Plan for Steve Taylor

#1 Care to elaborate? :) I'm curious.

#2 I thought about a longer reply, but I decided it wasn't fair to talk about the details without involving my business partners. So, I'll just say:

I'm extremely discouraged with the return so far on what we've put into the game. We come from a deep traditional developer/publisher relationship background and this has been a learning experience, to say the least, and in the end I feel like we still don't really know what we're doing in the downloadable game market world. We know how to make games, but we apparently don't know how to sell them.

#3 Oh hey! It's you!

Jay pointed me at your game a while back... Really cool idea. A little quirky, and pretty fun. Nice graphics, too, very consistent feel. Nice job!

#4 I join the "Huh" chorus.

I think the game is great. And I'm the guilty party that gave you the brain dump on the indie game scene.

So I'm also confused. It's all about the conversion rate... and why isn't it higher? I compare the game to a lot of other titles out there that seem to be pretty successful, and I think, "WOW! This leaves them all in the dust! It's pretty, it's cute and humorous, has a fun story, solid gameplay, and it's FUN!"

So why isn't it blowing the socks off the latest match-three bubble-popper? I know one month is hardly enough time to reach a solid verdict on the game - but ya don't want to be saying, "Ah, give it time," and proceed blindly on to do a sequel or the next indie project without understanding what's going on.

If anyone has any insight on this, I'd sure like to know, too. Is it the game? The registration incentives in the demo? The downloadable game market? Is the 3D interface too confusing for people? Does it just not run on too many machines? This is the kind of game I wish I'd made, so I'd like to know my tastes aren't TOO far off from the market's.

#5 could it be the name Outpost Kaloki.?

I recall someone (maybe it was JT?) talking about where you game falls in the search on downloadable sites.. how easy is it to find.. is it hidden in the depths of a massive search result? will the name reach out and grab someone etc..

I could be way off, heck I am no markiting guy. the screenshot looks polished, does the gameplay match?

-Ron

#6 Steve,

A few questions:
1) How many people have you watched play your game?
2) Are they the same audience profile as you have on the download portal?
3) Are your download numbers near 100k generally and what is your conversion rate (you don't have to answe this), but if you're not tipping 2% on a serious number of downloads then its the demo, if you don't have downloads (and you have good results from play testers never getting enough from the first minute start to play - without any interaction) then it has to be the eye candy (screenshots, trailers, box shot), sticky factor of the name - I personally don't get Outpost Kaloki - it doesn't tell me what to expect really or offer enough curiosity factor to make me check it out (I have a duh factor test I use for any game name).
4) Can you build a fan base for this game on your own?
5) How many raving fans do you have addicted to your game?

#7 100K downloads in one month? Is that a reasonable expectation on a major portal?

#8 @Jay,

Thanks for the questions and feedback. A few answers:

1. About 20 total, I'd say, in the weeks before we officially released the game. We had two different playtesting parties, and incorporated a lot of changes suggested from those sessions, and we had other individuals try the game out a few times. In the adjustments we made, we leaned toward "make it even easier for beginners".

2. Partly. Some of them were 30-year old housewives. Some were gamers. Some were kids. Some were older ex-gamers. Presumably, the profile for the portal on which we released is primarily non-gamers.

3. No, the download numbers are WAY smaller than 100K. Our conversion rate so far is less than 2%.

We would have called the game "Cute Funny Space Station Tycoon Game with a Story" but it wouldn't fit. :) Seriously, though, we did spend a lot of time discussing the name with a bunch of people, probably more than it deserved. Maybe we goofed there, but it wasn't from lack of trying.

We've heard very positive feedback on the screenshots (the only aspect of eye candy we influence on that portal), but it apparently hasn't been enough to get 100K downloads in a month!

There are so many conflicting opinions on what makes a good demo. In the end, our demo was done the way the portal essentially required it to be done. They said we must do a 60-minute demo, not feature limited, and that was that.

4. That's a great question. I'm not sure. We're selling and supporting the game on NinjaBee.com, and doing our own marketing for this site, so we're giving it a shot. We did a press release (through VGSmart) which was picked up at a bunch of sites. This generated a lot of initial traffic which has since slowed down a lot. We were Editor's Choice on GameTunnel.com (over Wik, even), but they link back to another portal for the actual download.

5. Another good question. We hear almost exclusively positive feedback on the game so far, and there *are* raving addicted fans, but it seems to be the same small number that bought the game so far.

We've had more than one person tell us this game is one of the best indie games of the year, but perhaps that doesn't matter if we don't get everything else exactly right. And that's what I'm frustrated about - we can make a great game, but that has a lot less impact on actual sales than I had hoped.

I suppose you all figured this out a long time ago.

#9 I don't want to sound presumptuous or patronizing, but this is definitely worth a read...

www.dexterity.com/articles/shareware-amateurs-vs-shareware-professionals.htm

It's a little bit on the cheeky side, but I think the core ideas are valid...

