“I have a cool game idea” or common mistakes of young game developers
Many young developers and guys are still not related to game dev, often say the phrase "I have an idea for the game and we will earn a million on it!". Know yourself? At this moment they are in an extraordinary state, when it seems to them that the sea is knee-deep and that cherished million is already in their pocket. On this wave of inspiration, they start to develop and do not even think about what lies ahead for them.
Next, I will talk about my story and what our initiative led to. I hope that this story will help young developers to understand the current situation on the market and, perhaps, to avoid the typical mistakes that are common to all novice developers.
It all started with the fact that my friend and I decided to make the game, the idea seemed to us very fresh and interesting. We didn't think about the genre for a long time, we wanted to make a tower defense, which we like very much. We quickly came up with a plot, analyzed the market for the presence of this and, to our surprise, there were no games with a similar plot and setting. This was familiar to us from above and gave us even more faith in our undertaking. We didn’t think about the engine too long, we chose Unity because of its cross-platform nature, especially since the programmer was fine with C #.
')
Having written a design document, we started looking for a team that could work on a full time project. We were even ready to throw money in order to pay them. But for starters, we found only a programmer who went through the ready-made TD purchased by us and redid it partly for our ideas. He did it rather slowly and not efficiently, so his services had to be abandoned.
Then we began to think about the graphics, found guys who agreed to work for free, but they did not want to work on the game in the previous setting, so they decided to change the setting. One of the artists proposed his idea; Googling it to the account of the similar on the market, it was decided to change the setting to a new one, which, by the way, was not on the market either. We were lucky. But it did not last long. For half a year we managed to create several low-poly models and draw some 2D art, then the guys slowly started to score on the project, as they did not have the motivation to do something else after a hard day’s work.
This is typical error number 1: lack of motivation . If your team is not motivated by money or something equivalent, then, most likely, they will not work on the project for a long time.
The project was frozen for half a year, I tried to find investments and, after several unsuccessful attempts, gave up. This is typical error number 2: lack of faith . If it seems to you that everything is going wrong, something is not working, you are not investing in the deadlines, or your team is scoring for the project - you should not despair. With such a mood you will never earn a million. Look for options, think only about your goal, live your project and soon you will discover new opportunities, as I did.
Six months later I moved to the capital and, after unsuccessful attempts to find a job, I had a choice: either I started my project or I went back to my city and continued to exist.
As the soul lay to the first option, I decided to start looking for investments in my game. Less than a month, I received the necessary amount for the development of the project, having in my arsenal just a couple of pictures, an idea and faith in my project.
The team was happy, all the guys were ready to resume work on the project. The programmer also moved to the capital and we continued working. But everything went wrong.
Typical error number 3: lack of control. If you do not control the development process, then most likely it will be sideways for you. So it was with me. Relaxing after realizing that I was able to find investments for a project, I missed a very important detail: in addition to the fact that employees need to distribute tasks and name deadlines, the process of accomplishing the task itself must also be controlled, especially if you work in a “virtual office”. It so happens that not all employees understand you perfectly, and there are practically no psychic employees who can read what is going on in your head. Hence comes the typical error number 4: inaccurately stated tasks. Remember once and for all: the more accurately you describe the task to the employee, the more accurate the result will be. Do not give employee freedom of imagination where it is not required. Otherwise, what he does will not meet your expectations by 99% and you will force him to redo the work, and this comes up against extra time. There is only 1% of what the employee will do the task better than it is described in the technical task.
Typical error number 5: part-time employees. If you risk contacting employees who are not fully engaged in your project, and this, say, will be their second job, then rest assured that the quality and timing will definitely suffer. Only employees who have worked all their time on a single project can produce a really good result. Otherwise, it does not cost anything to promise investors in time. Most likely you do not do them. We planned to finish the project in 4 months. As a result, due to the fact that I lost control, it turned out that after 3 months we had the code ready, but still the graphics were not ready and the programmer was idle for almost 2 months. So far we have solved the issue with graphics, which, due to inaccuracies in the tasks and, again, in the absence of proper control, had to be redone several times. The project was delayed for another 3 months.
And then, when the project was ready and the balance and bugs were corrected, a real hell began. Typical error number 6: the lack of a promotion strategy. Now it’s absolutely not enough just to make a bright, beautiful, interesting application and put it on the market. It will simply be lost among millions of others, equally bright, and equally beautiful, good applications, and never in your life will earn you a million. Humble yourself.
No money for promotion - you can not start. 99% sure that the launch of the application without advertising and store shopping will end in failure. You will collect up to 10k installations, earn a couple of dollars from advertising - and that’s it.
