Cannot break into Windows market?

After realeasing many games on iOS/Android and having good sales, simply the same games are not selling at all on the Windows platforms, Windows 8.1 / Mobile 8.1.

I'm doing Universal build and cannot think what is going wrong with this platform, yet i see everyday number people making builds for it.

Also I notice a lot of these porting events for Windows, all seems a lot of bullshit to me considering I not heard any success stories from Indie developers and smaller unknown game studios,

Anyone else have similar experience?
Anyone have any tips for these platforms?

 

perhaps it is due to the 2.6% market share of the Windows mobile market.... of which only a small percent are gamers, which (if you look at their market), is primarily consumed with Xbox specific or larger studio games (Disney being one)...

??? just a thought, but without a really strong viral marketing and a solid game, it might be tuff... either that, or those whom are being successful are just being hush-hush about it.


[edit]

link a few of your top games here from the store so we can take a look?

 

I actually have a 7" Windows tablet that does Windows 8.1 and tried to find apps but was surprised at the lack of the curators weeding out apps that use 3rd party intellectual property to create 'quiz style' fan games (e.g. name a popular show franchise like Disney and you will find plenty of such games in the Windows Store). Then I also looked for a fitness app that has been popular on the iOS for years (the former iFitness, now Full Fitness) and a search in Windows Store for it revealed an app clearly presented in the Windows Store to appear to be the same (iFitness / Full Fitness) app as on iOS. Also is Zynga Looney Tunes Dash there? No. Fitness Buddy? No, but in fairness Fitness Buddy is only available on Android if your Android device has a cellular service chip for some bizarre reason.

It's a lot market share but now tell me why someone's going to wade through such poorly curated Windows Store apps? I was really surprised on my searches and this is page one results, not paging through many pages of apps.

It's a shame because Windows 8.1 on a 7" tablet is every bit as good and better in some respects OS wise then Android and iOS. A novice user would have no more trouble with Windows 8.1 on a tablet then iOS or Android.

 

I only have 6 months experience, so this is worth less than 2 cents maybe, but my general take:

Windows Store - slim chance to get rich, but you can at least get people playing your games without spending $$$ on advertising -- the store isn't super flooded, so at least 100s of people will try your game if it doesn't look like total trash (you aren't going to get rich with 100s, or even 1000s though)

Google Play - opportunity, if you are willing to advertise... but you better be a popular developer or have a free app/version, a paid app will just sit with zero downloads forever, most likely, if you don't drive a ton of traffic to it

App Store (Apple) - best revenue potential, best chance of getting lucky, audience most likely to make your game go viral (the "social media crazed" folks live here)... but same as Google, so flooded, you better get really lucky if you aren't willing to risk in advertising

...so if you have an advertising budget and need to make money, iOS first, Android 2nd, and forget about Windows Store (for now). If you aren't spending money, and aren't trying to get rich, but would like 100s or 1000s (not 100,000s) of installs, then try Windows.

Also... with my Windows Store games, I'm seeing about 80% desktop PC installs, and 20% or less tablets (Surface). When I used to play "Total Conquest" a lot (I played on tablet) 9 out of 10 people I'd ask (in game chat) told me they played on a desktop PC... hardly anyone playing on the tablet, and maybe 1 out of 10 played on their Windows phone (that game is setup so Windows players only get to chat with other Windows players, so not sure about iOS/Android).

 

Have had the exact same experience. I've stopped bothering to even port the games over. The time it takes to build them and upload them to the Windows Store literally costs me more than I've ever earnt through them.

I even had a Microsoft evangelist contact me at one point regarding my game "Requiem Z" because they were going to feature it. I think that week I had something like 5 downloads vs the usual 1-every-2-weeks that I was getting previously.

I guess it all just comes down to their market share. It's a shame.

 

I've published 2 games to Windows Store, and I got that same email for both of them... but they never did feature them, as far as I could tell, they just asked if it was "okay" for them to do it. That is, if you mean the "Red Stripe Deal" email. Just published my 3rd last night.. looking forward to that email again, in a few days

"Requiem Z" looks awesome (nice textures, especially rocks and house).... zombie killing! If you don't have a free trial/demo version, do you mind saying how your experience on Google Play has been? All of the "Android Fans" I know are super cheap-o folks, and I can't see them spending a dime (especially if not made by a major game studio) without a demo at least.

 

Total Google Play sales to date = 282. So, yeah... not selling too well

Windows Phone = 20
Windows Store = 38

App Store = in the thousands but hard to measure as I've run several free days.

Thanks for the compliment, though I can't take credit for those elements - I made Requiem Z completely from the Asset Store to keep the budget on it super low. Still, I think it's the game I'm most proud of - gameplay, code, etc are all mine and I think I did a decent job on it.

