Create your own games» Game Creation Blog by Koonsolo

My game company Koonsolo is shifting it’s focus

Koen Witters — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 19:06:59 +0000

I got great news for everyone who likes to create his/her own games. As you might know I started this blog because I wanted to share my knowledge on creating games. Developing games by myself allowed me to give some practical advice. But now I have the opportunity to do even more for you. As you can read in my latest blog post, my game company Koonsolo is shifting it’s focus from making games to making a game creation tool. Yes, that’s right! So next time you can leave all the technical stuff up to me, and focus on creating your dream game .

5 reasons why indie game developers should support Linux

Koen Witters — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 19:17:22 +0000

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A lot of myths exist about Linux users and the whole open source community. Because of these wrong assumptions, a lot of game developers still hesitate to support the Linux platform. As both a Linux user and an indie game developer, I want to educate everybody with hard facts about the advantages of supporting Linux.

Here follows the list of 5 reasons why it benefits for indie game developers to support Linux.

1. Doesn’t take more effort or budget

Sometimes you hear game developers having a realy hard time porting their game to Linux, sometimes they even give up just because they run into technical difficulties. Truth is that it all depends on how you wrote your game in the first place. If you choose the right technologies at the start of your project, porting a game to Linux or even Mac takes no serious extra effort, or it can even eliminate a porting step.

There are plenty of game libraries and frameworks out there that support all mayor platforms (Windows/Mac/Linux), so why pick one which limits you to only one platform? I personally use pygame for my 2D games, and it just runs out of the box on all these platforms. For 3D you got some powerfull engines (for example Ogre3D for rendering, Bullet for physics, etc…)

2. Yes, linux users pay for games

A common misconception is that Linux users are not willing to pay for software. They get a whole operating system, together with loads of software, for free. Therefore most think that the main reason they use Linux is because it’s free. The following might surprise some people, but Linux users actually use it because they think it’s a better operating system (compared to anything else out there).

You don’t have to take my word for it, just look at the statistics. The developers of indie game ‘World of Goo’ found out that Linux users are willing to pay higher prices for their game. And my own statistics on Mystic Mine show that Linux users are more eager to buy my game.

3. They love it when you support their favorite platform.

In a world where MS Windows dominates desktop computers and Apple’s Mac OS is a tiny second, Linux dangles as the underdog of Operating Systems. Hardware and software companies often forget to support Linux. In the past Linux users sometimes responded to this in an offensive and impolite manner. But that trend is changing. Of course you still have total jerks online, but they represent a tiny minority right now.

Anyone who supports Linux knows how nice that community really is. They are helpful, even giving advice and tips on a technical level. They also give a lot of positive feedback, and are very supportive for anyone who supports ‘their’ operating system.

4. Less pirating. Linux users are not used to visiting warez sites

A lot of Windows users, especially young gamers, are familiar with warez sites. These sites are full of pirated software and cracked serial numbers. This way they can download commercial software for free, but at the risk of bringing in malicious software like viruses or troyans.

As a Linux user, there’s no point in visiting such sites. Most Linux software is freely downloadable as Open Source software. And as long as Linux users don’t care about warez sites, warez sites won’t care about Linux users. It’s kind or self maintaining.

5. Easier to get noticed

As an indie game developer, you have to work hard to get exposure for your games. Most game review websites get tons of requests form other game developers. But since Linux is a niche market, even the most popular Linux gaming sites are eager for any news on a game. It’s the questions of what’s best for your game: A big fish in a small pond or a small fish in a big pond. If you also develop for Linux, your game can be both the small fish in the Windows and Mac pond, and the medium/big fish in the Linux pond.

And again, it’s not just me that noticed this. The game developers from Wolfire concluded that “A lot of people heard about and supported Lugaru simply because we had a Linux build”.

Conclusion

As you can see it does make sense to develop your games for Linux. Or to put it in 2D Boy’s words: “There is a market for Linux games after all ”.

So I hope that with this article more games will become available for Linux, and more indie game developers can make a profitable business.

Koen Witters

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Who is going to steal your game idea?

Koen Witters — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 14:35:32 +0000

During the development of your game, you should already do some marketing. This way you line up some customers to buy your game once its released. But marketing means revealing parts of your game. And when developing an innovative game, your primary fear might be that someone is going to steal your idea, and… (Tune from Jaws here) daaa dum daaa dum daaa dum… bring out a cloned game sooner than you! AAAARRRRGGGG!
Well… I got news for you: nobody is going to steal your idea.

Take a look at Braid or Tower of Goo for example. Both are innovative games, both revealed their concept long before their release. And you know what? Nobody stole their idea.
Next to these two masterpieces, I’m shamelessly going to use my own game Mystic Mine as an example. To be honest I was indeed scared that someone would steel the idea of those impossible “Escher”-levels. But you know what? Nobody did! And if you think of it, this makes perfect sense. Why would you clone a game that hasn’t yet proven itself in the market? And if it’s already popular before release, people are waiting for the original game, not the clone. Besides, are you sure you will put the game faster on the market? It just doesn’t makes sense to clone a game that hasn’t been released yet. And your fellow indie game developers, they all have their own game ideas to develop.

So market the hell out of your game while working on it, and don’t worry about someone steeling your idea or concept. Now go do it! What are you waiting for?

Are portals ripping you off?

Koen Witters — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 07:50:45 +0000

Indie and casual game developers can sell their games through various portals. Unfortunately these portals offer very low royalty rates (about 25% to 35%). Some ‘developer friendly’ portals offer 40%. Remark that this percentage is not calculated on the game’s price, but on the ‘net revenue”, which means that when a game is sold, first some payment processing fees and other costs are deducted, and you will get the % of what’s left. And you know what, it doesn’t stop there. Portals make sure they stay in control by forcing following policies:

You have to remove any links in your game that point to your website.
You don’t receive customer details (most importantly their email).
You can’t decide your game’s selling price.