We originally intended to publish through publishers - companies that have been doing this for a long time and have an appropriate budget for promotion. As soon as the game was ready, I started searching for publishers, googled a lot, walked through various lists I found on the Internet, went to a couple of conferences, talked in person, but the result was approximately the same.
Typical error number 7: lack of proper monetization. If your game is not designed for long-term pumping of money from users, if the game has a low LTV, then no publisher will take your game for promotion.
After a month of searching, I received more than 30 refusals from major publishers who, in fact, liked the game, but, in their opinion, did not have a unique character. And, most importantly for the publisher - the game had bad monetization, it was not sharpened under free to play. At the same time the game had an end. And in our case, the game could have been completed even without donat (if we knew the strategy) in just 7-8 hours, which is very bad for a publisher who, having poured a million into the promotion of the game, will not have time to repel it, since the game is too short and the player needs to make Only 1 purchase to complete the game.
Well, what can I say, we don’t like free to play as players, it annoys us, we are ready to pay 2-3 dollars to enjoy the process. We wanted to achieve the same in our game, so we didn’t sharpen it under free to play, even though we screwed up the purchased bonuses and goods. But this was not enough for publishers. Investors were extremely dissatisfied with this outcome, because they still wanted at least to return their invested funds. After another 2 months, I still managed to find one publisher who, only after seeing our screens, had already agreed to sign the contract. To celebrate, we did it.
Typical error number 8: before signing a contract - re-read it 100,500 times. We did so, but this did not help us, because in the end we missed (or misinterpreted, due to the fact that the contract was in English) one very important point, which said that we are bound by this contract for 2 years and break it can not. Yes, there are such contracts, it turns out.
But, let's order. Having found a publisher, our happiness knew no bounds, we talked on Skype for a long time, they said that we need to change, how to improve monetization, which levels make it difficult for the player to make a purchase in this place, which, on the contrary, simplify. It seems everything went well and after some 5 months (3 months the publishers did the localization), they launched the application. Waiting began ...
Typical mistake number 9: do not rush to any publisher . Otherwise, it will turn out that we have. Our publisher has a not very rich history, but, nevertheless, they worked with some large titles, they have offices around the world and some of their applications have more than a million downloads, which, in fact, gave us hope.
We were promised gold mountains, advertising, featured in some sites and return on investment during the year. As a result, we received a Facebook page from 1k followers and up to 10k installations on google play, while the publisher (according to him) invested $ 6000 in advertising! For the year they earned us a little more than 500 euros.
Before you start working with the publisher - google reviews about it. In many ways, you can help this document, which I myself once found in the open spaces of Habr.
My investors have iron patience. If I lived in the 90s, I most likely would have fed worms somewhere in the forest, but I am glad that I live in our time and investors help me in many ways, as this is in their interests too. It so happened that one of the investors has an acquaintance who is engaged in SEO, mobile applications and their promotion, but has never been engaged in games before. We decided to talk with him about this. He agreed to try on his own terms.
He said that you need to redo it. After the work done, we launched the game under a new name, on his account, and only in his country. After a couple of weeks, we received more than 15k installations and the first $ 120 (the region was absolutely unprofitable, we ran it purely to increase the audience and reviews), and then we opened it to the whole world and by the end of the month we earned about $ 2500 purely thanks to untargeted traffic from our comrade’s websites and organics. on in-app purchases and advertising, and the number of installations has reached almost 40k. For us it was a very good sign. But the reviews began to deteriorate sharply due to the lack of localization - we left only English and Russian. Therefore, we had to translate the game into 8 more key languages, including Asian.
Then something happened that we most did not expect. This person decided to go to another business, leaving the promotion and everything connected with it. Accordingly, without support and investments, our application began to sharply lose its audience and profit, respectively.
Typical mistake number 10: games with an average and large budget. If you plan to make a game with an average or large budget, remember one important thing: if you do not know how to make your game, do not see it in the smallest detail, do not start.
Soberly assess your strength, perhaps it will be better to concentrate on small games, which will take you a month or a month maximum for you and your team. Make for the same budget (if you managed to find investments) some good small games and you will have more chances for success than with one average of the same quality.
Never forget about promotion. Create an application - this is only 20% of the work. Accordingly, the budget should be divided in the same way. If you are not bound by a contract with the publisher and you have no guarantees that the application will be taken (and most likely it will not be taken), rely only on your strengths. Without money, you and 100k users will not collect, not to mention a million.
Remember that according to statistics, only 3% of your players will make a purchase in the game and then only if it is good. Therefore, to earn a million, you must have at least several million installations. There is only 1% that you are lucky and the application will go by itself, without any promotion. Now this is extremely rare.
