4 ms·

http://i1.wp.com/www.raphkoster.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/whatmobilepubs.png http://i1.wp.com/www.raphkoster.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/... This image fr

http://i1.wp.com/www.raphkoster.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/whatmobilepubs.png http://i1.wp.com/www.raphkoster.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/... This image from the article is so true it actually hurts. The number of times our company has had a conversation like this would boggle the mind. We are not even a mobile game. We are a free to play PC title and we still get this garbage. It's interesting that publishers for Asia don't have this mindset. They are willing to actually put money up front, something that no non-asian publisher has ever offered us.

Pxl_Buzzard 12y ago
Your staff page[1] doesn't show anybody in business / marketing roles. How do you handle website production, forums, marketing, legal, etc without dedicated staff? Even with a small group making a game engine[2] we're finding that those issues that pretty much require a full-time person. 1. http://www.grindinggear.com/?page=staff http://www.grindinggear.com/?page=staff 2. https://github.com/Circular-Studios/Dash https://github.com/Circular-Studios/Dash
- Negitivefrags 12y ago
  That page is a bit out of date. We do have a marketing guy as of fairly recently. The day to day business stuff is handled by our Managing Director (listed as Lead Designer on that page).
socialist_coder 12y ago
You get those shitty publisher terms because the publisher has no idea if your game will be good or not. Why would they commit to spending anything before they know what kind of revenue & retention your game will have? If you release your game yourself to a limited market, prove it has good revenue & retention stats, then shop around for a publisher, you get much better terms.
- Negitivefrags 12y ago
  We did release the game ourselves and generated good revenue and retention. I'm certainly not complaining about our current level of success. The (non-asian) publishers still come out of the woodwork to offer you these kinds of garbage deals. We just don't take them. The fact that we were already successful is why these leeches turn up in the first place. These "publishers" are essentially glorified and very expensive user referral programs.
- DannoHung 12y ago
  Maybe they should ask to fuckin' play the damn game so they can decide whether it's worth a marketing spend.
- hnnewguy 12y ago
  >Why would they commit to spending anything before they know what kind of revenue & retention your game will have? Why would you sign a publishing deal if you know that your game has awesome retention and big revenues? The idea is to share the risk.
existencebox 12y ago
This may not be the best place to fanboy, but I wanted to say how much I REALLY appreciate your guy's model. It's been a total breath of fresh air in an environment that supports the absolutely worst trends in perverse incentives for free to play games; so just, thank you to you and all of your team. (on top of that, it's a damn solid game too.)
- mratzloff 12y ago
  Oh, Path of Exile! A coworker was chatting with me about how much he liked the DLC model for that game because it doesn't give anyone a purchased advantage, it's strictly cosmetic. He also said that this was the game that Diablo III should have been.
  - BystanderX 12y ago
    It and DotA2 are the primary titles supporting this model, and it's great for players. It's hard to sell to marketing though, apparently.

Pxl_Buzzard 12y ago

Your staff page[1] doesn't show anybody in business / marketing roles. How do you handle website production, forums, marketing, legal, etc without dedicated staff? Even with a small group making a game engine[2] we're finding that those issues that pretty much require a full-time person. 1. http://www.grindinggear.com/?page=staff http://www.grindinggear.com/?page=staff 2. https://github.com/Circular-Studios/Dash https://github.com/Circular-Studios/Dash

Negitivefrags 12y ago
That page is a bit out of date. We do have a marketing guy as of fairly recently. The day to day business stuff is handled by our Managing Director (listed as Lead Designer on that page).

socialist_coder 12y ago

You get those shitty publisher terms because the publisher has no idea if your game will be good or not. Why would they commit to spending anything before they know what kind of revenue & retention your game will have? If you release your game yourself to a limited market, prove it has good revenue & retention stats, then shop around for a publisher, you get much better terms.

Negitivefrags 12y ago
We did release the game ourselves and generated good revenue and retention. I'm certainly not complaining about our current level of success. The (non-asian) publishers still come out of the woodwork to offer you these kinds of garbage deals. We just don't take them. The fact that we were already successful is why these leeches turn up in the first place. These "publishers" are essentially glorified and very expensive user referral programs.
DannoHung 12y ago
Maybe they should ask to fuckin' play the damn game so they can decide whether it's worth a marketing spend.
hnnewguy 12y ago
>Why would they commit to spending anything before they know what kind of revenue & retention your game will have? Why would you sign a publishing deal if you know that your game has awesome retention and big revenues? The idea is to share the risk.

existencebox 12y ago

This may not be the best place to fanboy, but I wanted to say how much I REALLY appreciate your guy's model. It's been a total breath of fresh air in an environment that supports the absolutely worst trends in perverse incentives for free to play games; so just, thank you to you and all of your team. (on top of that, it's a damn solid game too.)

mratzloff 12y ago
Oh, Path of Exile! A coworker was chatting with me about how much he liked the DLC model for that game because it doesn't give anyone a purchased advantage, it's strictly cosmetic. He also said that this was the game that Diablo III should have been.
- BystanderX 12y ago
  It and DotA2 are the primary titles supporting this model, and it's great for players. It's hard to sell to marketing though, apparently.