That's noble words!
Hmmmmm, let me think a little...
Do note that while I can assess current state of affairs, I can't peek into your plans. So most things I'll say are HOPEFULLY taken into account, will become irrelevant soon or otherwise void and null.
I think that I'll leave it here in the open, since it's more or less universal set of problems. Gamers develop seldom. Developers are gaming seldom. And neither is a qualified seller. Might come handy to someone eventually. Which will be for good for everyone, eventually.
I as avid gamer am tired of looking for what to play next.
However, each and every single publishing platform I came across is busy shooting themselves in the foot in this regard.
Yes, Steam included. I can dredge Steam for hours, using third-party tools even, and find nothing - just to bump at something relevant few days, weeks, months even later. My year's best purchase there was made by a sheer accident - and that's for me, knowing EXACTLY what I'm looking for.
(for historical purposes, it was Steam version of Card Artisan. Masterpieces like this pop in once a decade. And I wonder why can't I find it at both Steam and Itch regardless of how hard I try. . .)
You wrote: "no tricky algorithms will define how your customers will find your games".
It MAY work while your games catalogue is slim.
Unfortunately, even curated catalogue tends to get very bloated very soon. Some means for automatization will be necessary.
How to solve this?
Well, I see that you are no stranger to AI.
And developers will give you enough material to categorize your catalogue: game screenshots.
And since every genre / subgenre tends to use similar patterns in its UI building...
(and if the developer supplied you with arts-only no-UI screenshots... do he really want to be discovered?)
Genre/subgenre separation is a problem - however, I've bumped onto one very good example of almost-scientifical game genres classification few decads ago (do note that it's in Russian - but it's exceptionally well-written, your favourite translation software should process it well).
Fiction genres (which are supposed to cover sorting things outside of gameplay genres) are, on the contrary, relatively well standartized...
If the problem above is solved, then
I as potential game developer with big ambitions am tired of constantly discovering new hoops to jump through.
Whatever your publishing process will be, I need it all in a step-by-step guide in a singular place.
From developer account registration to getting actual cash.
If it's too big for a step-by-step guide, then... maybe it's time to revise this process?
Fair Revenue Split and Copy Protection are nice - but what's the point in it if I am not sure if I'll be able to make it to actual income?
If games discoverability was a mere contest in shooting in the foot, then transparency of publishing process is a damn feet poaching!
Like, when our local... hehehe... small indie social network decided to become a... hehehe... small indie game publisher, they were so inclined to become first on market so they've COMPLETELY forgot to share ANY publishing process description with actual indie game developers. Even right after government-level nation-wide announcement: Yes, We're Open For Business Now!
Yes, I've spent hours (days even) looking. No publically available information found.
Then they've reported to shareholders: hey, we did the thing you wanted but... noone's coming to publish games with us!
(except some military grade shovelware from people with no creativity and abundnance of free time to get this stuff sorted. Of course it flopped hard)
As of here and now, I find it bewildering to see that, all of a sudden, players have to ask developers why, for example, some games had to be double-listed. Let's pretend that I'm still eager to pay for stuff like that. Aaaaaand, it's shadowbanned. Noone can get my money. Uncool.
If things like this are unavoidable, these must be stated explicitly for BOTH PLAYERS AND DEVELOPERS ALIKE.
But I still don't see any intel on this even in a dedicated FAQ entry for developers. If it's allowed but not discoverable - then it's not allowed. That's simple. And things like this Should Not Happen.
That's the skeleton. The two-piece cornerstone which will hold everything else. Without it, other decisions won't help you descend above others.
Oh, and one more thing.
If you're planning to get a grip on some indie games, you'll bump onto "pay what you want" monetization scheme eventually.
You see, can't tell about WHOLE world of indie game development, but here in our country there is a roadblock called "necessity to make legal entity for almost all commerce oriented activities".
It's an absolutely humongous can of worms.
Since I've never had enough time to breach through the question above, I didn't pondered this financial/juridical sophism enough YET.
Two things I know for sure:
1. Making a dedicated legal entity consisting of me alone is completely out of question. Our SIMPLIFIED taxation policy is difficult to navigate through even with full crew of accountants and lawyers and consultants. I as lone developer can't afford that in this specific point of time and space. And I've seen enough people getting disproportionally big problems by trying to go legit.
2. There IS a definition of DONATION in our codex of laws, which de jure allows your average John Doe to receive monetary tokens of appreciation of their work (and personality, probably). With official taxation and stuff. Which 100% fits "pay what you want" monetization scheme, if cooked right.
As of the latter, I'm 110% sure that I'm not the one with this problem/interest.
But I don't see even a list of potential cash transfer reasons to choose from on any platform supporting cashing out one's earnings.
Which is a HUGE thing. Since if I can't get cash transfer with legally appropriate transfer reason - then I'm in trouble. Big trouble, if taxation oversight responsibles would spot it. And I do NOT want any risks of this kind. I can't afford that. Period.
Not mentioning that every Bob, Locke and their pet rock tend to resort to having only PayPal (which still doesn't allow RECEIVING funds for residents of quite a lot of countries) as a sole cash out option.
And only very few sites support general purpose "man, I love what that guy is doing. Here, he can have my money" type of transactions, on top of that.
But, alas, monetization topic is as infinite as humankind's stupidity.
Infinite - yet it needs some simple solutions, if you hope to attract people from countries where personal accountant is a luxury.
...I think it's enough for starts.
Specific HOWs depend on what you have available.
It's WHYs that are important in given set of circumstances.
It's not much, since I'm in a sort of indefinite retirement from IT. And my skills are degrading faster than I thought.
Still, hopefully, SOMEONE would find this message in a bottle eventually.
The treasure awaits the determined.
Thank you sooooooo much for your feedback!!
We need, we love some people like you who help us in the making a platform that is not only our platform.
About genre/subgenre separation. We are looking for something very precise. Part of our platform engine will be based on that.
Careful about the AI. First of all because it's an external code, out of the platform server, second because itcan be risky to use it in a website like our website. AI has bee developed for other purpose, not for a website search or product classification. Further, yes, its true that until the marketplace is small its easier to manage the stock,that's why we though about another approach to help gamers to discover more games. Every widget will implement a "local" system to instantly retrieve info from games of the same genre, so gamers can do multiple research in the same storefront (this feature will be constantly under dev)
Of course the platform, like any other software is based on algorhythms, but what we mean is that we want to let more freedom to gamers to do research themselves instead that having our software fully decides for them.
The state of the art of our platform can see the publishing process much easier and funny compared to other platform. The goal to have all in one place was also our goal and we are currently reaching the "help central " with as much information a possible. This is crucial for us, because making the process easier means less headache and stress for developers that can be more happy to work on it.
Of course, we do our best but as soon as the platform will be availale for devs, we'll be working more and more with you.
I personally thought about a donation system, but at the moment we prefer to let devs to release their games for free or paid.
Yes we found your message, :) andI think it can be very useful buddy,
Hope you will be in touch, especially when we will add the Sign Up button on our platform and you can start publishing on it :) Because we will need to work a lot, even more more than now and listen to all feedback, on our forum too !
