Topic: How much do indie PC devs make, anyways?

[idolminds]

Article

We're all heard about the surge of indie devs and games, from Braid, to Torchlight, to Mount & Blade. But how hard is it to really get out there and get those sales? Pretty hard.

The game is "The Oil Blue". The article goes into some details where he was worried no one would understand the subject matter of deep ocean drilling....then the Gulf spill happened. Unfortunately it seems a lot of people and review sites brushed it off as trying to capitalize on the event, when in reality they were working on it before that whole mess even occurred. Just bad timing.

One thing I found interesting:

There's also something I like to call the "Steam factor." A good number of people have told me to let them know when my game is on Steam so they can purchase it, but very few people realize just how difficult it is for games to be accepted onto the Steam platform. And while Steam did download my game at the start of this month I haven't received any feedback, which could really only mean that they're not interested. And as far as portals/distributors go for indie devs, that's pretty much all there is.

If you follow indie games any, you will see this EVERYWHERE. "I'll buy it when its on Steam", but they forget that Steam gets to be choosy and its not really that simple to get your game on there. Famously, Steam originally turned down the option to carry Braid until it hit it big and had a huge buzz on the Xbox. Just to illustrate a point.

Thats where I hope mod/indieDBs Desura can fit in, to offer a place to advertise and sell indie games. Real indie games, not just the ones that hit it big.

[Quemaqua]

Absolutely.  Fuck Steam and that choosey shit.  So many good indie games out there, and a lot of them are truly something... but they don't make it big so nobody pays any fucking attention.  I hate people that play games these days.

[gpw11]

There is the flip side of the Android Market, which is more or less completely unregulated.  It is full of so much low quality garbage that it is almost unusable, which is probably what Steam is trying to avoid.    I'm sure there's a happy middle ground, and that probably would consist of some sort of aggregate site or service that would not only collect and offer indy games but also review them or assess them for quality.  Parsing through a thousand pieces of shit to find the one diamond in the rough just isn't worth it a lot of the time.

[scottws]

Yeah, look at Impulse.  There is a lot of good stuff on there, but a lot of garbage too.

[idolminds]

I would say the same holds true for Steam...or any store.

[Cobra951]

There is the flip side of the Android Market, which is more or less completely unregulated.  It is full of so much low quality garbage that it is almost unusable . . .  Parsing through a thousand pieces of shit to find the one diamond in the rough just isn't worth it a lot of the time.

That applies to more than just Android.  And it hurts not just the publisher, but the authors of quality games as well.  Consider the indie outlet on XBL.  There's no way in hell I'm spending time (and maybe money) on all that shit to find the occasional good game.

Steam is the Devil as far as I'm concerned.  But I don't blame them for trying to maintain high standards.  It's the same with books.  Lots of rejections by publishers for every success story.  That has been going on for centuries.

[idolminds]

Its just a weird situation PC gaming is in. You don't see people saying "Man, I would love to read your book but ONLY if I can buy it on Amazon." or "I'd like to buy your album but ONLY if its on iTunes."

But we do see "I'd like to play your game but ONLY if its on Steam."

Its more a problem with peoples mentality than Steams choosiness. Unfortunately I can't think of a way to change that way of thinking, and its going to hurt smaller devs in the long run.

[scottws]

I would say the same holds true for Steam...or any store.

I disagree to an extent.  Not that Steam doesn't have garbage, but that Steam has a higher quality catalog overall than Impulse and I don't even think it's comparable.  Just a couple weeks back I saw some game highlighted on Impulse.  It looked neat from the description and screenshots, so I read some reviews.  It was panned everywhere and apparently suffered from a ridiculous amount of technical issues.

You wouldn't see something like that highlighted on Steam, but Impulse's catalog is so poor overall that they don't have much of a choice a lot of the time.

Edit:  Oh and I just wanted to point out that I'm not a Steam fanboy and I don't hate Impulse.  Valve has the potential to be evil with Steam and they have had their fair share of technical issues that are scary, such as offline mode not working and the accidental VAC bans.  It's also got some questionable design decisions such as forced updates.  But it's a good service overall, for broadband users anyway.  It's got a nice interface, a solid catalog, some neat social networking and game-integration features, and it is easy to use.

Impulse is good too, but generally in other ways than Steam.  It too has a nice interface and is easy to use.  It doesn't have the community features, but it makes up for it in patch management and the fact that you don't lose your games if your Impulse account gets screwed up somehow (so long as they are already installed, from what I understand).  It just has a pretty piss-poor catalog, in my opinion.

