Old questions never die: "is it possible to make a living out of iPhone development?"

Discussion in 'Public Game Developers Forum' started by ziotoo4, Jan 10, 2010.

  1. ziotoo4

    ziotoo4 Well-Known Member

    Jan 9, 2010
    86
    0
    0
    So, probably, this is one of the most asked questions ever.

    After the careful marketing campaign by Apple, and as succes stories (see doodle jump, Zombieville, iShoot are what i'd call that way) started flowing, almost every indie developer started dreaming touch banknotes.

    But now, after the 99cent price war, not-so-happy app income reports (i'm thinking for example to Streamingcolour's Dapple blog posts), new tools ranging from unity to gamesalad, as well as the arrival of the Usual Suspects (Gameloft, EA), things have changed, and the dev scene has gotten more and more realistic.

    Howewer, deve tend to keep apps state for themselves, and this lack of info leads people into thinking that the app store is actually a gold mine.

    I personally know it's very hard to become millionaire in the iPhone market, but the question is another: is it possible to live with an income due solely to apps? Can indie make quality titles and be rewarded, or is it some kind of gamble for every published app?

    I am curious about your experiences; not just income but also development time, money invested, public relations cost (if any) and so on.
    Of course i am not looking for accurate sales stats, just rough extimates wich would surely help professionals, wannabe devs and users as well to understand how the market works, and, eventually, whether if quality is actually rewarded or not.

    Looking forward to hear your impressions, thoughts, experiences ;)
    thanks and ciao!
    Fede, from italy (so forgive the bad english ^__^)
     
  2. Quorlan

    Quorlan Well-Known Member

    Sep 5, 2009
    314
    0
    16
    Game Designer
    Georgia
    Every developer's experiences are different. Developers like Gameloft can release total bombs that don't make back their high development costs while indie devs that create apps like Pocket God can reap rich rewards with little programming time and very little invested in marketing.

    I realize you're looking for info from several devs to perhaps get an overall, top-down view of the app store. But most people who ask this question are looking for the "secret formula" to iPhone development riches. There isn't one. It takes high quality apps, great timing, vocal fans, and a healthy dose of good 'ole fashioned luck to create success on the App store.

    That said, I'm curious to see what other responses this will generate. The more real world anecdotes we have the better a picture of the current state of things we'll be able to form.

    Q
     
  3. Amelia

    Amelia Well-Known Member

    Jan 1, 2010
    86
    0
    0
    Is it possible? Of course it is.
    Is it probable? who knows!

    You take your chances, you do the best you can, and you see where you get. I think the best advice would be - don't quit your day job yet. :)
     
  4. caa4444

    caa4444 Active Member

    Dec 11, 2009
    30
    0
    6
    the iShoot guy made a lot and quit his job
    you just need a good original idea that people are willing to pay decent money for or improve on an existing idea and make a better one for less money in order to be successful
     
  5. Carlos

    Carlos Well-Known Member

    Sep 29, 2009
    755
    0
    0
    Software architect, game dev and book author
    xor eax, eax
    When I started iPhone development, I was hoping that maybe I can make a living out of it, and dedicate myself completely to game development. After two released paid apps, this dream has not yet turned into reality. However, the ones who give up early willl never succeed...
    And yes: don't quit your 5x8 job yet. Not even after a spike in sales (if you belong to the lucky ones). The income does decrease exponentially if you're not in the top100 anymore. ;)
     
  6. ThunderGameWorks

    ThunderGameWorks Well-Known Member

    Nov 14, 2009
    692
    0
    0
    Of course it is possible. All you need is = A product the market desires + quality to the product + effective marketing of said product.

    Trenches has risen the ranks and is in the Top 10 Grossing of all US applications. The defining difference is the effort put into what we deliver along with how we market our product.

    If you look at it from a business perspective, then yes, there is still potential in this market, although the influx of competition makes success that much more challenging.

    EDIT: I mean, no, nope, not possible.
     
  7. d1

    d1 Well-Known Member

    Sep 19, 2009
    5,678
    5
    0
    Well put :)
     
  8. Nijo

    Nijo Well-Known Member

    That may have been true a year ago. These days you need all that AND a marketing plan (which indie devs aren't normally really very good at) AND a whole load of luck.

