16 ms·

A Dark Room: From Sabbatical Year to $800k

399 points by nicoserdeir 9y ago

rubicon33 9y ago
> I liquidated my 401k savings (took all the tax penalties up front), and said "alright, gonna live off of this for as long as I can until I figure something out". This is the hard part in all of these stories. Props to him for having the courage (stupidity?). I think this forum is full of people who would not just love to quit their job and work on their own project, but would THRIVE in doing so. The problem is the paycheck. Do I want to risk it all, throw away my savings, all for a chance at success?
- cvaidya1986 9y ago
  Regret minimization framework. Looking back from your old age would you wish you had done something like this? Can you earn it all back with a good fall back plan on your expertise ?
  - rubicon33 9y ago
    > age would you wish you had done something like this? Not if I was 65 and still working, because I liquidated my 401k back when I was 30 and it never panned out. But yea, I would regret being 65 and having never built a business. > Can you earn it all back with a good fall back plan on your expertise? I don't know. Probably, if you were able to dramatically cut costs and go into hyper-saving mode. This can be a challenge later in life though (once kids and a mortgage take hold).
    - cvaidya1986 9y ago
      Why not throw out dirty prototypes of your top ideas every weekend to see if they gain traction?
  - toomuchtodo 9y ago
    And if you can’t earn it back, are you prepared to work until you die?
    - cvaidya1986 9y ago
      Opportunities are always there for those who keep an open mind and a growth mindset.
      - toomuchtodo 9y ago
        Let’s not derail the thread, but there are lots of people with college educations who can still only get a minimum wage job. Opportunities are not endless, nor always there. It’s entire possible you jump off the corporate ladder and never make it back on, your wages permanently stunted and your career prospects dimmed.
        cvaidya1986 9y ago
        Ok let me update it. Opportunities are always there for enterprising, confident and contrarian thinkers who will take several chances with low downside and try to create new things rather than compete within existing paradigms. Disclaimer: Not financial advice but personal observations
        toomuchtodo 9y ago
        This discounts the high failure low success rates of entrepreneurship, which is dangerous advice in a country with a broken healthcare system and no social safety net.
        cvaidya1986 9y ago
        Again, it’s not an OR situation. One can try doing side projects while one works full time.
    - CryoLogic 9y ago
  - purplethinking 9y ago
    I think more people would regret it if they knew what they were giving up, but most would probably not make that calculation. If he had kept his corporate job and spent the initial $30k a year he could have retired early only 10 years later. Maybe less if he'd be willing to live very frugally. Then he would be free to build as many apps and games as he wanted, giving him many chances at getting a big hit. I'm in this dilemma myself, as I've always wanted to do something more risky, but I don't want to jeapordize my ability to be financially independent at ~40. Being stuck in a potentially crummy corporate job with potentially terrible management and coworkers for another 25 years (not the case now, but things can change quickly) is the regret I want to minimize beforehand.
    - cvaidya1986 9y ago
      Moonlight unless your co owns your IP? Post traction go independent?
      - purplethinking 9y ago
        Seems the only reasonable option to have the cake and eat it too.
    - sumedh 9y ago
      > he could have retired early only 10 years later. That is a flawed argument. 10 years later you might not have the same drive/ambition which you have right now.
      - purplethinking 9y ago
        Maybe, but sounds a bit like future discounting to me. I'm just presenting my dilemma, and I don't think the solution is to be idle for 10 years and then switch to entrepeneurship overnight. More like work a normal job and try to get stuff going on the side, but don't risk your life savings for a lottery ticket.
  - wuliwong 9y ago
    Is the question of what I will think of something when I'm old really the best question? I know that this seems natural but I wonder if it is a bad way to make choices. I don't think my enjoyment when old is more valuable than my enjoyment when young.
- wuliwong 9y ago
  I've been considering this same move a lot recently. I know this is appealing to some people and seems completely insane to others. I believe that I understand my own psychology pretty well. The situation where every productive hour of my life can be devoted to creating my own product and my own business as well as every passing day being a step further towards zeros dollars in the bank is a way to push me into the mode of peak productivity and creativity. This is weighed against the large risk of not creating any positive revenue streams or cash injections from outside investors and spending all my money. :) I do not have a wife or children so the amount of risk is limited only to myself.
  - rubicon33 9y ago
    I'm in the same boat as you when it comes to my psychology and ability to get motivated. I am fairly risk averse though, and find myself unwilling to risk my nest egg.
- mkagenius 9y ago
  > The problem is the paycheck. Do I want to risk it all, throw away my savings, all for a chance at success Reading this, it feels better in India. Here I can work for 2 years in a good company, save enough to quit job and do something of my own for 3 years before needing money. (Lots of other stuffs are shitty in India, but this aspect is good)
  - rubicon33 9y ago
    That's awesome. I love hearing about how this scenario is for people in other countries. Here in California, I don't think that's possible. Cost of living is too high to live for 3 years off of 2 years of savings. Maybe if you were very careful with spending and had a good rent situation, you might be able to do it.
    - CryoLogic 9y ago
      If you are single and don't have children you can always leave CA for a few years, cut your expenses in half by living in a low COL area and come back if it doesn't work out.
      - murukesh_s 9y ago
        I was making the same point. Why make money in a high cost area and insist on spending there :-).
      - rubicon33 9y ago
        Yup, that is a good point. I would definitely recommend anyone with the drive and interest in striking out on their own, do so in their early - mid 20's ... Move somewhere really cheap, and make it happen! You won't be able to do that (or it will be very difficult) once you find a partner because their career may be geographically restricted. Even more difficult if you have children.
    - murukesh_s 9y ago
      You are actually luckier. If you live in California, please work there for 1 year, get your ass of that city/country and come live in a country where cost of living is lower :). That is provided you have the stomach for that and if you don't have family/kids. You can easily get Visa to almost any country and perhaps one month of California/SF salary is enough to live one year in a low cost place.
- CryoLogic 9y ago
  If you are living in a high COL area like Seattle or Bay area consider moving to a low tax state with low COL. Kansas, Montana, Arizona, not places you want to stay forever but you can get a studio apt for $600-$700/mo. Can probably cut your expenses from LA in 1/3 if you are frugal and push your runway out several years until you start making profits.
  - hansmalone 9y ago
    Engineer in St. Louis here. I live in a crazy nice walkable area of the city and pay $400/mo splitting a 3 story house with 2 others. There are plenty of very livable cities esp in the midwest perfect for saving/working on passion projects, only off-limit because they aren't seen as tech hubs or considered hip (These are the best guesses I have). Honestly I don't really understand why programmers (or anybody working mainly on a computer) aren't getting work from home and living in cheaper more livable places. Shrugs the lack of demand is sure favoring my lifestyle.
- taway20171214 9y ago
  > The problem is the paycheck. Do I want to risk it all, throw away my savings, all for a chance at success? here's something nobody seems to mention. most people don't risk everything once, then exit with a set-for-life payday a few short years later. that's the rare minority of entrepreneurs. most are moderately successful for many years on end, and may finally do a $multi-million exit after a decade or more of hard work and risk. after that initial success, you have to risk it all, multiple times, to either keep succeeding, or reach the next level of success. at any point, if you stop risking the status quo you are likely to fail. in other words it's a self-selecting process. if you are having doubts about risking your meager savings which you can likely earn back within a few years of frugal living while working a high paying programming job, there's your answer.
- adamnemecek 9y ago
  I’ve actually realized that I was thinking about this wrong. If you spend a year doing shit, you will be in a fundamentally different position skill wise. I quit my job over a year ago (I know, long time but my project is pretty ambitious). In that year I acquired way too many skills. Like I feel like a different person. You aren’t betting necessarily on your project but more on yourself.
- amirrajan 9y ago
  Not courageous. Really stupid.
evmar 9y ago
"If we spend a second thinking about this, if 9 out of 10 startups fail, then we only need to roll the dice 10 times and the last startup will (by statistics) achieve success." That is not how statistics works. :< With a 90% failure rate, your chance of failing 10 times in a row is (9/10)^10 ~= 35%.
- justinpombrio 9y ago
  They're also not independent trials. If you just failed 9 times in a row, you're probably not the best at startups.
  - GuiA 9y ago
    Or maybe you learned tons and it makes your 10th attempt more likely to succeed? Ultimately these ponderations are kind of meaningless in the absence of great data to frame them with.
    - jabgrabdthrow 9y ago
      At which number would you no longer make the point you just made? 100 failed startups? 50,000? You’ve got a lot of faith in people. My number is maybe 5.
      - always_good 9y ago
        Dunno, depends on the kinds of startups you're trying to create. For example, I don't think you're "bad at startups" just because you create more ambitious ones with a higher chance of failure. Some people are at a place where they can take more risks, it doesn't make them an abject failure.
