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“I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

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51–60 of 346 posts

Re: “I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

#51

I don't understand how people still think that just creating and publishing a game is enough to sell enough copies or make a living from it. Maybe a few years back, that barely worked, but even then, if you didn't have an audience, your game never sold as much.

> I don't understand how people still think that just creating and publishing a game is enough to sell enough copies or make a living from it.

Back in the 80s even the crappiest games sold relatively well. Infogrames made a whole publishing company out of it.

Re: “I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

#52

> All in all just getting the business prepared ended up costing me about 550 more dollars than I was expecting. That's one month out of the 4 taken out. Either I'm misunderstanding this statement or he really calculated $550 for a whole month. How or in which country is that enough to survive a whole month?

I took a break from work to try out some personal projects this year and I got easily by with around that amount of money. As a student I lived on maybe half a that a month. Of course it would be different if I had mortgage and/or kids to take care of.

And before you say "wow, that's perfect, you could work remote, ..." consider that electronics and software (including games) cost more than it does in US.

(While I live in EU I think the most important part is that I live in former Eastern Block)

Re: “I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

#53

"... just getting the business prepared ended up costing me about 550 more dollars than I was expecting. That's one month out of the 4 taken out." You saved 2000$? OMG I would wait until 10000€ at least (Spain). At the end, he says: 'I know I can get hired for a good salary again but I don't think it will happen this year' . What do you mean by good salary? Because if you say you have a low mortgage in a low cost cou…

I live in Poland, which is more expensive as Romania (as far as I know), but close enough. My first salary as a developer was 750USD net per month and I was able to live out of it easily, partying a lot and not cooking much (and I'm a smoker).

His assumptions were not too unrealistic, he just didn't factor out additional costs and should have had bigger margin of safety.

You shouldn't compare money like this between countries, differences are big and Romania is on the bottom of EU when it comes to income (though they are currently developing super fast, so it will definitely change - good for them).

Re: “I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

#54
post #28

Quitting your job with only 4 month worth of savings, with a new mortgage, to enter an industry known for its oversaturation, extreme competition, and high luck element for indies ? That's insane. Maybe I'm just risk-adverse. That said, I think he actually succeeded, despite appearances. Managing to release a working game in 3 month, that actually got sales, is a feat in itself. The game will keep trickling sales, if…

Yes, it's very impressive, and the purpose of the whole post IMO is part of the marketing (call me evil). Also if he didn't quit his job, he probably wouldn't be able to get this far within a year.

Re: “I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

#55
post #42

Yeah, quitting the job with no savings is a mistake. The things he could have done better are mainly 1) Proof that people want to play this game. Post the gameplay video on /r/indiegaming, see what people say. I remember the early days of Minecraft, people went wild for it, even though it was very basic. 2) Marketing. Tweeting is not enough. Submitting to reviewers is not enough. On the positive side, he is fast and…

1) It's very hard to get proof for good, but not exceptional games. Getting any feedback is hard. Minecraft was unique, it will likely get to a quarter billion sold copies eventually, it's not the game you want to compare your 3-month project to.

It always saddens me when people claim Minecraft was unique, because it was actually a clone of Infiniminer [0]

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LwM6OA9DkXI

Re: “I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

#56
There is a success hiding in what you call a failure.

You've built a fully working product in a short amount of time. It went pretty much as you have planned it. This speaks volumes to your abilities as a game developer.

You discovered that you are not that great at launching products, marketing, and sales. These are the areas you need to spend a lot of time improving.

It sounds like the plan right now is to get up on your own two feet, financially wise. Get a job that will cover your expenses, so that stress disappears. Start saving up again.

Start learning about sales, marketing, and product launches. They may seem like a second thought to you, but each of these areas is as important as product development.

Another thing to consider is when to quit your job. In general it is said that one should have about six months of living expenses saved up, just in case. This is to cover a situation where you have a job and lose it unexpectedly. That six months of savings will allow you to spend time to find a new job.

To quit your job and self-fund, you need a lot more savings. How much is tough to say. But let's say you give yourself six months to break even in your game venture (no guarantees!), you need to plan an additional X months of savings to find a new job.

The good news is the next time, you possibly will not need to quit your job altogether. You already have a well-built game. Tweak it, redress it, and spend 90% of your time launching and marketing. Perhaps you can do it while you have a job and reduce your financial risk greatly.

Re: “I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

#57
post #28

Quitting your job with only 4 month worth of savings, with a new mortgage, to enter an industry known for its oversaturation, extreme competition, and high luck element for indies ? That's insane. Maybe I'm just risk-adverse. That said, I think he actually succeeded, despite appearances. Managing to release a working game in 3 month, that actually got sales, is a feat in itself. The game will keep trickling sales, if…

I also read it as a success. Developing and selling hundreds of units of software in less than 4 months for mere hundreds of dollars is challenging and iterable.

Re: “I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

#58
post #54
post #28

Quitting your job with only 4 month worth of savings, with a new mortgage, to enter an industry known for its oversaturation, extreme competition, and high luck element for indies ? That's insane. Maybe I'm just risk-adverse. That said, I think he actually succeeded, despite appearances. Managing to release a working game in 3 month, that actually got sales, is a feat in itself. The game will keep trickling sales, if…

Yes, it's very impressive, and the purpose of the whole post IMO is part of the marketing (call me evil). Also if he didn't quit his job, he probably wouldn't be able to get this far within a year.

[deleted]

Re: “I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

#59
post #54
post #28

Quitting your job with only 4 month worth of savings, with a new mortgage, to enter an industry known for its oversaturation, extreme competition, and high luck element for indies ? That's insane. Maybe I'm just risk-adverse. That said, I think he actually succeeded, despite appearances. Managing to release a working game in 3 month, that actually got sales, is a feat in itself. The game will keep trickling sales, if…

Yes, it's very impressive, and the purpose of the whole post IMO is part of the marketing (call me evil). Also if he didn't quit his job, he probably wouldn't be able to get this far within a year.

It is for sure, and it's fine, the amounts of money being mentioned are only material if you picked the short geoeconomic straw.

Re: “I thought I could ship at least 700 units to stay in business”

#60

Yeah, quitting the job with no savings is a mistake. The things he could have done better are mainly 1) Proof that people want to play this game. Post the gameplay video on /r/indiegaming, see what people say. I remember the early days of Minecraft, people went wild for it, even though it was very basic. 2) Marketing. Tweeting is not enough. Submitting to reviewers is not enough. On the positive side, he is fast and…

I quit my job a few years back with around $150k in the bank to fund my startup. A few months later, still nervous about leaving full time employment, I took a job interview with a big four. I received an offer with a base salary of $600k. I turned that down and committed to the startup.

A few months on, I receive a letter from the tax department advising that my previous employer provided corrected earnings information and that I now owed them most of what was left in my savings account. Grim news.

That big four job was already gone so I ended up in another interview process. Leaving that interview for the train station, I realised the coins in my pocket were not enough for the train ride home.

I set out walking, it was about 5 kilometers, 30c degree heat and equatorial humidity and then it started raining. I was in a suit. Strangely enough I found myself smiling. I thought "is this all you've got?". I actually felt happy... with nothing.

A riches to rags story by traditional measure.

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