Free w/ in-app purchase or Lite & Full version?

Discussion in 'Public Game Developers Forum' started by invulse, Jul 13, 2010.

  1. invulse

    invulse Well-Known Member

    I am on the fence with this one right now. My original plan was to offer my game as free with a couple of levels then unlock the full game with an in-app purchase for $.99.

    However, when researching apps similar to mine that are free with in-app purchases I noticed they received tons of 1 star reviews from people who felt they were 'ripped off' cause the game had in-app purchases.

    I also noticed that one of the games which has openfeint enabled for a free game with IAP had over 40,000 players for the free level, yet only had 100 players for the first of the paid levels. I know this could be a testament to how people liked the game, but it worries me that a game could have a conversion rate of 1 purchase per 400 installs.

    So now I am considering the Lite & Full versions of my game with a call to action in the lite version for purchasing the full game, but I am really on the fence about it.

    If anyone would like to share their experiences with either of these methods, or their opinions on the matter I would appreciate it.

    Thanks!
     
  2. Eli

    Eli ᕕ┌◕ᗜ◕┐ᕗ
    Staff Member Patreon Silver Patreon Gold

    I really like free games that give you a tutorial and a few levels then offer to unlock the rest of it via IAP. I hate dealing with two different versions of game, especially if I lose progress made in the free version by switching to the paid version. Pester @OwenGoss on Twitter about how good/bad Landformer is doing because I really like how that game is monetized.
     
  3. Marc Vaughan

    Marc Vaughan Well-Known Member

    Apr 15, 2010
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    I haven't played around with in-app purchasing yet - but its fairly easy for a developer to 'export' save games etc. from a 'Lite' application to a full one and I think anyone making an application with the lite -> full app system should support that functionality as a matter of course.
     
  4. heffdog116

    heffdog116 Well-Known Member

    Oct 21, 2009
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    Not a dev, but I appreciate the Free + IAP method. It makes it easier and less cluttered. I dont understand why this method is the cause for low ratings (probably same reason why most lites have bad ratings). Maybe from your point of view, lite + full is the way to go, but from a consumer stand point, i like free + IAP.
     
  5. invulse

    invulse Well-Known Member

    My question is geared more towards if developers are seeing better conversion rates with free + iap vs lite/full. As a consumer I would prefer the free+iap just because it makes things less cluttered however as a dev. if I see low conversion rates with this method I probably wouldnt go with it.

    I also definitely get that free apps get lower ratings because any person can just download and hate it, but the free with IAP seemed to be getting an unusual amount of low ratings for great games (like Landformer) just because people wanted the entire game to be free.
     
  6. Stroffolino

    Stroffolino Well-Known Member
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    Apr 28, 2009
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    From a consumer perspective, free with IAP is extremely convenient. I don't think anyone would question that.

    But some pros/cons for developers to consider:

    1. Apple gives visibility to pay and free apps in separate top lists. By releasing free with IAP, your game will only be visible in the "free" lists. But there are plenty of paying customers that don't bother browsing through the free lists very deeply, because it's harder to find quality apps there. If you have both a pay and free version of the app, you increase the chances that a user will stumble across it. You can even stagger the pay and lite releases to get a "2nd chance" burst of visibility.

    2. when pay game goes free, they get huge spikes of visibility. A good example is TA's frontpage coverage of the 0.99 cent Super KO Boxing 2 going free. The full game had already been quietly given away through the lite version for some time, but most people hadn't noticed. By leading with a free game, you're ruling FAAD style tactics out.

    3. Free apps get impulse downloads from people that would have otherwise never bothered checked out out your app. This cuts both ways. User rating for the free apps tends to be a star lower for free apps. This affects user perception of quality and is compounded by search results being skewed by Apple to favor more expensive apps.

    I'd love if the AppStore were structured to reward developers that produce apps with IAP, or universal apps, for that matter. Right now, it isn't on either count.

     
  7. Foursaken_Media

    Foursaken_Media Well-Known Member
    Patreon Indie

    First of all it depends on what type of game you have. Is it a pure casual experience or more of a "gamer" game?

    From a business standpoint though, I would recommend 2 versions. As Stroffolino said, you basically have 2 chances to get noticed since you'll be on 2 different charts, and a chance to basically get twice the exposure (especially considering the free and paid market are like 2 different entities, and you just won't know how your game will respond in either of them, including which one it could do well in).

    Also don't forget with a paid version you can have sales and price drops, which are then published on 100's of websites for lots of exposure. In our experience, dropping the price for a sale every once in a while has proven to be HUGELY profitable, getting sales spikes of up to 10x our pre sale revenue.

    In the end, having 2 versions out there just gives you flexibility. You can take down the lite, you can have paid version sales and price drops, etc...

    Another alternative you could do is have a free + DLC version, AND a premium, paid only version, usually packaged with a few bonus things that you can't get in the DLC version. That way you kind of have the best of both worlds. The downside with this is it can be confusing to some people.
     