So what do you get out of it? Well, some portals get a lot of traffic. And what you can get out of this is a lot of sales. A lot of sales on 25% means you get a nice amount of money. But does this theory make sense? I think not. See, for portals it costs the same whether they put a good or bad game onto their website. It makes sense that when they think a game is not going to sell, they take a bigger cut from the revenue, so they can recoup their costs. When they think a game is going to sell big time, they can take a smaller cut because the total revenue will be big enough. And in practice this also gets applied: popular games can negotiate for a bigger cut.
And now comes the real problem: when you get a small royalty rate, you expect to sell high volumes to get enough revenue. But as I explained above, a small cut probably means exactly the opposite: a low sales volume.

So making deals with portals is currently very bad for your long term business strategy. You offer them your game, they use it to gain extra customers, keep those customers for themselves, and keep the biggest revenue share. And what do you get out of it? The breadcrumbs that fall off the table.

The only thing portals can offer you is traffic, but remember that they will keep that traffic for themselves. They are in control, not you, and they make damn sure it stays that way.

So what can you do about it? Well, just refuse the kind of deals that will put you in dead end street. Use your games to build up your own business, not someone else’s. And when doing deals, make sure both parties get their fair share.

I want to know your opinion on this, so comment below and tell me what you think. How low will you go to sell your game?

How much money will your first game make?

Koen Witters — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 07:18:08 +0000

This question has been asked an answered many times before, but none of the answers seems satisfying. I’m going to give you a clear and realistic answer, but you’ll have to work hard to achieve those numbers.

Jeff Tunnell tried to answer this question in 2006, but basically he says it’s in between $0 and what a no.1 selling game on a portal can make. That’s a safe answer, but it’s a pretty wide range to say the least, and therefore totally useless. Part 2 of that article never came… .

The Rampant Coyote also took several shots at the answer, and he provides more clear information. You should definitely check out his articles Yes, Virginia, There Is Money In Indie Games and Should I Become An Indie Game Developer?. But still, no real numbers are given for your first game.

There are many more articles available on this topic, but none of them provide the answers you seek. That is until now.

I’m going to give you a more specific answer: If you use what you learn on this site, your first game will make you a few thousand dollars. This is not a lot, you won’t get rich from that, but that’s reality. And this doesn’t mean creating a game and uploading it to the internet. It means working incredibly hard and doing a huge amount of marketing. Or in other words: create (and finish!) the best game you possibly can, and market the hell out of it. I’ll help you with this by providing ready-to-use articles, but in the end, it’s you that has to do it.

If you want some realistic statistics, take a look at the sales data from Immortal Defense, those numbers are still relevant today, and show you what you can expect.

So what about those developers who don’t sell anything?

Well, they are doing something wrong, or are not doing anything at all. (If you’re one of them, subscribe to this blog! ). If you want to create a game, make sure it’s a project you can handle. And if you want to sell a game, marketing is everything!

The first day you release your game, you should already have sales. If not it means you haven’t done your marketing properly. At launch, your customers should be lined up to play the demo and buy it. (Yes, all 5 of them! )

What about those developers who earn lots with their game?

These developers fall into 2 categories:

They already released previous games which have built up a customer base.
They released the right game at the right time to the right audience. Or in other words: they got lucky.

Developers like Positech, Spiderweb, Anawiki, etc… belong to the first category. They will earn a lot more when they release a game, simply because they already have an existing audience to sell to. Remember that it’s always easier to sell something to existing customers than it is to gain new customers. And because you will only have new customers to sell to, you will not reach these numbers with your first game.

For the second category, don’t count on it that it will happen to you. These are the Braid’s or Number 1 hit wonders on portals. You should definitely dream of it, think that it’s possible (hey, there is a small chance!). It will keep you motivated, but don’t forget the brutal facts of reality: it probably won’t happen to you. (If someone knows a magical formula on how to create number 1 games, or how to get hyped on the internet, please let me know )

Conclusion

So… is a few thousand dollars the only thing you will get out of your first game? Of course not! If you play it smart you’ll build up a customer base. The next game you release will have more momentum, and will have more sales. After releasing a few games, you can become one of those ‘established’ developers I’ve talked about above.

Jim Collins has a great metaphor for building a business like this, explained in his book “Good to Great“:

Now picture a huge, heavy flywheel. It’s a massive, metal disk mounted horizontally on an axle. It’s about 100 feet in diameter, 10 feet thick, and it weighs about 25 tons. That flywheel is your company. Your job is to get that flywheel to move as fast as possible, because momentum—mass times velocity—is what will generate superior economic results over time.

Right now, the flywheel is at a standstill. To get it moving, you make a tremendous effort. You push with all your might, and finally you get the flywheel to inch forward. After two or three days of sustained effort, you get the flywheel to complete one entire turn. You keep pushing, and the flywheel begins to move a bit faster. It takes a lot of work, but at last the flywheel makes a second rotation. You keep pushing steadily. It makes three turns, four turns, five, six. With each turn, it moves faster, and then—at some point, you can’’t say exactly when—you break through. The momentum of the heavy wheel kicks in your favor. It spins faster and faster, with its own weight propelling it. You aren’t pushing any harder, but the flywheel is accelerating, its momentum building, its speed increasing.

Now go push your flywheel!

Koen Witters

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Below are links to all indie game sales statistics that I’ve found. If you come across other ones, please let me know and I’ll update this list: