itch.io

Your zip file must contain the two folders (Build and Template Data) and the index.html file.

Check that you've marked all the right boxes on your project page:

Kind of Project: HTML

Once you upload the file tick the block: This file will be played in the browser

I don't know what you mean by switch lanes. I could store the villagers and release them. But that was all I could do. The game seemed to be waiting for me to do something I wasn't doing.

The tutorial worked up the point where it told me how to store and release my villagers. After that it just stuck there.

(The getting meat from the sheep is a bit realistic - most games hide the fact that you're actively killing animals. For example, they could catch the sheep and take it home.)

Sometimes when games are overpriced here, they're available elsewhere cheaper - like on Steam or Patreon. The overprice on itch.io is to advertise the game here - but get the person to conclude the purchase elsewhere.

Your game has no instructions. I didn't know what I was meant to do.

Many of my games are cute. Have a look: https://evolutionarygames.itch.io/

Some of them are free, like all my browser games, and

Covert Dragons & Co - find the matching dragon or bird 

Pizzantropia - catch the pizzas and potions, avoid the obstacles - the demo is free and it's a full game in its own right

I'm not sure what you mean about a feel good moment - that would be more like a visual novel that has a happy ending - but my browser games for destressing have that - you can turn all the faces happy (or eliminate all the angry faces).

Said every developer on itch.io...

Money

Games don’t necessarily make enough money to pay a team. If you look at the speech of the small studio that won an award in the UK, they mentioned that they didn’t make enough money from the first game to make a second game.

Control

In the game I wrote most recently, I didn’t like one of the puzzle games. I decided to change it, thought of a new idea, implemented it, tested it and was happy with the change. This took me perhaps 5 hours. Now imagine a team member had written the puzzle game and was proud of it and unhappy that I wanted to change it. We would need more testing, input, and in the end one of us would be unhappy. It would slow down the game by several days and create conflict.

Empire building

I make a good entrepreneur because I’m a self-starter, motivated to get things done and have many ideas. Simultaneously, I make a bad entrepreneur because I just want “enough.” I would be really happy if my game sold 3,000 copies. Others would keep going for more sales – if they sold 3,000, they’d want 30,000. If they sold 30,000, they’d want 300,000 sales etc. The latter group will get more people onboard, start a studio and grow it. People like me, will outsource the parts we don’t enjoy and keep doing the rest ourselves.

Career choice

I’m passionate about developing games – it’s fun for me. If one of my games became successful and I built a team the nature of my job would change. I’d become a manager and would no longer be a hands-on game developer. Alternatively, I’d have to appoint project managers and then the whole process would slow down. If it took me 3 months to deliver the next game, it would then take me 6 months because of the extra communication, documentation and collaboration processes.

And then it goes back to the money – if the game made enough money to sustain me for 3 months, would it make enough money to sustain an entire team for 6 months?

It depends on whether you're logged in or not. If you download your game while logged into Itch.io, it won't trigger a download or page view.

If you go to a different browser where you're not logged in and download it from there, it shows as a download.

Using assets that other people made is fine. After all, whether you employ them to make the asset, or buy it in store doesn't make any difference. The same applies to free assets. It's only developers who frequent these stores that will recognise the assets - and itch.io tends to be a community of developers (so this might be the wrong place to ask). 

Where it becomes a problem is when you buy a demo of a game,  and release the game as is. Google Play Store blocked this because they were getting 1000s of listings of the same game. They've now stated that only the person who created the demo may publish it on the Google Play Store. It was this behaviour that gave asset flipping a bad name. 

Try to download it through the itch.io app. If it's playable through the app, mention in your description that people should play the game using the app to avoid anti-virus issues.

Yes, Poser and Daz Studio .  Most of the graphics I use in my 2D games are rendered in Poser software. That gives them a 3D look, while being 2D.

Those of us  who are vendors at these stores, must model the 3D objects for resale by hand. Here polycount is less important because people are rendering the 3D objects, or making animation videos, rather than using the 3D in a real-time environment like games. If I had software that could let me make unique products, like making it off a 2D image I could draw, then it would really speed up my production time.  

Vendors making content to sell at places like the Unity Asset Store, and Itch.io, may also be more willing to pay for this type of software, because they could also speed up their production times.

It depends on the game development software you're using. 

For example, inside Unity you can use ProBuilder to make 3D objects - you can learn using Unity learn.

Otherwise use free assets - available here, and also in the software stores like Unity Asset Store until you've mastered the game development side, and then worry about learning modelling.

It looks awesome. But we would need details on the polygon counts etc. 