 

Very nice to have real info, thanks for sharing. Makes me want to try another paid game, for ios. I only have one, "Frogs and Flies" but I rushed it because I wasn't happy with the concept and available technology to support real-time multiplayer.. so yeah, even I wouldn't buy it. I hate doing ads or F2P/IAP... but so far thinking too hard to get people to try a paid game. I guess your method of having some 'free days' is another option.

I had another game make $200 from IAPs in the first week on the app store... but that was Xmas week, and sadly sales died right after that.

P.s.-Just purchase your game from Windows Store... amazing it is all asset store art.

 

Agreed, takes me the longest amount time to port to anything Windows, firstly cannot use my Mac (main machine) so need to use Windows machine, then open everything in Visual Studio then do the 100 images they require (piss take) then fix any code thats been bugged for long time, such as splash screens etc. Then need to do check - then need make sure upload is ok(log into my account) wait for email or text message, high security from microsoft. Its all a big pain and no reward in the end, waste of time.

Thing is they really need to move people from Windows 8 or Phone 8 to 8.1, just kill 8 - as now I just build to 8.1, imagine pain doing dual builds. Windows 10 around the corner, we see what happens I guess.

 

I've never counted.. but it feels like iOS needed more images than Windows.

 

A while ago I released a crappy game on Windows Phone, Android and iOS, they had about the same amount of downloads per day on WP and Android, but neither was very much. iOS generates a lot more revenue for me, but I still try to release on all platforms. It was Android that surprised me the most though, 50 times the market share of WP and makes me no more money. I did some looking around and essentially if you want your game to have any kind of visibility you either have to be a big dev, in which case you just pay Google for the visibility, or you have to game the system. There are entire forums dedicated on how to increase your play store ranking and it all revolves around fake reviews and fake downloads. I know one guy who has a stupid little app with 500 reviews, every single one of them fake.

 

Well, I must say that I have quite the opposite experience. My game is doing OK on Windows Phone but Android and especially iOS is really hard to break into. The game has been featured in the WP store many times in different countries. But it has never been featured in GP or iTunes, so I don't really know what to do with those markets ..

 

One of my games is supposed to be featured in Windows store towards the end of this month. I've only heard of people saying "it did nothing, or very little". Mind sharing any numbers, numbers of installs at least, or what game that was? I'd like to get excited about my game being featured, but so far I'm thinking it will probably not be a big deal.

Google Play store is for sure slanted towards popular developers getting bigger, and little guys staying little. Even if someone searches on your exact game name, chances are your listing will not show up in the top 10, maybe not even top 100... all kinds of other games, by popular developers, or with over 1 million downloads, will show up first, even if nothing related to your game or the name of your game.

I'd think users would be the driving force for change here, eventually. For example, if Google (the search engine) didn't list things first, when you search on the exact name, people will stop using Google because they can't find what they want. Maybe the Google Play store (and others?) will eventually get better, due to user demand?

I mean, how do you get 1 million downloads in order to be at the top of the list, if you can't even show up in the list for people to find your game? Of course, the answer is advertising.. spend $50,000 to get 10,000 downloads, and then hope you get another 1,000,000 downloads after that (free) in order to make back half the $50k you spent.. lol, or cry?

For example, one of my games is "Hill Racing Challenge". It hasn't had a ton of downloads, but it has had around 2400, and 27 ratings (3.59 average, so doesn't totally suck).. yet, if you search on the exact name, it doesn't even show up in the top 10, and "Bike Racing 3D" shows up before it, and other games that don't have "hill" or "challenge" in the name also. However, if you Google the game name, chances are half of the top 10 results will all be links to my game (Windows store, Facebook page, my website, YouTube videos, etc). So you can't tell me that Google Play just doesn't have the technology to show more relevant search results... they do, but they just choose to show other first. At least in Google, the web search engine, when they do stuff like that, they list them as "ads".

 

I have tons of downloads on Windows Phone and got featured several times but I have almost no buys. I'm changing my game from "10 levels free and in-app to Unlock All" to "Ads supported with In-App to Remove Ads". But, I don't know yet which ad provider is recommend for Windows Phone. Anybody have any experience to share?

 

Google Play's sorting algorithm is kind of bizarre. For example, I have a word puzzle game, I put the word "word" in my description 23 separate times. If you search for word, I don't come in the top 500. But, someone reviewed my game, who's last name is Hansen. If you search Google play for Hansen, I'm in the top 20... Like, really? I'm getting hits on a user's last name?

Yet Zynga can release a word game and get in the top 5 on day 1, with 0 downloads and 0 reviews.

