It did. I've seen the data on how we sold on Steam versus all those other sites (though I'll point out in Itch and GJ's case those are just my titles so I'm less sure on their actual market power). Perhaps it's just the genre we've put games out in (or our game's aesthetic, its marketing, its price, etc) but in at least the data from what I saw it isn't even a competition as comes 'where are all of our purchases coming from'.
[QUOTE=simkas;51806463]Barely. They're no effort cash ins that get put up in the hopes that some people will get tricked and buy them and will get the dev at least a little bit of money. A higher fee would stop those.[/QUOTE]
It wouldn't. You slip one in, you can keep pumping them out. Even if there's a fee for each release, you can make enough from card baits to keep yourself afloat. It only harms actual serious devs.
[QUOTE=Popularvote;51804998]I'm taking art classes and learning Renpy now. I always hoped I could put a small game up for three bucks and maybe get things going, but I work in the food service industry. There's no way in hell I could afford 1000, let alone 5K.
I feel very crestfallen now.[/QUOTE]
i know im gonna sound like ass for saying this but steam needs less babbies first video game so I don't really feel sorry. The biggest complaint already was people submitting their incomplete first video games that are awful or just not outstanding at all.
[QUOTE=Drury;51806526]It wouldn't. You slip one in, you can keep pumping them out. Even if there's a fee for each release, you can make enough from card baits to keep yourself afloat. It only harms actual serious devs.[/QUOTE]
Not so much though. If recoupable means "make it back with sales", [i]most[/i] bad Greenlight games esp. RPG Maker trash barely earn $1,000 in a year.
If my game makes less than $1000 in the first four months then I should give up now.
Saying 'you'll get it back' doesn't matter when you're already on a tight budget. There's no point in spending money that you'll never see back or have to go bankrupt for the chance of having.
If I default on a loan they'll probably demand I pay them immediately or give up all my profits from the game. I'm not willing to risk defaulting or giving up my IP in the hope that my game makes money at a fast enough rate. It's an adventure/interactive fiction game - exactly how fast do you think that's going to sell, regardless of quality?
It's not that my market doesn't want the game. It's that that market is small. This is going to hurt those small markets as developers like me who're interested in making content for them are just going to say 'I can't prove that I'll make that money back quickly, so I'm going to refuse to make games for that genre'. Which is why the 4X market went to hell and never came back. If Star Ruler 1 never came out, I'm not convinced that it wouldn't still be dead because it'd still look like the market had evaporated when, in fact, all that was true was that it was a smaller, underserved, market that had suffered from a long string of same-y titles who were all blah.
This doesn't just affect indie developers. It also affects niche genres. They're all going to get slammed -- hard -- if the fee for entry is too high.
[QUOTE=simkas;51806483]It is going to stop asset flips, those devs will think twice before paying a $500 fee for every shitty game they put up when they're most likely not going to it back. And for real indie devs, there are now plenty of other places to sell your games that will get pretty decent recognition and when they sell enough copies there, they can then get their game on Steam.[/QUOTE]
I can't speak about exact numbers for Steam but you're completely wrong.
My sales experience.
Steam - Several Thousand
Itch.io - 1
(This is not hyperbole.)
yea the truth of the matter is that steam has a peak of 12,410,991 concurrent users daily, when your game hits the "new releases" feed you're going to have more people seeing it in the first few hours than you ever would have viewers on any random indie game site.
[QUOTE=Firgof Umbra;51806639]If my game makes less than $1000 in the first four months then I should give up now.
Saying 'you'll get it back' doesn't matter when you're already on a tight budget. There's no point in spending money that you'll never see back or have to go bankrupt for the chance of having.
If I default on a loan they'll probably demand I pay them immediately or give up all my profits from the game. I'm not willing to risk defaulting or giving up my IP in the hope that my game makes money at a fast enough rate. It's an adventure/interactive fiction game - exactly how fast do you think that's going to sell, regardless of quality?
