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On the other hand, sometimes it's very much not chance. Take stardew valley. It's not like Barone hit some sort of jackpot with his game. It really is head and

On the other hand, sometimes it's very much not chance. Take stardew valley. It's not like Barone hit some sort of jackpot with his game. It really is head and shoulders above the competition, and that appears to be entirely due to his hard work on it. My evidence for this is that after I played Stardew Valley I was thirsty for more similar farming games, so I played or looked at every single one on steam (there's only about a dozen or so that qualify) and none of them are half the game that stardew valley is. If there were some diamond in the rough, stardew valley-quality game out there that through happenstance never went viral I would have hoped to find it, but no, there really isn't.

Nition 8y ago
I just had a look myself. The first one I see is "Fantasy Farming: Orange Season"[1]. Looks very similar to Stardew Valley, review average is 96% positive, but it only has 61 reviews (a good general indicator of sales) vs Stardew Valley's 86,000. I'm sure it's probably not as good as Stardew Valley, but one has probably 1400x the sales of the other. It did also release after Stardew Valley which is a problem. You can certainly benefit from being a first to fill a niche that people are missing. I wonder if the Stardew Valley dev had taken another year to release and Fantasy Farming had released first, if things would be the same. [1] https://store.steampowered.com/app/416000/Fantasy_Farming_Orange_Season/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/416000/Fantasy_Farming_Or...
- xupybd 8y ago
  You don't happen to be the creator of another indie game Scraps, do you?
  - Nition 8y ago
    Yeah that's me. Still working on it when I get the time - unfortunately I don't have a lot of time at the moment.
    - xupybd 8y ago
      Ah cool, I thought I recognised that username. I used to work across the room from you back at UR. I hope all is well. I was impressed with how well your kick starter went.
      - Nition 8y ago
        Small world. Yeah, the Kickstarter was good. Not good enough to finish the game as full-time work unfortunately, but that was my bad estimating of how long things would take. The experience on it got me another good job when I needed to go back to work on something that'd actually pay money, but I still want to finish it (for the people that have bought into it, and for myself), so I'm doing bits when I can. Working on a hopefully fun singleplayer mode that'll help alleviate the fact that there's no-one on the multiplayer. Should've coded it in Umajin. ;)
- hhjinks 8y ago
  It's also immediately obvious that it's just an RPG Maker game with very little effort put in to conceal that fact. RPG Maker games generally don't do well, because 99% of them are garbage, and those that aren't go to great lengths to distinguish themselves visually, like Yume Nikki, and I don't know if that title ever was a commercial success.
  - Nition 8y ago
    Nevertheless its review score average is equal to Stardew Valley's. Although I concede that people's expectations may be lower when buying this game, and that may make them less likely to leave a negative review.
- projektir 8y ago
  This game looks obvious problematic as far as marketing goes in my opinion. I mean, just look at the name, for starters.
  - Nition 8y ago
    Stardew Valley didn't do much marketing either. Yeah the name isn't very good. And yeah the base engine is RPG maker (re the other comment here). But this is kinda my original point. Making a game with a good name, or a different engine, isn't going to mean it's successful. You can always point out something in terms of "well it's clearly failed because X". Hell, people even say the Unity3D logo scares them off. But people really like that game. They like it as much as they like Stardew Valley. And it's probably sold less than 0.1% as much. And that's just the first game I saw on the list.
    - savanaly 8y ago
      I think you're putting too much stock in the steam reviews. Just because a game has the same % positive rating as another doesn't mean it's of the same quality or even that people like it the same amount. It's like rotten tomatoes. 2001: A Space Odyssey [0] has 93% on RT, Pick of the Litter has 100%. I'm sure Pick of the Litter is a fine film, but clearly there's a sense in which it's a lesser movie compared to 2001 by general consensus, despite what the percentages would indicate. Now the case of stardew valley and "the other farming simulators on steam" is not so extreme but that's what I'm getting at. [0] https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1000085_2001_a_space_odyssey https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1000085_2001_a_space_odysse...? [1] https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/pick_of_the_litter https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/pick_of_the_litter
      - Nition 8y ago
        I do think that people have lower expectations for more obscure games, and tend to review higher when they're pleasantly surprised.
    - projektir 8y ago
      But Stardew Valley is a much better name. You may be right that a good name or a different engine won't save a game, but I don't think the game you chose as your point is one to demonstrate that. > But people really like that game. It seems most people haven't played it. And there are often game with, say, awful graphics, that are awesome to play. It happens. That doesn't mean you should bank on it.