While I'm editing, I think I'll just keep going, I know the developers over at www.mistaril.com/ (they have a simmilar product to yours in some ways) are able to make a living and work full time off the sales of their product. From what I know they don't use portals at all or if they do they don't see much traffic from those portals. The problem is, the portals are for the most part match 3 gems of the same color, arkanoid with curved paddle gamers. I think the product you have created is a great ex-gamer product, closer to the audience that Garage Games attracts. Your game is not a game that will do well on the portals, you are going to have to find other ways to reach your customers, perhaps give the mistaril guys and email and ask for advice?

#10 Dan:

I've read that article before, but thanks for posting the link - I think I needed to read it again. My post here is certainly in the category of 'Ask disempowering questions like, "Why do my sales suck?"'.

We looked at Mistaril's product a bit a long time back. It's interesting to hear that they don't use portals much. I wonder how long it took them to get to the position they're in.

I agree that our product is more ex-gamer in nature and closer to the GarageGames audience. We haven't found a good way yet to reach this audience directly.

Thanks for the feedback!

#11 I just spent the last 45min playing the demo, there is NO reason why this game cannot sell well online! It's a beautiful addicting game, that said I think there are some reasons why it's not selling.

In the downloadable space, the first few minutes of the game are CRITICAL. It only took me 30 seconds or so to download the game, but it took me at least 20 seconds to realize I had to dismiss the tutorial dialog before being able to click on the branch the arrow was pointing at. If I wasn't determined to play the game I might have exited right there and spent my next 30 seconds downloading someone else's demo.

To hook the gamer downloading your demo they need to have something new thrown at them every 10 or so seconds for the first 2 min of the game. With your game I would have users starting and completing their first building inside of a minuet. I think this game struggles in the first minute but absolutely shines in the hours following. Tweaking your tutorial so it's more idiot proof is going to help your conversion rate.

Also, don't get fixated on 100,000 downloads in a month. I know indies who do quite well on much less :)

#12 Have you considered submitting the demo to computer magazines for inclusion on their CDs? It won't cost you anything and will get it out to a larger audience!

#13 Steve,

For what it's worth, I just wanted to say that I've played this game and I really, *really* like it and so do a few friends I recommended it to. I'm definately confused as to why this hasn't "taken-hold" yet; it's a cracking game that's quite addicitve and *FUN*.

This game has definately got the "look and feel" of a GG game; it should be on this site. ;)

I hope all goes well in the future Steve and this product really starts picking-up the pace.

- Melv.

#14 Steve, the game looks cool.... good luck with it.

You really need to do abit more PR with the game tho.

#15 Steve,

I think youre really thinking about this far too short term. It takes a long time for word of mouth to get around. You might think about seeding the word of mouth by offering some freebies to game sites as an incentive (a competition which gives away some copies of the game for instance).

I'm sure the initial sales of the game will be small, probably smaller than you all imagined, but dont take that as an indication that they will STAY small.

Also, dont forget that you can and should be using lots of different methods to get your game out there.

Its weird, it sounds like youre far more of a developer, and yet you used VGSmart to do the initial release, why not get them to work on some press/buzz generation?

Anyway, keep at it, dont expect one product to be the big bank it might be in the commercial world, even if this product doesnt sell massively out of the starting gate, its likely over its lifetime if you stay with it, you'll see a good ROI.

#16 hehe I just opened PC Gamer UK and the first thing I saw was a review of this game :-p

Only 56% tho

#17 Steve - If we've missed connecting try again (that is if you want to consider having GG publish it - we do some non-exclusive deals).

#18 Wow, many thanks to everyone for the great feedback!

I'm feeling a bit better after having gotten some sleep... :)

Joseph: Ah, I didn't know about the PC Gamer UK review. This was a review in the printed magazine, not on a web page, right? Only 56? Dang, that's the lowest score we've gotten on this game. What didn't they like?

It's a funny thing, though, having an indie downloadable game reviewed in a serious gamer site or magazine, 'cause you never know if they're going to be comparing you to Half Life 2 or Gem Snatcher 2.

Phil: We're still talking to VGSmart about more press/buzz options - the issues are just questions about where else Joe can reach that he hasn't already. It's easier for him to work with a game that he's in on from the ground floor - in our case we asked him to do the press release at the last minute. They were well worth the cost of the initial press release, by the way. I recommend them to everyone here.

Jay: Yes, we've missed connecting. We'll try again.

#19 It's the Mag and it says.....

Space is notoriously empty, Famous for it.
If space is at a party, the one thing people are guaranteed to mention in the small talk is, "Hey, you're really empty, right?" Space hates that.
Outpost Kaloki wishes to fill the said emptiness with your friend and mine, evil Capitalism.

Where Startopia was an elaborate, Bullfrog-esque management game aboard a multi-layered space station, Outpost Kaloki is what it might look like if a five-year-old had tried to make it out of Lego.

That

#20 Youch, that's not a very positive review, is it? :) Apparently he wanted more details to control.

Joseph, thanks for taking the time to post this!

This is only the fourth review we've seen so far, and the other three rated the game 7/10, 7.5/10, and 9/10.