Agree on releasing an update. You've come out with a fantastically polished product, you've gotten a huge boost from Apple featuring you out of the gate -- take full advantage of this and milk it as much as you can and build up your brand. Not everyone gets that kind of shot in the arm at launch and you shouldn't discount its impact on your success. The branding is what will help you in the initial launch of your next product, and the key right now is to build a loyal following. The thing to keep in mind is that even a well polished product may not translate to a commercial success, even WITH brand recognition. Look at Brian Greenstone. He had tremendous initial success porting his MacOS products over to iOS, got his own fancy iTunes page, and had all of his products consistently in the top 25. Then he released that game (can't even remember the name now) that he developed specifically for iOS and it was a complete flop even though every one knew Pangea and was eagerly awaiting their next release. My point is that there's no guarantee that your next game will do as well, even if you apply all of the lessons you learned from DEO because app store customers can be a fickle bunch. If the changes you're thinking about for DEO are really significant and dramatically alter gameplay, then why not consider incorporating these features into a DEO sequel? That way you can take advantage of DEO's recognition and user-base and translate that into all-new sales. EDIT: Of course you have to balance that against your current customers getting pissed if you release a sequel too soon or one that is not dramatically enhanced from the existing version.
But the point is that once you have a loyal following, AND you have a good game, you'll at least be moderately successful. And also, to what your doing,yes. As for whether you should release one huge update, or several small ones, I suggest both. First, post-release, release a quick update for some easily correctable bugs, menu, gamecenter. Anything that people want AND isn't a major release. This will make your current customers more happy, and probably influence some new customers. While your doing this, start working on a big update. By big update, I do not mean 200 levels after half a year. I suggest releasing "level packs" by planet, and slowly releasing new mechanics along with each planet.
Yup, agreed! Sites will most likely only talk about it again if the change is worth mentioning. You make a great point with the case of a 3rd game. Not sure about a sequel, I think I'd rather make it as a free update. Perhaps a few smaller updates after that and if things goes well begin working on a sequel. That makes sense! I think we might even end up doing that. However, if we're quite for a month, just assume that we're cracking our butts on the big update lol.
as for a sequel. This is my advice on a sequel. The only time you should do a sequel is if you have enough content to warrant a sequel. They had a lot of extra levels, and that's a lot of content, but now they're making a sequel. For ex: they're adding 6 different cars(that have different features), a level editor, a freestyle mode. If you have enough stuff like that, it's a sequel. An good update, for ex, is adding replays. Replays add a lot of value to the game, but it's not sequel type stuff. PS, another option that's worked out nicely for some developers is making your extra content DLC.
Yeah makes a lot of sense, only way to go! Some ppl have also suggested DLC stuff to us. Haven't really put any thought into what it would be though...
Usually, DLC is just more levels. However, for a company like you guys, choose DLC with caution, as it could easily make a lot of people mad.