[idolminds]

Yeah, it kinda sucks. I wonder what the deal is there. Why are so many high profile games not on Impulse? Why don't they ever have the same sort of sales as they do on Steam? Publishers apparently set up those kinds of things (what games go where as well as sale prices), its like they want Steam to be the only place their stuff sells. I recently looked at publishers that were on both Steam and Impulse, but in most cases they had more games on Steam than Impulse, and for some publishers the difference was significant. 20-50 MORE games on Steam vs Impulse.

I just find it strange.

[Cobra951]

Its just a weird situation PC gaming is in. You don't see people saying "Man, I would love to read your book but ONLY if I can buy it on Amazon." or "I'd like to buy your album but ONLY if its on iTunes."

But we do see "I'd like to play your game but ONLY if its on Steam."

Its more a problem with peoples mentality than Steams choosiness. Unfortunately I can't think of a way to change that way of thinking, and its going to hurt smaller devs in the long run.

Good point.  That's the fault of the lazy masses, not any particular outlet's.

[Xessive]

Normally, the providers are supposed to be the ones scrambling to get a product on their list. Valve have done a smart thing (from a marketing perspective) where they've effectively reversed the roles, where the developers and their products are scrambling to get on Steam. Regardless of how we feel about it, Valve are going to push on because it's the sound business decision.

I do agree that the core of the problem rests with the ignorant/lazy masses. I think it also has to do with the "collector" trend. The convenience of being able to collect your games within a single platform rather than have them scattered across multiple platforms i.e. Steam, Impulse, D2D, etc. would appeal to the casual crowd.

[MysterD]

Edit:  Oh and I just wanted to point out that I'm not a Steam fanboy and I don't hate Impulse.  Valve has the potential to be evil with Steam and they have had their fair share of technical issues that are scary, such as offline mode not working and the accidental VAC bans.  It's also got some questionable design decisions such as forced updates.  But it's a good service overall, for broadband users anyway.  It's got a nice interface, a solid catalog, some neat social networking and game-integration features, and it is easy to use.

Impulse is good too, but generally in other ways than Steam.  It too has a nice interface and is easy to use.  It doesn't have the community features, but it makes up for it in patch management and the fact that you don't lose your games if your Impulse account gets screwed up somehow (so long as they are already installed, from what I understand).  It just has a pretty piss-poor catalog, in my opinion.

One thing I dig about Impulse is I don't need to run Impulse to run a game I bought directly from them. And, I don't have to run newest said version of a game, if I don't want to - it's up to me. I can install my Impulse game anywhere I want, either - I am not forced to put it in one location (Steam puts all its games in Steam folder). I think that's the things I like best about Impulse - a lot of stuff is NOT forced upon you (unlike Steam).

Lately, we've seen A LOT of big titles decide to go to Steam-Only - i.e. Modern Warfare 2, Kane & Lynch 2, Civ 5, Mafia 2, Dawn of War 2, and Fallout: New Vegas. While it's good for developers to only have to worry about making a game for one real platform and one set of DRM - this really is a punch in the face to Impulse, D2D, and the others who will miss out on some sales.

[gpw11]

"I'd like to buy your album but ONLY if its on iTunes."

I'm 99% positive this happens quite a bit.  I don't really blame them; CDs are kind of a bitch these days.  If I was going to pay for an entire album, I'd probably want a CD personally, but I can see why some might not.

But yeah, I do get what you're saying and it is a very good point.

[MysterD]

GamePro Article on Piracy.

Evidence shows that piracy has already become a problem on the iPhone, with some game developers reporting alarmingly high numbers of illegal downloads. Miguel Sanchez-Grice, the independent-game developer behind tank shooter iCombat, states on his blog that a staggering 75 percent of users playing iCombat are doing so on pirated copies of his game. To make matters worse, iCombat only costs 99 cents.

Not only can piracy hurt game developers large and small, it can also hinder their efforts to develop new video-game experiences and business models.

Seriously...major WTF? 
It's not like this dude's game - regardless of how big or small his game is - costs like $50-60 or something...

[Cobra951]

You're not understanding the difference between grabbing something easily without any strings, and going through a financial transaction to get it.  That's why it happens regardless of price.