It looks like you're creating a 3D object out of an image. If you have software that can do that, that would be useful in many places, not just Unity.

You could search the forums and you'll see many threads explaining it. It's also in the FAQ. Basically, you need to pay the fees associated with the transactions. These are fees charged by credit card companies and PayPal. (Itch.io doesn't charge anything, but they do take whatever you give them off the top - not after the fees). 

When you request a pay out, there are again fees involved to process the payment charged by PayPal etc.

Having a license won't help you combat piracy.  People who steal games and assets, know that they're doing it, and don't care.  

The only issue where you'd need a license is to let people know if they're allowed to use your assets commercially - i.e. put it into their own games. You could write it in the description, but that's risky for the users. If they have a "readme" file they download with the asset, users are better protected in case there's a dispute.

If you report a game to Itch.io / Google, it's up to you to show it's your game and a license alone won't help you. You'd need screenshots perhaps of the game in your software, and of the publishing date that shows you published first.  

(+ do what redonihunter suggested by putting in links to your itch.io pages or website etc. in the game itself)

Yandex is  a search engine like Bing, Google and Duckduckgo. They also offer (or used to offer) other services like music streaming to the Russian-speaking market. You would find your game only by typing in a specific search term - possibly in Russian. 

Some of my games are translated into Russian, so I get some traffic from Yandex. But it's random - much like all search engine traffic when you're mostly unknown.

Most likely indie game developers won't pay for testing because they (a) don't have a budget for testing (b) can get it for free from people here who offer.

If you extensively played a genre of games, say puzzle games and you could give advice on specific aspects of a puzzle game, or suggest improvements, someone might pay for that. The price would depend on the person's financial status and country they live in, rather than the skills you bring to the table. 

Which analytics? 

I can see how many people play my browser games on my website through Awstats. 

Awstats shows how many people accessed a certain file which is needed to run the game (under Page URL - Top 25). That stat equals how many people started to play the game. 

I can also see under the heading Top Downloads, how many times the sound files (as an example) were downloaded (it's automatically downloaded once they open the game). 

Awstats is normally included if your website hosting includes a control panel. Find it under "metrics"

Future shot: Alien Apocalypse

I wrote a few games about emotions - if you're sad or angry. I find if I'm holding in an emotion, the games help me to release it. So use them as an idea for your own game. For example, if you're feeling sad, write a game about consoling someone. If you're angry, write a game about getting even - or a game like whack-a-mole and pretend the mole is your ex. Or do the opposite and write a game where you must make everyone happy.

https://evolutionarygames.itch.io/dry-the-tears

https://evolutionarygames.itch.io/fight-the-sadness

https://evolutionarygames.itch.io/squash-them

This is a fun and challenging browser game. I prefer to play with the arrow keys, but needed to use WASD for the orientation (to know which key to press). I'd also like an option to turn the tips off, after I've played the game once or twice.

I believe Unity has done an overhaul of their web browser backend in their latest beta version. Perhaps this is an issue they addressed.

I prefer to use Clickteam Fusion for web games - but with this particular game I encountered a bug in Fusion, so rewrote it in Unity (it was quicker than rewriting it in Fusion to overcome the bug). All my other browser games are written in Clickteam Fusion. 

I actually used the recommended dimensions suggested by Huawei App Gallery since 95% of people who play my browser games find them on the Huawei App Gallery and the other 5% go directly to my website. 

Thanks for the feedback. I've enabled full screen mode on  itch.io.  (Itch.io's full screen, not Unity's).

There is no text on the bottom when you play the game. Only the start screen has the instructions, and below the instructions a banner ad, showcasing my other games. (If the instructions are cut-off, the game would be unplayable, because you wouldn't see the bottom rows of tiles.)

There's one example here

To give the canvas more space to scale on different sizes like 600 x 800. I have it at 550 x 800 with the setting match 80% of the height.

You can program the camera to adjust itself when necessary.  Test the screen width and height and if it's too far from your target, it can change the projection size (orthographic) etc.  Just do a search on setting the camera size in Unity. There are multiple options. 

Wouldn't it be nice if mobile screens all had the same resolution?!

The game in window mode fits on my monitor which is standard 1920x1080 without scrolling. On itch.io you need to scroll past my banner once, on my own website, there's no scrolling needed but I've also disabled full screen. On the longest side it is 800 which fits well into a height of 1080.

I designed the game to be played on mobile devices (it's published on Huawei App Gallery and at Amazon). That's why I have an odd portrait resolution (450 x 800). If I was designing it for PC I would've used different dimensions.