      - gargarplex 9y ago
        I've been seriously, actively interested in building a tech biz or startup since 2003. In 2003, I started selling chat bots on the Internet. In 2005, I cofounded an affiliate marketing website that cracked the Alexa top 10k In 2007, I built an app that scaled to 100k MAUs and was acquired for $20K In 2009, I started a SaaS but couldn't break $~600/month in revenue. In 2010, I built a business that ran for over 5 years and supported me entirely for two of them, but probably grossed less than $100K total revenue. But it couldn't grow, as I struggled to find a repeatable and predictable customer acquisition channel. In 2013, I got involved in Bitcoin. Finally one home run after a portfolio of mediocrity. [I am choosing to omit various projects from this list, but between 2003-present, there have been a lot.] In 2013, I also started doing stock market research with ruby. In 2015, my work had attracted enough momentum to bring on an outside angel investor and even piloted the strategy in the markets with $1.5MM. Didn't perform that well; investors withdrew their capital. In 2017, I started a SaaS that is currently doing ~$2800/month in revenue. I also did consulting. I grossed about $190K this year from my business efforts - note, that's nearly 10 times faster (in terms of growing revenue) than I was 7 years ago. I also fixed a major hole in my previous business skillset, i.e., predictably acquiring customers - something I could never do for the biz in 2010. Furthermore, I have a lot more emotional maturity than I did 7 years ago - though Sam Altman was precociously mature, with the "emotional maturity of a 40 year old" (Paul Graham, on meeting Stanford undergraduate Sam Altman). So I can tell you definitively, that: - My skills are expanding due to systematically resolving the deficiencies in previous attempts. - These improvements are a result of deliberate practice. - Some people may have the ancillary skills, resources or characteristics that position them to perform better from early on - YC seems to be adept at identifying these people, but also credit them for making 1,500+ bets. - My best success to-date has been as a result of luck. I'm 30 years old now.
fragsworth 9y ago
This is incredibly depressing. It hits home for me because I'm in a very similar situation. I and one other guy almost went broke making Clicker Heroes, but it turned out to be a great success. But so far since then every project has not been worth doing. > I didn't do ads, I didn't do micro-transactions, scummy energy bars, and all those other bullshit monetization tactics. We did this in Clicker Heroes, and I don't like that we did. But I'm learning more and more that it's hard to compete against scummy tactics. I hope Clicker Heroes 2 does OK. We might have to find corporate jobs too if it doesn't.
- notl4wy3r 9y ago
  Even if nobody was using scummy tactics, it'd be hard to compete. There are so many people who want to make video games. Hell, I wanted to, before I got my "boring" BigCo job. Personally, I'm really glad I decided not to make games. I like the safety a regular income brings. Maybe once I hit my number I'll make some games, and we'll see if I'm any good at it. In the meantime, I have nothing but admiration for those of you who actually do it before having independent financial security. I can't say I think it's wise, but I am a beneficiary of the massive numbers of talented people working in your field.
  - otakucode 9y ago
    Unfortunately, that 'safety' of a 'regular' income is almost entirely illusory as well. Employers stopped providing insulation from market fluctuations in the 1980s. If your market dips, your company will hemorrhage workers without a second thought. Your desire for a place you can 'settle down' will also be ruthlessly exploited, and if you don't jump to a different company every 4 or 5 years, you will rapidly end up making radically less than you could elsewhere due to your experience level. This is unfortunately the scenario companies have built. It can be dealt with so long as you understand the game as well as they do, though. 'Make game of that which makes as much of thee.'
    - notl4wy3r 9y ago
      I provide my own insulation by spending much less than I make, and saving the rest. I have decades of savings at my current rate of spending. I'm about as safe as a person can be in this world. My company has been paying me very competitively for more than a decade. I'm not worried about settling down here, but nobody else will make me a higher offer, at least not without requiring much more of my time than where I am at.
ghostbrainalpha 9y ago
The math on this makes no sense at all. > - Live off of $15k a year. Don't buy a house. Don't buy a fancy car. Just save. - Do this for a year. - Land a job that makes you $100k a year. Save the rest. Max out your 401k contribution. - Celebrate by living off of $30k a year. - Do this for three years. - Land a job that makes you $140k a year. Save the rest. Max out your 401k contribution. Get a Roth, put $5k a year into that. - Celebrate by living off of $60k a year. - Do this for three years. > He is talking about SAVING, $500,000. Then needing to liquidate your 401k, just to take off a year? If he is capable of living on 60k before this, he should be able to live almost 10 years just on his savings without liquidating the 401k.
- scarmig 9y ago
  He did apparently have a girlfriend during his sabbatical, whom he supported. I suspect most of those budgets were aspirational as well, and he ended up spending 10k more for each of them.
- stevenwoo 9y ago
  He mentions in the course of the article putting a big down payment on a house after his big hit because his girlfriend/wife got tired of living in a small apartment, so he still has mortgage payments to make, plus his family didn't want to live frugally forever.
- castle-bravo 9y ago
  Yeah it doesn't make any sense at all. He grossed over 800k on a video game, loves programming, but after another three years he has to go back to his day job? It sounds like he's burning over 100k/year and lying about his expenses in this report. In any case, there's a lot of information left out.
  - amirrajan 9y ago
    I give you my Armchair Expert of the Year Award. Congrats :-) Must be nice to live in a world without having to give Apple 30%, insurance premiums, taxes, and royalties/partnership splits. Take this comment in good spirit. We all make mistakes. Nothing but love for you. Go build awesome things. Hire a CPA for all the math related stuff.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
warent 9y ago
But if you really want numbers, here are some of the numeric sacrifices I made to role the dice _once_ ( ... big list of qualifications ... ) Now you can take a year and a half off and roll the dice _once_ The author did great and should be proud, but I wholeheartedly disagree with this part. You don't have to have these ridiculous qualifications to take a risk (let alone "roll the dice once") and be successful. Choose not to live a lavish lifestyle and you can "roll the dice" many times.
angelsl 9y ago
No one's mentioned it yet, so I guess I'll be the one. I can't tolerate that many misspelt words and grammatical errors...
- notl4wy3r 9y ago
  > . . . grammatical errors.. Normally we only put one period at the end of a sentence.
  - FireBeyond 9y ago
    Apropos of the value of his comment, I'm sure you can appreciate that there's a difference between grammatical errors of the "don't understand the rules of language" type, and "poor keyboard/typing".
    - CobrastanJorji 9y ago
      Since you brought it up, what WAS the value of his comment?
      - FireBeyond 9y ago
        The original point was valid - that it is hard to read writing with many spelling and grammar errors.
    - notl4wy3r 9y ago
      I guess my point was, by demonstration, that nitpicking little aspects of the articles we link here is without positive value. I'd have been wiser to leave my comment unwritten, but sometimes I can't help myself.
- ryandrake 9y ago
  My guess is: English is his second language, but yes, I had a real hard time getting through that one. That piece would improve greatly with a little proofreading.
loteck 9y ago
This guy made a lot of really questionable decisions. Put his future and family at risk. His only hit was porting someone else's hit game to iOS. He himself admits he is working again now only so he can build a stash and gamble it all again. I hope he finds success some day, but given his track record, I'm very skeptical of his conclusions.
- misnome 9y ago
  Whilst perhaps a little harsh in its tone, this comment appears to be the only one commenting on the fact that it sounds like he only ported the existing game from web, didn’t create it. So, depending on how much split with the original coder/creator that 800k might not have gone very far, and seems pretty good for “A port”. I wonder if/why not forming a small studio with the original creator would have worked.
  - egypturnash 9y ago
    From the article: > I redesigned so much of the original game. So much of me went into it. I haven't played the iOS version of A Dark Room so I can't speak to exactly how much change there is between the original web version and this one, but it sounds like it's not just a straight port.
- jacquesm 9y ago
  Compared to some of HN's 'mega successes' he actually did quite well. There is still quite a bit of survivor bias at work here and if he had to do it all over again he would likely change some decisions but you can do far worse than this. What I like is that it shows adaptability and a willingness to try again and again until something actually worked.
- amirrajan 9y ago
  >questionable decisions That’s an understatement. >His only hit was porting someone else’s game Yep. He’s a hack job for sure. There is no way he’ll be successful in future stuff tbh.
  - 9y ago
myth_drannon 9y ago
Similar recent interview with him on indie hackers : https://www.indiehackers.com/businesses/a-dark-room https://www.indiehackers.com/businesses/a-dark-room
- midnightclubbed 9y ago
  This one adds some details of where the $800k revenue went. Apples cut of 30% drops it to $553k. Since it was a port of someone else's game half goes to them, so his actual income was $278k for the 16 months from start to end of 2015. Still a significant take-home but makes it more understandable why he had to take on contract work when his subsequent games did not hit iOS pay-dirt. I wish him the best, iOS is a brutal market.
- Apocryphon 9y ago
  If he's talking to the press, here's hoping he might restore some of the content he removed in his data purge. There's got to be interesting, useful knowledge in there for other game dev and future generations.