It's not that my market doesn't want the game. It's that that market is small. This is going to hurt those small markets as developers like me who're interested in making content for them are just going to say 'I can't prove that I'll make that money back quickly, so I'm going to refuse to make games for that genre'. Which is why the 4X market went to hell and never came back. If Star Ruler 1 never came out, I'm not convinced that it wouldn't still be dead because it'd still look like the market had evaporated when, in fact, all that was true was that it was a smaller, underserved, market that had suffered from a long string of same-y titles who were all blah.
This doesn't just affect indie developers. It also affects niche genres. They're all going to get slammed -- hard -- if the fee for entry is too high.[/QUOTE]
Making games should remain a pasttime or a side project until someone can support themselves through menial labour; most developer success stories are actually from people who do not dedicate all of their time to developing games. Also, in general, game development is less profitable than developing software, with the possible exception of the App Store, which is $100 per year. That's why I chose to specialize in software engineering instead of game design, even though I'll never legally be able to use the title software engineer.
[quote]Making games should remain a pasttime or a side project until someone can support themselves through menial labour; most developer success stories are actually from people who do not dedicate all of their time to developing games. [/quote]
I feel your romanticized views of what an independent developer should be are flawed and should not be canonized in some arbitrary 'the poor need not apply to Steam' situation. I have spent 8 years of my life supporting the creation of games by creating games. I have more than 'paid my dues' and I don't see any further reason for someone to tell me 'you shouldn't make games, professional game developer'.
Indie devs have been all up in arms over steams lack of curation and opening the floodgates, and how it ruins their ability to get noticed in a flood of shit games. This is the indiepocalypse idea that's been going around; steam turning into an App Store or Play Store where there's so much garbage that your stuff will never get noticed. Many devs have suggested curating games again but ironically, 90% of those devs would probably get shot down by the curators.
Steam Direct should be able to keep most of all the crap games (shovelware, asset flips, babbys first game) off of steam and give devs a much better shot at visibility.
So basically it's either;
- keep the price low and let more garbage on steam. This is basically what we have now with greenlight, a flood of shit games that makes it hard for people to notice and buy the actually good games.
- or raise the cost of entry to keep out the shit games. This I think is preferrable because if there are a lot fewer games entering the market then visibility of new games should be much higher, meaning it will be easier for people to find your game and should result in higher sales.
[QUOTE=Firgof Umbra;51806472]Exactly that. You're not stopping people from making asset flips. You're stopping people with genuine products from coming to Steam (which is tantamount to them committing suicide in the present digital storefront climate).
This isn't harming malicious developers. This is harming [I]all[/I] developers.
What's to say those asset flippers don't just say 'well eventually I'll make money'? What makes them any different from any other dev in that respect? You're not going to solve the problem with money because when you do you'll not just be getting rid of asset flippers, you'll just be getting rid of indie developers period (minus those who came from AAA studios).[/QUOTE]
This is most certainly will kill off asset flips. Asset packs are cheap, and if the dev has to pony up 1-5K [I]per flip[/I] then they're certainly not going to make any money from it
[QUOTE=Pelf;51808526]Indie devs have been all up in arms over steams lack of curation and opening the floodgates, and how it ruins their ability to get noticed in a flood of shit games. This is the indiepocalypse idea that's been going around; steam turning into an App Store or Play Store where there's so much garbage that your stuff will never get noticed.[/QUOTE]
Uh, I'd say it's more a group of loud consumers complaining about the lack of curation. Steam's discovery updates have increased sales for a lot of devs. Good games do get noticed, but you're competing with plenty of other good games.
I don't think Valve is planning to put up big barrier. Assets flips would still come in regardless, and you'd only keep legit indies out. But people shouldn't be so worried about the garbage. With the current refund system, reviews and all other community curation sources, it's not bad for consumers at all. I never see asset flips on my Steam store front, or even my discovery queue.
