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Making A Fortune From Casual Games
hapwned writes "In yet another interesting article from the Escapist, Allen Varney has a piece on the ludicrous amount of money you can make from small, downloadable flash-type games that most Americans play. From the article: 'Which American designer personally made the most money last year from computer games he or she designed? Not the most money for a company, mind you, nor for a studio or licensor, but individual, take-home, taxable income. Was it a famous game god? John Carmack, Will Wright, Sid Meier, Warren Spector? Probably not. It was probably some guy you never heard of who wrote some little shareware game you never heard of. Those "casual games" - the puzzles and Mahjongg tilesets and card games and Breakout clones and match-three Bejeweled-type things - are downloaded, and sell, in numbers some game gods only dream about. Over the lengthy life of a successful casual game, the independent ("indie") designer can make serious, serious money - high six-figures and low sevens. Personally.'"
I'm currently a homebrew GBA game developer, and I am considering trying the SWF platform. Is there any decent SWF authoring software that's less expensive than Macromedia Flash and suitable for developing games?
But the bigger reason is accessability. My mom has purchased a couple of these games. They are simple, not twitched based (the ones she buys, she's not good at that kind of stuff), and easy for her to find and buy online. She can play them for a quick few minutes, or spend more than an hour playing them. In every way they are more accessible than a big console game.
And these are basically the same kind of games a cell phone games which are also exploding (and what do you expect when many of them cost $5 A MONTH to play here in the US).
I've tried my hand at it, and I intend to do it again. I'd love to be the next person to make a little game that goes BIG to become the next Bejeweled or Snood. My little game is on my website, and you just need Java 5 to play it, if you're interested.
Comment forecast: Bits of genius surrounded by a sea of mediocrity.
Isn't that why these games are successful though? Because they're so easy to get? Since when was the Sourceforge download page easy for new-users to navigate?
Linkage for the text-only version for SMS/people-with-a-800x600-resolution/aversion-for- the-current-design/people-who-like-scrolling.
Seems to me, small, simple time-wasters will be just as big a market for people on the go soon. Mobile phones and PDAs are just as capable of running this type of game, and you can play them when you are stuck on the train or whatever too.
Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
Wrong link, apparently the text version only does one article instead of the entire issue /rollseyes
Here ya go for varney's article: Linkage
"Next" button at bottom of the screen.
They have the power and magic and elegance of simplicity without being too dumb. They cater for the widest variety of consumers ...
And though I wouldn't personally shell out a single cent for any of them (the free versions being enough for the casual break) I'm not surprised they do get people to pay up.
Lots of small change makes for a fortune ...
"I'm never quite so stupid as when I'm being smart" (Linus van Pelt)
While this makes horse-sense to me, I'd still like to see some numbers. There have to be some examples out there. I wonder if ringtone sales work the same way?
Time to create graphics and gameplay for a simple arcade clone:
I've done it in 120, lets be extravagant and say 320 (2 whole months).
Set a cheap price: $5
Set a goal for wages: $50/hr
So the amount of money you want to bring in for your game, disregarding the tiny amount of advertising you might do, would be about 320*$50. At five dollars a game, thats just 3200 copies.
Sell 3000 copies of a game people already love for dirt cheap and make $50/hr? Sign me up!
Forget about going head to head with EA, or Ubisoft! If I can just make beer money with little flash games, I'll be quite happy. Seriously, with little overhead and some quirky, addictive games, the small timer can do quite well picking up quarters that the EA's cannot really afford to reach. That's what I mean by conquering the world one pixel at a time. Now if I could just get those titles finished!
To the making of books there is no end, so let's get started
I've thought about trying to enter this world for a long time, but I frequently run up against two problems:
1) lack of long term attention span
2) artistic ability
The closest I've ever come to a functional game is demonstrated by the stunningly cutting edge and innovative game, PigShooter. (I use the worlds "stunningly", "cutting edge", "innovative", and "game" somewhat loosely...)
Hexy - a strategy game for iPhone/iPod Touch
In my defense, I have a "Previous" button at the bottom of the page, but no "Next". The page looks misrendered, though, so I'm probably getting cut off at the right. I'd consult the PDF, but can't get it to open...
What I'm listening to now on Pandora...
To me, the interesting part of this is the implication that FINALLY a business and distribution model has emerged. Apparently not quite "micropayments", but it's interesting that games can get the attention they need, and then get people to fork over some dough... ...besides the spur of Internet distribution via fancy websites, is the model much different than what Id used back in the day, here are some levels, pay us for more?
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
IIRC, totally written by one guy. And sold at least several hundred thousand units, spawned what seems like a dozen sequels and expansion packs. Chris Sawyer.
"Sometimes a woman is a kind of religion, she can save your soul & set you free from all your sins" - Bad Examples
If you want to develop for Windoze, I'd still would recommend GameMaker by Mark Overmars.
Its easy to use and quite powerful. 2D games are a breeze to make and since version 6, you can now make 3D games as well.
The GML programming language is very simular to object oriented C so you can make your games as complex as you would like to.
The forums are also a great resource for people just getting started.
DEAD DEAD DEAD DELETE ME
The article uses a truly awful flash-based reader. I had a hard time getting past the first page, too.
It's a great article but they should really dump that Flash, especially since lousy Flash font handling makes it a great deal harder to read than a HTML site. Why do people insist on spending weeks or months to create an interface that's worse than what already exists in standard HTML?
That being said, horizontal scroll all the way to the right side of the screen and you'll see "Next". You have to have a really wide screen to access this page properly.
