Approaching portals - lots of questions

[Desktop Gaming]

Hello.

I have a game in progress... nowhere near finished but its at a playable stage. Having done a load of games before and sold all the IP every time, there is no way I'll go down that route again ever. I'm looking at portals.

At what stage should I be approaching portals? Will they expect my game to be complete and bug-free? Is a working 'prototype' enough? They're probably going to ask that I change bits of it anyway, I assume?

And what of NDA's? Worth bothering with, or over-cautiousness?

Which portals should I be looking at? Any I should avoid?

What royalty rates can I expect?

[cliffski]

why assume portals are the answer, you can try selling direct. Portals arent always the best business model. Im guessing current royalty rates are around 25%, around as low as they are in retail ;(

[Desktop Gaming]

why assume portals are the answer, you can try selling direct.Because I'm a programmer, not a salesman.

[Sakura Games]

Sad but true, selling online nowadays doesn't differ too much from selling retail. Lot of new titles coming out every week, portals selling gamepacks (4-5 games for 20$) or gamepass (a game for $6), very small royalties, and so on.
You require lot of time to market properly a game - or money. Either you pay for PR, google adwords, a good file hosting etc, or you give up and just hope a portal pick your title.

[Nauris]

Well, there`s one difference that seems to matter to Gfk- portals usually are not after your IP. In that regard they`re Walmart not Activision.

[Phil Steinmeyer]

Portal royalty rates are higher than 25% - roughly 28-42% for a more-or-less unknown developer, depending on the portal.

Best sales channel depends on what kind of game he's made. If he's made a unique, niche product that he can get the word out about independently, then selling via his own website makes sense. But if the game is designed in a way that fits into the portal/casual market, then he will likely make far more money selling via portals than on his own.

[Savant]

Because I'm a programmer, not a salesman.
Then find a salesmen to work with you because unless you've created the next Bejeweled, going through portals will barely keep you afloat.

[Bmc]

Then find a salesmen to work with you because unless you've created the next Bejeweled, going through portals will barely keep you afloat.


Like you would know.

[Sakura Games]

Like you would know.
Maybe he talked with some developers. Hard to know/trust anyone without any concrete figures/sales stats though... :)

[Savant]

Like you would know.
No, you're right, I have NO idea what I'm talking about.

[TimS]

1.) -- Approach them with the complete game. Some will look at unfinished games, but it's problematic for them to do so usually because you may never finish it. If they do look at it unfinished, it's out of kindness, curiosity, or boredom, and the exchange will inevitably end with "Well show it to us again when it's done.", since they obviously can't do much with it.

2.) -- Aside from the not caring to look at a prototype, portals will also not ask you to change things (save maybe a splash screen or logo). The guys who look at prototypes and ask you to change things are Publishers. If you're specifically looking to take a prototype to someone and get them to tell you what to do to make it great, as well as fund it and find distribution for you, then Publishers are the guys you want to talk to after all. Folks like PlayFirst, iWin, Oberon, etc. will do this, but it had better be a very good prototype and yourself or your team had better have reasonably demonstrable experience with development.

3.) -- Make your betatesters and employees sign NDA's -- publishers and portal reps won't even look at 'em, I'd wager. If you already have a multimillion dollar licensing deal or you're a big-name game designer, they might humor you by signing such things, but otherwise, it'll just elicit a chuckle, methinks.

4.) -- As for royalty rates, it'll vary a lot depending on who you get to. I suppose saying expect 20% -> 60% doesn't mean much of anything. The key is to get on as many portals as you can, and let the madness of the nickel and dime math sort itself out. Oh, and if you go the publisher route, remember that they don't typically pay out royalties until your cut gets past the initial advance, and after that they're still in for a cut (so you might get 60% of 30%, instead of the retailer's orginal 30% cut.

5.) -- Go the direct sales route also. Portals and Direct Sales are not mutually exclusive. If you stay away from retailers that want an exclusive on the game, there's certainly no harm in keeping all of your titles available from your own site. If you really don't like the PR/marketing/sales stuff, it might be worth considering finding a publisher, since in that instance you only have to sell it once, to them. Remember, if you don't already have a website with decent traffic, you will need quite a bit of time, money, and effort invested before you start seeing a stream of income from direct sales. Direct sales (like really anything in this Indie madness) requires patience...

