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Didn't expect to see this pop up again! I'm Adam, the guy that wrote that. Happy to answer any questions anyone has. Since writing that I've gone full time mak

by yeah_us 12y ago

Didn't expect to see this pop up again! I'm Adam, the guy that wrote that. Happy to answer any questions anyone has. Since writing that I've gone full time making games and I'm just finishing up the follow-up game, 'Pumped BMX 2'. You can see some clips on my instagram account: http://instagram.com/pumpedbmx http://instagram.com/pumpedbmx

marak830 12y ago
Not a question just a thankyou. An interesting read, im in japan atm teaching english while building my first game too haha. Currently in one of those sumps you mentioned, reading your article in the train though reminded me to break the parts im stuck at down more and get off my arse!
- illumen 12y ago
  Keep at it!
- yeah_us 12y ago
  That's awesome to hear, glad it helped!
johnsteve 12y ago
Thank you for this amazing read. A nice long route it seems that you have covered. Keep it up!
nnnnni 12y ago
Thanks for specifying that you made "new car money" rather than "new house money"!
- yeah_us 12y ago
  No problem! However when this last appeared on HN that was taken to mean the project was a failure, which I'd disagree with. 'New car money' doesn't mean buy a new car and nothing else - it just means I'm not living in a penthouse apartment! I've been fortunate enough to earn enough to quit my 'real' job and make games full time, which is the ideal outcome as far as I'm concerned! I'm not rich, but I'm doing what I love, so I'd count that as a resounding success. :)
  - philbarr 12y ago
    You've done brilliantly with that. I've written a few apps/games myself although they're mostly a bit crap [1], and I make about £20 total a month. I think I need to spend much more time on them like you did, particularly in the graphics / UI. Could you give a bit more information on: - how you recruited someone to do the graphics for you, was it odesk or similar? how did you choose someone? did you pay for graphics even though you didn't use them? - marketing. This appears to be the most critical different thing you did compared to other people with similar stories. Could you give examples of the emails you sent out? How did you decide which sites to target? How effective do you think sending out emails was compared to social media? [1] - https://play.google.com/store/apps/developer?id=Simply+Apped https://play.google.com/store/apps/developer?id=Simply+Apped
    - yeah_us 12y ago
      Sure, no problem. For the graphics I began by simple searching for 'video game 2d artist', and just browsed through portfolios. Eventually I realised that I was getting a lot of the same style of artwork, which wasn't what I was looking for, so I changed tack and started looking at 'classical' illustrator portfolios which resulted in a much more diverse set of artwork. After that I simply stumbled upon Eva Galesloot's portfolio (http://cargocollective.com/skwirrol http://cargocollective.com/skwirrol) and knew it was an awesome fit. For my latest game I'm working in 3D so I looked at lots of portfolios on Polycount (http://www.polycount.com/forum/ http://www.polycount.com/forum/). Marketing wise, I honestly did terribly at getting any coverage on video game websites. I think my success came from targeting a very specific niche, i.e. BMXers, which led to me getting good coverage on those websites. For my next game I'll be trying again to get some traditional games coverage, but I'll be spending more effort on cycling journalists than video games journalists.
      - philbarr 12y ago
        Yeah that makes sense, target the market that you're game is actually about rather than just "the game market". Makes sense when you think about it. By the way - I'm in the UK too. If you fancy someone to do the Android version I've plenty of Android, LibGDX and Java experience :). Email is in my profile.
chdir 12y ago
Interesting read. Question : I see that you just created your account. What notification service do you use that tells you that your app/game is being discussed on HN or any other forum? Genuinely curious !
- yeah_us 12y ago
  I'd love to say I have some awesome tool, but in reality I just check HN a lot and saw it when I sat down with my coffee this morning! I'd forgotten my normal account password so quickly created a new one!
- timjahn 12y ago
  I use HN Watcher for HN (http://HNwatcher.com http://HNwatcher.com).
  - chdir 12y ago
    Bookmarked. Though I wish there was one that covered every forum that matters for an entrepreneur.
    - Torn 12y ago
      Google Alerts should get you most of the way there. http://www.google.co.uk/alerts http://www.google.co.uk/alerts Seems like it supports RSS, so you could write a script to filter as needed
      - chdir 12y ago
        I've found it unreliable at times
- Concours 12y ago
  I use https://www.feedsapi.org/ https://www.feedsapi.org/ for this
jsumrall 12y ago
I'm thinking about making some apps, but one concern I have which I haven't found an answer to and was hoping to find in your post was a discussion about the legal/financial aspect of it. If I make an app, is there any way I can be liable for anything? Could someone sue me if I leaked a password? I don't want to incorporate just to make some apps for fun. For financials, how does one report those earnings? These are the questions I have, but I don't know which country you are based out of. If you or anyone knows how this would work (or know some online resources) for people in the USA or the NL, I would really appreciate it.
- yeah_us 12y ago
  I can't really answer your question directly since I'm in UK, but I can say that once the game had some success I went straight to an accountant to form a Limited company. That accountant now deals with the money side of things, so I can stay focused on the games (plus I'm terrible with money). That separation of concerns is, I suspect, a lot easier when there's only one person in the business! Additionally I didn't do much in terms of legal contracts with the first game (mostly stock assets with just the character art being commissioned), but for my new game I've had a lawyer draw up contracts for any major pieces of work.
napolux 12y ago
I'd really like to thank you for the article. I'm in the phase of "I have an idea for a game, how can I make it a real product" and this really helped me getting the right direction!