 

I have not read your app description, but maybe this is too excessive for the search ranking. See Keyword spam on Developer Console Help.

 

Well I tried 5 times and nothing. So I increased it to 10, still nothing, now it's 23. Nothing seems to make a difference. I just left it because its apparently meaningless.

 

Big company, the way world works, special deals behind closed doors

 

I don’t know anything about that, but one thing I know for sure is that the Android store has a high number of apps that is of low quality. So I think that it is reasonable that they prioritize developers with a track record of high quality apps with high numbers of downloads in the search results. Without some sort of prioritizing of quality apps, I think the search results had been flooded with crappy apps and a bad experience for the consumer as the result.

hmmm, do I sense some sort of chicken and egg dilemma……..

 

Yes you are correct in a way, problem with Android is they do not have proper review process, so 90 percent is junk apps, anyone who wants make a quick buck uploads to Android and then I see buys fake reviews, again no control over this - not the mention the mass .apk pirating going on. Even though Apple is a pain sometimes, they are doing very well to help customers.

Windows tries to protect itself with the mass background checks when creating a account, and this also I assume works in a way because reduce number of crap apps, dont see that many on there.

 

I've been using Microsoft PubCenter, https://pubcenter.microsoft.com/Dashboard -- for about 3 weeks now. My stats thus far:

Revenue: $14.64
Requests: 23,642 (this times fill rate = impressions)
Fill rate: 48.07%

The fill rate seems horrible at first... but if you look at per-country, you see that USA, Canada, most of the other big markets are at 100% or near it... while some south american countries and Russia are almost 0%, so really skew the results.

I don't have details on one of my apps because I recently added ads, so not sure how many of the installs have ads and how many don't, but for 2 more recent ones:

Julia's World = 575 downloads = $7.18 in ad revenue
Ace Ninja Run = 166 downloads = $0.81 in ad revenue

...not sure if $7.18 for 575 downloads is pretty good? It seems exciting to me, to think of what the numbers would be, if it scales at that rate... if I had 1 million or more downloads -- and then compounded over time.

I also have those games on Google Play using AdMob, and soon to be iOS using AdMob also... but my numbers are so tiny of AdMob not even worth posting, and still waiting for Apple's review for iOS store, so can't post any of that yet.

Microsoft PubCenter was SUPER EASY to add to my games, even for one where I have an option to turn on/off at will by the user (turn on to get double coins, turn off, no double coins). AdMob... not as easy, but not too bad either.

I'm using banner ads only, no "pop-ups" (or whatever the industry term is).

Hope that helps someone...

 

How many downloads did you have in those 3 weeks for the number of impressions you got? Seems like @ 1.14M impressions... it was quite a lot. or...

They liked the game and played it often

 

That's a better CPM than I got for admob. I had 30,000 impressions in one day once and made $0. Even my best day wasn't much better. I ended up replacing it with Leadbolt in the end, the results were better but by then my user base had died off so I missed my window. I'll never use admob again.

So far I'm liking the results from Unity Ads, but my user base is really small as my game was just released. Hopefully if I can increase my users I'll see some better numbers.

 

The impressions where around 10,000 actually. 23,000 requests * 48% fill rate = about 10k.

 

Yeah, I'm not sure which is better... I feel Microsoft's method (charging and paying based on impressions) is at least harder to fraud than Google's (based on clicks). Seems harder for someone to generate 10,000 fake impressions than 1 click... and 1 fake click can cost $1 or even $20, depending on your bid. I feel there is a lot of fraud in all of the marketing, in fact we've had clients (in my day job) lose $1,000s because of it, on most cases we've proved the fraud an got money back, but what a hassle it is.

Edit: Sorry for grammar.. typing on tablet tonight.

 

The money from banner ads in general has fallen off quite a bit over the last few years. There's a lot of fraud and a huge saturation. I'm hoping the video ads from unity will be more lucrative for me this time around.

 

ok, I obviously need to learn the buttons on my calculator (%, * or / ).. makes a difference

 

I released a game on the Windows Store (desktop only) last July, in February I added a trial - allowing users to play the first 5 (of 40) levels before having to purchase the game.

In one month (Feb -> March) I had more downloads than I did from July 2014 -> Feb 2015, but unfortunately no extra purchases.

I did a post mortem of my sales: http://enigma23.co.uk/blog/shh-zombies-sales-post-mortem/
And then a look back at how Windows downloads was affected with the trial: http://enigma23.co.uk/blog/windows-store-trial-one-month-on/

I've just released my latest game on iOS and Android, for free with UnityAds, which I'm thinking of porting to WP8.1 ... however UnityAds doesn't support WP
I was looking around for a WP alternative, and your post has made me think about using Pubcenter... do you have any links to share that will help with implementing it in a Unity project (I'm on Unity 5)? Or that you found useful?