  - amirrajan 9y ago
    >there's got to be interesting, useful knowledge in there for other game dev and future generations. There is, but "the few ruined it for the many". Some who got access to that information tried to "growth hack" their way to a successful app. They started name dropping me to Apple as if they knew me. This isn't a very nice thing to do.
    - ricardobeat 9y ago
      Can’t anyone name-drop you even without such “information”? I wonder what kind of content that would be?
alexashka 9y ago
I'd like to think there's a middle ground between 'corporate america' and 'at home alone'. Hitting the jackpot the first time around may have actually led the author away from a place he'd feel most comfortable in - a small company with other people who love what they do.
- amirrajan 9y ago
  During my free time I did a good amount of contract work with small companies. They loved what they did and it was energizing. But what they love working on isn’t what I love working on which is in essence: “artistic, evocative experiences”. Yes I’ve invested in a closet full of turtle neck sweaters while I continue my search for my “magnum opus”.
  - a_t48 9y ago
    There are companies like that, but they are tough to get into (generally small company, low budget, low openings). I personally think it would be cool to work on the next Journey/The Witness/Monument Valley/etc, but it’s a crapshoot of knowing the right people at the right time with opportunity to jump on. I’m personally saving up until that opportunity comes or I go nuts like you and quit to do my own thing. Best of luck.
    - amirrajan 9y ago
      Thank you for the well wishes. You'd be surprised at how small/close knit the game dev communities are (come to TouchArcade's after party at GDC and say hello to figuratively every indie worth their salt). There isn't really a company that any of use work for per se, but "all" of us are collaborating in one way or another to make sure we succeed collectively. It's pretty great, but you have to have the battle scars to join (actually you just have to bring cool laptop stickers to the party and we'll tell you all of our war stories in great detail).
      - a_t48 9y ago
        I believe it. Game industry is a small place. I miss shipping.
krutzger 9y ago
Finally created an account, just to say this "A Dark Room recently hit the #2 spot _overall_ on Google Play (pro tip: stick to iOS, the revenue is almost an order of magnitude better)" I bought the game on android to support the developer despite the game being VERY late to android. With that said, the android port is horrible. It's behind garbage. Amir cannot talk about love for the code and release crap like that. So treating android user as idiots. We pay for good game and avoid crap. Don't be crap. Edit: ADR went quickly free on android because nobody would pay for that crap. So that's why it didn't make much money.
- amirrajan 9y ago
  That sucks. I’d spend more time on the Android version. But there is a really high piracy rate. Buy a Samsung Galaxy S8, it was tested on there. Both Michael and I appreciate the hat tip you gave us by buying it. Email me and I’ll glady refund your $0.99.
  - qzervaas 9y ago
    My 2 cents: 1. Charge more than 99c. Double the price and your sales will likely drop by less than half, making it profitable to do so. 2. If you’re going to half-ass the port to Android, why even bother? It will do more damage than it’s worth.
    - amirrajan 9y ago
      It works great on the devices I’ve tested on. Which is like 4 out of the 15,000 possible OS+Device+Carrier combinations.
      - krutzger 9y ago
        If it looks like a half-loaded web page on a nexus (which is the reference device for the platform) then something is wrong. Please don't take offence, I'm just trying to explain why it did so bad on android. edit: you don't need to test your app on 1500 devices. They are all the same, if you plan for it only two devices (big/small screen) should suffice. Source: former app developer.
cdelsolar 9y ago
Privaledge? Role? Come on man, edit the article a little.
bambax 9y ago
> All code I see is beautiful in its own way. It tells a story of the reasonable programmers put in unreasonable situations. I like that. I think it's kind of deep.
downandout 9y ago
I have never been directly employed at a large Silicon Valley tech company. Is it really that difficult to work on side projects on your nights/weekends while working at these places? To be sure, it would take longer to get your projects finished, but you would also be doing so with the benefit of a steady paycheck and health insurance. If you happen to hit the lottery with your finished project, great - quit your job. But it seems insane to me to just gamble on something with such absurdly long odds, especially if you have a wife. Also, the sad reality is that only a very lucky few will create games that become popular enough to generate a living wage without somewhat aggressive monetization techniques, such as ads and in-game purchases. This guy seems to really dislike his corporate job, but apparently not enough to monetize his games well. If anyone else wants to follow in his footsteps, you should do some soul searching before you put in your notice and decide if you can live with a near-zero chance of success while sticking to your principles, or if you want to have a much higher chance of success but with the caveat that your users will be seeing ads and buying power bars from you. Life is full of crappy trade-offs.
- amirrajan 9y ago
  +1. This guy took a huge risk and is an idiot. He got stupid lucky.
  - scott_karana 9y ago
    In case anyone missed it, 'amirrajan is the author of the submission :)
  - downandout 9y ago
    I didn’t say you were an idiot. You bought a lottery ticket, and won. All I was saying is that most people in the app business lose, especially if they don’t use aggressive monetization.
    - amirrajan 9y ago
      No seriously. My current self would be slapping my past self in the back of the head saying “you idiot, do you have any idea what kind of bullet you dodged?!”
dougmwne 9y ago
His budget numbers & supposed savings vs. sabbatical runway shock me. The 401k bit fits his "roll the dice" theme, but should never have been necessary. I can't help but feel we have an unreliable narrator who's not telling us the full story about finances and motivations. The truth would be so much more interesting and instructive. What setback really led to needing to clock out and cash out? What was really left of that 800k after the app store cut and taxes and marketing and mistakes? Was it only money that pushed him back into the workplace or something more? Real life is messy and I can see the hole where he cut that part out of his story.
namuol 9y ago
Here's a funny satirical antidote for "bet the farm" success-story fantasies like this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_F9jxsfGCw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_F9jxsfGCw
- amirrajan 9y ago
  Loved it. Thanks for sharing. Survivorship bias is a problem imho.
- lalos 9y ago
  Thank you for this. A great talk in youtube equating winning lottery ticket with a successful business / startup. (want this indexed by my bookmarking site google.com)
- lscore720 9y ago
  I loved this, thanks for sharing! I died at "niche numbers."
m3kw9 9y ago
I think he meant 9/10 times a business will fail if trying the first time in a field. If it is your 2nd time trying after a fail or success, the chance has to be different because you’ve boosted your chance from the learnings
senatorobama 9y ago
Upper class privilege
matt_wulfeck 9y ago
> So here I am with a disgusting $140,000 in total compensation. A sea of cubicals, souless sheep that want nothing more than to do their time and go home. We need to learn the art and skill of finding joy in any circumstance. This detached, negative view of your coworkers does nothing but signal your inability or unwillingness to become something apart from your selfish, personal desires. This entire generation is lost at sea. Can’t you see that your happiness is dependent on none other than yourself?
- l33tbro 9y ago
  Did you read the entire thing? > The people I once called sheep, aren't that. They just didn't have the means to roll the dice. Source: later in blog.
  - pyro2927 9y ago
    That's still an extremely opinionated viewpoint. Some people are happy to work a 9-to-5 gig because it affords them stability in exploring their other hobbies.
    - gregorias 9y ago
      I agree with your sentiment and find the judgemental, derisive attitude that some entrepreneurial communities exhibit distressing. Going so far as to call 9-to-5 workers sheep is a display of arrogance and (perhaps) own insecurities. It would be better for us not to foster such attitudes.
      - amirrajan 9y ago
        This has been a big regret of mine. I should never have preceived anyone in a 9 to 5 that way. And as mentioned above, there is nothing wrong with a 9 to 5 (dice or no dice). It’s a prefectly valid course of action to pursue the more important things in life.
- tootie 9y ago
  I'd you'd have to back up that statement implying that this is somehow unique to this generation.
jblow 9y ago
Yes, the game market is often hard. But I find this author's attitude fatalistic and weird. (Also I agree that the numbers do not add up). He seems to think that "rolling the dice" is the primary thing going on, and that he can't influence this substantially by any amount of development skill, proper tactics, and so forth. I wonder if this kind of mindset is a side-effect of modern-day political correctness -- that if you succeed, it is 100% due to your good fortune (combined privilege and luck) and not because you did anything special to get there. The upside of such an attitude is that we recognize luck and recognize that people who failed did not necessarily fail through fault of their own. One major downside is that we feel a lack of agency, and this lack of agency is almost certain to drastically decrease the chances of future success. Be careful what you believe, because it matters. For my part, I think talent and skill and grit are huge factors in success, so if I want to succeed at something, I am able to formulate some kind of a plan. I don't feel that I am "just rolling the dice", even when luck is involved (which it is all the time, in everything).
- yannyu 9y ago
  I don't think most people think all success is 100% luck, but many people do find issue with those who consider themselves self-made without any consideration for privilege and luck. It feels like you're setting up a strawman here of people who believe that all success is unearned. The author only said that there are those who work as hard as he does and are as smart as him and yet don't succeed. How else would you rationalize situations where you find your peers failing and you succeeding, even though you might consider yourselves equals in ability and tenacity? Or do you simply consider yourself above and beyond and attribute all your success to that?
