Which would work if that were an option, but it isn’t. We cannot release more individual apps. Apple rejects them.
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My apologies if his has already been answered, but why did Apple insist on doing the omnibus app? Did they have an issue with the standalone releases or something?
Sorry if this has been answered before (although I’m certain it hasn’t been asked in this topic), but will the Heart’s Choice label also receive its own omnibus? I’m inclined to believe so as it’s been mentioned that the Hosted Games label will, but confirmation is still nice. 
Alas, that’s probably the closest I’ll get to giving substantial feedback as this is an android house only as god intended lol
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Yes. We were, in fact, planning on launching HC in an omnibus anyway.
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will this make all games forced to play in online? i sometimes play them offline, also how much mbs will the App be? those 2 are my main fear for ómnibus, also the fact that if i have to update the App just because there is a new game that i may not like that will be a bit …turn off for me. dont know how the App Works so i guess will wait and see for myself, sorry if this has been already asked and replied 
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I checked the App Store link and the omnibus app itself is free. The titles published are to be considered IAP. I think it is safe to say that it will be available offline as well.
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Well as one of the next 2-3 authors to be published after submitting my game last November, this sucks.
No blame to CoG, of course. You are doing what you have to.
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Several troubling things here:
- Those stories are largely garbage.
- They have a visual element, and CoG/HG don’t. That was true already of course, but it matters more now because
- These other companies are now much more direct competitors with CoG. No more individual games topping the paid RPG charts anymore, bringing readers to the rest of the pack while staying well away from Choices and Episodes over on the free side. It’s now going to be all about the performance of the omnibus app, and whether it can fight through the extremely crowded top list for free apps to be visible.
Not to mention that trying to get people unfamiliar with CoG to buy your story just got a whole lot harder (which shoots my promotional plans to pieces). It’s a whole lot easier to say “Go to the App Store and purchase my story” as opposed to “Go to the App Store, download a free app and then do an in-app purchase to unlock my story.” That is just going to sound shady to a lot of people, especially those like the above poster who don’t understand the omnibus isn’t taking your card information directly.
There are advantages to the omnibus. But it will have some very significant disadvantages to overcome.
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Quite a problem yes. However how much we want to have sold it as separate app, how could you circumvert if it is a platform directive?
Judging from what I have seen so far, Apple seems to be one pressuring the developers to do so? But if you are referring to the Playstore platform, I suppose these are valid points to take into account.
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- As far as story quality and literary worth? I wouldn’t argue with that at all.
- As far as how much money they make?
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After a quick “research”, these keywords will show relevant HG/CoG titles and other Omnibus app by other companies.
Choice story: reveals more omnibus than individual title
Choice story medieval: Delight Games’ on 3rd, Magium 5th. HG The Great Tournament shows up somewhere below, and the rest is mostly omnibus.
Well, scratch that. The Great Tournament now 2nd. I guess I used different keyword.
Choice story samurai: SoH top 5. Choices’ omnibus top.
Choice story romance: Individual titles dominate the list. Choices’ omnibus top, Choice of Romance top 5.
To get the idea of how does the search list perform in my region. But getting the HG Omnibus an “Editor’s Choice” rating is a godsend.
(pun intended?)
Other than that, the performance of the omnibus itself will greatly boost CoG/HG titles’ sales, IMO.
Good title > boost Omnibus > boost the library
Good omnibus > boost the library
That being said, I don’t think authors should be worried for competition against individually-released stories. Although I agree that getting to the top list of the omnibus is much more important (since titles made by our community is of a great quality) 
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I appreciate that folks are going to work through the negatives here, and please go ahead. We’ve been dealing with going through all of this ourselves, as a matter of apprehension, for some time. However, as iOS stands it is a Hobson’s choice. This is it.
The other argument here, the positive side, is perhaps that this isn’t disturbing, but good news for CoG. Perhaps the omnibus is really what users (not any specific people here, or specifically forum members, but that broad nebulous group of “users”) want. Maybe the form as much as the content is what people prefer. We don’t know yet. There are a lot of unknowns.
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I meant disturbed me in a good way. 
I tried Choice Story Samurai: Wayhaven Chronicles appeared here. I think the labeling is wrong. XD
When I typed Choice story romance, Wayhaven Chronicles don’t appear. 
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The game icon should definitely appear next to the title in the list of games in the home screen.
I would also like the ability to reorganize the list and make folders. I would want to combine sequential titles for example into one folder.
The restore purchases functionality should also appear in the homescreen and allow you to restore all purchases at once. It would be really nice if it could search the App Store as well, but I’m not sure Apple would give you that information.
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An obvious thing here that hasn’t been said:
EVERYONE SHOULD DOWNLOAD THE OMNIBUS NOW!
And advertise now as well. Facebook / Twitter etc. Tell your friends. The first week is vital for boosting sales and that’s especially true for free apps.
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I’m quite sure nothing is being said here that y’all have not raised many a time in meetings and e-mails. And thankfully, this is not your sole marketplace (even if it is the biggest). I imagine this is beneficial to many users, but it may prove difficult to connect with them to show it. And it is almost certainly detrimental to authors. Less visibility more than likely, less accessibility for certain, and potentially less money to boot.
Just sucks, man. Sucks for everyone. Sucks for Apple too, even if they’re too blind to see it. They never seemed to make CoG games featured or promoted, yet still they sold and gave Apple their meaty cut of the proceeds (as well as the added money for individual app submission costs). Screwing over devs and publishers like this doesn’t seem to make financial sense to me, unless I’m missing something.
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Would you guys consider making this an apple exclusive thing? Since it’s apple that has the issue with the apps. Simply because I do believe a certain number of people find CoG/HG titles simply by searching terms or seeing them in the recommended games section. I know I’ve found my favorite stories that way.
Unfortunately, I don’t have an apple device or else I’d love to download and see how this works 
especially in the case of reviews, which is also a way I’m sure people decide to buy something…unless all HG games are going to be play-a-little-bit and then pay from now on?
And a tiny thing but if you guys add a screenshot that shows all the titles on like a homepage or something, I think that’d help with bringing interest? ive noticed other omnibus apps do that, but of course im no marketing expert so whatever is best! I know that Lovestruck was individual apps at one point too, having to move to the omnibus-style system. Episode, Playchoices and Lovestruck all also use a facebook system for saving data across multiple devices? which idk is helpful for this but there’s also that
and for anyone who’s tested out the app, how is the progress saving? is it possible to play multiple books at once?
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Playing multiple books is fine. You can exit a book to the main menu and choose another to play.
The App Store icon for the app should be changed too - it should be the hosted games flame-maze, although it might be good to add colour to it to make it stand out in the App Store.
At present the interface for the app is very basic. It does it’s purpose but it’s not inviting. As others have said, an icon for each book would help a lot, as well as a preview. Ideally, make the interface as similar to the App Store as legally possible.
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Maybe. We don’t know. IAP is searchable in the App Store. There’s also arguably more visibility within the app once all games are there. You’re assuming that the vast majority of our sales (anywhere) but in this case, on iOS, come from organic searches or charting in Paid RPG. I would venture to say that an irreducible number of opening week sales come from our mailing list. Which wouldn’t be impacted by this, unless everyone, including people who buy everything we release, hates using our omnibus so much they literally will not buy even one more game from us on iOS. We don’t know that.
Upside: The omnibus could increase sales of older games because now they are all in one place. “Visibility,” as I suspect you’re thinking of it, drops to zero a few days after a game releases anyway; now it won’t.
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