    In the words of the meme:

    1. Think of a great idea
    2. Implement it brilliantly
    3. ?????
    4. Profit
     
  9. GavinBowman

    GavinBowman Well-Known Member

    In the App Store you can have a tough time if you drop the ball on any of those things.

    If you can get them all right, sure, it's still possible.
     
  10. eJayStudios

    eJayStudios Well-Known Member

    Oct 17, 2009
    249
    0
    0
    It's as simple as winning the lottery, all you really need is the lucky numbers..
     
  11. GlennX

    GlennX Well-Known Member

    May 10, 2009
    761
    0
    0
    UK
    It's all a matter of perspective. If I look at when I started and how long it took to get my first game (Ground Effect) out it hasn't come close to paying me a wage. However, if I'm a little more realistic and think of the first 8 months of dev time as learning the system and building my library, the game only took four months.

    If I reconsider the sales as having to pay for only 4 months of my time, it's close. Not great but then Ground Effect hasn't quite stopped selling completely yet.

    All I need to do is ensure future games are better, finished quicker and appeal to more people. I've learned a hell of a lot in the two months Ground Effect has been out and am pretty sure I can do this. It's hardly been what I hoped for but it looks like I might be able to make a living even if I don't have a huge hit, which is of course the real point. If you are relying on having a hit, you are going to have trouble.

    The most frightening aspect of this whole thing has been the realisation of quite how top heavy the app store is.

    At one point Ground Effect got to 11 in the US racing chart. It also got to 4 in UK racing which was 20 in the UK games chart (the second biggest market). My best ever day's sales were 853 copies worldwide.

    My biggest surprise is just how far up the charts you can get with so few sales. When I released the game I naively thought that if I ever achieved positions like that, i'd be rich. You have to realise that most of the sales go to the few at the top.

    There are games that sold more on Christmas day than 99% of the competition sell in their lifetimes. That 99% isn't an exageration, it's a conservative estimation!
     
  12. JoshCM

    JoshCM Well-Known Member

    Aug 11, 2009
    4,250
    23
    38
    Game Designer
    Upstate NY
    Marketing hype has a lot to do with initial sales - how good your game is after that, and word of mouth really makes the difference once its "out"
    With Ravensword, our experience is that getting featured is probably the best thing that can happen.
    I think with Glenn's "Ground Effect", while it did fairly well on its own, in its genre especially (hover racing games) it can be tough for an arcade style game like that, where there is so much competition from other racing franchises and other racing genres. In our case, we were the only western style RPG besides Dungeon Hunter at the time on the App store - and still are (despite Crusade of Destiny)
    Part of the trick is figuring out where the market is lacking and coming up with
    something "Different"

    Russ and I do not have day jobs and are able to support our families on this iPhone income now. In order for it to continue we have to release a 2nd game now. Had I not been in so much debt originally (for stupid reasons having nothing to do with iPhone dev) I would be living like a king right now.

    Yes its still possible to do it - but getting harder.
     
  13. travisdunn

    travisdunn Well-Known Member

    Aug 10, 2009
    68
    0
    0
    Developer
    Amsterdam, NL
    I'm not anywhere close. Rogueship's only been out less than a month, but I'm not expecting lucrative sales rushes or any such windfalls. I think, at least for me, a strategy of several different, regularly updated apps is the path I'll be taking in order to find profit.
     
  14. YmirMobile

    YmirMobile Active Member

    I agree with JoshCM getting featured with Ringo was the best that could have happened. Nevertheless we could not sustain ourselves just with that game.

    Our solution are contract jobs and a portfolio approach on game development like travisdunn said.
    Other than that game developing is not the most lucrative app development field for the iPhone, maybe developing more outside the game-genre might be a good approach too.

    With our Mobileguide Iceland we worked together with sponsors and Icelandic municiplaities to offer the App for free and that has proved to be the right way for us, we have stable download numbers and the feedback is overall psoitive.
     
  15. CommanderData

    CommanderData Well-Known Member
    Patreon Indie

    I think the most important question is- what is YOUR standard of living, and where in the world do you live?

