Sadly with modern day licensing costs and SDK specifications it’s probably not worth their time or money to port to console, even if there was a remotely large audience…
@AKNel1 That’s an interesting idea. I’m not 100% sure on how it would work (either technically or financially). I wonder how easily mutable prices/content are on different platforms too, because if they are (relatively) easy to update, it’s possible to connect it to the idea of releasing games in parts. When CoV3/Affairs3 comes out, bundle P2 with a purchase of P3 for the first (couple of) week(s). That may help to spike early downloads.
As for packs of games, that’s also an interesting idea, but I think it’s a tiny bit away at the moment, as there are just too few games to offer more than one coherent bundle.
Another option is to release a CoG/Hosted games ‘Annual’ on CD for the PC. Bundle all the games released in the previous 12 months and release the CD in October to be in the shops for the Christmas market.
Aim for the budget market $10-$20 (£5-£10). With sales figures divided between the games after costs have been deducted.
Possibly look for a company to handle production/distribution.
Another option would be to see if you can get a PC magazine to release a free demo version of one of the games each month. The demo would have ads so would generate income and you would also pick up sales of full games from this.
My view on why CoG games, done by professional writers (e.g. To the City of the Clouds, Heroes Rise, Eerie Estate Agent etc.), are worse than many games that are done by people with other jobs, who do not do this professionaly (correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m assuming this is the case for these games- Zombie Exodus, Vendetta: Rise of a Gangster, Way Walkers: Universityland others. You may have noticed none of these are completely finished yet, I will get onto that later.) is as follows:
Professional writers, who make a lot of the aforementioned CoG games, are under financial pressure to finish their piece of writing in time, so they can earn money- needed for basic things such as food etc. etc. This is not the case in some examples, but it definitely is the case in others. Because they are under this pressure, they may have to rush their games, meaning (overall) a drop in quality. They cannot earn much more money by coming back and nit-picking until it is perfect, so a lot of the time, they move on onto other projects, leaving behind one that is not as good as it could have been. This shows why CoG charge for games that many feel are not that good compared to other games that cost less or cost nothing.
However, amateur writers (although the standard of their work is very professional) are not rushed to do any work, so they can take their time and make a very good game with few flaws. This may take a while (professional commitments may also make it take longer) but in the end it results in a better product. The best games out of these do cost money, but you get a lot more product for what you pay, and that, combined with the extended length of time that can be put into them, can make people think that they are better (and in my opinion, those people are right).
I’m not criticising the CoG business model, or the professional writers’ games, I’m just giving my opinion on why others may feel that the professional games are a bit expensive. To me, a £2.99 game costs the same as a packet of cookies and a bottle of coke, and I would prefer to have the game, so I don’t feel that they are too expensive. Personally, I think that the ‘amateur’ games are just fantastically cheap. But some others may not feel that way, and I’m trying to provide some insight as to why they feel like they do.
One of the reasons there is a difference between the official games is that the professional authors don’t spend time on the forums. IMO Zombie Exodus is better than Choice of Zombies and one of the reasons is that @JimD spends time of the forums finding out what people think.
@Nocturnal_Stillness good point, and one I completely missed out. I wonder how different (and how much worse, presumably) games would be if they were never tested, and if the author never got any feedback on the forum… My guess would be that they would be a lot worse, but maybe that’s just because all the authors listen to the feedback so much and act on it well.
There is definitely merit to feedback as @Nocturnal_Stillness said. In this day-and-age of communication, if you don’t interact with your readers, you’re wasting valuable opportunities for feedback. Of course, the tradeoff is time. I spend at least 4 hours a week of emails/FB/Twitter/forums. That’s a slow week.
Also, the CoG authors may be more motivated by a pay check. Speaking for myself only, I have a job that pays my bills, and I don’t need revenue from ZE. So there is less pressure to get a finished product out (as @Redgrave said), though I do put pressure on myself to stick to update schedules.
Personally, I think communicating with the audience is the biggest factor. It makes everything extremely interactive. If you look at ZE, pretty much the whole game has been put to open beta testing, and bringing in the readers to that type of development gets them invested.
Just putting in my two bits here:
One thing I find that I don’t agree with is the limitations that the 2 labels COG and HostedGames have placed (but there could be a very good reason for such this is only my humble opinion) I believe there was a time (if my memory serves me correctly) that both kinds of games (professional made and user made) were under the same label, having 2 different labels might detract customers from the other label simply because it no longer runs under the COG label and as of currently to run under such one must be a published author. As for professionally made games, there will come along every once in a green and pink striped moon an author who does a pretty good job even if its slightly railroaded a good bit of the time (Heroes Rise namely,
even though linear I enjoyed the story quite a lot). And this part is really just an add on but perhaps (and I DO realize this will take a loooooong time to happen if it even does) COG should consider using and/or hosting Free online engine made games like those made in RPG maker. But that’s just my thoughts.
