Jump to content

Avadon on Steam


Madd The Sane

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 212
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Originally Posted By: Enraged Slith
I'll continue to shop directly from Jeff, but it's awesome to see one of his games on Steam.


This is where I sit. Spiderweb has been great with sending out new registrations, although that may no longer be an applicable issue. The service I get by buying the game directly is worth the premium fee. I also love that my entire purchase goes to supporting and indie developer and his family, rather than a huge corporation with more money than I can fathom.

Originally Posted By: Critical Miss
Whenever you buy a product at launch you're paying a premium for early access. Those who wait are trading time with the product for potential cash savings. If any early adopters out there are somehow offended by the fact they're being consistently put out of pocket by those dastardly market forces, the solution is simple, stop being an early adopter.


Can we get this posted on billboards around the world? It seems like such a simple concept, but [a loud minority of] today's gamers don't seem to understand it.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

True, though i'm hoping (and kind of expecting) that this pricing thing is cleared up a bit for the next release from spiderweb. Avadon was always going to be messy as first on steam and first on ipad after all. I guess one option would be for Jeff to go down the same path as an increasing number of other indie devs by having the optional "pay-more-and-support-the-devs" type deal. So standard price of say $15 across steam, direct spiderweb download and tablet with the option to pay 20/25 (maybe with some kind of incentive? though that's not totally necessary really, but its always nice to have it as a little "thank-you") That way those of us who are already massive fans can shell out more to support Jeff, and new potential fans can get on board more easily because of the cheaper price point.

 

It's win/win! tongue Well those are my thoughts at least. I just know i'd feel kinda bad if i couldn't pay at least $15 for the "new" Avernum ($20 if poison makes a reappearance! wink

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I come from steam to say that I'll buy the game immediately when it's available on steam if it's priced at $9.99. grin

 

I think it's a good price point. People on steam usually have a huge backlog and/or are spoiled from all the sales that most of them will definitely not buy the game at $25. (me included)

 

And as someone here pointed out, there are many classic RPGs such as KOTOR, the Infinity engine games, the old Fallout games,

or the Troika games which are more popular and can be bought for far cheaper than Avadon.

Releasing the game on steam for $25 is not giving the game the proper chance for the recognition it deserves.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I will be posting about this issue, here and on my blog, on the day that the Steam version comes out. Remember, our 3rd party distributors set prices, not us. We are only allowed to suggest prices. (This is what antitrust law allows.)

 

The most likely outcome is that Avadon on Steam will be fairly cheap and that we will lower the price of the game on our site.

 

In addition, future games directly from this site will be cheaper. For example, we've already announced that Avernum: Escape From the Pit will be $20.

 

- Jeff Vogel

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I would rather buy form jeff than steam...I myself dont like steam, a mate of mine who was always banging on about how good it is and buy a lot of games via steam was recently left without any access to his account for about 8 weeks because of a problem with it. Steam wanted to know the serial number for EVERY title he had purchased via steam and refused to budge when he could only offer 4 or 5 of the more recent ones he had purchased... Needless to say that after much digging around he found them and informed steam, but it still took them about 2 - 3 weeks after that to get his account back. I would much rather buy the tile from the shop/Amazon or in Spiderwebs case stright from Jeff.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi,

 

I recently felt like playing games from Spiderweb again. Previously I played Avernum 1 - 3, but didn't like Avernum 4's use of the Geneforge graphics engine at all. I also played demos of others games (mostly the Exile series) a very long time ago. In fact, I am looking forward the upcoming remake of Avernum 1 ! I hope it brings back things that were present in Exile but lost in Avernum.

 

But in the meantime... Avadon seems like a nice game, I'll try it.

 

I too am a user of Steam. There are things I like about Steam : very good prices during the sales, ease of use... but also very wrong things. Corallus is perfectly right. If you happen to have a problem with your account, or if your account gets closed for no apparent reason, you're going to be in trouble. This happens more often than you would think. Steam's terms of use are very restrictive and unfair, and the users have very few rights. In fact I am pretty sure they are bordering the illegal at least in my country. That's not the only negative criticism I can formulate against Steam, but certainly the most important one in my opinion. I am therefore reluctant to buy lots of games with Steam, because the games are tied to your account forever, and if you lose your account you lose everything.