[QUOTE=Clavus;51808543]Uh, I'd say it's more a group of loud consumers complaining about the lack of curation. Steam's discovery updates have increased sales for a lot of devs. Good games do get noticed, but you're competing with plenty of other good games.
I don't think Valve is planning to put up big barrier. Assets flips would still come in regardless, and you'd only keep legit indies out. But people shouldn't be so worried about the garbage. With the current refund system, reviews and all other community curation sources, it's not bad for consumers at all. I never see asset flips on my Steam store front, or even my discovery queue.[/QUOTE]
Yes, the wider steam community has been vocal about wanting better curation, but same with the gamedev community, hence the Indiepocalypse that devs have been talking about.
And I think most asset flips will stop coming in because asset packs are cheap (on the order to 100-500$), and having a 1-5K submission fee increases the amount of sales required to turn a profit by roughly 10x at least. I don't see the business case closing for most asset flippers, though some certainly will still try. But with refunds and better reviews and such, I think SD would be the nail in the coffin for pretty much all flips.
How exactly will increasing the fee keep the shit away?
If someone can pull off more money out of their ass that doesn't mean their product is any better than the crap we're already getting.
What we actually need is real quality control, not higher fees.
-snip-
The amount of copies needed to make back that amount depends entirely on how much the dev is willing to charge. Likewise, what they're willing to charge is going to be typically defined by what their target audience is willing to pay.
Most people aren't willing to pay more than $15 for anything like a visual novel or interactive fiction on Steam. Going with $2-5 seems fairly reasonable in my situation and lands me in that boat you've mentioned - however if the price is above $500 it still leaves me in a pretty pickle.
Again, I'm not going to get paid for two months after my game launches. So there's $500 I'm spending that I can't recover for at the very least two months. That empties out all my savings at my present rate of loss. So if it's any higher than $500 I'm going to have to question whether I can even launch my game on Steam - which really means launching at all.
Some of the services that sold Star Ruler 2 didn't make 100 units in a month. One of those that did is now all but shut down. Itch doesn't have a lot of money-bearing traffic unless you're top on the boards. GameJolt has a money-spending-averse audience still, despite having decent traffic if you can get noticed. Given how I'm not making a zombie FPS game but a niche IF/Adventure point-and-click hybrid my sales will be slower. Since I'm not sure how much slower, I'm also not sure whether I should even try to get on Steam or just pull out now.
This sort of uncertainty that I'm feeling is going to echo through a lot of indie devs and really chill overall enthusiasm at pursuing 'less sure shot' genres or experimental games. Because you not only have to pony up the money -- you also have to live without it until you can make it back on Steam.
200 Units doesn't sound like a lot -- but how feasible that number is depends a lot on how titles that go through Direct are showcased on Steam and what sort of game you're pushing. You also have to remember that you have to have the money to start with. $500 is tough but $1000 is unreasonable. You're talking about asking the average person to buy a Vive and a PS4 at the same time - it's a big ask.
And, in the end, I don't think at that price range $500-1000 is going to stop asset flips. The trouble is: The people who are making asset flips can afford to launch their product just as well as a lot of legitimate, serious, developers. So if you screen them out by making it a poor-filter you're also filtering out any developer who doesn't have that cash. In the end it's not a filter for sincerity/seriousness: It's a filter for poorness. So what is the point in that case of raising it from $100 to $500? All it does is increase burden on legitimate developers who have less money.
Increasing fees does not solve the core problem. Not much will change if steam is unwilling to do actual curation.
-snip-
[quote]there's no reason to flood the Steam with that type of game.[/quote]
Here's the trouble with your logic: What you're basically saying is 'if a genre is unpopular, let it die'. It isn't that I don't have an audience - it's that that audience is smaller than most. They're slower to hear about such new games. So on and so forth.
All your logic advances here is that 'some game genres are more legitimate than others'. Which is, if we're being harsh/blunt, bullshit.