  - jblow 9y ago
    Have you seen A Dark Room? It's text. He ported a text game, that someone else had already designed and implemented, to iOS. This is not a huge amount of work compared to what most game development people do, and is not particularly challenging compared to what people are doing with 3D graphics, etc. I am pointing this out not to be mean, but to respond to your point: "those who work as hard as he does and are as smart as him". What he did for A Dark Room was something pretty much any iOS programmer can do, and in those conditions it's natural not to expect to be noticed in a crowded market. i.e. he evidently did not do anything noticeably smarter or work noticeably harder than anyone else. This doesn't mean he can't do smarter and bigger things, just that a port of ADR is not that, and neither were his other descriptions of projects he did in the meantime (for example, look at the screenshots for Mildly Interesting RTS). I think when this is the limit of what one is attempting, one has no right to complain that people aren't buying one's stuff (and should not be surprised at that either!)
anigbrowl 9y ago
Then. A Dark Room went viral. I suspect the author's lack of subsequent success with his other games stems from his apparent lack of curiosity about exactly how his first and only lucky break took place.
- jng 9y ago
  It's not about lack of understanding. The viral success of a "one-off" type of game like ADR is nearly impossible to reproduce. Sometimes people take a liking to something because you hit exactly the right notes without even knowing what notes they are (not that they do themselves even!), and it is impossible to hit them again. ADR looks like that kind of success. Repeating the success of GTA Vice City is very hard, but probably more tractable than repeating the success of ADR. There are a few reasons: the high resource requirements for the production and marketing create a moat, the type of game is amenable to a near "extension" to repeat the success, etc... notwithstanding that, most game publishers end up finding the way to kill a franchise after a few titles.
  - anigbrowl 9y ago
    Sure, but I'd have expected at least some analysis of what happened - where it got reviewed, or what the growth pattern leading up to the sudden spike was like, or anything really.
  - wccrawford 9y ago
    Actually, if the original creator of A Dark Room wrote another game that was nearly identical, people would lap it up. Especially the ones that loved it the first time. The problem is that the OP here didn't write it. They ported it to mobile. So they haven't yet actually created a game like this, they've just made some changes to an existing one that was already insanely popular and reaped the rewards for it. Story-based incrementals are still incredibly popular in the incremental games community, and another good one will do quite well. It's very, very hard to charge for them, though, because nobody trusts them to be any good until after they've played it to the end. So you basically have to make a free one and hope it takes off, and then charge for the mobile port of it.
- 9y ago
phaser 9y ago
I appreciate the honesty in this post and I'm pretty sure we people who make games can all learn from this. having said that, before relating to the story please take into consideration he is going solo at it. Difficulties are very different if you are working as a team: It's a lot more expensive but a collaborative approach to creation can yield better odds of success if they can look at the game from different points of view (story, graphics, programming) I'm not in favor of either approaches to game development, but Please remember that following your guts on creative work is both a blessing and a curse, and teamwork is a totally different beast.
foxfired 9y ago
> The people I once called sheep, aren't that. They just didn't have the means to roll the dice. One thing I see often and often (I've done it too) is that when you quit your job to pursue your dream, everybody else working at a job is a sucker. They are too comfy in their life sucking job and one day they will get fired and realize that they wasted their time making someone else rich. I was lucky that failure caught up with me really fast and I realized I am no better then others (so did the author). But I've seen cases where the person believes in this so much that even after catastrophic failure they can't go back to a job because, well, of all the horrible things they said about being an employee. I was in start up school this year and one of the common theme was about people who where at the brink of losing their home for an idea that was not even close to ready to launch. The instructor stress them to get a job.
- amirrajan 9y ago
  >The instructor stress them to get a job. This is really good advice. Additionally I'd say don't bet the farm. Some times the best you can do is be that rock/stepping stone for your kin to build a legacy with.
jondubois 9y ago
>> There is such a heavy dose of luck in success. There are those that will give one thousand percent, and because the roll of the dice wasn't perfect, nothing materializes. They have as much love for the game development as I have... they've worked as hard as I have... but just didn't get a kiss from Lady Luck. And it sucks. It just isn't fair that they want to create more than their next breathe, but can't catch a good break to devote time to it. They have to look over at those that have the privaledge to take multiple rolls of the dice, eat their cake and have it too, and if everything still fails, they get bailed out by mommy and daddy. This is exactly how I feel.
dankohn1 9y ago
I spent every morning for several weeks playing A Dark Room while commuting by subway with my 7yo, so I this story really engaged me. My biggest takeaway is to think about this advice from Sam Altman: http://playbook.samaltman.com http://playbook.samaltman.com “A word of warning about choosing to start a startup: It sucks! One of the most consistent pieces of feedback we get from YC founders is it’s harder than they could have ever imagined, because they didn’t have a framework for the sort of work and intensity a startup entails. Joining an early-stage startup that’s on a rocketship trajectory is usually a much better financial deal.” There are so many good jobs out there that are not just being a corporate drone. He has amazingly relevant experience for tons of companies. He should find one that has already taken venture funding and ride the rocketship (along with punching a lottery ticket) while still getting a reasonable salary.
- amirrajan 9y ago
  I'm really really happy that ADR gave you some (hopefully) great moments during your commute. Seeing thing comment means the world to me (it really, truly does). If you get a chance, download A Noble Circle and play it with your child. You may find that you can connect over it's ridiculous story and crazy gameplay. I'd love any feedback you may have about it.
  - dankohn1 9y ago
    Thanks, my son and I really enjoyed playing A Dark Room, and were definitely freaked out when we saw the workers had become slaves. I'll try A Noble Circle with him.
    - amirrajan 9y ago
      This is exciting!!! All the random criticism from this post will be entirely worth it if your son ends up smiling even once while trying to navigate Mr Circle. Let me know!
imesh 9y ago
His math for what it takes to roll dice once doesn't make any sense. If you can live off $15k a year, than can't he just work one year for $30k and roll the dice? It seems unnecessary to ever take the other jobs after his first year of working.
- infinite8s 9y ago
  Once you live off $30k/yr it's difficult to go back down to $15k/yr (especially if someone else like a significant other is involved).
omot 9y ago
Wow the ego in this guy is thick. It seems like he thinks success is only luck and it's no wonder, not once did he mention his customers. He only talked about how much he loves his work and his freedom.
drdrey 9y ago
> two years of internships, one year as a full time employee 2 years of internships? Is that a thing in some industries? Sure seems crazy to me
throwawayyy9876 9y ago
I am curious as to why some people think being paid $140,000 a year is 'disgusting'? I live in Australia so the comparison is a bit different, but here electricians and carpenters will very frequently make over $130,000 a year. Traffic controllers can make up to $180,000 a year, which is an unskilled job with only two days training [1]. In the prime of their careers, dentists, lawyers and doctors can commonly make over $300,000 per year. At the top end of the spectrum, specialist doctors and commercial lawyers can make over $1,000,000 a year, as can those who work in investment banking for instance. What is it about software engineering that people think is less valuable that these other occupations? Why do people think that earning $100k a year is overcompensation? My personal theory is that it is because impressive wages are a relatively new phenomenon in software (there is a much longer history with doctors and lawyers) and people are not comfortable with the idea yet. But I can assure you that there are many groups in society earning over this amount and one shouldn't feel disgusted by doing so. (Of course, there are many who are not - but that is a longer conversation) [1] https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/sweet-deal-traffic-controller-earns-a-shocking-130000-all-thanks-to-the-construction-boom/news-story/ae3305f632a9b9d206f1dd99bbf2e840 https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/sweet-deal-traffi...
- sflicht 9y ago
  envy?
- oculusthrift 9y ago
  it’s weird because that’s starting salary levels in a lot of silicon valley..
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- BigJono 9y ago
  That article is a crock of shit by the way. I know two traffic controllers and they're both on $25 an hour. I'm sure there's a couple somewhere that are well connected with the unions and get sweet gigs, or some actual engineers that get put on traffic control duty and earn that salary, but you can't just walk into a $140k job off 2 years experience doing traffic control like you can in software in SV.
yhavr 9y ago
- 215k$ in savings after game had succeed, according to the graph in the article - managed to spend in few years There's plenty of decent countries where you can live off this sum for decade, at least, and have much more dice rolls.