    99% of iPhone developers who live in countries like the USA, UK, Australia, France, Germany, and Japan (for examples) would find it impossible to live off the proceeds of a single App or Game. This is because the harsh reality is most everything in the App Store brings in between $0 to $10 USD per day combined for all iTunes regions worldwide.

    Now, if you have several of these, or one of the odd-duck apps that consistently sells, but never enough to stay in the top 100 you might be able to count on $30-$60 USD per day. That might be enough to live off if you're single and have a small apartment in some rural american town, just remember to save 30% of that money for taxes! Keep in mind an 8-hour work day at the current minimum wage in the USA will pay you $58 pre tax (8 hours * $7.25).

    Just remember that most of the money pulled in by the App Store goes to a small group (the 1% big name / smart / talented / lucky) of developers, and the vast majority of devs fight over the remaining scraps of cash ;)
     
  16. ziotoo4

    ziotoo4 Well-Known Member

    Jan 9, 2010
    86
    0
    0
    I'm infact asking for the first thing.
    I have seen many threads about "what's the secret formula", and i am aware there isn't one. Or better, there is one, wich is the same for every product: customer.need+marketing+quality+innovation=success.

    Howewer, as we all know this, there is a complete lack of reliable infos and stats on what real life devs do and don't do-therefore we don't know what can be defined a succes, what has changed in those months, and, basically, wether it's a viable opportunity or not.
    I am not talking only about cash, but also about exposure (i.e. Imangi studios, Mountain ships, ecc ecc are somehow a "celebrity"-and even if your app doesn't break even, if it gains you exposure it can be a great start for the next projects)

    I do not think this is true
    Maybe devs can correct me here, but while making a new thing (i.e. minigore, ravensword, and n.o.v.a. were "new things" and they had a great success) can grant your app a blazing success, on the other side copying other's ideas might just divide earnings-and it won't surely be a hit.

    Although copying is sometimes good, the only way for a non PRed indie to have success is to count on word of mouth.
    And that cannot be accomplished by releasing another line-drawing of doodle jump clone.


    I already knew that 8) and i am not making riches' dream. ^_^ Thanks anyway for the good advice that too many people seem to forget...



    Now, let's pass to who i recognized as developers at a first glance ;)



    TRENCHES

    Exactly. While Trenches might not be the most original game out there, it was supported by ads, blog "hands-on preview", some good old bragging (adaptive AI, state of art animations, and all those great things mentioned in the trailer :p) as well as a great dev-user interaction in the forum(s?).
    This is what i call a great marketing, and TGW is one of the devs i would love to ask some questions like:
    -what does it mean "top 10 US" in term of copies?
    -how big was your team to make such a polished game? Has it already reached break even point?
    -did you think of marketing strategies from the beginning? did you do market researches before choosing a game type, or did you just go with a concept you liked?
    -do you think putting ADs (like on TA main page) can help selling?






    GROUND EFFECT


    Hi Glenn!
    It's interesting that, even with your programming experience, it took you 8 months to make a full game.
    It's true that GE uses a custom engine (did you write it from nothing, or did you have some previous code to port/use as a basic source?)-and framerate is very smooth, all this supporting a great draw distance: this has howewer been an interesting choice.
    Apart from the procedural (custom) terrain generation was there any other factor that made you choose a custom 3d engine? Do you think that using unity, like the guys of Ravensword, or even starting from an untethered engine source (i.e. oolong) would have cut development time? so, the question is
    -why did you choose a custom engine, especially seeing it took you so much to do the game? I'm interested about it, as it is a really different choice for an indie-using a premade engine is often the most picked choice-especially for 3d engines like yours.

    Also, i see you could pay yourself a 4-months wage with the earnings.
    But, what do you mean with "wage"?
    Often indies pay themselves a salary wich would be appropriate for an intern-not for a lead game developer like they are in reality. That is, sometimes you think "well, i broke even", but you god paid less than a freelance. And it's another part of the gamble ;)



    RAVENSWORD

    Ravensword could count on the "new and different" factor-but hype was also another point in your favour.
    That is the question i have for you is:
    -what did you do to heighten the hype? I wasn't here yet when RS came
    out-so i missed out your marketing strategy.