Edit:
[quote]there are other venues for these games.[/quote]
And I've also already debunked this. This is not true. Also, yes, it will stop first projects. It will [i]not[/i] stop asset flips. If you'd like evidence to this respect, I present as my case Greenlight - which didn't stop asset flips but has stopped first projects.
-snip-
[quote]You are doing a straw man argument, I've said nothing about genres or how popular they are[/quote]
Here you are, saying it:
[quote]I'm going to sound harsh but when we talk about money there's no way around it. If you want to make a small product where you don't expect to sell well or if you are inexperienced and new to the scene there are better platforms to sell your game - there's no reason to flood the Steam with that type of game.[/quote]
"Sell well" is relative. Well as relative to what? More popular genres? Then that means you're saying that unpopular genres are less legitimate because there's 'no reason to flood Steam with that type of game'. The reason to put the game on Steam is because there are people who like that genre, despite it being smaller or underserved.
[quote]For instance, there's an endless list of low-effort parody games that are constantly trying to get greenlit - and some of them actually get through after enough time.[/quote]
And how is a barrier of money going to stop them without stopping legitimate enterprises from serious developers with money problems? Also do I need to point out the tons of money people spent this year on digging a hole for no other reason but to dig a hole (Cards against Humanity)? People are willing to spend a lot of money on a joke if they think it's really funny and they've got the money.
-snip-
[QUOTE=bunguer;51809210]
Have you seen the recent submissions?
Here: [url]https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/browse/?browsefilter=mostrecent&appid=765&browsesort=mostrecent[/url]
[/QUOTE]
Quite a lot of these are looking surprisingly good
For example
[url]https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=861517092[/url]
[url]https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=861768043[/url]
[url]https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=861780193[/url]
[url]https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=861594665[/url]
[quote]I can't really grasp that connection, that's a large leap from "sell well" to talking about genres, how can you say that I said that?[/quote]
It's easy. You're simply rejecting the idea that some genres have a smaller or slower population than other genres. If an IF game is 'selling well' but is only making some 60units/month I imagine you'd call foul on that because it's not 'selling well' as you'd like 'selling well' to be defined - which is what you've set up in your head as 'a quality product which deserves sales which should easily make 200 units in 2 months'.
Perhaps you haven't read what I've written so far but I'll repeat it in case you have missed it. I'm an 8.5 year indie industry vet. I've helped put out 2 titles on Steam that have sold more than 300k units collectively. This isn't my first rodeo. The game I'm making presently I've so far spent about 1.6 years on. What the game I'm making is, however, is a game that serves a smaller market. So what you're telling me is tantamount to 'boo hoo, you're trying to put out a game to serve a smaller market - go take it elsewhere'. But there isn't anywhere else to go. Nobody else is going to give me sales for this sort of game - I'll only get sales by being on Steam where the larger part of my audience is.
All you're arguing about is that you're mad that there are people who have the money to get on Greenlight and put out low-effort titles. Guess what? There are going to be people who have the money to go through Direct and put out low-effort titles.
The money barrier only removes pools of developers according to how much money they [b]have[/b] to invest, not how much they'd be [b]willing[/b] to invest. It does not divine 'intent' or 'quality'. A game's quality bears no respect to its creator's financial standings. In fact it, as you say, is often related to how much effort the developer has put in. Unfortunately we do not live in a world where how much effort you put in to a thing is how much reward you gain from doing so. There are plenty of people running themselves ragged to make nice games with no money just as there are plenty of people who want to get famous or have the 'allure' of being a game developer who have lots of money to throw around. If there's a way to seperate the 'wheat' from the 'chaff' just by those two groups' wallets, I don't see it.
The way I see it, you're only arguing about the money because it's the only thing you think is relevant here. But it isn't. What you're arguing for is [b]quality control[/b] and quality control has nothing to do with how much money is in a person's bank account. If anything, you're kicking more legitimate and serious developers out more than you're keeping good quality in. People who put out bad things don't care about the quality of their product and are willing to spend money because they don't care. People who want to put out good content care intensely about the quality of their product but if they don't have money they can't spend it.