399 points by nicoserdeir 9y ago

> I liquidated my 401k savings (took all the tax penalties up front), and said "alright, gonna live off of this for as long as I can until I figure something out". This is the hard part in all of these stories. Props to him for having the courage (stupidity?). I think this forum is full of people who would not just love to quit their job and work on their own project, but would THRIVE in doing so. The problem is the paycheck. Do I want to risk it all, throw away my savings, all for a chance at success?

cvaidya1986 9y ago
Regret minimization framework. Looking back from your old age would you wish you had done something like this? Can you earn it all back with a good fall back plan on your expertise ?
- rubicon33 9y ago
  > age would you wish you had done something like this? Not if I was 65 and still working, because I liquidated my 401k back when I was 30 and it never panned out. But yea, I would regret being 65 and having never built a business. > Can you earn it all back with a good fall back plan on your expertise? I don't know. Probably, if you were able to dramatically cut costs and go into hyper-saving mode. This can be a challenge later in life though (once kids and a mortgage take hold).
  - cvaidya1986 9y ago
    Why not throw out dirty prototypes of your top ideas every weekend to see if they gain traction?
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  And if you can’t earn it back, are you prepared to work until you die?
  - cvaidya1986 9y ago
    Opportunities are always there for those who keep an open mind and a growth mindset.
    - toomuchtodo 9y ago
      Let’s not derail the thread, but there are lots of people with college educations who can still only get a minimum wage job. Opportunities are not endless, nor always there. It’s entire possible you jump off the corporate ladder and never make it back on, your wages permanently stunted and your career prospects dimmed.
      - cvaidya1986 9y ago
        Ok let me update it. Opportunities are always there for enterprising, confident and contrarian thinkers who will take several chances with low downside and try to create new things rather than compete within existing paradigms. Disclaimer: Not financial advice but personal observations
        toomuchtodo 9y ago
        This discounts the high failure low success rates of entrepreneurship, which is dangerous advice in a country with a broken healthcare system and no social safety net.
        cvaidya1986 9y ago
        Again, it’s not an OR situation. One can try doing side projects while one works full time.
  - CryoLogic 9y ago
- purplethinking 9y ago
  I think more people would regret it if they knew what they were giving up, but most would probably not make that calculation. If he had kept his corporate job and spent the initial $30k a year he could have retired early only 10 years later. Maybe less if he'd be willing to live very frugally. Then he would be free to build as many apps and games as he wanted, giving him many chances at getting a big hit. I'm in this dilemma myself, as I've always wanted to do something more risky, but I don't want to jeapordize my ability to be financially independent at ~40. Being stuck in a potentially crummy corporate job with potentially terrible management and coworkers for another 25 years (not the case now, but things can change quickly) is the regret I want to minimize beforehand.
  - cvaidya1986 9y ago
    Moonlight unless your co owns your IP? Post traction go independent?
    - purplethinking 9y ago
      Seems the only reasonable option to have the cake and eat it too.
  - sumedh 9y ago
    > he could have retired early only 10 years later. That is a flawed argument. 10 years later you might not have the same drive/ambition which you have right now.
    - purplethinking 9y ago
      Maybe, but sounds a bit like future discounting to me. I'm just presenting my dilemma, and I don't think the solution is to be idle for 10 years and then switch to entrepeneurship overnight. More like work a normal job and try to get stuff going on the side, but don't risk your life savings for a lottery ticket.
- wuliwong 9y ago
  Is the question of what I will think of something when I'm old really the best question? I know that this seems natural but I wonder if it is a bad way to make choices. I don't think my enjoyment when old is more valuable than my enjoyment when young.
wuliwong 9y ago
I've been considering this same move a lot recently. I know this is appealing to some people and seems completely insane to others. I believe that I understand my own psychology pretty well. The situation where every productive hour of my life can be devoted to creating my own product and my own business as well as every passing day being a step further towards zeros dollars in the bank is a way to push me into the mode of peak productivity and creativity. This is weighed against the large risk of not creating any positive revenue streams or cash injections from outside investors and spending all my money. :) I do not have a wife or children so the amount of risk is limited only to myself.
- rubicon33 9y ago
  I'm in the same boat as you when it comes to my psychology and ability to get motivated. I am fairly risk averse though, and find myself unwilling to risk my nest egg.
mkagenius 9y ago
> The problem is the paycheck. Do I want to risk it all, throw away my savings, all for a chance at success Reading this, it feels better in India. Here I can work for 2 years in a good company, save enough to quit job and do something of my own for 3 years before needing money. (Lots of other stuffs are shitty in India, but this aspect is good)
- rubicon33 9y ago
  That's awesome. I love hearing about how this scenario is for people in other countries. Here in California, I don't think that's possible. Cost of living is too high to live for 3 years off of 2 years of savings. Maybe if you were very careful with spending and had a good rent situation, you might be able to do it.
  - CryoLogic 9y ago
    If you are single and don't have children you can always leave CA for a few years, cut your expenses in half by living in a low COL area and come back if it doesn't work out.
    - murukesh_s 9y ago
      I was making the same point. Why make money in a high cost area and insist on spending there :-).
    - rubicon33 9y ago
      Yup, that is a good point. I would definitely recommend anyone with the drive and interest in striking out on their own, do so in their early - mid 20's ... Move somewhere really cheap, and make it happen! You won't be able to do that (or it will be very difficult) once you find a partner because their career may be geographically restricted. Even more difficult if you have children.
  - murukesh_s 9y ago
    You are actually luckier. If you live in California, please work there for 1 year, get your ass of that city/country and come live in a country where cost of living is lower :). That is provided you have the stomach for that and if you don't have family/kids. You can easily get Visa to almost any country and perhaps one month of California/SF salary is enough to live one year in a low cost place.
CryoLogic 9y ago
If you are living in a high COL area like Seattle or Bay area consider moving to a low tax state with low COL. Kansas, Montana, Arizona, not places you want to stay forever but you can get a studio apt for $600-$700/mo. Can probably cut your expenses from LA in 1/3 if you are frugal and push your runway out several years until you start making profits.
- hansmalone 9y ago
  Engineer in St. Louis here. I live in a crazy nice walkable area of the city and pay $400/mo splitting a 3 story house with 2 others. There are plenty of very livable cities esp in the midwest perfect for saving/working on passion projects, only off-limit because they aren't seen as tech hubs or considered hip (These are the best guesses I have). Honestly I don't really understand why programmers (or anybody working mainly on a computer) aren't getting work from home and living in cheaper more livable places. Shrugs the lack of demand is sure favoring my lifestyle.
taway20171214 9y ago
> The problem is the paycheck. Do I want to risk it all, throw away my savings, all for a chance at success? here's something nobody seems to mention. most people don't risk everything once, then exit with a set-for-life payday a few short years later. that's the rare minority of entrepreneurs. most are moderately successful for many years on end, and may finally do a $multi-million exit after a decade or more of hard work and risk. after that initial success, you have to risk it all, multiple times, to either keep succeeding, or reach the next level of success. at any point, if you stop risking the status quo you are likely to fail. in other words it's a self-selecting process. if you are having doubts about risking your meager savings which you can likely earn back within a few years of frugal living while working a high paying programming job, there's your answer.
adamnemecek 9y ago
I’ve actually realized that I was thinking about this wrong. If you spend a year doing shit, you will be in a fundamentally different position skill wise. I quit my job over a year ago (I know, long time but my project is pretty ambitious). In that year I acquired way too many skills. Like I feel like a different person. You aren’t betting necessarily on your project but more on yourself.
amirrajan 9y ago
Not courageous. Really stupid.

evmar 9y ago

"If we spend a second thinking about this, if 9 out of 10 startups fail, then we only need to roll the dice 10 times and the last startup will (by statistics) achieve success." That is not how statistics works. :< With a 90% failure rate, your chance of failing 10 times in a row is (9/10)^10 ~= 35%.