 

So, like Corallus and others, I would rather buy directly from Jeff and not from Steam. Even if it's more expensive. I know that not everyone feels the same, but 25$ for a game is not excessive in my opinion, especially when I know that it goes in entirety to the developper. Furthermore, the prices in Steam for european users frequently are more expensive than in the USA, so the difference between the prices would be less in my case. And with spiderwebsoftware you don't get DRM.

 

I have however a suggestion to make, and I would love this : Would it be possible that, when we buy the game directly on spiderwebsoftware's website, we also get a key to redeem the game on Steam ? For instance, some days ago I bought the 3# Humble Indie Bundle, and in addition they give a code to activate the games on Steam. This is such a nice thing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't mind paying a little bit extra since I feel the games are worth it. However, like the previous poster suggested, please let us register the games on Steam. Several other indie titles such as Fate of the World and SpaceChem (in addition to the Humble Indie Bundles) have allowed this. I'm sure it's not free for the developer but please, throw us a bone here.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I do not have the capacity to give unlimited copies of games out on iTunes and Steam. It's not an issue of what I would prefer or am willing to do ... It's just not possible on the systems. For example, on iTunes, I only get 50 promo codes for each release (iPad or App Store), total, period.

 

- Jeff Vogel

Link to comment
Share on other sites

What's the benefit of this, besides showing off your achievements and letting Steam friends see when you're playing?

 

—Alorael, supposes the ability to re-download if necessary is nice. If you do that you get stuck in the trap of requiring Steam, though, and he still thinks that's more trouble than emailing Spiderweb and asking for a new code.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

There is no benefit imo, only hinderance...

 

EDIT:

 

Well, there is a benefit for Jeff..it gets his games to a wider audience..which is good, very good in fact.. But once people have found spiderweb I think they are better off getting them from Jeff...pay a little more and help keep him earning enough to continue doing what he does best.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: Spidweb
I do not have the capacity to give unlimited copies of games out on iTunes and Steam. It's not an issue of what I would prefer or am willing to do ... It's just not possible on the systems. For example, on iTunes, I only get 50 promo codes for each release (iPad or App Store), total, period.

- Jeff Vogel


Really? to clarify - its definitely not going to be possible for copies of Avadon that have been purchased direct from spiderweb to be redeemed on steam? That seems odd. Its not a whole new copy after all, just the ability to register an existing copy with steam... how is it that the Humble Bundle managed it on such a massive scale then? Special allowance? :s

Also, to the naysayers tongue - the main advantage to doing it is for those use steam as a primary gaming platform. I find i'm much more likely to just jump into a game if i've got them all listed infront of me, which no doubt, i could set up anyway, but steam does it automatically. If you're used to going to steam for your gaming fix, then its handy. It's also handy to keep tabs on how long you've been playing for (something of concern to a lot of people for many different reasons)and the overlay makes it easy to screenshot, chat to friends, track achievements etc.

lol, clearly i'm a fan, but i get its not for everyone, you kinda have to go all or nothing with steam. and although all these probably won't apply to Avadon, those that do would still be kinda nice.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I dont see how steam makes it easier...Hardrives are now of a asize where you can have many games installed on your system at once...go to public>users>Games> <Name of game you want to play> What is so hard about that ? And ther is no problem where you lose access to your account and therfore ALL of you games ..as ther is with steam.. That and the price at which you can pick up used games now from amazon and the like I really see no point in steam.. I think it is good that Jeff can try and reach new players there (as I already said).. But other than that..I dont see the point. And all of my mates that used to harp on about how great it was have all come to have problems with it and have since stopped using it for new purchases..

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: corallus
I dont see how steam makes it easier...Hardrives are now of a asize where you can have many games installed on your system at once


True, but what happens when you change your system? That's the main advantage I see in Steam in my specific case. I have my Steam install on a USB disk; migrating all my Steam games to a new computer is no more work than plugging it in and running Steam. It will fix Steam's installation the first time I run Steam, and it will fix any of the games the first time I run them. This is an advantage precisely because you can have so many games installed at the same time. I just built a new PC a few weeks ago and within minutes, I was running games again that would have taken hours to install the old-fashioned way.

Yes I can hypothetically lose my account and therefore access to my games, but it's not like there are no risks associated with traditional media or other download stores. In fact I've re-purchased several games on Steam because the old installation media either didn't work anymore, or were lost (it happens...)