Hope that helps.
D
While these one-hit wonders are nice in the short run, lets face it. These kinds of games are hit or miss. For every Bejeweled, theres hundreds, if not thousands of other games out there that get almost no public attention.
Probably? But who was it really?
Hey, it's my OPINION that dogs have eight legs and make a sound like a car horn every time they take a piss.
The target audience for the big games is largely computer enthusiasts, people with high spec machines who know how to play games. These are also people that are more likely to circumvent copy protections. The target audience for the small games is more casual gamers, office workers with too much time, mum's and dad's that just use the PC here and there. These people are less likely to know how to get these games without paying and are not to fussed to shell out $10 to unlock a small shareware game.
IIRC, he did most of the development for BC3000 on his own. I know that Take2 did some work and provided some artwork for it, all controversy aside it seems he did quite well off of it.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
Good, so we've heard the success stories (which is all the author really mentions). What about the legions of shareware developers that just make a decent living (nothing wrong with that) without making a fortune? And what about the ones that soon have to find something else to do when they can't pay their bills?
It's just like rock bands. You only hear about the successful ones. You never hear about all the very decent bands that, 20 years later, are still playing in ordinary bars in front of an audience of 3.
(trivia: The Police once played in front of an audience of 2!)
Give me a break, "most Americans" do not play Flash games. What do you base that on?
I don't think it has anything to do with Flash. Looks like some pictures in a table, and they just DHTML/CSS the text over the correct area of the images.
Or click on the Text link to read without all the flash.
Here's a shortcut
The Escapist - Casual Fortunes
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/print/8/14
__________
Don't belong. Never join. Think for yourself. Peace!
I beg your pardon? Where did your see the flash? It's well laid out XHTML1.0 + CSS.
Actually, it's so well done, it even validates by w3c standards, something your own site doesn't.
I can even read "The Escapist" in links!
Hack your mind out of its sandbox.
That probably depends on what are your goals. If you want to get a job in the industry as a level designer or modeler or something, I think a mod is the way to go. If you want to make your own games and go indie, make your own game :)
My website
TRIGLAV RPG
This game (and the engine behind it) utilizes some really nice DHTML footwork to create something real close to the isometric look and feel of Diablo and similar games.
Another game I found while looking around:
DHTML Arkanoid
This one appears to work with all browsers, and even has nice sound effects.
Both of these examples show that you don't necessarily need to have Flash or know Java to create these types of games - it is possible to do them using only browser-based technologies and/or some server side work.
Just to throw in another "buzzword" - AJAX-based gaming!
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
why have you been told not to move?
I have never lived alone, always with family or a college roommate. I have never learned to drive, although that might not be as much of a problem in Europe. The vocational rehabilitation agency I'm working with is limited to the State of Indiana, and my case worker is not sure that I would qualify for vocational rehabilitation assistance under the different rules that apply outside Indiana and especially outside the United States.
let me know if you'd like my help. i can set you up with people who can help you find a place to stay and maybe even be able to get you a job directly.
If you really mean it, then please e-mail me through my contact page.
they won't reject anyone with an education
"An education" meaning a B.S. in computer science, or meaning a master's?
That article is just fluff. That's why they put those large pictures in the background. To distract you from the fact that the actual article is barely informative.
OK, I'll switch rails here and get more specific: The article makes it sound like:
A. It's easy
B. EVERYONE gets rich.
C. EVERY independant and/or casual game sells crazy numbers.
This is so far from the truth. And the writer avoids the key reasons WHY some casual games are huge hits: MARKETING. It's quite easy to sell huge numbers of a game like Bejeweled when it's featured on SO MANY (All?) casual game websites.
Now if Joe Shareware writes a game that's got ALL the key points a good original game requires, does that guarantee the same sales as Bejeweled?! Of course not! No one will buy Joe's game if no one has heard, seen, or played Joe's game!!! This is true of any commodity. Making the public aware your product exists is half the battle.
I'll take your word that the subject site does validate, and that it's not Flash, but there's no question that a lot of people have a very hard time navigating it.
If it's hard to navigate, does it really matter that it validates?
And if my site is clear and easy to navigate, does it really matter that it doesn't validate?
I looked at the validation report, and for the most part it's things like attributes that should have been quoted that I didn't quote. I do that because I find the page easier to read and maintain that way.
I don't understand the point of being anal as the validators are, as long as my intent is clear, ambiguous and interpreted correctly by all known web browsers.
D
David, the point of validation is that an SGML parser can effectively process and output your page on any display, or convert it in any other dialect (RSS, et al).
Usability also means "usable in any situation", which in turn means "with any hardware/software that complies with universally accepted standards". Note the "standards" part.
A lot of code wizards I know don't take the time in making their personal pages validate, RMS is an example. But then, don't criticize people that put effort in doing things the "right way". The only element that violates normally accepted usability notions is that the - perfect understandable and non redundant - navigation menu is at the bottom right instead of on top. This is done for esthetic reasons: they wanted to introduce an innovative design that takes the best elements from digital paper without the hassle of using externa, bloaty software, copying the design of a typical glossy magazine. It's a thousand times more interesting than your typical Gamespy template. No ads, no annoying flash menus, no cruft... just the article and the textual navigation menu at the bottom. What's so hard about that?
Also, David, for Christs sake, you're an IT professional aren't you?. You don't have to take my word for it, you can verify that for yourself, or don't you usually take the effort to check things out before signing them off?
Hack your mind out of its sandbox.