[idolminds]

I would just like to jump in here and say I tried the demo for The Oil Blue, and its really kind of an interesting game. I don't really want to call it a puzzle game since the minigames themselves aren't really puzzles. The closest match I can think of are those time management games. You know, where you are running a bar/restaurant/pet shop/spa/etc and have to serve all the customers in a timely manner or they get pissed and leave? Kind of like that, but a lot more interesting.

You have this island that has several different oil drilling machines, and a goal for that island. For example the first one in the demo I have to sell 12 barrels of oil in 3 days, and now the second island is going to task me with 59 barrels in 6 days. Thats quite a jump, but the new island has a new machine on it. And thats where it feels like a time management game. You have these different drilling machines that you want running simultaneously, and each one has certain demands on your attention. The easiest one is just setting a speed and a number of power cells to power the thing. More speed = more power draw. But cells not in use charge back up, so its just getting the right balance of harvesting oil and occasionally switching over to it to switch the cells on and off.

One machine needs your attention as its drilling, but theres a long "rest phase" that will allow you to step away to check on another machine. And then theres one machine that you'll spend most your time looking at because it requires almost constant attention...unless the tank is full and you transfer the oil out to be sold, which takes some time.

All the while you can go back to the surface and the market to sell off the oil you have collected. The going price changes through the day, so its not always best to wait till the last moment. And as the machines get stressed they'll need repairs which are also short minigames, but the machines have to be off for this and some machines cant be restarted that day if they are shut down.

So yeah, time management. But its really very pretty and well put together. I suggest you guys check out the demo.

[MysterD]

You're not understanding the difference between grabbing something easily without any strings, and going through a financial transaction to get it.  That's why it happens regardless of price.

Oh, I understand that they're skipping a whole entire big time-sinking step by just flat-out pirating it and that it's extremely convenient.

But to me, it's like to me, "Dude, the game's only 99 freakin' cents to buy."
Seriously, it's the cost of a yummy candy-bar.

[idolminds]

And update to the original post. The games creator posted on neogaf:

I finally got a definitive answer from Steam! And it only took two months too.

Hello David,

Thank you for submitting “The Oil Blue” for potential Steam distribution. We have taken a look at the information you have provide and determined that Steam is not a good fit for distribution.

Please consider Steam for your future products.

Oh.

So there you go: this game won't ever be on Steam. Damnit.

So there you go.

[W7RE]

I have to admit that I largely ignore indie games, unless they're on the XBL indie service. Why? 1) because I'm too lazy to seek them out, and 2) because I like to have all my games in one place (as mentioned in an earlier post) Also, it can be a bitch to hear about/keep up with new indie games, because they don't always get noticed.

On the PC, I use Steam for everything out of convenience. For non-Steam games, I put a shortcut in Steam. I like the XBL indie channel because games update automatically, and I can easily just glance over the new releases on a regular basis and rarely miss something. Also the games are all designed with a controller in mind, which is not always the case with PC indie games. For example I was messing around with Gish and Jumper Three last night. (I don't know if the guy that made Jumper is on the Super Meat Boy team, or influenced them, but it's overwhelmingly similar) I was having issues with my gamepad (Xbox controller)

I have Gish from the Humble Bundle, which is version 1.53. Current version is 1.6, and there's no way to update unless you bought through the game's website (You're SOL if you got it from the Humble Bundle or Steam) The game won't recognize my controller. I rebought the game so I could get the newest version, and the problem still exists. I could play with the keyboard, but that just feels really cumbersome.

With Jumper Three, the controller was detected fine. What I didn't like, was that it didn't recognize the d-pad (treated as a hat switch by the PC, I think), and the movement with the analog stick was much more sensitive than with the keyboard. Some jumps were designed so you could just make it across a gap, but I'd fly past it because my movement was different. Super Meat Boy will likely be better than this "slightly more indie" version, just because of being designed for a controller. (also the Meat Boy style and theme song are fuck-awesome)



Also, a note about my controller complaints: most indie games I give a try are 2D platformers (a genre that needs more love). Obviously I wouldn't try to play an indie FPS with a controller.

[MysterD]

Bigdownload.com -> Chris Peck of Outerlight talks about Indie gaming, retail distribution, digital distribution, and dealing w/ publishers.

If you guys remember Outerlight - they made The Ship, which is a Steamworks-required game released through Steam and also retail.

They also worked on Bloody Good Time - which basically is a spiritual sequel to The Ship, which UbiSoft is publishing.

