the GDC. This time of year the indie scene gets special attention paid to it, which increases the odds of coverage tremendously. It is also a slow time for reviewers as it is before E3 prep time and between anything major.

If I had to pick a second-best date it would either be the holiday season (people are still spending loads of money!) or Mid-Late January. Once again, simply because editors are not doing much at that time and it gives you an opportunity to get some media coverage.

This only applies to "non-casual" games. Casual games don't get much coverage unless they are wildly successful no matter what and as I understand it have consistent sales year round (though like everything it picks up for the holiday season).

-Joe

[Robert Cummings]

Thank you Joe, very insightful.

[Coyote]

The "off" season (springtime / early summer) is sometimes a good choice simply because of the traditional lack of major releases during that time. There's always a huge push for Christmas, so September through December is huge... and then from January to March you get all the games that were trying to have a Christmas release but just didn't make it. April through July are usually pretty dead months, but then the hype machine starts throttling up to full for the Christmas releases again.

I dunno if any of this applies to indie games, which have a tough time getting noticed 12 months a year... :)

[Mike Boeh]

After 5 years of launching titles, I really believe that January is the best month to launch. My sales data shows year after year that this is when there are the most downloads and sales.

Why? Well, I have ideas why, but they're pure speculation....
1. People are inside in cold climates.
2. People have holiday money to spend.
3. Lots of people got new computers for xmas, and their old pc becomes someone else's new hand-me-down pc, creating 2 new perspective customers...
4. Lots of people are on vacation...

[arcadetown]

I say get it out there as soon as possible and get the revenue flowing in otherwise you're just missing X months of income if it's a good seller. If it's not a good seller it doesn't really matter anyhow. Can't comment about other places but most any time is good here with xmas and late spring / summer being particuarly nice and late summer being slowest.

Interesting you guys say that. Here Jan is good but definitely slower than Dec and Apr - early July are also kind. My theory is leading up to vacation people get more busy blowing off steam at work / school and during summer people want something to spend the long hours and increasingly people live in hot climates so are stuck indoors on vacation (reverse of Mike's winter theory). By late summer everyone starts going away on vacation or get more outdoors.

[svero]

I have to agree with Mike. I'd say Jan-Mar is the best period.

- Steve

[baegsi]

If you create an olympics game for example, right before the beginning of the real olympic games could be a good time. Same applied to the american election last year, even cnn did a coverage of election games.

So, if your game deals with any real event I would very much try to align the release date to the real event.

[soniCron]

So, I think the general consensus is any time between September and July. I guess people just don't like August. (I know I don't.) ;)

[arcadetown]

Kind of like the housing market. Seems like always a good reason to buy, interest rates go down then everyone rushes to buy while they're low, rates go up everyone rushes to buy before rates go even higher.

[Hiro_Antagonist]

I had a business manager guy from a major casual publisher tell me recently that summer months are the worst for sales and releases. When he found out I was going to be releasing soon, he encouraged me to wait and release in the fall instead.

Of course, my game isn't a traitional casual/downloadable game, and it will have a long shelf life, so it doesn't really matter when it's released. But I still took heart of what he was saying...

-Hiro_Antagonist

[Chris Evans]

I don't know about sales data, but in terms of media coverage non-casual Indie games can do pretty good between June - August. Usually during this period there's very few retail releases, so gaming news sites are starved for info. You might even get lucky and get picked up by some of the bigger media outlets. It worked for me last year.

You don't necessarily have to launch your title in June - August, but it might be a good idea to get a news piece or preview materials to a few news outlets to generate some hype and get newsletter signups. I think Nov. - Dec. and Apr. - May are the worst months to try to get media coverage as an Indie since the hype for AAA retail games are in full force.

Again, I'm talking about non-casual Indie games. I realize some developers don't like showing off their game until it's virtually complete, but there's a value in generating buzz. I got a lot of newsletter signups before my title was released and many of them turned into sales once the game was out.

[Robert Cummings]

I'm not really talking about coverage, but more buying patterns of people on the portals for casual games.