 

I hope they add WP, or even more important (IMHO) Windows Store support soon.

I found some info here that got me started on pub center: http://blog.thomaslebrun.net/2012/10/#.VTiFNnktG72

Actually I think this is a direct link just to the section about ads: http://blog.thomaslebrun.net/2012/1...g-the-microsoft-advertising-sdk/#.VTiF3XktG70

It looks like a lot at first, but maybe I'll write something up when I have more time because it was actually real easy, something like:

1. Download SDK

2. Add reference to SDK in Visual Studio

3. Register on pub center and add your app name and a few other simple steps to get some ID numbers

4. Add a few lines to the MainPage.xaml file (going from memory, I think that is the file name), and include the ID numbers from step 3

..that's it. Unless you need to do anything fancy like hide/show the ads, or pause/resume them... then it takes a few extra lines of code.

 

Just wanting to shout out a "Thank-you!" for your time and effort put into providing the information and experience with the WIndows Phone/Store/pub advertising experience. I've been seriously considering whether (or not) to port my brand new, just released, Tilt-A-Cube: Origins game to their platform. This has helped me decide to give it a try.

 

No problem, glad I helped someone after all the help I've received in these forums. I tried the web player of your game, it's fun. Best of luck!

 

Thanks for the links, I ran in to some problems when following the steps though. Ended up finding the official MS steps here: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-gb/library/advertising-mobile-windows-phone-ads-walkthroughs-81-xaml-markup(v=msads.20).aspx?f=255&MSPPError=-2147217396

That uses

Code (csharp):

1. xmlns:UI="using:Microsoft.Advertising.Mobile.UI"

instead of

Code (csharp):

1. xmlns:Ads="using:Microsoft.Advertising.WinRT.UI"

I couldn't get the WinRT one working - I assume I didn't have the correct extension installed.

Anywhooooo, I have Ads displaying straight away atm... then they get hidden behind the actual game, still need to sort that out, for now I've been distracted by setting up leaderboards using GameSparks. Cheers again for the help!

 

In my experience it's a difference between Windows Phone and non-Phone builds. The phone build wants "Mobile", the non-phone build wants "WinRT". The link I had posted is for 8.0, and really only for non-phone builds. Glad you found the 8.1 info. I haven't gotten an 8.1 build fully complete with ADs yet, ran in to some issues and haven't had time to figure them out. Let us know if you get it all working. It seems like you have to do more work, more changes to the default Unity template project, to get 8.1 working (change to "Frame Based" layout).

 

I have released a few games in the past on iOS, and figured it was time to begin porting to Android and Windows.
So far Windows has performed way beyond what I was expecting with the new game I have released (which is called "Tiles - Relaxing Puzzle Game"... shameless promotion right there!).

I get the occasional peak where iOS and Android could hit 30 for the day, but on Windows when it peaks I reach around 800+ for a single day.
I recently attended a Unity workshop in my area and asked them if they had planned to bring Unity Ads to the windows platform, and all I was told was, "Who uses windows mobiles"... Which I thought was a very blind statement to make. Yes the market is dominated by Android and iOS devices, but for us indies, the now growing Windows market is something we should have access to in order to be some of the first people to get in on the action, and to have the opportunity to show our games off without the flood of competition that is on the other platforms.

Unity Analytics (which supports windows, go figure) shows me that I have over 100 active daily users on most days, which are mostly on windows. So rather than using Unity Ads, I am using Vungle. Compared to Unity Ads, the eCPM is considerably low. Unity Ads I am getting around $20 / thousand ad views, where on Vungle I am hitting about $5 / thousand, and that is on a really good day.

So I would say that breaking into the Windows market is not quite as hard as it is to do so on the other platforms, simply because of the competition on Android and iOS. But making a living based on the support it has, well that's a different story.

 

You might be mixing things up here. Are you seeing most of your installs on "Windows Mobiles" (Phones), or desktop? What you were told at the Unity workshop is true, "Who uses Windows mobiles?" (not many). However, the Windows Desktop market is as huge as always and still dominates all...

So next time you talk with someone at Unity, please make sure you reply with "Can you at least add support for Windows Desktop then?" please, and thanks!

 

Currently my installs are split 50/50 on mobile and desktop, according to my Windows Dev Acquisition reports.
I get what you mean about Windows PC users far outweighing their mobile users, but with the Universal Windows Platform I think the question I should have asked was not PC or Mobile specific, but Universal

Here's hoping we find more support for the platform soon enough!

EDIT
Although it is funny, the reports say most of my mobile installs are from the 25-34 age bracket, and for PC its 50 and over.
50+ love their PC's