Pretty much, Outerlight is just about done and ready to go under, unfortunately.


Here's some interesting stuff to quote, from Chris Peck of Outerlight - on digital distribution vs. retail.

I guess this is the right time to talk about the two business models, publisher and independent.

The traditional publishing model is awful for developers, it's their gilded cage. It requires costly pitching, to emissaries of publishers, who return to corporate rooms & badly pitch the idea to large groups who need consensus to act, and typically take 6 months to close any deal they offer. Publishers are motivated by greed, but restrained by fear of risk, and thus seek sure deals, licenses and sequels, which makes pitching innovation almost pointless. Should you get a deal, the usual is 20 percent royalties, but after the retailer takes their share of 50 percent, you are getting 20 percent of the 50 percent left (so 10 percent of retail price). That doesn't sound too bad, until you realise that the developer is the one that actually pays for the development, the publisher has just advanced the developer their share of the royalties to pay for making the game.

So...the developer takes 10 percent of retail, after ALL costs have been repaid from that 10 percent. Assuming the game cost £2m to make, and sold for 20 pounds, the developer gets 2 pounds for every unit, once the 2 million punds is repaid, so that's 1 million copies before the developer sees their first 2 pounds, meanwhile the publisher has recouped their 2 million pound and is sitting on an extra 6 million pounds. What happens next? History shows us the developer goes bust, or gets acquired by a publisher, and the publisher maybe buys another publisher for kicks.

The self-funded, digitally distributed model should be the future, it brings 70 percent of the retail price back to the developer, which means 14 pounds for every unit sold. Assuming the game cost 2 million pounds to make (although it wouldn't, being independently developed it would be half the price, being twice as efficient!), that's a break even for the developer at 142,000 units, instead of at 1 million units. If they did get very lucky and sell 1 million units they'd make a profit of 12 million pounds, instead of 0. For an efficient team like ours, we made the game for 700,000 pounds, so our break even would be at 50,000 copies. Instead of games development being seen as a hit or miss industry, it should be seen as a break even or profit industry, there is no miss, only the chance to do better next time.

All money aside, innovation is hard. Coming up with the next big idea is hard, and it's even harder to make it into a reality. Creating a good team, keeping them happy, and keeping the project on track is hard. Developers don't need a monkey on their backs making it harder.

However, the independent route still has the key flaw of needing funding. Investors are justifiably skeptical about developers (after all, we usually go bust), and banks don't lend, despite the public bail out, so where will the development capital come from? At the moment, the main option remains a publishing deal, and while it seems like a lifeline, it's more like a shackle with a death sentence at the end.

[Pugnate]

I think it is pretty fucking ridiculous to hate on Steam for being choosey with their indie games catalog.

That's why all these Indie developers want to be on Steam, because they are choosey about some of the stuff that goes on there. I second what GPW said about Android, i.e. it is great that it is a free-for-all, but there is a lot of garbage on there as well.

People don't have the time/money to shuffle through every indie game out there, and are more likely to buy an indie game impulsively on Steam than other platforms because they have a sense of trust.

The other thing is that aside from an investment in reputation, Steam have a monetary investment as well. They have to have someone design a page, test a demo etc.

BTW, a Pakistani indie studio made a cricket game, and it is on Steam!

http://store.steampowered.com/app/25500

Check it out. It is called Cricket Revolution. I believe there is a demo there as well.

[idolminds]

Except Steam already has a bunch of shitty games on there, what are they trying to protect people from? Its like the Apple App store. They have all these rules and can turn stuff away, but theres still like a thousand fart sound apps.

I mean, its their site/store so they can do whatever the fuck they want with it. It just seems like a lot of good stuff gets turned away for unknown reasons. And because people are so entrenched with Steam, not being sold on there can be a huge blow to sales.

[Pugnate]

They have all these rules and can turn stuff away, but theres still like a thousand fart sound apps.

hahaha...

I don't know man... I haven't explored the the Indie games on Steam myself, but I always assumed there was a level of quality there.

[idolminds]

Follow up article from the creator of The Oil Blue.

Its interesting to read for a different kind of perspective. He only goes into sales made directly on his site and he does mention places like GamersGate get the same if not more sales of his game, but after reading about 1,000,000 copies sold of Minecraft and the $2million the Humble Bundle brought in its wild reading about this polished indie game selling 24 copies in the month of August.