by yeah_us 12y ago

marak830 12y ago

Not a question just a thankyou. An interesting read, im in japan atm teaching english while building my first game too haha. Currently in one of those sumps you mentioned, reading your article in the train though reminded me to break the parts im stuck at down more and get off my arse!

illumen 12y ago
Keep at it!
yeah_us 12y ago
That's awesome to hear, glad it helped!

johnsteve 12y ago

Thank you for this amazing read. A nice long route it seems that you have covered. Keep it up!

nnnnni 12y ago

Thanks for specifying that you made "new car money" rather than "new house money"!

yeah_us 12y ago
No problem! However when this last appeared on HN that was taken to mean the project was a failure, which I'd disagree with. 'New car money' doesn't mean buy a new car and nothing else - it just means I'm not living in a penthouse apartment! I've been fortunate enough to earn enough to quit my 'real' job and make games full time, which is the ideal outcome as far as I'm concerned! I'm not rich, but I'm doing what I love, so I'd count that as a resounding success. :)
- philbarr 12y ago
  You've done brilliantly with that. I've written a few apps/games myself although they're mostly a bit crap [1], and I make about £20 total a month. I think I need to spend much more time on them like you did, particularly in the graphics / UI. Could you give a bit more information on: - how you recruited someone to do the graphics for you, was it odesk or similar? how did you choose someone? did you pay for graphics even though you didn't use them? - marketing. This appears to be the most critical different thing you did compared to other people with similar stories. Could you give examples of the emails you sent out? How did you decide which sites to target? How effective do you think sending out emails was compared to social media? [1] - https://play.google.com/store/apps/developer?id=Simply+Apped https://play.google.com/store/apps/developer?id=Simply+Apped
  - yeah_us 12y ago
    Sure, no problem. For the graphics I began by simple searching for 'video game 2d artist', and just browsed through portfolios. Eventually I realised that I was getting a lot of the same style of artwork, which wasn't what I was looking for, so I changed tack and started looking at 'classical' illustrator portfolios which resulted in a much more diverse set of artwork. After that I simply stumbled upon Eva Galesloot's portfolio (http://cargocollective.com/skwirrol http://cargocollective.com/skwirrol) and knew it was an awesome fit. For my latest game I'm working in 3D so I looked at lots of portfolios on Polycount (http://www.polycount.com/forum/ http://www.polycount.com/forum/). Marketing wise, I honestly did terribly at getting any coverage on video game websites. I think my success came from targeting a very specific niche, i.e. BMXers, which led to me getting good coverage on those websites. For my next game I'll be trying again to get some traditional games coverage, but I'll be spending more effort on cycling journalists than video games journalists.
    - philbarr 12y ago
      Yeah that makes sense, target the market that you're game is actually about rather than just "the game market". Makes sense when you think about it. By the way - I'm in the UK too. If you fancy someone to do the Android version I've plenty of Android, LibGDX and Java experience :). Email is in my profile.

chdir 12y ago

Interesting read. Question : I see that you just created your account. What notification service do you use that tells you that your app/game is being discussed on HN or any other forum? Genuinely curious !

yeah_us 12y ago
I'd love to say I have some awesome tool, but in reality I just check HN a lot and saw it when I sat down with my coffee this morning! I'd forgotten my normal account password so quickly created a new one!
timjahn 12y ago
I use HN Watcher for HN (http://HNwatcher.com http://HNwatcher.com).
- chdir 12y ago
  Bookmarked. Though I wish there was one that covered every forum that matters for an entrepreneur.
  - Torn 12y ago
    Google Alerts should get you most of the way there. http://www.google.co.uk/alerts http://www.google.co.uk/alerts Seems like it supports RSS, so you could write a script to filter as needed
    - chdir 12y ago
      I've found it unreliable at times
Concours 12y ago
I use https://www.feedsapi.org/ https://www.feedsapi.org/ for this

jsumrall 12y ago

I'm thinking about making some apps, but one concern I have which I haven't found an answer to and was hoping to find in your post was a discussion about the legal/financial aspect of it. If I make an app, is there any way I can be liable for anything? Could someone sue me if I leaked a password? I don't want to incorporate just to make some apps for fun. For financials, how does one report those earnings? These are the questions I have, but I don't know which country you are based out of. If you or anyone knows how this would work (or know some online resources) for people in the USA or the NL, I would really appreciate it.

yeah_us 12y ago
I can't really answer your question directly since I'm in UK, but I can say that once the game had some success I went straight to an accountant to form a Limited company. That accountant now deals with the money side of things, so I can stay focused on the games (plus I'm terrible with money). That separation of concerns is, I suspect, a lot easier when there's only one person in the business! Additionally I didn't do much in terms of legal contracts with the first game (mostly stock assets with just the character art being commissioned), but for my new game I've had a lawyer draw up contracts for any major pieces of work.

napolux 12y ago

I'd really like to thank you for the article. I'm in the phase of "I have an idea for a game, how can I make it a real product" and this really helped me getting the right direction!