BTT: I've previously said I'd buy Spiderweb games on Steam if I could for these exact reasons, and although I was more hoping for the older ones, it's a start. I only have copies for the other two platforms so far anyway.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: Jase
Would you consider a sale on Avadon for the iPad, to take advantage of the hoopla and attention of Avadon going live on Steam? If you do this I'll post on forums and try to get my friends to take advantage of the sale.


Originally Posted By: Spidweb
Remember, our 3rd party distributors set prices, not us. We are only allowed to suggest prices. (This is what antitrust law allows.)

- Jeff Vogel


Jeff can't put the iPad version on sale, only recommend it. And it's already less than half of the regular price of the game. That's a pretty good sale in my opinion.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

It is my understanding that in the App Store, you can change the price whenever you like to whatever you like. Apple just takes 30% and the developer retains 70% of the revenue. So if Jeff decided to cut the price from $9.99 to $6.99 for a few days, he would still get $4.90, which is $2.10 less than what he is getting at full price. But hopefully he would much more than make up for the loss with incremental sales from people who were waiting for a sale. If he cut the price all the way down to $4.99, then he would be losing $3.50 per sale over the regular price while only making $3.50 in revenue vs. the normal $7 that he pockets for each sale on the App Store.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This may be exactly why Jeff was so reluctant to go to Apple's pricing range, initially. Compare to pocketing $20 per sale (previously, more!) on the Spiderweb site.

 

Is the extra exposure worth these price drops in raw numerical terms? It seems like it ought to be, in Spiderweb's case. But it's a risk, so the hesitancy makes sense.

 

Also, I don't know what the price on Steam will be, but assuming it is also around $10, wouldn't Steam be unhappy if Jeff made the App Store price even lower intentionally coinciding with the Steam release?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Jeff discussed in his blog last year pricing his games. Dropping the game price requires a huge increase in sales to make up for the lower revenue per game. As a niche market with only about 10,000 in sales on one of his previous games he needs to more than double that in new customers to have a 50% drop in price and compensate for the cut to the distributors.

 

Jeff's seems to have been treating iPad sales as new customers on top of his expected sales.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

10,000 in sales x $25 for one of the previous games = ... well, I'm not going to do the math out because that seems a bit rude, but combined with incidental sales of previous games, that seems like it would cover pretty healthy salaries for 3 people.

 

It really makes me understand the reluctance to switch pricing schemes. At $7 a pop from the App Store, you'd need three and half times the sales to get to the same point. At 99 cents that would be easy to get. At $9.99, good question. I hope Jeff shares some info on how well the iPad version of Avadon has sold at some point.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

i hope Spiderweb makes millions of dollars in profits, They deserve it. I wouldn't want them to put their games on sale unless it makes sense for them. I do think that a limited-time sale on Avadon for iPad would capture some revenue from people who are waiting for a sale or who wouldn't buy Avadon unless it went on sale.

 

Personally, I plan to play Avadon and all future Spiderweb games on both Mac and iPad once the cloud game saves are instituted with iOS 5 (assuming that Spiderweb implements it.) If most Spiderweb customers start buying both a Mac/PC and iPad version of the game, then maybe Spiderweb can afford to put their iPad version on sale occasionally.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S
10,000 in sales x $25 for one of the previous games = ... well, I'm not going to do the math out because that seems a bit rude, but combined with incidental sales of previous games, that seems like it would cover pretty healthy salaries for 3 people. ...


That is not at all enough for healthy salaries for three people. You have to consider that you are talking Revenue here, not profit. To see how much the company makes, you have to know what their expenses are. You need to account for taxes, taxes, and more taxes. You also need to account for insurance. There's also legal fees, web hosting fees, keeping a good set of equipment running, paying for music, graphics, etc. On top of that, if there are any employees (other than just Jeff himself), there is Workmans Compensation Insurance, Unemployment Insurance, and all kinds of other money-sucking government regulations. I would not be surprised if half of that Gross Revenue is eaten up before any profit at all appears. That comes down to a decent salary for ONE person when you consider the market Jeff lives in, his skills and talent, and the fact that he has to pay the full cost of health insurance for his family.