justinpombrio 9y ago
They're also not independent trials. If you just failed 9 times in a row, you're probably not the best at startups.
- GuiA 9y ago
  Or maybe you learned tons and it makes your 10th attempt more likely to succeed? Ultimately these ponderations are kind of meaningless in the absence of great data to frame them with.
  - jabgrabdthrow 9y ago
    At which number would you no longer make the point you just made? 100 failed startups? 50,000? You’ve got a lot of faith in people. My number is maybe 5.
    - always_good 9y ago
      Dunno, depends on the kinds of startups you're trying to create. For example, I don't think you're "bad at startups" just because you create more ambitious ones with a higher chance of failure. Some people are at a place where they can take more risks, it doesn't make them an abject failure.
    - gargarplex 9y ago
      I've been seriously, actively interested in building a tech biz or startup since 2003. In 2003, I started selling chat bots on the Internet. In 2005, I cofounded an affiliate marketing website that cracked the Alexa top 10k In 2007, I built an app that scaled to 100k MAUs and was acquired for $20K In 2009, I started a SaaS but couldn't break $~600/month in revenue. In 2010, I built a business that ran for over 5 years and supported me entirely for two of them, but probably grossed less than $100K total revenue. But it couldn't grow, as I struggled to find a repeatable and predictable customer acquisition channel. In 2013, I got involved in Bitcoin. Finally one home run after a portfolio of mediocrity. [I am choosing to omit various projects from this list, but between 2003-present, there have been a lot.] In 2013, I also started doing stock market research with ruby. In 2015, my work had attracted enough momentum to bring on an outside angel investor and even piloted the strategy in the markets with $1.5MM. Didn't perform that well; investors withdrew their capital. In 2017, I started a SaaS that is currently doing ~$2800/month in revenue. I also did consulting. I grossed about $190K this year from my business efforts - note, that's nearly 10 times faster (in terms of growing revenue) than I was 7 years ago. I also fixed a major hole in my previous business skillset, i.e., predictably acquiring customers - something I could never do for the biz in 2010. Furthermore, I have a lot more emotional maturity than I did 7 years ago - though Sam Altman was precociously mature, with the "emotional maturity of a 40 year old" (Paul Graham, on meeting Stanford undergraduate Sam Altman). So I can tell you definitively, that: - My skills are expanding due to systematically resolving the deficiencies in previous attempts. - These improvements are a result of deliberate practice. - Some people may have the ancillary skills, resources or characteristics that position them to perform better from early on - YC seems to be adept at identifying these people, but also credit them for making 1,500+ bets. - My best success to-date has been as a result of luck. I'm 30 years old now.

fragsworth 9y ago

This is incredibly depressing. It hits home for me because I'm in a very similar situation. I and one other guy almost went broke making Clicker Heroes, but it turned out to be a great success. But so far since then every project has not been worth doing. > I didn't do ads, I didn't do micro-transactions, scummy energy bars, and all those other bullshit monetization tactics. We did this in Clicker Heroes, and I don't like that we did. But I'm learning more and more that it's hard to compete against scummy tactics. I hope Clicker Heroes 2 does OK. We might have to find corporate jobs too if it doesn't.

notl4wy3r 9y ago
Even if nobody was using scummy tactics, it'd be hard to compete. There are so many people who want to make video games. Hell, I wanted to, before I got my "boring" BigCo job. Personally, I'm really glad I decided not to make games. I like the safety a regular income brings. Maybe once I hit my number I'll make some games, and we'll see if I'm any good at it. In the meantime, I have nothing but admiration for those of you who actually do it before having independent financial security. I can't say I think it's wise, but I am a beneficiary of the massive numbers of talented people working in your field.
- otakucode 9y ago
  Unfortunately, that 'safety' of a 'regular' income is almost entirely illusory as well. Employers stopped providing insulation from market fluctuations in the 1980s. If your market dips, your company will hemorrhage workers without a second thought. Your desire for a place you can 'settle down' will also be ruthlessly exploited, and if you don't jump to a different company every 4 or 5 years, you will rapidly end up making radically less than you could elsewhere due to your experience level. This is unfortunately the scenario companies have built. It can be dealt with so long as you understand the game as well as they do, though. 'Make game of that which makes as much of thee.'
  - notl4wy3r 9y ago
    I provide my own insulation by spending much less than I make, and saving the rest. I have decades of savings at my current rate of spending. I'm about as safe as a person can be in this world. My company has been paying me very competitively for more than a decade. I'm not worried about settling down here, but nobody else will make me a higher offer, at least not without requiring much more of my time than where I am at.

ghostbrainalpha 9y ago

The math on this makes no sense at all. > - Live off of $15k a year. Don't buy a house. Don't buy a fancy car. Just save. - Do this for a year. - Land a job that makes you $100k a year. Save the rest. Max out your 401k contribution. - Celebrate by living off of $30k a year. - Do this for three years. - Land a job that makes you $140k a year. Save the rest. Max out your 401k contribution. Get a Roth, put $5k a year into that. - Celebrate by living off of $60k a year. - Do this for three years. > He is talking about SAVING, $500,000. Then needing to liquidate your 401k, just to take off a year? If he is capable of living on 60k before this, he should be able to live almost 10 years just on his savings without liquidating the 401k.

scarmig 9y ago
He did apparently have a girlfriend during his sabbatical, whom he supported. I suspect most of those budgets were aspirational as well, and he ended up spending 10k more for each of them.
stevenwoo 9y ago
He mentions in the course of the article putting a big down payment on a house after his big hit because his girlfriend/wife got tired of living in a small apartment, so he still has mortgage payments to make, plus his family didn't want to live frugally forever.
castle-bravo 9y ago
Yeah it doesn't make any sense at all. He grossed over 800k on a video game, loves programming, but after another three years he has to go back to his day job? It sounds like he's burning over 100k/year and lying about his expenses in this report. In any case, there's a lot of information left out.
- amirrajan 9y ago
  I give you my Armchair Expert of the Year Award. Congrats :-) Must be nice to live in a world without having to give Apple 30%, insurance premiums, taxes, and royalties/partnership splits. Take this comment in good spirit. We all make mistakes. Nothing but love for you. Go build awesome things. Hire a CPA for all the math related stuff.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

warent 9y ago

But if you really want numbers, here are some of the numeric sacrifices I made to role the dice _once_ ( ... big list of qualifications ... ) Now you can take a year and a half off and roll the dice _once_ The author did great and should be proud, but I wholeheartedly disagree with this part. You don't have to have these ridiculous qualifications to take a risk (let alone "roll the dice once") and be successful. Choose not to live a lavish lifestyle and you can "roll the dice" many times.

angelsl 9y ago

No one's mentioned it yet, so I guess I'll be the one. I can't tolerate that many misspelt words and grammatical errors...

notl4wy3r 9y ago
> . . . grammatical errors.. Normally we only put one period at the end of a sentence.
- FireBeyond 9y ago
  Apropos of the value of his comment, I'm sure you can appreciate that there's a difference between grammatical errors of the "don't understand the rules of language" type, and "poor keyboard/typing".
  - CobrastanJorji 9y ago
    Since you brought it up, what WAS the value of his comment?
    - FireBeyond 9y ago
      The original point was valid - that it is hard to read writing with many spelling and grammar errors.
  - notl4wy3r 9y ago
    I guess my point was, by demonstration, that nitpicking little aspects of the articles we link here is without positive value. I'd have been wiser to leave my comment unwritten, but sometimes I can't help myself.
ryandrake 9y ago
My guess is: English is his second language, but yes, I had a real hard time getting through that one. That piece would improve greatly with a little proofreading.

loteck 9y ago

This guy made a lot of really questionable decisions. Put his future and family at risk. His only hit was porting someone else's hit game to iOS. He himself admits he is working again now only so he can build a stash and gamble it all again. I hope he finds success some day, but given his track record, I'm very skeptical of his conclusions.

misnome 9y ago
Whilst perhaps a little harsh in its tone, this comment appears to be the only one commenting on the fact that it sounds like he only ported the existing game from web, didn’t create it. So, depending on how much split with the original coder/creator that 800k might not have gone very far, and seems pretty good for “A port”. I wonder if/why not forming a small studio with the original creator would have worked.
- egypturnash 9y ago
  From the article: > I redesigned so much of the original game. So much of me went into it. I haven't played the iOS version of A Dark Room so I can't speak to exactly how much change there is between the original web version and this one, but it sounds like it's not just a straight port.
jacquesm 9y ago
Compared to some of HN's 'mega successes' he actually did quite well. There is still quite a bit of survivor bias at work here and if he had to do it all over again he would likely change some decisions but you can do far worse than this. What I like is that it shows adaptability and a willingness to try again and again until something actually worked.
amirrajan 9y ago
>questionable decisions That’s an understatement. >His only hit was porting someone else’s game Yep. He’s a hack job for sure. There is no way he’ll be successful in future stuff tbh.
- 9y ago

myth_drannon 9y ago

Similar recent interview with him on indie hackers : https://www.indiehackers.com/businesses/a-dark-room https://www.indiehackers.com/businesses/a-dark-room

midnightclubbed 9y ago
This one adds some details of where the $800k revenue went. Apples cut of 30% drops it to $553k. Since it was a port of someone else's game half goes to them, so his actual income was $278k for the 16 months from start to end of 2015. Still a significant take-home but makes it more understandable why he had to take on contract work when his subsequent games did not hit iOS pay-dirt. I wish him the best, iOS is a brutal market.
Apocryphon 9y ago
If he's talking to the press, here's hoping he might restore some of the content he removed in his data purge. There's got to be interesting, useful knowledge in there for other game dev and future generations.
- amirrajan 9y ago
  >there's got to be interesting, useful knowledge in there for other game dev and future generations. There is, but "the few ruined it for the many". Some who got access to that information tried to "growth hack" their way to a successful app. They started name dropping me to Apple as if they knew me. This isn't a very nice thing to do.
  - ricardobeat 9y ago
    Can’t anyone name-drop you even without such “information”? I wonder what kind of content that would be?