Much of the above is very invalid if you have a Mega Hit on your hands, so it should be read from the assumption that you don't (no offense! ;) )

-Tim

[Davaris]

Try PopCap. The last I heard they were offering 50%. Also they were saying they'll arrange art/sound for a game (it will come out of your end) if they think it will help sales. They seem like fair people to me and I'm going to offer them my next game.

[Tertsi]

That would be 50% off of popcap.com and 50% of [Developer cut]% of other sites, right?

[Polycount Productions]

Hello.

I have a game in progress... nowhere near finished but its at a playable stage. Having done a load of games before and sold all the IP every time, there is no way I'll go down that route again ever. I'm looking at portals.

Good. Besides portals you might want to consider publishers.

I wrote a small entry about portals here (http://www.gameproducer.net/2006/05/04/how-to-get-your-casual-game-to-major-portals/). It might be somewhat useful.

At what stage should I be approaching portals? Will they expect my game to be complete and bug-free? Is a working 'prototype' enough? They're probably going to ask that I change bits of it anyway, I assume?
I belive it should be finished & polished. They might require some elements (like certain type of polished graphics, high click-to-reward ratio or something) and can ask you to contact them later with different game. I suggest checking the 'best selling games' on different portals, that should give you idea about what kind of games portals are looking for.

And what of NDA's? Worth bothering with, or over-cautiousness?
Best selling games (at casual portals) are copied faster than... something that moves very fast. You can use NDAs, but I'm not sure how useful they are. Papers are in the end... just papers. But - if you feel you should have them, then have them.

Which portals should I be looking at? Any I should avoid?
I believe bigfishgames.com is a great portal. There are other listed here:
http://forums.indiegamer.com/showthread.php?t=2720 and http://www.logler.com/2006/04/28/casual-games-portals-major-list-third-edition/

What royalty rates can I expect?
I believe 30% is pretty standard.

[impossible]

Try PopCap. The last I heard they were offering 50%. Also they were saying they'll arrange art/sound for a game (it will come out of your end) if they think it will help sales. They seem like fair people to me and I'm going to offer them my next game.
Yes, but its also pretty apparent that they'll only work with proven developers with established track records (Phil, Raptisoft, etc.) They also publish very few games.

Unless you have something really incredible that the guys at Popcap absolutely love I'd expect they'll just ignore you. I'm sure once you're with Popcap its a nice, but its much easier to get on Bigfish games or Realarcade.

[Phil Steinmeyer]

I think with an unproven developer, PopCap, or any other 'big' casual publisher (Playfirst, etc), will be interested first and foremost in your game.

If it's very good, well-polished, and looks like a game that can compete with the best other casual games out there, they'll be happy to talk to you.

If it's rather rough/unpolished, but "I promise it'll be as good as [current #1 game XYZ] in a couple months", they'll brush you off and/or tell you to come back in a couple months (when it truly is as good as game XYZ)

[Davaris]

That would be 50% off of popcap.com and 50% of [Developer cut]% of other sites, right?

Don't know. As they will be handling marketing and distribution they'll be getting the best deal they can for you and themselves. Being PopCap, I'm sure they'll be able to get a better deal than most Indies.

Anyway you can find more info at the PopCap developer program.

Unless you have something really incredible that the guys at Popcap absolutely love I'd expect they'll just ignore you. I'm sure once you're with Popcap its a nice, but its much easier to get on Bigfish games or Realarcade.


I don't know about that. The last game I saw on PopCap was from an outside developer and didn't have much in the way of game play. It was a side scrolling shooter. So I think they are expanding their horizons. Also they are asking people to submit games (made with their framework) to them before anyone else so they are on the look out for new games.

[Bmc]

If you have something good to offer, you won't have to work that hard to get people to want to work with you.

[arcadetown]

Here we get a lot of submissions and weeding through them fast is top priority. I suspect other portals are the same. We typically like to see...

- link to a game description page with following...
- professional looking web page, quite honestly good web pages more likely hold good games that sell.
- screen shots for quick measure of game type and production quality.
- appropriate $10 - $20 pricing, like to see $20 norm, don't like $6 games for example.
- lastly downloadable to sample the game.

Unless you know the partner, I'd wait for a mostly finished product as sales wise it's easiest to say what is good. Avoid explaining "but" or "will have" as it dilutes your sales proposition. Suggest getting alpha stage feedback from appropriate sources, cold calling portals is not the best way to do that though.