Small game developement making money?

Quote from JasonDarby

benjamin Sometimes you have to compromise... thats the nature of games/software development. If you have the skills and think you can make money out of it, then why not make a hidden object game.

The way i look at it is that you (Im talking generally not specifically you)..its a means to an end. You make some games to generate enough money to create something else that you might have more creative control/investment in.

I really dont have an issue with that way of thinking personally. I know indies like to be independant, but still

If your goal is making money then perhaps the reasoning is true. But even if you generate enough money, who will publish your dream if a lot of the publisher have a bigfish games mentality. I guess you could use the money to self promote and self publish perhaps.

Personally I'm not in it for the money. I do create games I like and most of them were picked up by one or more publishers making me some nice pocket money. So I don't care what kind of games bigfish wants, it's not what I enjoy creating. I've got a good job, so I don't rely on the money at all. Game creation has been a good learning experience for me. It's taken me to places I may have never reached otherwise. It has expanded and enhanced my graphics skills so much that I'm able to create comics and recently have started illustrations for children's books. So even if I wouldnt have made any money from the games, it still has helped me in developing some skills, which are very useful for me now.

I really like creating games, but I really love doing computer gfx. Game creation has been a stepping stone for me.

Relating to some earlier posts, what is the "Hidden Object" type genre? I have never heard of it before.

You get a clue, and you need to look through a picture with tons of random things in it, like: If they give you a clue, you need to figure out that they mean a trumpet, and then find the trumpet in the picture. They are generally timed and you can only 'false click' so many times.

Eg. Naughty Teacher on Addicting Games. I don't have a link (sorry! )

Those games are really boring =/ Has anyone noticed that ALWAYS in the comments people say that they are boring stupid, and a waste of time, yet the creator still creates them and they get worse? I hope most of us here have the common sense to stop making a game if all reviews are bad on dozens of previous versions.

Which reminds me of another question that I was never answered...

Have any MMF2 games been on AddictingGames? If not, is there anything stopping us?

Eliyahu, lol. That's what you think. Enjoy not being the core demographic, and being totally oblivious to the market. Most of you don't get it, and that's fine by me. More customers for us who are brave enough to make games that lots of people actually want to play.

Quote from Eliyahu

Those games are really boring =/ Has anyone noticed that ALWAYS in the comments people say that they are boring stupid, and a waste of time, yet the creator still creates them and they get worse? I hope most of us here have the common sense to stop making a game if all reviews are bad on dozens of previous versions.

First I'll assume you are actually being serious. Secondly, hidden object games can be astoundingly popular. A few have even gone on to sell hundreds of thousands of copes. Just because you're not into them, doesn't mean that the core casual audience that you're clearly underestimating isn't.

Eliyahu

You are not the target audiance for those casual games. This has been told many times on the board: those are Woman, 29+. The Casual Market is dominated by female buyer. They like those games, that is why they are beeing made. Same for Match Three and time management.

Reflexive attracts also male purchaser, so they host games like Westward, Be a King, Crimsonland, Eschalon Book 1, Fast Crawl, King Mania, Alien Shooter and many more. Those are RPG, Strategy and Action. I'm not saying female players do not enjoy them but male player come into the market too. So Reflexive offers a bit more for the male casual market.

If you want to make a successfull start into Indi Game Development you have to address the proper target audience.

I'm not a fan of Hidden Object Games too, but played a few and they where pretty decent in gameplay and presentation.

This topic has been discussed a lot in the past.

Please see the topic:
MMF2 for a living
Please login to see this link.

Forum user Ace, has some great input there.

Making a living selling games with MMF2 is definitely possible. BUT chances are that the game idea you or anyone of us if toying with in our mind, will probably not sell. It's somewhat easier to take a look at whats popular and does sell eg. Hidden Object games, and work on such a game. Anyway you go about it is fair in my book, as long as you enjoy your work.

Another advice Ace gives, that I've heard many times is that you should spend as much time on marketing that you spend on developing.

I did admit that I actually hate those games, but I think it must be that males are more....agressive?...and they are the ones who comment on those games. I am just saying that majority of comments on those games are not good, but the casual audience could just not be presenting themselves.

But still I think that the creator of those games would see that a lot of people are not enjoying them and take some sort of action... I don't know.

EDIT: I can't edit my above post so I'll say here, that I was not trying to be as rude as it sounded, but users should be aware of what people are saying about their games. Also, I was thinking of the naughty games on AddictingGames as someone else said. I went on Big Fish and saw some other Hidden Object games and those look quality, and the one I played was actually fun. My post was more focused on the ones at AddictingGames, which are not good even at its genre's standards.