  8. invulse

    invulse Well-Known Member

    This is the direction I have started leaning. I saw your post before about how FAAD spiked your downloads really high then your purchases continued at about 9x what they were previously. So the benefits from lite/full versions really seem to outweight the free+IAP.
     
  9. slimothy

    slimothy Well-Known Member

    Dec 5, 2009
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    Well, if you go with IN-APP Purchase, I don't think the hackers will be able to steal the game, if that's what you're worried about. I personally hate In app purchases, but I hate it if the app is a huge file, it takes too long to download a free one, then the full one which will take even longer. Personally, if I were you, just go with In App Purchase. :)
     
  10. Venan

    Venan Well-Known Member

    Jan 13, 2010
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    One note about the free app ratings - that will probably change a lot now that Rate On Delete is no longer presented.

    That being said though, I think Lite+Full will work out best in the long run. I can't say I've seen any poster children for In-App purchase yet other than the Freemium games, so unless this is just a hobby, I'd pick the one with the better track record.
     
  11. DropDKeith

    DropDKeith Well-Known Member

    With Tap Studio, our original version was free only. Then we added the PRO functionality as an in-app purchase. This was going pretty well, and then, on a bit of a whim we decided to release a standalone Tap Studio PRO that contains the exact same functionality as the free + PRO Upgrade in app purchase.

    The crazy thing is that we get about 3x more Tap Studio PRO sales than PRO Upgrade in-app purchases in the free Tap Studio. So doing both was a great move for us.

    I really don't know why... Is it because you can't make in-app purchases through iTunes?

    One other thing to note is that we do get complaints and confusion about the two different versions, several people have purchased both because they didn't understand. We're trying to clear that up in the app.
     
  12. invulse

    invulse Well-Known Member

    Keith, Thanks for the insight. I'm pretty sure I'm going to go with the lite/full route now.
     
  13. MrBlue

    MrBlue Well-Known Member

    Sep 3, 2008
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    Btw, you can use FAAD for free + IAP type games. They promoted tapfish and that gangsta game and propelled both to top spots in the app store. But those games have built-in audience from other sources as well, so who knows.
     
  14. EssentialParadox

    EssentialParadox Well-Known Member

    Sep 21, 2009
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    I think your experience touches on an important factor in any retail environment: impulse purchases. It's often that I'll see a paid app, and just based off it's screenshots and description, I buy it there and then. But once I've had that chance to play the game first, the novelty has worn off a little and that 'impulse' part is mostly gone by then.
     
  15. ElectricGrandpa

    ElectricGrandpa Well-Known Member

    Sep 5, 2009
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    As a user, free with IAP is definitely better.

    As a dev, I can't see how free with IAP would be better than lite+paid.

    A lot of great reasons have already been stated, but one of the key things is that tons of users never look at free apps. I know I only look at the paid app charts unless I specifically hear about some sort of "free-for-a-day" deal. There is just WAY too much crap in the free store to even bother going through it. Another problem is that a large portion of free users will never pay for anything, no matter how good it is, which is why they're looking at free apps in the first place.

    Also, even with rate-on-delete removed, free apps still get way worse ratings, because users have no money invested, and therefore won't bother to "understand" the game. With paid apps, they want to get their money's worth, so they're more likely to try it and put a bit more time into learning it.
     
  16. EssentialParadox

    EssentialParadox Well-Known Member

    Sep 21, 2009
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    Well you do have one advantage in terms of it acting as an anti piracy measure. But I don't know if that's worth the disadvantages.
     
  17. Tap Dat App

    Tap Dat App Well-Known Member

    Aug 28, 2009
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    If you make the app Free + IAP, it will be harder for people to fully pirate. But, if you do make it Free + IAP, note that a lot of jailbroken users seem to have difficulty with purchasing IAPs, as it doesn't work half the time due to an install they have of something else in Cydia, and some users may not take the initiative to find out why the purchase won't go through and simply give up.

    From a consumer stand point, I do think Free + IAP is more convenient, but the apps that do it make me feel like they're shady ever since Ngmoco started doing it with every freakin' app they have. It makes me feel a bit ripped off.
     
  18. Eli

    Eli ᕕ┌◕ᗜ◕┐ᕗ
    Staff Member Patreon Silver Patreon Gold

    Solution: Don't buy things you don't feel are worth your money.
     
  19. ElectricGrandpa

    ElectricGrandpa Well-Known Member

    Sep 5, 2009
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    What I've noticed with Trainyard is that the vast amount of pirates are just people who wouldn't ever pay for the game anyway. A few of them don't have credit cards, and things like that. I'd rather have more people playing it than not play it at all. I'm definitely not encouraging piracy, but I feel like if my app had IAP, they would just go pirate other paid apps and ignore my app completely. I don't really see that as a good thing.
     
  20. RebelBinary

    RebelBinary Well-Known Member

    Jun 11, 2012
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    Ottawa, Canada
    Hey, sorry to resurrect an old thread (which was super informative btw), but is the same consensus on lite vs in-app still true today (2 years since this thread began)?

    Also for naming the lite version, should it be lite, free? or should you rename the paid version PRO/HD whatever.

    Thanks
     

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