I suppose the other developers are creating their browser games using resolutions more suited to desktops that can resize based on desktop dimensions.

We can program the cameras to fit black bars and force a resolution when necessary. I didn't in this case, because the game was okay on all my test devices.

In Unity,  look at Project Settings - Player - Resolution and Presentation - Set your default width and height there.

This game: https://evolutionarygames.itch.io/pattern-puzzles

I have the default resolution set to 450 x 800. The canvasses are created 550 x 800. 

On itch.io my settings are:  Embed in Page - Manually set size to 450 x 800 with orientation Portrait. I've disabled go full screen (don't tick the box), because then the game is cut-off.

1. Right click on the file. Choose Extract All.
2. Once extracted, go to the folder. If you have an anti-virus, let it check the folder.  (right click the folder - select "Scan with..."
3. Once that is done, look for a file that ends in .exe - double click that.
4. You'll most likely see a blue popup - Windows has protected you - click on more info - click on allow this app.
5. Play.

Easier option: download theitch.io app and let it handle this process for you.

Alternatively, write in your description: Payment is optional. To get the game for free: Click "Download Now" then click "No thanks, just take me to the download".

You should be able to do that yourself. 

When you edit the game at the bottom there's three options:  SAVE, View Page and on the right Delete game.

If for some reason that button isn't there - change the game to draft and it will be unpublished.

It sounds like you could be making the wrong assumption. 

The credit card companies, PayPal,  and Stripe charge a fee for someone to buy your game. That fee is carried over to your account. Once every three years you must complete a tax certificate which costs $3 (last time I checked). 

See: https://itch.io/docs/creators/payments

If it was tax, your tax certificate would highlight that. If your country has a tax treaty with the US there won't be any tax withholding, only the fees. The fees can still constitute a large chunk of your earnings if you have a lot of small transactions.

In contrast, other companies absorb the fees in their 30% commissions. But because Itch.io doesn't enforce a commission, they can't pay for the fees themselves.

You generally can't play html games without uploading and publishing them to a website. To test your game, you can create a new itch.io project and leave it as draft so nobody can see until you've finished. 

On Itch.io:

• Under "Kind of Project" You need to state HTML
• When you upload a zip file you need to tick the block, this file will be played in the browser.
• Your zip file should include an index.html file along with the data files.

No, you can't play .exe files (downloaded Windows files) on your browser. They must be built for a browser.  But perhaps you should try the itch.io app - because it will install the games for you so you can just play them.

People are not that attentive. If you change your name to something like Gooseball they will look for you by typing goofball and never find you. But you could try something more professional sounding like Strange Goose Games. 

There are few developers complaining and having issues (when you consider how many developers are actually on itch.io). The complaints are all variations of the same theme:

1. Developers want to upload extra-large files and can't (I have no idea if players even download these)

2. Developers want to get paid more promptly (but itch.io has to deal with fraud, so they're careful and that takes time) followed by accusing itch.io of withholding money because the developers haven't read the documentation. Itch.io is free, you can give them a share if you want to (and you should), but they pass on the charges by the payment processors to the developers - developers often struggle to understand this. 

3. Developers complain that nobody can find their games / their games are not indexed (that is difficult - you basically need to promote your game elsewhere (social media) because the chances of it being seen here is potluck - some games win the lottery and get featured, most games don't). 

This one: https://www.magix.com/us/music-editing/music-maker/

But my first game's music was me playing the music on keyboards and recording it... my own composition. You can always do that too.

I agree with Sundler.

Itch.io is completely transparent about their fees.

If you click on: Earnings - Payouts - payout details - you get a very detailed breakout of what itch.io deducts.

For example: 

• Payment Processor Fees in this instance is what the payment processor deducted to process the customers' payments. If there are a lot of micro transactions, like $1 at a time, that can be much higher. This fee is not within itch.io's control.
• Itch.io recommends we don't charge $1 for our games, because we do tend to lose half of it to fees. 
• Itch.io share is what I give to itch.io considering they don't charge me a cent otherwise to host all my games.
• Adjustments is the payout charge for processing the payout - not itch.io's charge but PayPal's.  
• Adjustments can also increase by $3 if you've just completed a tax certificate - which the company that does the tax certificates charges.
• Of this, itch.io only gets the 15% I've allocated to them: $1.35. Nothing else.

It depends on whether you want to program, or just use an interface to write games. 

You can look at software like Clickteam Fusion, that simplifies programming. There are other similar programmes like Game Salad or Construct.

If you want to use code, then Unity, Godot, or GameMaker are popular.