Sell More Games

I am sure you’ve heard the 5th Symphony of Beethoven: taa-taa-taa-taammm. The initial motif of the symphony has sometimes been credited with symbolic significance as a representation of Fate knocking at the door. Well, two weeks ago it knocked at my door.

Apple seems to like my games. Everytime I submit our game to Apple downloads it is rated high and gets good coverage. I have also found out that Apple stuff tries to find good software on their own. That’s how they picked Path of Magic (after PR). But somehow they found out about Pony World, added it to their catalogue and made it featured game for kids.

In the first day we received over 2000 downloads and it didn’t dried off quickly. But we received just one! order. Imagine my shock and disappointment. When your game gets 0.02% CR it is a dissaster.

The problem is – the game was not fully ready to be launched. We added it to our catalog to get players feedback, but without pushing it to hard to the crowds. It was also Mac Intel only.

Once Apple featured us we quickly released Universal Binaries and fixed 2 or 3 bugs. That made a trick. CR increased to 0.5%. It’s not a good one, but it’s soo much better than 0.02%. I knew that the game may not sell like fire… that’s why we’ve been working on Pony World Deluxe for last 3 months. Still, 0.02% is something hard to believe for a game like Pony World.

It shows that Power PC has still very big share on Macs. Don’t even try to fool yourself with Mac Intel only release. It will not get you far.

It also shows that you never know when or who can feature you – and once it happen – you better be ready!

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It’s been a month since my last post. Some could think that I dropped the idea of blogging… and I am here again to tell you that there will be few very interesting posts coming in the nearest futere.

First of all, I haven’t been blogging for one reason – I was focused on Runes of Avalon 2. I was also working on Pony World Deluxe. Getting the games ready for launch is very time consuming, but I’ve learned a lot and I will share my experience with you.

Here’s what I will talk about in the next few posts:

– From 0.8% to 3.6% CR – how I improved CR from a crappy one to a stellar one
– Are you ready to be picked by Apple? I was not!
– Get in top10 or die! Big Fish Games Top 100 analysis inspired by Jake from Grey Alien Games.
– Importance of beta testing

So see you soon.

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So I already told you why it is good to work with publishers. Unfortunately working with publishers isn’t great for all the time. Even if the deal looks great on paper, sometimes it doesn’t work out for you. It doesn’t work out for many reasons, but here are my top 3.

#3 Less creative freedom

Once someone agree to put money into your game he may want to have creative control over your game. Most often both sides will work to make the game the best thing on earth, but it may happen, that you’ll be forced to add or remove features that doesn’t go with your ideas.

Remember, you have the passion for your game. Employees of your publisher may not.

#2 Lack of experience

Yeah, I know how does it sound, but believe. Just because they are cold publishers, doesn’t mean they are experienced in the area you are wanting them to be. Need an example? Great retail publisher doesn’t have to be great online publisher (and vice versa).

If you work on a casual game, make sure your publisher can provide you quality beta tests. And put it in contract! Casual game success depends a lot on gameplay balancing and without a real player testing your game it is not possible to catch all weak points in your game. Some devs advice to test game mechanic on every stage of development. Make sure to test it after each bigger change in gameplay mechanic.

#1 Money

Early cash advance is great, but then you have to wait for a long time before the flow of cash comes in… It can take 4 mothns (best case scenario) or… but it may never happen. Your publisher takes 50% or more of your game NET revenue and needs to recoupe your advance first.

Publishing online is quite easy. It can take some time, but it’s not worth giving away 50% of your games revenue. The only reason to go with a publisher in this case is only when you can’t get there without him… and there are only 2-3 places that will not work with indie developers directly (AOL, Yahoo). So sign a deal to publish your game only on those two portas. Submit your game yourself to the others.

Your publisher may want to trick you that he will get a better deal with a portal than you do on your own. I really doubt it (mine didn’t). Portals just don’t feel like giving more to anyone and it doesn’t matter for them if you’re small or not. Of course, they may want to try to give you lower royalties, but it doesn’t mean that you have to agree. Learn to say no. Negotiate. It is a great skill in the long run.

And last but not least… let’s say your game is not so hot as it seemed to be. With so many titles in publishers portfolio they may just don’t work that hard on monetizing your game, cause they may have better converting game. If you sign exclusive you’re screwed. Your game is probably all you have… you’ve been working on it for 6, 9, 12 or more months. You need to make those money back. Even if your game is not so well converting among all other games it may still be the best converting game in your portfolio. Keep at least the right to sell from your own website.

Whatever you choose – good luck!

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If you could ask software journalist about the biggest disappointment of the year 2007 most of them would say: Windows Vista. I am pretty sure that there’s a lot of reasons behind that… and I just found one yesterday on my own. I’ve setup new computer for my mother. It did come with Windows Vista Home (or Basic) edition. I installed Runes of Avalon and … it doesn’t work.

It’s not the game’s fault. It’s Software Passport aka Armadillo that is not compatible with Vista. There is of course a new version that is compatible with Vista, but guess what… there’s no upgrade, you need to buy full new license. What the heck? Not only Armadillo doesn’t protect you against piracy (Runes of Avalon had been cracked one day after release) but they force you to buy new license (300$) to get your software compatible with new Windows.

Lucky me, Vista users correspond to only 12% of ANAWIKI website visitors so I can focus on finishing Runes of Avalon 2 before switching to home made DRM solution. I will either go with separate demo/full version or online activation. We have to do something for Mac and Linux anyway, so no point for paying for new Software Passport that is not cross-platform.

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