alexashka 9y ago

I'd like to think there's a middle ground between 'corporate america' and 'at home alone'. Hitting the jackpot the first time around may have actually led the author away from a place he'd feel most comfortable in - a small company with other people who love what they do.

amirrajan 9y ago
During my free time I did a good amount of contract work with small companies. They loved what they did and it was energizing. But what they love working on isn’t what I love working on which is in essence: “artistic, evocative experiences”. Yes I’ve invested in a closet full of turtle neck sweaters while I continue my search for my “magnum opus”.
- a_t48 9y ago
  There are companies like that, but they are tough to get into (generally small company, low budget, low openings). I personally think it would be cool to work on the next Journey/The Witness/Monument Valley/etc, but it’s a crapshoot of knowing the right people at the right time with opportunity to jump on. I’m personally saving up until that opportunity comes or I go nuts like you and quit to do my own thing. Best of luck.
  - amirrajan 9y ago
    Thank you for the well wishes. You'd be surprised at how small/close knit the game dev communities are (come to TouchArcade's after party at GDC and say hello to figuratively every indie worth their salt). There isn't really a company that any of use work for per se, but "all" of us are collaborating in one way or another to make sure we succeed collectively. It's pretty great, but you have to have the battle scars to join (actually you just have to bring cool laptop stickers to the party and we'll tell you all of our war stories in great detail).
    - a_t48 9y ago
      I believe it. Game industry is a small place. I miss shipping.

krutzger 9y ago

Finally created an account, just to say this "A Dark Room recently hit the #2 spot _overall_ on Google Play (pro tip: stick to iOS, the revenue is almost an order of magnitude better)" I bought the game on android to support the developer despite the game being VERY late to android. With that said, the android port is horrible. It's behind garbage. Amir cannot talk about love for the code and release crap like that. So treating android user as idiots. We pay for good game and avoid crap. Don't be crap. Edit: ADR went quickly free on android because nobody would pay for that crap. So that's why it didn't make much money.

amirrajan 9y ago
That sucks. I’d spend more time on the Android version. But there is a really high piracy rate. Buy a Samsung Galaxy S8, it was tested on there. Both Michael and I appreciate the hat tip you gave us by buying it. Email me and I’ll glady refund your $0.99.
- qzervaas 9y ago
  My 2 cents: 1. Charge more than 99c. Double the price and your sales will likely drop by less than half, making it profitable to do so. 2. If you’re going to half-ass the port to Android, why even bother? It will do more damage than it’s worth.
  - amirrajan 9y ago
    It works great on the devices I’ve tested on. Which is like 4 out of the 15,000 possible OS+Device+Carrier combinations.
    - krutzger 9y ago
      If it looks like a half-loaded web page on a nexus (which is the reference device for the platform) then something is wrong. Please don't take offence, I'm just trying to explain why it did so bad on android. edit: you don't need to test your app on 1500 devices. They are all the same, if you plan for it only two devices (big/small screen) should suffice. Source: former app developer.

cdelsolar 9y ago

Privaledge? Role? Come on man, edit the article a little.

bambax 9y ago

> All code I see is beautiful in its own way. It tells a story of the reasonable programmers put in unreasonable situations. I like that. I think it's kind of deep.

downandout 9y ago

I have never been directly employed at a large Silicon Valley tech company. Is it really that difficult to work on side projects on your nights/weekends while working at these places? To be sure, it would take longer to get your projects finished, but you would also be doing so with the benefit of a steady paycheck and health insurance. If you happen to hit the lottery with your finished project, great - quit your job. But it seems insane to me to just gamble on something with such absurdly long odds, especially if you have a wife. Also, the sad reality is that only a very lucky few will create games that become popular enough to generate a living wage without somewhat aggressive monetization techniques, such as ads and in-game purchases. This guy seems to really dislike his corporate job, but apparently not enough to monetize his games well. If anyone else wants to follow in his footsteps, you should do some soul searching before you put in your notice and decide if you can live with a near-zero chance of success while sticking to your principles, or if you want to have a much higher chance of success but with the caveat that your users will be seeing ads and buying power bars from you. Life is full of crappy trade-offs.

amirrajan 9y ago
+1. This guy took a huge risk and is an idiot. He got stupid lucky.
- scott_karana 9y ago
  In case anyone missed it, 'amirrajan is the author of the submission :)
- downandout 9y ago
  I didn’t say you were an idiot. You bought a lottery ticket, and won. All I was saying is that most people in the app business lose, especially if they don’t use aggressive monetization.
  - amirrajan 9y ago
    No seriously. My current self would be slapping my past self in the back of the head saying “you idiot, do you have any idea what kind of bullet you dodged?!”

dougmwne 9y ago

His budget numbers & supposed savings vs. sabbatical runway shock me. The 401k bit fits his "roll the dice" theme, but should never have been necessary. I can't help but feel we have an unreliable narrator who's not telling us the full story about finances and motivations. The truth would be so much more interesting and instructive. What setback really led to needing to clock out and cash out? What was really left of that 800k after the app store cut and taxes and marketing and mistakes? Was it only money that pushed him back into the workplace or something more? Real life is messy and I can see the hole where he cut that part out of his story.

namuol 9y ago

Here's a funny satirical antidote for "bet the farm" success-story fantasies like this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_F9jxsfGCw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_F9jxsfGCw

amirrajan 9y ago
Loved it. Thanks for sharing. Survivorship bias is a problem imho.
lalos 9y ago
Thank you for this. A great talk in youtube equating winning lottery ticket with a successful business / startup. (want this indexed by my bookmarking site google.com)
lscore720 9y ago
I loved this, thanks for sharing! I died at "niche numbers."

m3kw9 9y ago

I think he meant 9/10 times a business will fail if trying the first time in a field. If it is your 2nd time trying after a fail or success, the chance has to be different because you’ve boosted your chance from the learnings

senatorobama 9y ago

Upper class privilege

matt_wulfeck 9y ago

> So here I am with a disgusting $140,000 in total compensation. A sea of cubicals, souless sheep that want nothing more than to do their time and go home. We need to learn the art and skill of finding joy in any circumstance. This detached, negative view of your coworkers does nothing but signal your inability or unwillingness to become something apart from your selfish, personal desires. This entire generation is lost at sea. Can’t you see that your happiness is dependent on none other than yourself?

l33tbro 9y ago
Did you read the entire thing? > The people I once called sheep, aren't that. They just didn't have the means to roll the dice. Source: later in blog.
- pyro2927 9y ago
  That's still an extremely opinionated viewpoint. Some people are happy to work a 9-to-5 gig because it affords them stability in exploring their other hobbies.
  - gregorias 9y ago
    I agree with your sentiment and find the judgemental, derisive attitude that some entrepreneurial communities exhibit distressing. Going so far as to call 9-to-5 workers sheep is a display of arrogance and (perhaps) own insecurities. It would be better for us not to foster such attitudes.
    - amirrajan 9y ago
      This has been a big regret of mine. I should never have preceived anyone in a 9 to 5 that way. And as mentioned above, there is nothing wrong with a 9 to 5 (dice or no dice). It’s a prefectly valid course of action to pursue the more important things in life.
tootie 9y ago
I'd you'd have to back up that statement implying that this is somehow unique to this generation.

jblow 9y ago

Yes, the game market is often hard. But I find this author's attitude fatalistic and weird. (Also I agree that the numbers do not add up). He seems to think that "rolling the dice" is the primary thing going on, and that he can't influence this substantially by any amount of development skill, proper tactics, and so forth. I wonder if this kind of mindset is a side-effect of modern-day political correctness -- that if you succeed, it is 100% due to your good fortune (combined privilege and luck) and not because you did anything special to get there. The upside of such an attitude is that we recognize luck and recognize that people who failed did not necessarily fail through fault of their own. One major downside is that we feel a lack of agency, and this lack of agency is almost certain to drastically decrease the chances of future success. Be careful what you believe, because it matters. For my part, I think talent and skill and grit are huge factors in success, so if I want to succeed at something, I am able to formulate some kind of a plan. I don't feel that I am "just rolling the dice", even when luck is involved (which it is all the time, in everything).