I hope our experience will allow you to avoid common mistakes. Take off the rose-colored glasses and create really good, high-quality games.
Next, I will talk about my story and what our initiative led to. I hope that this story will help young developers to understand the current situation on the market and, perhaps, to avoid the typical mistakes that are common to all novice developers.
It all started with the fact that my friend and I decided to make the game, the idea seemed to us very fresh and interesting. We didn't think about the genre for a long time, we wanted to make a tower defense, which we like very much. We quickly came up with a plot, analyzed the market for the presence of this and, to our surprise, there were no games with a similar plot and setting. This was familiar to us from above and gave us even more faith in our undertaking. We didn’t think about the engine too long, we chose Unity because of its cross-platform nature, especially since the programmer was fine with C #.
')
Having written a design document, we started looking for a team that could work on a full time project. We were even ready to throw money in order to pay them. But for starters, we found only a programmer who went through the ready-made TD purchased by us and redid it partly for our ideas. He did it rather slowly and not efficiently, so his services had to be abandoned.
Then we began to think about the graphics, found guys who agreed to work for free, but they did not want to work on the game in the previous setting, so they decided to change the setting. One of the artists proposed his idea; Googling it to the account of the similar on the market, it was decided to change the setting to a new one, which, by the way, was not on the market either. We were lucky. But it did not last long. For half a year we managed to create several low-poly models and draw some 2D art, then the guys slowly started to score on the project, as they did not have the motivation to do something else after a hard day’s work.
This is typical error number 1: lack of motivation . If your team is not motivated by money or something equivalent, then, most likely, they will not work on the project for a long time.
The project was frozen for half a year, I tried to find investments and, after several unsuccessful attempts, gave up. This is typical error number 2: lack of faith . If it seems to you that everything is going wrong, something is not working, you are not investing in the deadlines, or your team is scoring for the project - you should not despair. With such a mood you will never earn a million. Look for options, think only about your goal, live your project and soon you will discover new opportunities, as I did.
Six months later I moved to the capital and, after unsuccessful attempts to find a job, I had a choice: either I started my project or I went back to my city and continued to exist.
As the soul lay to the first option, I decided to start looking for investments in my game. Less than a month, I received the necessary amount for the development of the project, having in my arsenal just a couple of pictures, an idea and faith in my project.
The team was happy, all the guys were ready to resume work on the project. The programmer also moved to the capital and we continued working. But everything went wrong.
Typical error number 3: lack of control. If you do not control the development process, then most likely it will be sideways for you. So it was with me. Relaxing after realizing that I was able to find investments for a project, I missed a very important detail: in addition to the fact that employees need to distribute tasks and name deadlines, the process of accomplishing the task itself must also be controlled, especially if you work in a “virtual office”. It so happens that not all employees understand you perfectly, and there are practically no psychic employees who can read what is going on in your head. Hence comes the typical error number 4: inaccurately stated tasks. Remember once and for all: the more accurately you describe the task to the employee, the more accurate the result will be. Do not give employee freedom of imagination where it is not required. Otherwise, what he does will not meet your expectations by 99% and you will force him to redo the work, and this comes up against extra time. There is only 1% of what the employee will do the task better than it is described in the technical task.
Typical error number 5: part-time employees. If you risk contacting employees who are not fully engaged in your project, and this, say, will be their second job, then rest assured that the quality and timing will definitely suffer. Only employees who have worked all their time on a single project can produce a really good result. Otherwise, it does not cost anything to promise investors in time. Most likely you do not do them. We planned to finish the project in 4 months. As a result, due to the fact that I lost control, it turned out that after 3 months we had the code ready, but still the graphics were not ready and the programmer was idle for almost 2 months. So far we have solved the issue with graphics, which, due to inaccuracies in the tasks and, again, in the absence of proper control, had to be redone several times. The project was delayed for another 3 months.
And then, when the project was ready and the balance and bugs were corrected, a real hell began. Typical error number 6: the lack of a promotion strategy. Now it’s absolutely not enough just to make a bright, beautiful, interesting application and put it on the market. It will simply be lost among millions of others, equally bright, and equally beautiful, good applications, and never in your life will earn you a million. Humble yourself.
No money for promotion - you can not start. 99% sure that the launch of the application without advertising and store shopping will end in failure. You will collect up to 10k installations, earn a couple of dollars from advertising - and that’s it.
We originally intended to publish through publishers - companies that have been doing this for a long time and have an appropriate budget for promotion. As soon as the game was ready, I started searching for publishers, googled a lot, walked through various lists I found on the Internet, went to a couple of conferences, talked in person, but the result was approximately the same.