I hope his sales are in the hundreds of thousands rather than the tens of thousands, but the real point to all of this is: If I am satisfied with their product and they sell it for a price I am willing to pay, then t does not matter to me how much money a person/company makes. This is not a land where we should be looking at others and saying, "He shouldn't charge that much for his product, he doesn't need the money."
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: Skwish-E
I hope his sales are in the hundreds of thousands rather than the tens of thousands, but the real point to all of this is: If I am satisfied with their product and they sell it for a price I am willing to pay, then t does not matter to me how much money a person/company makes. This is not a land where we should be looking at others and saying, "He shouldn't charge that much for his product, he doesn't need the money."


He posted his sales figres for Geneforge 4: Superfluous Subtitle on his blog. Here's the exact figures:

Quote:
Total Copies Sold of Geneforge 4 as of March 13, 2009: 3979.
Total Gross Sales Geneforge 4 as of March 13, 2009: $111412.

Total Geneforge 4 Hint Books Sold as of March 13, 2009: 807.
Total Gross Sales Geneforge 4 Hint Books as of March 13, 2009: $5649.


He also stated in another post that the total development costs of G4, including salaries, was $120K. So after about two years of sales, his game was in the black. But keep in mind that when Jeff releases a new game, he does so to essentially pay his salary and offset dev costs. I'd be willing to bet that the majority of his profits come from older games that people still buy. If we presume that people have more-or-less stopped purchasing the original Exiles and the original Nethergate, and maybe BoA, he still has the sales of the 5 Geneforges, the 6 Avernums, and N:R to draw upon for profit. Even if each of those games pull in a mere 100-200 sales a year, that's still in the neighborhood of 3, 4 thousand dollars per game per year- times 12, thatanother sixty thousand dollars per year!

And he's said that G4:SS was an average game in terms of sales, whereas A6 and A:TBF were hits. If that means 150 or 200 k in sales, then that's a substantial packed of money, even after tax, for three people.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: ercankazaz
I hope game will be $9.99 on Steam so I can buy it for me and my girlfriend. It looks really good.


Originally Posted By: Spiderweb's Promise
Your child wants to play the game on his or her own machine? That's awesome, and an additional key is free.


While a girlfriend is not a child, I think a similar argument can be made here. You're not actually saving much by buying two copies on Steam.

—Alorael, who purchased an original Avernum trilogy CD as a gift to a friend once upon a time. It's actually quite cheap if you check all of the boxes for having previously purchased Avernum games individually!
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: Skwish-E
Originally Posted By: HOUSE of S
10,000 in sales x $25 for one of the previous games = ... well, I'm not going to do the math out because that seems a bit rude, but combined with incidental sales of previous games, that seems like it would cover pretty healthy salaries for 3 people. ...


That is not at all enough for healthy salaries for three people. You have to consider that you are talking Revenue here, not profit. To see how much the company makes, you have to know what their expenses are.


I strongly disagree. About the stuff to account for:
- Taxes: Sales tax, when applicable, is on top of the regular purchase price in the USA; it isn't taken out of it. Income tax does not figure into this discussion since salary levels are always quoted before any tax is taken out.
- Web hosting: We're talking about $250,000 in revenue here, if you do the math. One year of web hosting, even including the SW store and the forums, has got to be a drop in the bucket.
- Insurance, gov't fees, legal fees: I will admit I don't know how much these things cost, but I can't imagine they are very high for a company that has only 2-non principal employees, both of whom do clerical work.
- Computer equipment: A few thousand dollars a year at most, maybe less, and while this is a legitimate business expense, this probably replaces most personal computer purchases, so...
- Graphics and music: We know that SW avoids purchasing these when possible. In particular, most of the character graphics seem to be done in-house. I wouldn't expect the illustrations and the occasional item graphic purchase to run more than a few thousand dollars per game, maybe less.
- Health insurance: This is a good point. Insurers are mostly not nice to small businesses.

I'm not saying SW doesn't deserve this money. I'd love it if they made even more. But even if the above list of stuff really did take up $125,000 a year, an idea I find pretty ridiculous, that still leaves $125,000 for salaries. Take off $5000 each to adjust for health insurance, that leaves $110,000. That could allow, say, $30,000 each for the employees and $50,000 for the main programmer. Not high salaries, but pretty typical for a small business. Certainly enough to live of off. However, if the above list of stuff costs far less than $125,000 as I expect, the salary options start to look a lot rosier.

I feel a bad ashamed to be speculating like this on SW's own forums. But math analysis is math analysis.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Releases from 2000 on:

Avernum 1-6

BoA

Geneforge 1-5

Nethergate: Resurrection

Avadon

 

That's 14 games in 12 years, at a fairly consistent pace.