    While apple's "featured" is mostly bound to sales and exposures, it's hard to be featured when your game is just out.
    But Ravensword had a great following even before caming out-probably one of the first games to experience such a "hype-factor". What did you do to accomplish it, apart from delivering a top-notch product, of a loved genre that was missing in the Appstore?


    And this is great! Also, great work on the debt-it's great that you managed to pay it back with an onest work ;)
    Also, due to the hype, the novelty of the product and the never-seen-before graphics, ravensword was able to fix a different price range: $9.99. Do you think that selling for less (i.e. 2.99$) would have sold more copies, or do you think that over the .99 thresold only really interested customers buy the product, and therefore charging 5$ more or less doesn't change much the customer's will to buy?




    ROGUESHIP

    Do you really think that updates can grant you profit? In my personal view (and especially after the new Appstore policies, wich do not put anymore an updated app into the "new" section) updating is not worth the effort-apart from bug fixing.
    Adding new features, while it's surely easier than developing a new game, won't bring you advantages (IMO) unless you take the in app purchase path.
    Updates will only affect your existing user base now. And they have already paid ;)

    What do you think about this? Updating freely is worth the effort, or not? I can only think of Pocket God: it's a .99 game that gets new users thanks to the updates. But it's mostly based on word of mouth, so it's hard to replicate.



    And that's all-thanks everybody for the attention ;)
    Fede

    whew-i wrote a lot! :p
     
  17. Vingdoloras

    Vingdoloras Well-Known Member

    Aug 29, 2009
    1,070
    2
    38
    Marketing is a very important point...

    I'm thinking about the games "Trenches" and "Red Conquest".

    Trenches is a good game, but not perfect, some lags inside etc. Overall it's fun to play, but there are better games.

    Red Conquest isn't finished yet (remember the upcoming episodes adding much more content to the campaign? And even a new rac..), but it already feels like a full RTS game.

    Now think about the hype that ThunderGameWorks created for Trenches. People were raving about the game and many people wanted to have this as soon as possible, even though they didn't even know what kind of game this was.
    In contrast, Red Conquest seems to be overseen by many people. It's a true gem already (maybe Trenches will become a wonderful app too, but this will need some big updates) and will be expanded in the future.

    Marketing can make the difference, because BEING NOTICED is one of the most important things in the App Store. The more you are noticed, the more downloads you get... more downloads, higher rank. Higher rank = being noticed by even more people!
    This might end with being in the Top 10 of a category or the whole app store.
    When most people of the target group bought the game, sales will go down again...
     
  18. ziotoo4

    ziotoo4 Well-Known Member

    Jan 9, 2010
    86
    0
    0
    This is another interesting way of taking it: working under contracts to develop apps.
    This way, howewer, even if you don't risk ending up with just 10 copies sold, you won't earn more than the paid sum. And also, you'd be a freelance more than an indie ;)
    This is a risk free approach, but i am interested in the singles gambling in the Appstore-developing under contract, also, is great: but how many times will you have the opportunity to make something you actually like?




    In Italy-but being a student i do not actually need my apps to support my living yet ^_^
    Howewer, your opinion is interesting- and i think your calcolation are very good. Thanks!


    Fede
     
  19. ziotoo4

    ziotoo4 Well-Known Member

    Jan 9, 2010
    86
    0
    0
    Your points are exactly like mine: i too have my hidden gem that i play almost every day (Wheeler's Treasure)-and i think marketing makes the difference. Exactly what i said over to the Trenches developer ;)

    The point i quoted is also interesting. It's true for most apps but not for every app: for example, Minigore has now such a big extablished user-base that newcomers to the iDevice will eventually stumble upon it and buy it. This way the target group keeps on renovating-and that means big sales.
    I'd love to hear Minigore developer's take on this, but i don't think he browses those forums ;)

    Fede
     
  20. YmirMobile

    YmirMobile Active Member

    I am sorry Fede, maybe I was not clear enough at least you misunderstood me.
    We are of course an Indie Developer but to be able to develop our own games we have to do some contract jobs for other people/companies in between, basically a mixed approach which decreases the risk for us.
    I personally know of several indie developers that are going with exactly that approach. Making the games/apps they love doing and earning hard cash by doing contract jobs in between.

    Understood?
     

Share This Page