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QuoteSo let’s talk sales figures. In twelve months, Super Win the Game has sold 7,640 copies across Steam, Humble, itch.io, IndieBox, and direct sales, with an average unit price of $4.98, generating roughly $38,000 of gross revenue. By my napkin math, this translates to about $18,500 after-tax earnings for my household.
QuoteMac and Linux account for about 10.25% of sales (6.25% and 4% respectively), so again by napkin math, I would estimate I’ve earned roughly $1,900 on those platforms. They continue to be a net loss for now. Reaching profitability isn’t totally outside the realm of possibility, however, since there is minimal cost involved in supporting them now that the core engine work is done.
That's really not a lot of sales for all platforms put together, but the thing to takeaway here is that SWTG is a very niche game. It's not my type of game, and I don't personally ever plan to buy it. I imagine a lot of people also feel the same way about it. That's not to say it isn't a good game, I just burnt myself out on retro type games a long time ago.
The actual percentage of sales from our platform is actually a lot higher than most other indie developers that we spoke to, so that by itself is actually quite nice to see. However, you may think that 4% from Linux is good, as it's above our actual surveyed market-share from things like the Steam Survey, but the major publishers and developers aren't going to jump into bed with Linux for that. Also, if the game sold better in general, the extra sales would likely normalise the Linux percentage down to where we have seen it from most other developers in the 1-3% band.
You may think I am being negative here, and I am from a certain point of view. I am a realist, and we aren't gaining any ground yet. I'm not going to sugar-coat anything, we need to grow and that's not debatable.
We also need developers to branch out some more, platformers and retro styles are becoming far, far too common.
You can find Super Win the Game on Steam, Humble Store and Itch.io.
Thanks for pointing it out Till. Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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It's not my type of game, and I don't personally ever plan to buy it. I imagine a lot of people also feel the same way about it. That's not to say it isn't a good game, I just burnt myself out on retro type games a long time ago.
And if we're being honest - a large portion of Linux titles from the 1500 on Steam will fall into this category. That's what makes this kind of story pretty frustrating: AAA houses could look at these figures as indicative, but I suspect that the reality is that if you launch a AAA game on Linux, you'll see a bigger slice of sales going to AAA-starved Linux gamers.
I've just dropped £23 on SOMA and had £35 tucked away for Alien:Isolation until the delay. If I was still gaming on Windows, these awesome games would be vying with the likes of GTA IV, CoD, Battlefield and upcoming titles like Subnautic, Vermintide and many, many others.
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4% vs 6.25% on mac? That's huge! I bet a lot of those sales are from the alternative arenas (ie non-Steam) and that's where Linux gamers more often hang than Mac gamers (pure speculation of course).
Either way, if we reached 4% on an average Steam release I'd pop a cork and do a toast for a significant step forward.
... And when we reach 10% I'll buy y'all a beer. :)
Last edited by Beamboom on 29 Sep 2015 at 12:14 pm UTC
Either way, if we reached 4% on an average Steam release I'd pop a cork and do a toast for a significant step forward.
... And when we reach 10% I'll buy y'all a beer. :)
Last edited by Beamboom on 29 Sep 2015 at 12:14 pm UTC
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linux_gamer 29 Sep 2015
How is 4% low? It’s huge!Its not bad if the company has 100+ programmers of which only 2 do Linux porting (no allusion to Techland intended). If your a single person and have spent 10-15% of your time into that this will be no bonus when your game isn't that a big seller.
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"There is minimal cost involved in supporting them now that the core engine work is done". That's what I hope for for most developers. It may not be worth it the first time with all the starting problems, but when you've done it once, it's hopefully way easier next time.
I mentioned this in another thread...
I think we could start a list in the wiki of well done, enjoyable commercial games for Linux.
Obviously, it's not 1500, but I'd be very surprised if we couldn't come up with some hundreds.
Anybody can add games that run well on his system and he finds good work (but please nobody delete games because they, say, don't work with his AMD card).
Shall we?
Last edited by Eike on 29 Sep 2015 at 12:38 pm UTC
And if we're being honest - a large portion of Linux titles from the 1500 on Steam will fall into this category.
I mentioned this in another thread...
I think we could start a list in the wiki of well done, enjoyable commercial games for Linux.
Obviously, it's not 1500, but I'd be very surprised if we couldn't come up with some hundreds.