 

There's clearly a lot of wiggle factors: plusses for the slow trickle of sales from older games, from CD sales and hint book sales. Minuses from games that undersold. Plusses from games that were hits. However, if 4000 is average and 10,000 is a hit, then the numbers would suggest that the hits more than make up for the poor sellers, at least if they appear in similar numbers.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think the big litmus test is that Jeff is doing well enough to employ himself and his wife and raise two kids. And if that's not enough, he brought in a third person to help out. Somehow I imagine that he'd get by without the help if he were really hurting for money.

 

—Alorael, who imagines that the hourly wage is actually pretty awful; that's par for the course with small businesses. But Jeff gets to be his own boss, make the games that he claims he no longer loves but instead creates with stolid craftsmanship, and be something of an indie celebrity. And it's a living!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

i'm not sure anyone is actually disagreeing on anything substantial here. i think we can all agree that jeff is probably neither worrying about how to pay this month's electricity bill nor swimming Scrooge McDuck-style in an ozone-sterilized regulation Olympic pool full of money

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Most of the costs are salaries but even those aren't that much for a small business. No one is getting rich from their salary. The $120,000 was mostly how much it cost to pay for for a year of making the game for him and his two employees plus graphics and artwork from others,

 

Jeff has tried to get away from his potential profits being tied up in unsold hint books and CD-ROMs of his games. Digital versions are pure profit once development cost are recouped. With the iPad and Mac App Store he is getting new customers that are finally getting him over the break even point.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Those GF4 sales numbers... I'm not so sure about these assumptions. Avadon came with a revised game engine and system, a significant investment. Avadon 2 is likely going to be all game content, and take less than a year to produce. I also think his library generates more sales than what was estimated, and 2nd and 3rd year sales post release are probably still pretty strong. If he releases 1 per year he sees 2nd and 3rd year sales overlapping.

 

Spiderweb and Basilisk should be thanking each other for cross sales.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: Lilith
i'm not sure anyone is actually disagreeing on anything substantial here. i think we can all agree that jeff is probably neither worrying about how to pay this month's electricity bill nor swimming Scrooge McDuck-style in an ozone-sterilized regulation Olympic pool full of money


I am in full agreement here, though even the thought of Jeff diving into a huge bin of coins and swimming around is just a bit disturbing. Thanks for that image. Now I need to wash out my brain with tequila.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: Skwish-E
Originally Posted By: Lilith
i'm not sure anyone is actually disagreeing on anything substantial here. i think we can all agree that jeff is probably neither worrying about how to pay this month's electricity bill nor swimming Scrooge McDuck-style in an ozone-sterilized regulation Olympic pool full of money


I am in full agreement here, though even the thought of Jeff diving into a huge bin of coins and swimming around is just a bit disturbing. Thanks for that image. Now I need to wash out my brain with tequila.

Jeff's a good father. He wouldn't want to risk his daughters accidentally swallowing any change. More likely is rolling around on the floor in a pile of loose bills.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I just wrote a bunch about this on my blog.

 

http://jeff-vogel.blogspot.com/2011/08/avadon-is-out-on-steam.html

 

Includes a detailed discussion of pricing, both for now and in future games. TL;DR version: Everything will be cheaper in the future, so don't yell at me. :-)

 

- Jeff Vogel

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Here's hoping you gain enough in sales to justify the price drop.

 

I'm still going to purchase new games directly through spidweb.com rather than Steam in the future, for reasons already mentioned in this thread (earlier release, money back guarantee, etc.). Even being able to edit the scripts to make secret switches more obvious is worth a couple of dollars, at least.

 

EDIT: Come to think of it, are you able to modify Steam games? I've never tried, but I assume Steam prevents modifications the same way the App Store does.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ah, Avadon on Steam is fair priced for European users, 6.99€ and not 9.99€ ! (and at the moment 10% off, 6.29€)

 

For me, this means that buying Avadon directly from Spiderwebsoftware is more than twice as expensive as buying from Steam (I am in the eurozone for Steam but my country's currency is not €). It is tempting to buy it on Steam now tongue But I think I'll still buy it from Spiderweb

 

When will the update for Avadon on Windows be out ?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: Dintiradan
EDIT: Come to think of it, are you able to modify Steam games? I've never tried, but I assume Steam prevents modifications the same way the App Store does.


