You may have heard murmurings of the indiepocalypse, how the price of your average indie game is quickly approaching zero as desperate developers race to run bargain bin sales or join pay what you want bundles that net 2 cents per sale.
Are creators proud to list their game at 75% off after months/years/decades of development? In some cases, just weeks after a launch. Maybe when sales were novel, when the amount of units sold recouped for the reduced price. Sadly it seems selling your game for pennies on the dollar is just one of the many stages of a release you’ll trudge through as you try to make your game known among the thousands of sales and hundreds of bundles going on at any given time.
Can we solve this? I don’t know. But I do know that itch.io can make it easier for you to collect more money.
When you’re creating a sale you’re typically doing two things:
We think the second point is valuable. We’re surrounded by countless industries pushing to drive down prices, often at the expense of creators. It’s easy to get caught up in the first bullet point without really thinking about the second.
A sale is a celebration of your work. Why not celebrate by letting people pay their respects to your hard work by giving you more?.
Will this feature really fix anything? Probably not, but we think it’s cool and fun so happy April Fools*.
Go forth and host some sales, but don’t feel obligated to always lower the price :).
* This feature is here to stay
Enjoy!
- Leaf
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Thats actually a good one mate
I get the humor here, but let me be blunt. In my field (healthcare), I would never tell a client: “I believe you should pay me more, just because I feel undervalued.” That would be absurd. I provide a service, the fee is set, and people choose to accept or not. If the pay isn’t enough, you either improve your offering, negotiate within the system, or change profession.
Games, art, music—these are optional luxuries. Nobody asked for a game to exist, and nobody owes extra just because the creator feels underpaid. If someone enjoys a work and chooses to give more, that’s fine, but it shouldn’t be presented as if the audience has a duty to support beyond the price tag. A “reverse sale” is funny as a joke, but when it crosses into entitlement, it risks alienating the very people you want to reach. In the end, value isn’t declared—it’s earned, and people show it by choosing to buy (or not).
You don't get to decide if games, art, or music are "optional luxuries". You're right that the value we attribute to services has to be negotiated within the system, but hat system also has to include the livelihood of the provider of that service, whether creator or healthcare provider.You can't provide a service if the service is not providing for you.
I get what you mean, but, again, I didn't decided. The world did. No amount of semantics and hate will change this. Between bread, water and shelter, where aren't the things I mentioned, luxuries? By the way, luxuries are considered things you buy that don't impact your survival, no matter the price. You cna look it up. Water? Needed for survival? A game, book, phone? No needed, luxuries.
And trying to compare a healthcare professional to a game creator is quite a thing, too.
I am speaking about a system of abundance, not a system of necessities. In a system of necessities, yes, games and consequentially art, is not necessary for survival. I am assuming you are American since I am American and as we both live in a system of abundance in this country where our resources are funneled to the wealthy and their businesses. it is very suspicious to me when someone boasts about being a healthcare professional while also criticizing what is a luxury and what isn't when healthcare itself is treated as a luxury here. It is wrong. But yes, to end my point, in a world where games are not accessible by everyone, I do not believe that this should lessen the value of games and the lives of those who create games. When art is accessible (as it should be) it is not just a good to purchase, but a different way to look at the world around us. So again I ask, who are you to say what is a luxury and what isn't in this world when your line of work gets to decides who lives and dies just because of how much money they have?
I am not an American by the way. Healthcare where I come from is not considered a luxury but a right or at least one the citizens should have, if they work and pay their taxes their entire lifes. Assuming is the beginning of not understanding, and again, I did not assume where you are from, since it doesn't matter. Luxuries and necessities do not change meaning regardless of where you are, again, you should look it up; it's a universal rule, that, everything that doesn't directly affect your survival are luxuries. And putting words in my mouth is also not the way. I never stated that creators are less deserving of a good life and shouldn't be paid for their work, what I said and I will repeat is ,if you ask for a price in something, no matter what, that is the price people are forced to pay. If you want to give more, like a tip, good, if not, one shouldn't be feel ashamed because he didn't give more.
Make an exercise here, a game is 1$, and I pay 1$, I have no more money at all. Am I forced to feel ashamed because I didn't pay more? Then, another thought experiment; a plumer goes to your house and fixes the toilet, asks you for 50$ and latter on returns to your house because you only paid him what he asked. Do you see what I mean?
Again, no amount of semantics will change this. A price is a price, a tip is a tip.
i made a game available for free,it have 16 hours of gameplay,people don't download it.
making them obviously cost money to the dev.
i often saw games on steam that have 2 hours of gametime and they are sold 13$, people are buying it !
so i am currently using the feature to increase my game price rather than putting them for free.
if for free you don't want to play it. if it is double the price you will still not play it.
so it don't change my situation but at least i hope some people would take a step back
and think twice before buying games made with zero passion.
i love what i do, but i feel deeply depressed over humans behavior.
no dev are making their games to do deficit. (ah yes, me i do !)
The 'sale' premise and the game itself are literal baiting for publicity.
This game is free for download.
thank you
yhank
wonderful thank you
genius
I was confused for a moment, but honestly, I dig it.
That is hilarious
prices are for completed games.
pre-alpha testing periods are for goodwill and testing.
People need to eat.
then they better get to work and finish the job so they can get paid.
Extremely cringe opinion. Indie dev is totally different from AAA and people gotta eat
then they better get to work and finish the job so they can get paid.
beta testing is a paid occupation performed by qualified individuals WHO NEED TO EAT.
YOU just want free shit, commie.
Trolling on an itch.io blog post has got to be the lowest form of humanity.
calling someone a troll because you dont have a valid rebuttal is the lowest form of of intellect
What?
what a superb demonstration..
everyone wants to support a game developer, but noone wants to pay more than the game's already established price...
(unless its for charity, in which case, i agree!)
I agree with you !
That can help a lot us developer, but people don't like spend more
That can help a lot us developer, but people don't like spend more
Tears of happiness
This seems like a pretty neat feature, especially since I can see it allowing people more flexibility in pricing (i.e. not being locked in to the same low or high price all the time). But I'm sure it will never fire up most people like 'getting more for LESS' will.
If you don't already you might try to have the site make it a little bit more visible when this is enabled (at least as an encouraged choice on the seller's part). As is the minus in -100% isn't much and still strikes as discount. It would seem more honest as a different color (magenta vs cyan -- vaguely reminiscent of red/green, but not quite so charged with meaning) and possibly '+100%'. Buying something for more intentionally is all well and good, but at a first glance I think some people would be annoyed to find a game in a 'sale' list and then realize post-purchae that the price was actually increased.
Tangentially when it's a simple doubling ($1 -> $2) at most and the resulting price is around $8-10, I doubt most people would care, but slapping $5 more on top of $25 would be offputting when many other games are actually on sale.
P.S.
I found this article via someone using this feature for Black Friday this year.
greedist wet dream...
Cute idea but will ultimately make people laugh at those who actually do this UNLESS all the extra money is guaranteed to go to charity. If THAT happens then shut up and take my money O_O