These people don't have media coverage at all to rely on and they are my main customers. So therefore media coverage won't change a thing...

[James C. Smith]

We also see an increate in sales just after Christmas. Sometimes this is due to the bundling deals we have. If you received a new Logitech Extreme 3D Pro joystick for Christmas (or any Logitech gaming device) it comes with a copy of the Ricochet demo. But even without these bundling deals, our other distribution channels also get a post holiday bump.

However, I wouldn’t plan the launch of a game around this. Ship the game the day it is ready and not a day sooner or later. You don’t want to miss any sales you will get in the “off season” especially since there is a minimal difference in sales at different times of year. It is measurable but not very significant.

[NuclearNova]

From my experience the best time to launch the game is when its finished, otherwise you miss out on months of sales :)

[Anthony Flack]

"get it out there as soon as possible", sure, but there's many different degrees of "possible". Like, maybe you could make a January release if you worked really fast and put in a lot of overtime, and maybe skimp on a few details. Or maybe that's not necessary, and you can shoot for a March release and retain your sanity.

For example.

[arcadetown]

Or maybe that's not necessary, and you can shoot for a March release and retain your sanity.Less talk and more Cletus Anthony :D Those screen shots are looking awesome.

[Robert Cummings]

Still a bit more research is needed here, I think there are hot spot times which are great for portal sellers.

[Jack Norton]

From my experience the best time to launch the game is when its finished, otherwise you miss out on months of sales :)
I agree definitely. I released my Goakeeper game in september but had some annoying bug that occurred in particular team/leagues combination and to get it out soon I didn't test it a lot.
After I fixed it 2 months later, I noticed a great increase in sales (while all you know that the best sales usually occur the month when the game is launched).
So now I take my time before releasing a new game and test it a lot... :o

[Fry Crayola]

Wouldn't it depend a lot on the type of the game, and how you plan to sell it? I mean, you can get the game out there when it's properly ready (as opposed to rushing a release, or holding it off for the ideal time) and then when it's supposed "peak season" is arriving, push the marketing further and get the game known. This wouldn't work if you submit to portals only as it can slip off the radar a lot easier, but if you've a non-casual game that you're distributing yourself, why miss out on the extra sales?

It's not like the main retail market. There is no shelf space and chart position to worry about.

[Chris Evans]

Keep in mind, there's also a delay between when you submit your game on a portal and when it actually appears in their gamelist. It just doesn't show up the next day. There's usually a 2-4 week delay depending on the queue. If you have any technical problems preparing the game, it could be even longer. I've heard some people had to wait almost two months for their games to be listed.

So if you submit your game in early December hoping for a late December release, it could very well end up in January or even February. I think it's better to submit the game to a portal when it's done and after you've sold it on your own site for a few weeks instead of rushing it to a portal.

[Indiepath]

I would also bet on Today or Now. If you plan to sell the game for the next 3-5 years... it's propably good idea to get it out asap.

[Robert Cummings]

You don't seem to understand what I'm saying about the portals. When you release your game on the portals, you get portal exposure for a set amount of time, which can propel you to the top 10.

Providing people are in a buying mood.

If I was selling on my site, then of course I would release it now.

[Indiepath]

@Robert Cummings: Okay...I should have read this thread better but still... even on portals you can make long term deals, and sell the game for 3-5 years. I'm sure there can be better times to launch... but it's possible to encounter bigger competition as well. I'd stick with "now" ;)

[James C. Smith]

You don't seem to understand what I'm saying about the portals. When you release your game on the portals, you get portal exposure for a set amount of time, which can propel you to the top 10.

The difference in sales at different times of year isn't significant enough to worry about it. If portals is your biggest concern then a bigger factor would be what other games are released around the same time as your (or still on the top 10 list for a few months.)

[Fry Crayola]

Kinda like the music industry, in that respect. If you want a number one hit, you have to pay a lot of attention to what else is out. I've heard many stories of record companies moving release dates just to avoid other singles.