I've modded a bunch of games I bought off of Steam, Half Life 2 and Torchlight to name a couple off the top off my head.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Originally Posted By: ToddMcF2002
Avadon came with a revised game engine and system, a significant investment. Avadon 2 is likely going to be all game content, and take less than a year to produce.

Maybe, but new engine games haven't actually taken all that much longer to come out. It seems like Jeff cuts time in other areas: game length, the polish that goes into later iterations of the engine, or whatever. And while new games do require some expenditure on graphics, I think the really expensive changes were Nethergate, which ushered in the second generation of Spiderweb graphics style, and Geneforge, which ushered in the third. Avadon has new graphics of course, but it still uses Geneforge's style and recycles heavily.

—Alorael, who will point out that it is much easier to sterilize change than bills. And, of course, that money is filthy and should not be handled without proper hygiene.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

So with all of the Avadon hype, I tried the demo off of the Spiderweb website. Now that Avadon is on Steam, can I activate my character from the demo to the full game on Steam?

 

Or more likely, is there a way I can copy the character data over to a steam file/directory so I don't have to run through the intro dungeon again?

 

Thanks!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you can get me a copy on steam or in the mail I can get a review up for a magazine/website in canada I do reviews for and also my personal blog. We usually get more mainstream popular games sent to us unfortunatly so sometimes I like to hunt down the smaller known Indie companies to get them some shine (;

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That would be more credible if you had any kind of verifying information. I'd rate your chances of getting a free reviewer's copy at roughly zero.

 

—Alorael, who imagines that getting contacted directly by a notable publication would be much more likely to get Jeff's attention.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Im a new player from steam and I'd like to weigh in alittle as a perspective from the other side. Most of you guys seem like hardcore old school RPGers, just as Avadon (and other Spiderweb games) seem to be. I understand why its 20$ outside of steam and why you guys support the more expensive point. Afterall these are very niche games and are not made for casual players unlike most other indie games are like the new Bastion RPG game, so obviously these games need to be priced more so Spiderweb stays in business, where as Angry birds which is easy and casual can be .99$ and sell a mint and you guys support that because you love the hardcore game. I get all that.

 

But this is the days now of indie games, selling to a wider audience of people does have its price, I'll be honest with you, I'd never pay a cent above 9$ for this or any like it, and most 'mainstream' users wont. Why? because while hardcore classic rpg fans around here probably dont really dip into modern games (I've heard alot of old school types whining how games nowadays are stupid/easy/too mass market etc and dont want to play them. Thats fair, indie games like this are probably your own source of gaming.

 

But most gamers are use to paying 20$ and up (and sometimes cheaper!) for new sparkling 3D games and the like, and so its just not cost effective to drop more money on a game that looks like its from the 90s and lacks voice acting and all the modern amenities mainstream gamers are use to. Its tough to reconcile these two types of gamer players, probably impossible which is why these concessions must be made.

 

From what I can see, Spiderweb software has been a pioneer in the indie game field having started long before the indie craze ever happened, but there is a reason why they dont have the same name (or even make the same bundles of cash) as popular indie devs these days like Angry Birds guys, or the Terraria guys or half of the new indie devs that are rich and famous over night -- you cant change the market, you have to play the game to win it, meaning not using steam and charging a premium for old school indie wont get you anything other then a fiercely loyal but small fanbase.

 

So far Im enjoying Avadon and would like spiderweb to gain some recognition after all these years in the indie field, but it is important they 'play the steam game' if they want to become as famous as Terraria and Angry birds, and keep up with the Casual Mode thing so casual and hardcore alike can enjoy the game. It might not make some of the core around here too happy, but honestly you cant have your cake and eat it too, success comes with a price.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think the bigger problem is mass appeal. Traditional RPGs sell well, but not amazingly; casual games are much more accessible to more people who might want to buy them. Jeff has to sell at a higher price because at 99 cents he'll still sell far less than Angry Birds and it'll still take him far longer to produce his games.

 

—Alorael, who thinks Jeff would still stand by his previous statements even if he's lowered his price: he can't drop to a price than everyone will like and still make a living. The modal preferred price is $0, after all. If the $9.99 Steam sale works out by tripling the Spiderweb customer base, great, that might be the new price point. But if it doesn't, Jeff will happily cut his losses and go back up in price.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.


×
×
  • Create New...