3 ms·

Speaking as an independent gamedev: review-based storefronts (e.g. steam, egs, etc) select for the 1% of hits, but offers no pathway for the midrange -- everyon

Speaking as an independent gamedev: review-based storefronts (e.g. steam, egs, etc) select for the 1% of hits, but offers no pathway for the midrange -- everyone else gets lumped in with the slop.

deleted 1y ago
[deleted]
mattgreenrocks 1y ago
Yep. And no entity or group seems really interested in moving the needle on this. Instead it just devolves into stupid meta-gaming like the article discusses.
somenameforme 1y ago
It's definitely not just the 1%. Here [1] are some interesting data. 8.9% make $200k+, an additional 6.9% make $50k+. Exclude games under $10 and the median revenue of a game on Steam is around $17k. What's more relevant than that $$$ amount is the number of reviews that entails. That's sales in the thousands, which is more than sufficient to get that critical mass of reviews to start being recommended by their algorithm. It also varies heavily by genre. People love making platformers and action type games, probably inspired by the extreme simplicity of some hyper-successful games. But those are some of the worst selling games and the saturation of the market there cannot be overstated. By contrast colony sims, 4x, city builders, and so on have median revenue (with no filtering of the chaff) in the $4k-$8k range. Filter out the chaff and it'd probably be in the $30k range. And again in those numbers I'm not appealing to the $$$ values, but the corresponding number of reviews. Because the goal is to get some traction in their algorithm, and legitimate reviews play a major part there. [1] - https://gamalytic.com/blog/steam-revenue-infographic https://gamalytic.com/blog/steam-revenue-infographic
- somenameforme 1y ago
  One other addendum here. I didn't really put this into context of the exact numbers. So you might be thinking 'yeah, whatever - those top games are just the AAA stuff anyhow.' But those numbers are based on an average of 40 games being released per day. So in other words an average of 3.5 games are released per day that will make over $200k+! That's kind of insane really, and I think basically puts to rest the claim that mid-range games aren't being reached. Because there's obviously nowhere remotely near 3.5 big titles, or even remotely well known titles for that matter, being released each day.
- mwkaufma 1y ago
  Account for labor + marketing (or if you have a publisher, clawbacks on advances), and those are failure numbers.
  - somenameforme 1y ago
    Another datum they give is that 70% of published games are 'hobby projects' - no publisher and presumably little to no marketing and little no labor costs besides opportunity cost. The median revenue stats for publisher driven titles with an actual compensated team behind them are obviously going to be much higher.
    - mwkaufma 1y ago
      "hobby project" as a label is a patronizing deflection.
      - somenameforme 1y ago
        No, it's relevant to your assertion. It's the term used by the infographic for, at the minimum, projects without a publisher. And it turns out that it's the overwhelming majority of games. It's fairly safe to say that very near 100% of the chaff is going to qualify as a hobby project, but the great thing about development today is that hobby projects can also see basically unlimited success as well. For the obvious example - Minecraft was a hobby project by every possible definition of the term - no marketing, no publisher, single dev in his spare time after work - and it's one of the best selling games of all time. Lots of really great looking games today would also qualify as hobby projects. Advances in development tools/engines (and marketplaces) have really made some wild things possible.
        mwkaufma 1y ago
        "It's the term used by the infographic for, at the minimum, projects without a publisher." Term used by _whom_? Because nobody at DICE or GDC talks like that -- just peanut gallery blogs. "And it turns out that it's the overwhelming majority of games." Overwhelming majority... _of the way games are marketed_, not the reality of production. It's called "print the legend."

Speaking as an independent gamedev: review-based storefronts (e.g. steam, egs, etc) select for the 1% of hits, but offers no pathway for the midrange -- everyone else gets lumped in with the slop.

deleted 1y ago

[deleted]

mattgreenrocks 1y ago

Yep. And no entity or group seems really interested in moving the needle on this. Instead it just devolves into stupid meta-gaming like the article discusses.

somenameforme 1y ago

It's definitely not just the 1%. Here [1] are some interesting data. 8.9% make $200k+, an additional 6.9% make $50k+. Exclude games under $10 and the median revenue of a game on Steam is around $17k. What's more relevant than that $$$ amount is the number of reviews that entails. That's sales in the thousands, which is more than sufficient to get that critical mass of reviews to start being recommended by their algorithm. It also varies heavily by genre. People love making platformers and action type games, probably inspired by the extreme simplicity of some hyper-successful games. But those are some of the worst selling games and the saturation of the market there cannot be overstated. By contrast colony sims, 4x, city builders, and so on have median revenue (with no filtering of the chaff) in the $4k-$8k range. Filter out the chaff and it'd probably be in the $30k range. And again in those numbers I'm not appealing to the $$$ values, but the corresponding number of reviews. Because the goal is to get some traction in their algorithm, and legitimate reviews play a major part there. [1] - https://gamalytic.com/blog/steam-revenue-infographic https://gamalytic.com/blog/steam-revenue-infographic

somenameforme 1y ago
One other addendum here. I didn't really put this into context of the exact numbers. So you might be thinking 'yeah, whatever - those top games are just the AAA stuff anyhow.' But those numbers are based on an average of 40 games being released per day. So in other words an average of 3.5 games are released per day that will make over $200k+! That's kind of insane really, and I think basically puts to rest the claim that mid-range games aren't being reached. Because there's obviously nowhere remotely near 3.5 big titles, or even remotely well known titles for that matter, being released each day.
mwkaufma 1y ago
Account for labor + marketing (or if you have a publisher, clawbacks on advances), and those are failure numbers.
- somenameforme 1y ago
  Another datum they give is that 70% of published games are 'hobby projects' - no publisher and presumably little to no marketing and little no labor costs besides opportunity cost. The median revenue stats for publisher driven titles with an actual compensated team behind them are obviously going to be much higher.
  - mwkaufma 1y ago
    "hobby project" as a label is a patronizing deflection.
    - somenameforme 1y ago
      No, it's relevant to your assertion. It's the term used by the infographic for, at the minimum, projects without a publisher. And it turns out that it's the overwhelming majority of games. It's fairly safe to say that very near 100% of the chaff is going to qualify as a hobby project, but the great thing about development today is that hobby projects can also see basically unlimited success as well. For the obvious example - Minecraft was a hobby project by every possible definition of the term - no marketing, no publisher, single dev in his spare time after work - and it's one of the best selling games of all time. Lots of really great looking games today would also qualify as hobby projects. Advances in development tools/engines (and marketplaces) have really made some wild things possible.
      - mwkaufma 1y ago
        "It's the term used by the infographic for, at the minimum, projects without a publisher." Term used by _whom_? Because nobody at DICE or GDC talks like that -- just peanut gallery blogs. "And it turns out that it's the overwhelming majority of games." Overwhelming majority... _of the way games are marketed_, not the reality of production. It's called "print the legend."