Nition 8y ago

I just had a look myself. The first one I see is "Fantasy Farming: Orange Season"[1]. Looks very similar to Stardew Valley, review average is 96% positive, but it only has 61 reviews (a good general indicator of sales) vs Stardew Valley's 86,000. I'm sure it's probably not as good as Stardew Valley, but one has probably 1400x the sales of the other. It did also release after Stardew Valley which is a problem. You can certainly benefit from being a first to fill a niche that people are missing. I wonder if the Stardew Valley dev had taken another year to release and Fantasy Farming had released first, if things would be the same. [1] https://store.steampowered.com/app/416000/Fantasy_Farming_Orange_Season/ https://store.steampowered.com/app/416000/Fantasy_Farming_Or...

xupybd 8y ago
You don't happen to be the creator of another indie game Scraps, do you?
- Nition 8y ago
  Yeah that's me. Still working on it when I get the time - unfortunately I don't have a lot of time at the moment.
  - xupybd 8y ago
    Ah cool, I thought I recognised that username. I used to work across the room from you back at UR. I hope all is well. I was impressed with how well your kick starter went.
    - Nition 8y ago
      Small world. Yeah, the Kickstarter was good. Not good enough to finish the game as full-time work unfortunately, but that was my bad estimating of how long things would take. The experience on it got me another good job when I needed to go back to work on something that'd actually pay money, but I still want to finish it (for the people that have bought into it, and for myself), so I'm doing bits when I can. Working on a hopefully fun singleplayer mode that'll help alleviate the fact that there's no-one on the multiplayer. Should've coded it in Umajin. ;)
hhjinks 8y ago
It's also immediately obvious that it's just an RPG Maker game with very little effort put in to conceal that fact. RPG Maker games generally don't do well, because 99% of them are garbage, and those that aren't go to great lengths to distinguish themselves visually, like Yume Nikki, and I don't know if that title ever was a commercial success.
- Nition 8y ago
  Nevertheless its review score average is equal to Stardew Valley's. Although I concede that people's expectations may be lower when buying this game, and that may make them less likely to leave a negative review.
projektir 8y ago
This game looks obvious problematic as far as marketing goes in my opinion. I mean, just look at the name, for starters.
- Nition 8y ago
  Stardew Valley didn't do much marketing either. Yeah the name isn't very good. And yeah the base engine is RPG maker (re the other comment here). But this is kinda my original point. Making a game with a good name, or a different engine, isn't going to mean it's successful. You can always point out something in terms of "well it's clearly failed because X". Hell, people even say the Unity3D logo scares them off. But people really like that game. They like it as much as they like Stardew Valley. And it's probably sold less than 0.1% as much. And that's just the first game I saw on the list.
  - savanaly 8y ago
    I think you're putting too much stock in the steam reviews. Just because a game has the same % positive rating as another doesn't mean it's of the same quality or even that people like it the same amount. It's like rotten tomatoes. 2001: A Space Odyssey [0] has 93% on RT, Pick of the Litter has 100%. I'm sure Pick of the Litter is a fine film, but clearly there's a sense in which it's a lesser movie compared to 2001 by general consensus, despite what the percentages would indicate. Now the case of stardew valley and "the other farming simulators on steam" is not so extreme but that's what I'm getting at. [0] https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1000085_2001_a_space_odyssey https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/1000085_2001_a_space_odysse...? [1] https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/pick_of_the_litter https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/pick_of_the_litter
    - Nition 8y ago
      I do think that people have lower expectations for more obscure games, and tend to review higher when they're pleasantly surprised.
  - projektir 8y ago
    But Stardew Valley is a much better name. You may be right that a good name or a different engine won't save a game, but I don't think the game you chose as your point is one to demonstrate that. > But people really like that game. It seems most people haven't played it. And there are often game with, say, awful graphics, that are awesome to play. It happens. That doesn't mean you should bank on it.