Yeah, just look at what happened to Dynamix(aka Sierra now) Over about 15 years they went from making low quality high profit games and using that to earn their title over the next decade or so.

The funny thing is, I had only heard of Sierra once or twice until a couple months ago. :P

Man, have you ever heard the game Red Baron?????? O_o o_O O_O o_o

No, why?

This is completely off topic, PM me.


SO I guess the simple answer to this topic would be: Yes, we will be selling our games in the future.

Nickbomb

It's not entirely off topic. We're discussing the success of another game company and examining its causes. Don't backseat moderate the Admin. :P

Heck, I'm willing to sell them now, I just don't think it'd be wise.

As if a four letter name is too long to type. >_>

What? Is that what you do? :P

Do what? Replace sprites?

There are a few problems with selling gamemaker games, though. Nobody will buy it unless it's extremely professionally done and highly recommended- this means that you'll have to be a better game developer than the entire game maker community, because all of the other games can be downloaded for free.

Personally, I'd recommend making the games free and earning income with the revenue from advertisements.

While it's a good idea to have money in your pocket, but you'll be lucky to sell a single copy if you're marketing to a community that's used to downloading their games for free.

Personally I wonder more about his sounds.

First tip for selling GM games: Don't say it was made in GM. For whatever reason, once someone finds out about that, it instantly drops the quality in the player's mind, regardless of the validity of that feeling. I've found some workarounds that actually work beautifully, but I only use them when the issue comes up. No need to give the customer more info. than they want (with a few exceptions I suppose).

ShellBlast (I believe that's what it's called) is being sold, though obviously it's not your average noobish game. Then again, neither are ours. We're capable of doing pretty much anything he's got in that. For example many of the lighting effects can be done with simple blending techniques. You can also do it via Surfaces/Primitives (actually I think it's faster that way). Our disadvantage is simply that we don't have the manpower to churn it out in a relatively brief amount time. However, I'm unsure of how well it's doing in terms of sales.

I'm personally not a large fan of ads. Sure they're nice, but perception goes down because of them (I prefer an adless site over one with ads for example). They're used when they have to be, such as for this forum, but I prefer not to place them all over. I'm still annoyed at our host for deciding to instate them on its sites. Biotech also has found other revenue streams.

I've been doing marketing research for the past few months, come to think of it it's actually coming closer to a year, wow, and I've been discussing it with several media developers and marketing folks. The GM community isn't necessarily our end target audience.

To summarize: Selling is possible, but like said before not probable for some time. And doing your homework often helps selling as well.

The sounds? RS0 had a completely original score, as will Schism.

VERY true that pointing out the use of GameMaker damages credibility, although, in the case of the GM community, being obscure in that area breeds a feeling of distance.

I doubt ShellBlast is doing very well, but I don't really know, so I can't say.

Ads can work fine if they're intelligently integrated- and I can assure you that most players would choose a website with ads over a website with 20$ games.

Yeah, the GM community isn't- and that's why it's a good idea to keep the games free. I don't know many teenagers these days that DON'T go to AddictingGames.com or MiniClip.com- I'm going to a summer camp, and that's all they do during break.

Marketing folks? Are these GAME marketers? Because there's a large difference between the videogame world and your average stapler company.

Selling is always possible; I'd just highly recommend avoiding it.

More along the lines of effects than the score.

Having not been very active on the GMC, I can't say I've ever had the need to avoid disclosing the fact that it's been made in GM. I'm not really sure that I ever would either, it's kind of a "No duh" that just about everyone there uses GM.

Never said I'd be selling for $20. But when you compare two identical sites with the single difference being ads, guess which one most people will inherently choose? Obviously there are exceptions to the rule, but I tend not to see a preferance for ads. *shrugs*

Oddly enough, never been to Miniclip and only been to AddictingGames once from when NB linked me there. I've looked into them a little around the web, but I suppose I should look into them more.

Media. Two of them having particular expertise when it comes to the web. The stapler company wouldn't be so helpful, plus I don't have any connections to one. v_v

What about the effects, then?

Well, the thing is, if you just kind of post a link to an EXE file and say "look i made game" people will worry about viruses and spyware, which is rife in places that pretend to market free games.

Once again, don't underestimate how slickly ads can be integrated- and most users are used to seeing ads on free sites by now, so it's not much of a turn-off. That said, I imagine that the initial impression received when the user views the site with no ads will disappear once he/she realizes that they have to pay to have any fun on your site.

I haven't been to either until recently. But that's because we're not webgamers, we're webgame developers, and we rarely have time to cruise the internet for fun games to play- those who do probably visit AddictingGames.com daily.

Ah, well, that's a good connection to have. Although I would ensure that they really know what they're talking about before acting on their advice- it's not uncommon for small businesses to die because of impulse decisions.