I was wondering about this also and if they make much money as i see everyone going on about bigfish games and other portals yet it seems they take a giant cut of the profits.

They probably have a big userbase but that doesn't mean definate sales. Also im guessing since they always have new games it would mean making one that was popular would fall out of interest fast.

Eliyahu, go to the casual communities and read the comments there. Obviously if there is a discussion on a primarily core forum people will be saying that the games suck.

Atom, they do take a huge cut from profit, but they also have all of the power, all of the audience. Basically they have a very big customer base of people who know that they like certain types of games, and at the price they sell games it's almost an impulse buy on every game of a genre that the customer likes. If you make casual games you can't do it without portals, and if you make core games it's much harder to work with portals (you have to do more marketing and community building on your own, think wolfire.com or datarealms.com ). With casual games piracy isn't as much of a deal, but with core games your target audience is also the largest demographic of pirates, so it can hurt more.

I've always had a hard time with marketing whether being a game or a comic book. I used to try to make and sell my own comic books back in the 90's until some bigtime publisher decided to kill off a well-known superhero and the entire comic book industry went south. The gaming biz is just as difficult unless you know what gamers want-though I wonder if they want a game with great graphics -and- a great game; or a great game with mediocre graphics.

Quote from Pkeod

Atom, they do take a huge cut from profit, but they also have all of the power, all of the audience. Basically they have a very big customer base of people who know that they like certain types of games, and at the price they sell games it's almost an impulse buy on every game of a genre that the customer likes. If you make casual games you can't do it without portals, and if you make core games it's much harder to work with portals (you have to do more marketing and community building on your own, think wolfire.com or datarealms.com ). With casual games piracy isn't as much of a deal, but with core games your target audience is also the largest demographic of pirates, so it can hurt more.

Thanks for the info, i was thinking this might be the case. If the userbase is big enough and the sales come in it would be worth it just for this. Do they also sell boxed copys of the games in major retailers etc or in a bundle pack? If they do and it's global it would probably make decent money from it or at least for a while.

Another possibly big game thing would be a MMORPG if they get the user base because most of these have some sort of monthly/yearly subscription. So if it worked well it would draw a constant stream of funds to further development, cover server costs and make profits.

Atom, retail isn't worth it... unless you can get a good deal, but most deals are not a good deal. If in the future you do get a retail deal always get money up front, never accept just royalties!

MMORPG: No, never. Even million dollar funded MMOS fail. The only way you can compete is to offer a completely free game (selling premium items or other things), and then it still has to be good and new. You will have to spend a lot of time coding the game, and a lot of money on paying artist to make good art, all to give it away for free. Don't underestimate server costs even for starting out. Not worth it.

If you don't want to make casual games then look to DaTa for inspiration, and what he's doing with Cortex Command. He's been building his game over time and selling it for years now. With every update more people buy the game, even though it's not even near finished in terms of content. Check him out Please login to see this link.

Ok thanks for the info. In terms of a rpg i plan to make one in the style of FF7 at some point selling it maybe but it probably won't be a MMO at first.

Im a artist and also a musician/sound designer so i won't need to pay others for that i doubt unless i made a giant project and needed extra help. Servers sound like they cost too much from what you say unless it's a big and popular project. I will most likely try making a few casual games also, not my favorite types of games however i like puzzle games and sims style stuff and it seems the portals like these a lot.

Cortex Command looks amazing is this being made in MMF? It looks like it's sort of like worms which is a great game.

Well, it seems that by limiting their range of games to a consistent template, then they can guarantee what their clientele gets game wise. They've built their reputation on a certain category of games.

So you won't be seeing much creativity along those lines.

00J, If your game is genuinely good fun, the graphics are at least OK, and it's family friendly the portals will distribute it. They won't distribute something that looks terrible, and they won't distribute anything that's explicit. The popular genres will still outsell everything else.

Atom, not MMF, but the same game could certainly be made in MMF.

Regardless if you don't want to make casual games. Look to them for good, user friendly design principles.

Brian

To be honest, most of the games which are popular are simple games like bejewelled, solitaire etc. Look at the Iphone top apps and you will see a lot of them are small and addicting games that you can easily pick up and play whenever you feel like it.
Most of those games arn't my idea of a great game, but they are long proven to be popular and there must be some decent money it them when so many people are creating such games.
I'm not making games for the money. Im making games because I love games. But if I was going for the money I would make a simple card or puzzle game, or another tetris clone.