Leaving the appdev industry - my final thoughts

Discussion in 'Public Game Developers Forum' started by jokerseven, Jan 10, 2014.

  1. jokerseven

    jokerseven Member

    Feb 2, 2013
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    Hi everyone, I will cliff this to make it easier to read

    -I have been making games for 6 years
    -App Developing for a year and half now as a solo developer, contract runs out on 15th
    -Came out with 2 games, everyone loved playing them.
    -Spammed forums, created facebook/twitter, made lite versions, game center functionality
    -Spent many months coding and advertising these games for about 200 free sales in total
    -A far overcrowded industry, i would be willing to bet 5% of the devs make 95% of the money.
    -i heard back 2008/2009 all you had to do was submit a game, and you would see huge sales
    -Just no room for the little guy now and his entrepreneurial dreams.
    -You really have to be passionate about making mobile games to survive. I think for most of us we put more in than we gain from it
    -The adventure was fun, but its over now :) Peace everyone!
     
  2. ThreeCubes

    ThreeCubes Well-Known Member

    Oct 13, 2012
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    Well I thought it would be more helpful for others to see what games your talking about.

    Your first game Monster Catch was not "loved by everyone" as it was heavily criticised in a forum post to the developers here as to why it failed and PresentPlunder was a gimmicky Christmas cash grap game.
    (http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?t=177594)


    "I heard back 2008/2009 all you had to do was submit a game, and you would see huge sales" ​


    So you heard there was money in it just when smart phones became popular but did not bother to study the market 5 years later??? you just assumed it was the same?

    I do agree with this statement though -

    "You really have to be passionate about making mobile games to survive."

    - were you really that passionate about present plunder??

    Im saying this because there are still ways to make money on the appstore but the days of launching any old junk are long gone. Your game just has to be exceptional.


    Monster Catch
    PresentPlunder​


    [​IMG][​IMG]
     
  3. Wizardo

    Wizardo Well-Known Member

    Jul 30, 2012
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    Starving indie developer
    New Jersey!
    I'm sure OP didn't want to hear this, but I have to agree. These two games do not really impress.

    OP, you should feel proud for giving it a shot and actually completing a couple games, but you shouldn't blame the industry for your lack of success.

    However, you do have some skills, and I hope you find success in your future endeavors.
     
  4. Snozberry

    Snozberry Well-Known Member

    Jan 21, 2012
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    The games are pretty decent for somebody who has only been developing iOS alone for 1.5 years.. Those years would have given an abundance of knowledge of the AppStore, and coding, it's a bit of a waste to throw it all away.

    To make it on the AppStore, you need patience, persistence, and mostly, put everything into making one quality game, instead of a bunch of crappy, unpolished clones of games that have already been done long ago.

    People don't want some tired gameplay mechanics that they've played over and over years ago, they want something new and innovative.
    They want something polished and pretty.

    But often, even polished and unique games slip under the radar, so it's not foolproof, you need to just persist with marketing, emailing tons of review sites and whatnot, to review your GOOD, and UNIQUE game, because no good review site will review junk.

    Junk is constantly flooding the AppStore, and apple should really start a quality control approval process. If there weren't so many junk apps, then the good apps wouldn't get so easily buried under the rubble.

    Every man and his dog thought developing would bring riches, and yeah of course back when the market was new and bare it was much more easy to get rich.
    I suspect that's how games like fruit ninja and angry birds really thrived too, because back then they were probably the first of those types of games to exist on the AppStore, now there is probably a million clones of each type.

    Coming up with something original is the key, then polish the absolute poo out of it. Then market the poo out of it and pray it gets noticed.
    Repeat that process for 10 years or so and it could pay off.
    I've seen a few wonderful success stories from indie devs, but also seen some horror stories of loss, because sometimes people are silly and get loans out to support their idea, bad move, investing in an idea is risky, instead learning to code and make graphics yourself, or team up with a graphic designer and split the profits, would be the better route obviously.

    You can't be dedicated because you've quit after just 1.5 years, you must be dedicated and motivated to make it in the industry.
    You don't have to do a full time thing, just code on weekends, slowly, don't rush, and when you've made something cool, put it on testflight, or make some videos and see how people rate the game, see if it needs any changes, listen to feedback, it's completely invaluable, then make any changes it might need, then pay for the developer account only at that moment. It's pointless to have one for half a year before your game is ready anyway.

    Just my 2 cents. Don't ever rush anything. Maybe in a few months a wonderful idea for a unique game will pop into your head and you'll decide to start working on it slowly, but developing some half assed games that have already been done a million times will most likely not pay off, especially when so many users will opt for the popular clone version instead, like a release from chill ingo, because they will see it first when searching for that type of game, instead of little old you at the bottom of the list, since apple decided to make search results show popularity first, instead of relevance.

    I see potential, don't give it. Just stop over exhausting yourself with uninspiring ideas, wait for a great idea to spring to mind, then go from there.
     
  5. Hollance

    Hollance New Member

    Yep, except that never happened. If you were one of the first 500 apps to be released on the iOS App Store then sure, you made money because this was something new and exciting and everyone wanted to try it out. But anyone making an app after that -- basically every developer you've ever heard of -- had to do it the hard way, just like you.
     
  6. MiniMega

    MiniMega Well-Known Member

    Aug 4, 2011
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    Game Developer
    Byron Bay, Australia
    Sorry to see you go

    I think there are 3 main hurdles to being successful.

    • Make a really great game that people love
    • Let people know about your really great game
    • Get really Lucky, be at the right place at the right time.

    The more times you do it, the better you get.
    Also the more times you do it, the more chances you have at getting lucky.

    - Ben
    Working on Bonza Word Puzzle
     
  7. Destined

    Destined Well-Known Member

    Aug 11, 2013
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    The only correlation I have seen to successful app developers is the number of apps developed.

    While some get lucky/produce a great product first time out, most slowly work their way up.
     

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