Effort != Money
[QUOTE=Firgof Umbra;51809234]
The money barrier only removes pools of developers. It does not divine 'intent' or 'quality'. A game's quality bears no respect to its creator's financial standings.[/QUOTE]
The only thing it does is act as a quick band-aid that conveniently gives Valve more money. And it still won't prevent the companies that are abusing the system with cheap garbage.
I'd like to put something out someday but those prospects are fucked if it costs anything near $500-$1000 per game release.
-snip-
[quote]if you think you have a quality game, and other people said so too and are willing to buy it, selling to what amounts to $500 shouldn't be a problem at all, therefor is a small risk to take[/quote]
Again, and yet again, you're still ignoring what I'm pointing out. What if my game is selling well for my market, but 'selling well' in that case means 60 units per month?
It doesn't matter that my game has lots of quality. It doesn't matter that other people say it has high quality. It doesn't matter that that population is buying it in figurative droves. What matters is the population of the genre. The population is low.
[quote]That doesn't even pay the time you actually spend developing a game.[/quote]
And here we come to the crux of your problem. I'm not making this game to make a buttload of money. If I wanted to do that, I'd be making Survival Crafting Simulator But With A New Twist 2017. What I want is to serve a genre that I enjoy personally while also beefing up my portfolio and showing I can make games that are not 4X games.
The crux of your problem is you think that money is the end all be all for whether a game deserves to be on Steam. Deny it all you like and say I'm putting words in your mouth - what you're writing can be interpreted in no other way. What you actually imply you want though is for games to be judged based on their effort, no? [b]If anything, according to what you want, I am the ideal that you want on Steam - a passionate developer who's spending a ton of time trying to get out a polished product[/b].
And yet you're arguing I should stay off Steam? And go where? Please, tell me a service where interactive fiction sells in droves. I'll even settle for 'sells better than on Steam'.
Edit: Oh, and because you asked:
[quote]Can you stop putting words on my mouth about 'a quality product which deserves sales'? Do quote where I said that because I've never mentioned of the like and it's quite dishonest to do so.[/quote]
[quote]Here's what I actually said:
"If you manage to get good reactions on those platforms and you have numbers to support that you might sell reasonably, $500 is not that big of a risk to take."
[B]As in, if you think you have a quality game [I]('a quality product')[/I], and other people said so too and are willing to buy it [I]('deserving of sales')[/I][/B][/quote]
[quote]but there are many other platforms you can use where you can test your game and see if it's worth the risk and where you will earn some money too.[/quote]
I've seen the numbers from those platforms. They in no way would tell me whether it's worth the risk on Steam. The populations are wildly different as Steam is incredibly more diverse in its userbase.
[QUOTE=simkas;51806436]But it doesn't stop that, there's still so much garbage no effort asset flips on Steam, so it obviously needs to be higher to at least stop those.[/QUOTE]
How about just hiring people to actually play the game first? I know that's not Valve's style, but it's a [I]far[/I] better solution than shitting on low-income indie devs in order to stop garbage games making it in.
[QUOTE=gk99;51809413]How about just hiring people to actually play the game first? I know that's not Valve's style, but it's a [I]far[/I] better solution than shitting on low-income indie devs in order to stop garbage games making it in.[/QUOTE]
Are you suggesting Valve pays money to check the quality of things they will sell?
Clearly a better idea is for Valve to ask for a bigger upfront payment.
[QUOTE=Thlis;51809419]Are you suggesting Valve pays money to check the quality of things they will sell?
Clearly a better idea is for Valve to ask for a bigger upfront payment.[/QUOTE]
Surely the only way we can tell whether a game should go on to Steam is to raid the developer's pockets though! That'll tell us just how much effort they've put in to it!
-snip-
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