Anybody can add games that run well on his system and he finds good work (but please nobody delete games because they, say, don't work with his AMD card).
Shall we?
Last edited by Eike on 29 Sep 2015 at 12:38 pm UTC
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Mountain Man 29 Sep 2015
In terms of raw percentages, 4% is pretty darn good for Linux.
The he says, "I would estimate I’ve earned roughly $1,900 on those platforms. They continue to be a net loss for now." Really? It cost him over $2000 to create a Linux and OSX build?
The he says, "I would estimate I’ve earned roughly $1,900 on those platforms. They continue to be a net loss for now." Really? It cost him over $2000 to create a Linux and OSX build?
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How is 4% low? It’s huge!
Percentage wise it's higher than normal, but a percentage is meaningless when you look at the figures I quoted from him.
$1,900 - That's from Mac and Linux combined over a year. I don't see that being a good thing, hence me saying it's Low, which it is.
In terms of raw percentages, 4% is pretty darn good for Linux.
The he says, "I would estimate I’ve earned roughly $1,900 on those platforms. They continue to be a net loss for now." Really? It cost him over $2000 to create a Linux and OSX build?
Support costs money too remember, support can take a lot of time away from everything else.
Last edited by Liam Dawe on 29 Sep 2015 at 12:43 pm UTC
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Its not bad if the company has 100+ programmers of which only 2 do Linux porting (no allusion to Techland intended). If your a single person and have spent 10-15% of your time into that this will be no bonus when your game isn't that a big seller.
I always do multi-platform. I find that if the project is designed for multi-platform up front, the cost is virtually 0. Maintaining multi-platform code helps find bugs which is actually a huge cost savings!
On the other hand, if you take a completed single-target project and try to port to another platform, you will end up spending a lot.
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I played You Have to Win the Game (the free version) and NEON STRUCT (demo) form this developer, and I think his games are pretty solid, bug free software. Impressive that they are made by one single developer.
But they are also a one man show, so very simple games. YHtWtG is one of the most hardcore, difficult games I have played, leaving both Super Meat Boy and They Bled Pixels behind. Still a good, enjoyable game.
So is not a surprise that the sales figures are low. You have to remember that the majority of the people playing games stink, so a "easy" mode have to be provided, or you risk the loss of a lot of sales.
But they are also a one man show, so very simple games. YHtWtG is one of the most hardcore, difficult games I have played, leaving both Super Meat Boy and They Bled Pixels behind. Still a good, enjoyable game.
So is not a surprise that the sales figures are low. You have to remember that the majority of the people playing games stink, so a "easy" mode have to be provided, or you risk the loss of a lot of sales.
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SystemShock 29 Sep 2015
Why "pretty low" ? In my opinion the number of sales for such a simple Game, especially on Linux, is not too bad.
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Really? It cost him over $2000 to create a Linux and OSX build?$2000 is not many hours of developer/QA time.
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Percentage wise it's higher than normal, but a percentage is meaningless when you look at the figures I quoted from him.I can't agree here. Percentage are interesting because you can see Mac + Linux at 10%. The figures about sales are low in the global. It's not something in relation with Linux.
And you can quote this part too :
That’s not amazing, but it’s not nothing either. Alone, that’s not quite enough to pay rent, much less completely cover the cost of developing another game, much less actually turn a profit. But in conjunction with my remaining savings, income from contract work, additional revenue from Eldritch, and my wife’s income, we’re staying afloat.
So in general is no doing any profit on this game for the moment.
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$16,603.75 for M$ Windows
$1,156.25 for Mac
$740 for Linux
My opinion is that it doesnt matter the $ of sales in each OS but the developer have to see the whole picture globally instead of focusing on each OS.
Actually he should consider the Linux and Mac ports as a Bonus Sales! :)
I dont know how hard it was to port to Linux and Mac but I just hope the whole journey to port his game to Mac and Linux has teach him a lot of things so he can use what he had learned in the future with less hassles.
I just wish him good luck in his future projects and hopefully with the rise of Steam Machines his Linux sales will be increased as well ...
Last edited by wolfyrion on 29 Sep 2015 at 1:57 pm UTC
$1,156.25 for Mac
$740 for Linux
My opinion is that it doesnt matter the $ of sales in each OS but the developer have to see the whole picture globally instead of focusing on each OS.
