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After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

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Re: After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

#391

Post by spaceman_2020 »

lairv wrote: post #358
spaceman_2020 wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Here's the harsh truth: unless you're well connected, the only way to get visibility on social media is to pay someone. This can mean: - Paying the platform (the easiest and most scalable, but also the most expensive and arguably least effective) - Paying an influencer for an explicitly labeled sponsored content (effective, but depends a lot on your target demographic) - Paying a popular account to share your content…

Is the third one legal ? I thought influencers had to make it clear whether they are sponsored or not

Nope, that's why you won't see anyone online talk about it (at least not on public blogs and magazine articles). But it's also the most effective since it feels less like marketing and more like organic sharing.

Re: After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

#392

Post by namrog84 »

nosianu wrote: post #374
mcherm wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The flipside is that it's a lottery. Steam is overflowing with new indie games every day, and many very good ones die in obscurity. Sounds to me like an opportunity. There may be a demand for a service that reviews indie games and "discovers" (promotes) little-known-but-great ones. It even has an obvious revenue source: allowing advertising by games (so long as advertisements and promoted works are VERY CLEARLY sep…

You just shifted the problem to a different place. Now it is the reviewer who has to get big, and has to be able to meet the expectations of their audience - over a long period. There are tons of reviewer channels on Youtube and Twitch. I don't think becoming a big enough fish as a reviewer is any easier?

I personally don't think youtube or twitch is the right medium for a curated reviewer store system. It doesn't scale the right way.

You need to basically be an app store but do it better than original.

Re: After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

#393

Post by PainfullyNormal »

justinlloyd wrote: post #158
mosseater wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've read on the /r/gamedev subreddit of people succeeding with even just doing cold-call emails to popular twitch streamers. Someone recently posted a breakdown of how many streamers played their game after he sent out emails, and he seemed to get around 5% turnaround. There's a guide that was posted to this subreddit a while ago too, that gives what you are looking for I think. https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comm…

I was playing Diablo 3 one evening (I use my real name), and the guy who I was grouped with was streaming on Twitch. Reasonably big name streamer. He looked up my name, found my personal resume website, played the small game on there. His viewers play the game. It is just some super simple stupid little space invaders game. Next day I wake up to several hundred emails in my inbox from various people just randomly tal…

You know, I've been contemplating whether I should lose the pseudonyms and start using my real name for all of my online activity. This story has convinced me that it's something I need to do. That's such a crazy sequence of events that would have never happened if you had been playing under a pseudonym that's hard or impossible to connect back to your resume. All these years, I've been sabotaging my "luck surface area" with my stubborn insistence of online anonymity.

Re: After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

#394

Post by namrog84 »

bowsamic wrote: post #313
brundolf wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The flipside is that it's a lottery. Steam is overflowing with new indie games every day, and many very good ones die in obscurity. You really have to get lucky and go viral But yeah, the entry fee for that lottery is at a historic low, which is still great (especially for hobby devs who don't care about the rest!)

I don't think it's lottery. I think that we don't want to admit that most people are just bad at designing and developing games. I hang about on /r/gamedev and I've seen a lot of posts complaining about low sales and not a single one of those games was compelling

its hard to be critical. ive never seen a great game not do well. even games that might seem pretty not doing well if you look closely enough are often still missing something.

I challenge anyone to provide a link to an actual great indie game that hasnt done well. that flew under radar.

Re: After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

#395

Post by DonHopkins »

driverdan wrote: post #369
mlindner wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is pretty normal though. Also I wouldn't say they're racist. They'd strongly object to being called racist as well. And this is in a pretty liberal area too.

> This is pretty normal though. It's not. Stop making excuses for them.

No post body was provided.

Re: After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

#396

Post by DonHopkins »

justadolphin wrote: post #344
DonHopkins wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

It is not so black and white. A person may have been brought up racist, no fault of their own and tantamount to child abuse I would say. Your mindset would exclude any chance of re-education for them. At a wider scale it's also very simple to talk big like you are right now online. But as a hackernews regular I rather imagine you are most likely a middling tech worker, perhaps living pay cheque to pay cheque feeding…

No post body was provided.

Re: After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

#397

Post by ancapsfascists »

mach1ne wrote: post #376
ancapsfascists wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It failed to sell well enough to recoup expenses.

4,000 reviews suggests sales numbers of 400,000, which is huge.

They sent out a notification that development had stopped, but they were still selling the game for half price. This resulted in huge review bombing.

Re: After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

#398

Post by falcolas »

sgerenser wrote: post #134
falcolas wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heartbreaking. Even with millions, cancer could destroy you financially. One paramedic prices having a heart attack at about $400k pre-insurance† (or no insurance). Check those limits on your plan... † Healthline has an article with another example from 2012 priced at $500k

Why would someone with millions not at least have an ACA plan? Even the worst ACA plan has an out-of-pocket max of around $10K individual and $20K family.

Out of pocket maximums and limits (or aggregate limits) are two different concepts. Once the insurance plan's limit has been reached, it doesn't matter how much you've paid out of pocket.

The ACA does prohibit these limits for certain "essential health benefits", but there's a lot of wiggle room that insurance providers will take advantage of.

Re: After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

#399

Post by [deleted] »

spaceman_2020 wrote: post #337
larsiusprime wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Easy: Among Us, for the many months that it toiled in nearly complete obscurity to the point of the development team nearly giving up the ghost and quitting, until one specific streamer picked it up and gave it the critical mass attention it needed to go absolutely huge. Had the developers had slightly less resources and shut down the servers before that crucial moment it would have never happened, even though clearl…

What was Among Us' marketing strategy like? Most developers have very little understanding of marketing, and are very hesitatnt to pay for good marketing services. Here's something most people won't tell you: the majority of online marketing is paid, either explicitly (i.e. you pay Google) or covertly (i.e. you "bribe" an editor at Forbes to feature your article).

[deleted]

Re: After 20 years the Dwarf Fortress devs have to get used to being millionaires

#400

Post by MichaelZuo »

ancapsfascists wrote: post #397
mach1ne wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

4,000 reviews suggests sales numbers of 400,000, which is huge.

They sent out a notification that development had stopped, but they were still selling the game for half price. This resulted in huge review bombing.

Even 40 000 sales is still decent for an indie game?
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