Pre-Development Research

Sometimes I question as to whether or not indie developers research into the market before they set out and make a game. In most cases I would say that they don’t. At the indie level, it doesn’t matter if your game sells, you just want to make a game. But isn’t it nicer when thousands of people actually buy your game rather than a couple hundred?

The most effective way to achieve this is to do your research. Find out if there is an audience that you’re aiming for. Is this audience large or is it niche? Niche audiences are extremely hard to find without the proper marketing so what is your marketing strategy? What will you do if your strategy fails? Are there portals/distributors who would be interested in your game? If you cannot reply to these questions with specific details then you’re screwed.

I’ve played some great indie games before but some of those never sold well. Some were even higher quality than the ones that do sell well. So what’s the difference? The ones that sold well did the research before they developed the game.

Condensing the Blog

I’ve now merged some of the pages together. It was getting to the point that there were too many individual pages.

The Indie Game News page includes indie game news along with the indie game list.

The Useful Video Game References contains historical video game videos, recommended video game books, and college game degrees.

Video Game Articles contains both articles and reviews of video games from the parent StuffWeLike.com website.

So what do you think of these changes? Are they good or are they too much?

Never lose your cool

Yesturday I found another 3D artist forum so I went ahead and posted a help wanted thread for The Divine.  (http://www.cgchat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=25285)

You can see from reading the thread that members keep on questioning my intentions. I understand where they are coming from. It does make clear sense that volunteer projects could be considered scams.

At the same time I’m replying to their posts with a calm tone. It’s important that in these situations you represent yourself and your game with a clear and conscise voice. If you lose your cool, you have lost a potential market for your game.

This will happen to you multiple times throughout your career, so just be ready for it. Always avoid a flame war.

I laugh at any developer who doesn’t support Wii

Faster development cycles, cheaper budgets, creativity, innovation – that’s what the Wii brings. Does it make business sense not to support this console if you’re a commercial developer?

I predict that any developer who has games coming out on the launch for the Wii will make a serious amount of cash no matter the quality of their game. Gamers will be hungry from day one, they want the new experiences that all of these games bring. It doesn’t matter if the game is a port because graphics don’t matter. It’s the gameplay that makes the game.

Technically each of these games/franchises are starting off on a fresh start. It doesn’t matter if the series was bad on previous consoles because with the difference in gameplay, no one will be able judge, if the game is good or not, until the game is actually released.

Even if the game sucks, it still will be fun because you’ve never played a game like this before. It’s a fresh and exciting new experience. This experience will wane after sometime but for those that release a game within the first six months, their game will sell like gold.

The creativeness of each developer will truly show in the next couple of years. In the near future, sales charts will prove that creative and fun games will often sell more than games that follow previously designed gameplay mechanics for the Wii.

By the way, now is the time to invest in any game company stock, especially Wii developers. Sell come mid-January/early-Febrary.