Actually he should consider the Linux and Mac ports as a Bonus Sales! :)
I dont know how hard it was to port to Linux and Mac but I just hope the whole journey to port his game to Mac and Linux has teach him a lot of things so he can use what he had learned in the future with less hassles.
I just wish him good luck in his future projects and hopefully with the rise of Steam Machines his Linux sales will be increased as well ...
Last edited by wolfyrion on 29 Sep 2015 at 1:57 pm UTC
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Percentage wise it's higher than normal, but a percentage is meaningless when you look at the figures I quoted from him.I can't agree here. Percentage are interesting because you can see Mac + Linux at 10%. The figures about sales are low in the global. It's not something in relation with Linux.
And you can quote this part too :
That’s not amazing, but it’s not nothing either. Alone, that’s not quite enough to pay rent, much less completely cover the cost of developing another game, much less actually turn a profit. But in conjunction with my remaining savings, income from contract work, additional revenue from Eldritch, and my wife’s income, we’re staying afloat.
So in general is no doing any profit on this game for the moment.
That's part of my point, even if it sold well, the percentage is still low and would still have given very little money.
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Its not bad if the company has 100+ programmers of which only 2 do Linux porting (no allusion to Techland intended). If your a single person and have spent 10-15% of your time into that this will be no bonus when your game isn't that a big seller.
I always do multi-platform. I find that if the project is designed for multi-platform up front, the cost is virtually 0. Maintaining multi-platform code helps find bugs which is actually a huge cost savings!
On the other hand, if you take a completed single-target project and try to port to another platform, you will end up spending a lot.
You hit the nail on the head so hard it's on it's to fiji... pretty sure I saw that quote floating around here somewhere.
Anyhow it's insane to target a platform (or specific hardware thanks to this practice we get nVidia only games) for development then port afterwards, so many good engines do it for you. Even if you're creating your own engine there are many tools that are already cross platform SDL1/2 or SFML come to mind instantly especially for a low production/performance game which looking at the stills this game certainly is. A better plan instead of shouldering VERY high expectations on the Linux community with a port of this little game would of been just to focus cross platform on their next project and it would look better from a overall income perspective since it's basically free ports.
Support costs on all platforms Liam, if n hours is dedicated to this everyday issues get backed up but there isn't actually a cost overhead unless he himself/they themselves can't fix the problems in house or have to hire an additional programmer for lack of knowledge on said platform.
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Support costs on all platforms Liam, if n hours is dedicated to this everyday issues get backed up but there isn't actually a cost overhead unless he himself/they themselves can't fix the problems in house or have to hire an additional programmer for lack of knowledge on said platform.
A very obvious point, yes support costs on all platforms, but the more platforms you have: the more issues you will get.
There is always an overhead: time.
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I don't get the negative attiude of this article. It's not Linux fault that a game gets low sales numbers overall. All what matters here (from our Linux based point of view) is the percentage of Linux sales and that number is quite nice in this case. Cheers!
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I don't get the negative attiude of this article. It's not Linux fault that a game gets low sales numbers overall. All what matters here (from our Linux based point of view) is the percentage of Linux sales and that number is quite nice in this case. Cheers!
I deal in harsh truths sometimes, I don't fanboy everything about Linux gaming to sugar-coat it.
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mulletdeath 29 Sep 2015
Huh, that's weird, I would have thought this game sold pretty well across all platforms, actually. I guess that's what I get for assuming that just because I bought it and liked it that everyone else did.
As for the game itself, apart from being brutally hard in some spots it's really not a bad game at all.
As for the game itself, apart from being brutally hard in some spots it's really not a bad game at all.
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It frustrates me when indie devs release a small niche title and then complain about low sales on Linux. Companies like Farsight Studios seem to be paying attention to those comments because they use the excuse of low sales for other dev titles as their reason for not bringing The Pinball Arcade to Linux.
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The game appears to have low sales across the board. I'm curious whether total sales managed to cover the development of the entire game.
As time moves on this game may provide a respectable stream of sales on a yearly basis, perhaps not enough to live on, but maybe a nice bonus at christmas.
It appears this game didn't have the mass user appeal needed to make 10% Mac and Linux sales a respectable profit margin.
As time moves on this game may provide a respectable stream of sales on a yearly basis, perhaps not enough to live on, but maybe a nice bonus at christmas.
It appears this game didn't have the mass user appeal needed to make 10% Mac and Linux sales a respectable profit margin.
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