yannyu 9y ago
I don't think most people think all success is 100% luck, but many people do find issue with those who consider themselves self-made without any consideration for privilege and luck. It feels like you're setting up a strawman here of people who believe that all success is unearned. The author only said that there are those who work as hard as he does and are as smart as him and yet don't succeed. How else would you rationalize situations where you find your peers failing and you succeeding, even though you might consider yourselves equals in ability and tenacity? Or do you simply consider yourself above and beyond and attribute all your success to that?
- jblow 9y ago
  Have you seen A Dark Room? It's text. He ported a text game, that someone else had already designed and implemented, to iOS. This is not a huge amount of work compared to what most game development people do, and is not particularly challenging compared to what people are doing with 3D graphics, etc. I am pointing this out not to be mean, but to respond to your point: "those who work as hard as he does and are as smart as him". What he did for A Dark Room was something pretty much any iOS programmer can do, and in those conditions it's natural not to expect to be noticed in a crowded market. i.e. he evidently did not do anything noticeably smarter or work noticeably harder than anyone else. This doesn't mean he can't do smarter and bigger things, just that a port of ADR is not that, and neither were his other descriptions of projects he did in the meantime (for example, look at the screenshots for Mildly Interesting RTS). I think when this is the limit of what one is attempting, one has no right to complain that people aren't buying one's stuff (and should not be surprised at that either!)

anigbrowl 9y ago

Then. A Dark Room went viral. I suspect the author's lack of subsequent success with his other games stems from his apparent lack of curiosity about exactly how his first and only lucky break took place.

jng 9y ago
It's not about lack of understanding. The viral success of a "one-off" type of game like ADR is nearly impossible to reproduce. Sometimes people take a liking to something because you hit exactly the right notes without even knowing what notes they are (not that they do themselves even!), and it is impossible to hit them again. ADR looks like that kind of success. Repeating the success of GTA Vice City is very hard, but probably more tractable than repeating the success of ADR. There are a few reasons: the high resource requirements for the production and marketing create a moat, the type of game is amenable to a near "extension" to repeat the success, etc... notwithstanding that, most game publishers end up finding the way to kill a franchise after a few titles.
- anigbrowl 9y ago
  Sure, but I'd have expected at least some analysis of what happened - where it got reviewed, or what the growth pattern leading up to the sudden spike was like, or anything really.
- wccrawford 9y ago
  Actually, if the original creator of A Dark Room wrote another game that was nearly identical, people would lap it up. Especially the ones that loved it the first time. The problem is that the OP here didn't write it. They ported it to mobile. So they haven't yet actually created a game like this, they've just made some changes to an existing one that was already insanely popular and reaped the rewards for it. Story-based incrementals are still incredibly popular in the incremental games community, and another good one will do quite well. It's very, very hard to charge for them, though, because nobody trusts them to be any good until after they've played it to the end. So you basically have to make a free one and hope it takes off, and then charge for the mobile port of it.
9y ago

phaser 9y ago

I appreciate the honesty in this post and I'm pretty sure we people who make games can all learn from this. having said that, before relating to the story please take into consideration he is going solo at it. Difficulties are very different if you are working as a team: It's a lot more expensive but a collaborative approach to creation can yield better odds of success if they can look at the game from different points of view (story, graphics, programming) I'm not in favor of either approaches to game development, but Please remember that following your guts on creative work is both a blessing and a curse, and teamwork is a totally different beast.

foxfired 9y ago

> The people I once called sheep, aren't that. They just didn't have the means to roll the dice. One thing I see often and often (I've done it too) is that when you quit your job to pursue your dream, everybody else working at a job is a sucker. They are too comfy in their life sucking job and one day they will get fired and realize that they wasted their time making someone else rich. I was lucky that failure caught up with me really fast and I realized I am no better then others (so did the author). But I've seen cases where the person believes in this so much that even after catastrophic failure they can't go back to a job because, well, of all the horrible things they said about being an employee. I was in start up school this year and one of the common theme was about people who where at the brink of losing their home for an idea that was not even close to ready to launch. The instructor stress them to get a job.

amirrajan 9y ago
>The instructor stress them to get a job. This is really good advice. Additionally I'd say don't bet the farm. Some times the best you can do is be that rock/stepping stone for your kin to build a legacy with.

jondubois 9y ago

>> There is such a heavy dose of luck in success. There are those that will give one thousand percent, and because the roll of the dice wasn't perfect, nothing materializes. They have as much love for the game development as I have... they've worked as hard as I have... but just didn't get a kiss from Lady Luck. And it sucks. It just isn't fair that they want to create more than their next breathe, but can't catch a good break to devote time to it. They have to look over at those that have the privaledge to take multiple rolls of the dice, eat their cake and have it too, and if everything still fails, they get bailed out by mommy and daddy. This is exactly how I feel.

dankohn1 9y ago

I spent every morning for several weeks playing A Dark Room while commuting by subway with my 7yo, so I this story really engaged me. My biggest takeaway is to think about this advice from Sam Altman: http://playbook.samaltman.com http://playbook.samaltman.com “A word of warning about choosing to start a startup: It sucks! One of the most consistent pieces of feedback we get from YC founders is it’s harder than they could have ever imagined, because they didn’t have a framework for the sort of work and intensity a startup entails. Joining an early-stage startup that’s on a rocketship trajectory is usually a much better financial deal.” There are so many good jobs out there that are not just being a corporate drone. He has amazingly relevant experience for tons of companies. He should find one that has already taken venture funding and ride the rocketship (along with punching a lottery ticket) while still getting a reasonable salary.

amirrajan 9y ago
I'm really really happy that ADR gave you some (hopefully) great moments during your commute. Seeing thing comment means the world to me (it really, truly does). If you get a chance, download A Noble Circle and play it with your child. You may find that you can connect over it's ridiculous story and crazy gameplay. I'd love any feedback you may have about it.
- dankohn1 9y ago
  Thanks, my son and I really enjoyed playing A Dark Room, and were definitely freaked out when we saw the workers had become slaves. I'll try A Noble Circle with him.
  - amirrajan 9y ago
    This is exciting!!! All the random criticism from this post will be entirely worth it if your son ends up smiling even once while trying to navigate Mr Circle. Let me know!

imesh 9y ago

His math for what it takes to roll dice once doesn't make any sense. If you can live off $15k a year, than can't he just work one year for $30k and roll the dice? It seems unnecessary to ever take the other jobs after his first year of working.

infinite8s 9y ago
Once you live off $30k/yr it's difficult to go back down to $15k/yr (especially if someone else like a significant other is involved).

omot 9y ago

Wow the ego in this guy is thick. It seems like he thinks success is only luck and it's no wonder, not once did he mention his customers. He only talked about how much he loves his work and his freedom.

drdrey 9y ago

> two years of internships, one year as a full time employee 2 years of internships? Is that a thing in some industries? Sure seems crazy to me

throwawayyy9876 9y ago

I am curious as to why some people think being paid $140,000 a year is 'disgusting'? I live in Australia so the comparison is a bit different, but here electricians and carpenters will very frequently make over $130,000 a year. Traffic controllers can make up to $180,000 a year, which is an unskilled job with only two days training [1]. In the prime of their careers, dentists, lawyers and doctors can commonly make over $300,000 per year. At the top end of the spectrum, specialist doctors and commercial lawyers can make over $1,000,000 a year, as can those who work in investment banking for instance. What is it about software engineering that people think is less valuable that these other occupations? Why do people think that earning $100k a year is overcompensation? My personal theory is that it is because impressive wages are a relatively new phenomenon in software (there is a much longer history with doctors and lawyers) and people are not comfortable with the idea yet. But I can assure you that there are many groups in society earning over this amount and one shouldn't feel disgusted by doing so. (Of course, there are many who are not - but that is a longer conversation) [1] https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/sweet-deal-traffic-controller-earns-a-shocking-130000-all-thanks-to-the-construction-boom/news-story/ae3305f632a9b9d206f1dd99bbf2e840 https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/sweet-deal-traffi...

sflicht 9y ago
envy?
oculusthrift 9y ago
it’s weird because that’s starting salary levels in a lot of silicon valley..
deleted 9y ago
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BigJono 9y ago
That article is a crock of shit by the way. I know two traffic controllers and they're both on $25 an hour. I'm sure there's a couple somewhere that are well connected with the unions and get sweet gigs, or some actual engineers that get put on traffic control duty and earn that salary, but you can't just walk into a $140k job off 2 years experience doing traffic control like you can in software in SV.

yhavr 9y ago

- 215k$ in savings after game had succeed, according to the graph in the article - managed to spend in few years There's plenty of decent countries where you can live off this sum for decade, at least, and have much more dice rolls.