Typical error number 7: lack of proper monetization. If your game is not designed for long-term pumping of money from users, if the game has a low LTV, then no publisher will take your game for promotion.
After a month of searching, I received more than 30 refusals from major publishers who, in fact, liked the game, but, in their opinion, did not have a unique character. And, most importantly for the publisher - the game had bad monetization, it was not sharpened under free to play. At the same time the game had an end. And in our case, the game could have been completed even without donat (if we knew the strategy) in just 7-8 hours, which is very bad for a publisher who, having poured a million into the promotion of the game, will not have time to repel it, since the game is too short and the player needs to make Only 1 purchase to complete the game.
Well, what can I say, we don’t like free to play as players, it annoys us, we are ready to pay 2-3 dollars to enjoy the process. We wanted to achieve the same in our game, so we didn’t sharpen it under free to play, even though we screwed up the purchased bonuses and goods. But this was not enough for publishers. Investors were extremely dissatisfied with this outcome, because they still wanted at least to return their invested funds. After another 2 months, I still managed to find one publisher who, only after seeing our screens, had already agreed to sign the contract. To celebrate, we did it.
Typical error number 8: before signing a contract - re-read it 100,500 times. We did so, but this did not help us, because in the end we missed (or misinterpreted, due to the fact that the contract was in English) one very important point, which said that we are bound by this contract for 2 years and break it can not. Yes, there are such contracts, it turns out.
But, let's order. Having found a publisher, our happiness knew no bounds, we talked on Skype for a long time, they said that we need to change, how to improve monetization, which levels make it difficult for the player to make a purchase in this place, which, on the contrary, simplify. It seems everything went well and after some 5 months (3 months the publishers did the localization), they launched the application. Waiting began ...
Typical mistake number 9: do not rush to any publisher . Otherwise, it will turn out that we have. Our publisher has a not very rich history, but, nevertheless, they worked with some large titles, they have offices around the world and some of their applications have more than a million downloads, which, in fact, gave us hope.
We were promised gold mountains, advertising, featured in some sites and return on investment during the year. As a result, we received a Facebook page from 1k followers and up to 10k installations on google play, while the publisher (according to him) invested $ 6000 in advertising! For the year they earned us a little more than 500 euros.
Before you start working with the publisher - google reviews about it. In many ways, you can help this document, which I myself once found in the open spaces of Habr.
My investors have iron patience. If I lived in the 90s, I most likely would have fed worms somewhere in the forest, but I am glad that I live in our time and investors help me in many ways, as this is in their interests too. It so happened that one of the investors has an acquaintance who is engaged in SEO, mobile applications and their promotion, but has never been engaged in games before. We decided to talk with him about this. He agreed to try on his own terms.
He said that you need to redo it. After the work done, we launched the game under a new name, on his account, and only in his country. After a couple of weeks, we received more than 15k installations and the first $ 120 (the region was absolutely unprofitable, we ran it purely to increase the audience and reviews), and then we opened it to the whole world and by the end of the month we earned about $ 2500 purely thanks to untargeted traffic from our comrade’s websites and organics. on in-app purchases and advertising, and the number of installations has reached almost 40k. For us it was a very good sign. But the reviews began to deteriorate sharply due to the lack of localization - we left only English and Russian. Therefore, we had to translate the game into 8 more key languages, including Asian.
Then something happened that we most did not expect. This person decided to go to another business, leaving the promotion and everything connected with it. Accordingly, without support and investments, our application began to sharply lose its audience and profit, respectively.
Typical mistake number 10: games with an average and large budget. If you plan to make a game with an average or large budget, remember one important thing: if you do not know how to make your game, do not see it in the smallest detail, do not start.
Soberly assess your strength, perhaps it will be better to concentrate on small games, which will take you a month or a month maximum for you and your team. Make for the same budget (if you managed to find investments) some good small games and you will have more chances for success than with one average of the same quality.
Never forget about promotion. Create an application - this is only 20% of the work. Accordingly, the budget should be divided in the same way. If you are not bound by a contract with the publisher and you have no guarantees that the application will be taken (and most likely it will not be taken), rely only on your strengths. Without money, you and 100k users will not collect, not to mention a million.
Remember that according to statistics, only 3% of your players will make a purchase in the game and then only if it is good. Therefore, to earn a million, you must have at least several million installations. There is only 1% that you are lucky and the application will go by itself, without any promotion. Now this is extremely rare.
I hope our experience will allow you to avoid common mistakes. Take off the rose-colored glasses and create really good, high-quality games.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/247641/
All Articles