I have a question for all of you on the matter of pricing.
We have a few Hosted Games that are getting ready to come out. In my opinion, they should be priced at $1 (maybe even $2).
Obviously, I’ve heard the comments about price.
So: on your mobile devices (iOS, Android), would you rather pay $1 and own a game outright, or download it with ads, and have to pay $2 to turn off the ads?
I like the option to pay to turn of the ads, that way if I think I’ll re-play the game I can give you your money and be rid of the ads.
Hosted Games get less exposure, so allowing people to download it for free increases the chance of downloads. Unless the writer has a following, they need to build up readership primarily. Marketing it as free vs. even 99cents is much easier.
As a reader, I like the option of downloading for free then paying to support the writer by turning off ads.
I’d rather pay $1 and own it outright, although $2 or $3 and owning it outright still seems like a good deal. If there is a ‘remove ads’ option that should be charged at $1 or $2 in my opinion. If the game is good enough I’ll happily support the author by paying to remove ads.
I would prefer the option to remove the ads for $2, myself. But if I’m to be perfectly honest, I think it would result in a considerable loss of income. So I would probably rather the other option in order to keep COG going, even if it means I don’t get the option I would personally prefer.
@Mardam if you have any of the other games with ads on, I think it would be the same as them. A lot of the ads are for other CoG games.
I support the free version + ads idea…and if the game has more parts then price them for 89 cents for example (first one free, others for fee). In every CoG game with ads I bought the option to disable them just because I want to support the writer and I think many people will think similar.
@Redgrave That is, in no small part, because our advertising service experiencing some serious cash flow problems.
In our ongoing efforts to monetize our games, we were first banned from AdWords/AdSense. Then AdSense bought AdMob. AdMob was brought under the umbrella of AdSense after about four months, and when the conversion was complete, we were blocked from any further use of AdMob.
Which brings us to MobClix, are current advertising partner. MobClix has been having financial trouble since early last year. They are supposed to pay using N90 terms (meaning, we get paid around August 5th for the month of April).
Their last missive stated that we were going to be paid for June on December 7th. That has not happened. As you may have noticed, that’s more than 60 days overdue (on top of the N90 terms).
Thus, while MC has not paid us for months and months, their system is still working. Part of their system allows us to run “House Ads”. Back in July, we started running House Ads. We can measure the number of clicks on the House Ads by game, and pay royalties to our authors based on those clicks.
We’re not paying as well as MC does (we recently upped the rate to $0.03/click, and may up it again soon), but unlike MC, we’re paying, and we’re paying immediately (payments for House Ads go out with the monthly royalty payments, about ten days after the close of the month).
Unfortunately, much as there was a big step down from AW to AM, and from AM to MC, there’s an even larger step down from MC to the next best advertising provider. And, for the time being, even though MC is so behind, we’re not quite willing to fully divest from MC in favor of something that may very well be no better.
I would be more inclined to buy a game I haven’t herd of if it was cheap and had the option to remove the adds if I liked it, but as a fan of the work you guys do, if you were to put an increased price on an unknown game, it tells me you yourself thinks its worth it ,and would give you guys the benefit of the doubt and buy it anyway. I no that doesn’t help you sorry…
Stick ads on the game if you want, but I’ll be frank, there are no ads on the internet anymore. Not to anyone with any sense to get adblock plus. And that’s the advertiser’s fault, most people got sick of intrusive spam heavy ad sites, when I go to my sister’s (she’s clueless about computers anyway) and I go on the internet there, it’s like torture. Adverts every where. Urgh.
Point is, I think the majority of people will just block the ads and play on anyway so it’s not really that viable of an idea imo for the net anyway.
I’d happily pay upfront for a hosted game ($2 seems reasonable - would this equate to about £1.70?), but I do prefer the model where you can play part of the game for free (ZE did this I think?) and then pay for subsequent updates. I think by the end of a decent length first chapter, you know if you like the game or not and if you’re willing to pay for it.
For me, ads don’t bother me too much, but if I enjoyed a game, I’d pay to remove them in order to support the author.
Off the current subject on prices,. I had an idea to help recent cash flow problems. Now it’s a bit “out there” but has anyone ever thought to confront the education bored and tryed to insert yourselfs into the reading program’s? it hits all the marks, Parents that worry about kids playing too much video games are happy because they are now reading, and the kids are happy to still play games (and your making money)? Like I said, it’s Abit out there but…