how to make decent money with unity

It really gets me aggravated to see such negativity. Even though it partially may be true for the most part, that still doesn't make sense.

Do I really think I can compete with AAA? yeah kinda, I don't do anything but sit home and make my products/games. That's literally ALL I do, and I do it daily 16 hours a day. I may take 1 day off every 4 months or so.

But do I think I can compete with speed, absolutely not. But really though, Indie games do have a chance, I only consider my self an Indie because I work by my self, I don't establish quality of work as Indie, I establish indie as a 1-3 person team (you know what I mean, a small team). Bad Quality to me = Just garbage game. Indie to me = Something a 1 person or small team made. It shouldn't effect the outcome, a game is a game which is a game which means it can be a game, which also therefore means it can compete with AAA games, if you actually produce something worth a purchase.

That's what it boils down too, make something worth a client to purchase, don't settle for less than you know you can do.
Actually take a risk, a big risk, easier said than done - I can't really say much on that because I'm scared of taking the risk, but I know for a fact I know I NEED to take the risk, I'm not worried about failure because I have strong confidence, I'm just worried about Server Overloads (Photon Server). I don't know how much a Server can handle without Interest Management, etc. Unfortunately Photon Server hasn't updated the Interest Management, so I cant learn how it's done.

So yeah, I'm not worried about Failure, I'm worried about other things that are actually important to the player - a running game. If there's one thing I'm good at - it's hitting a big but unnoticed niche communities. So I'm not really worried about failure as I am things just running smoothly. I get paranoid if I don't know every single detail with a plan (A,B,C - all the way to Z). I have to know every possible outcome and revolve a plan around each plan that can go wrong, I hate unexpected things (E.G. - Server Overload).

But yes, 'Indie Games' still have a chance if you actually produce something that is worth even my interest.
Nobody is gonna get rich off a game about a Pet-Rock that you touch with your phone every 5 hours to feed it.

 

Nope, I disagree. Indies CAN'T produce AAA games. You can produce one scene or character AAA as indie, but a game no.. you can't. You don't have the resources to do that as indie.

 

When you say resources I assume you mean money...

Why do I need money when I can make everything my self?

I can code
I can make music
I can play (violin, piano, guitar,ocarina,etc).
I can 3d model
I can 3d sculpt
I can texture
I can make ideas
I can make Servers
I can make Network code
I can make weather systems
I can make Neural Networks
I can make levels
I can UV Unwrap
I can make Websites
I can market
I can make SFX
I can make Animations
I can code Animations
I can make Terrains
I can voice act
I can edit my voice to sound like anything/anyone I want.

and so on.

Why must I need 'Money' to do it when i can already do it on my own?

 

And/Or time.

Because time is a limited resource.

 

I stated above I don't think I can compete with speed at which they work.
But quality - you best believe I can if I really want too.

 

My friend, this is what we call AAA, good luck trying to make something like this solo:

 

There are a few things I've learned about business and marketing and getting people to find and buy your stuff, largely because I work at an ecommerce company. But these rules apply to games too.

First of all, for any business, you have to think about your audience. Is there even an audience? You need to find evidence that there is and get an idea of its size. You also need to find out what need that audience has that you are providing a solution for, and whether there are already a lot of other people providing solutions, or whether those solutions are actually doing it well. Is there room for you to compete? Can you do better? But perhaps more importantly, realize that it is far easier to tap into an existing audience that has a real need, than to try to invent a need by trying to push your product onto them. If e.g. 100,000 people have a terrible time with back pain, and you suddenly invent this amazing chair that totally heals all back pain, then obviously its going to sell like hotcakes. But if you invent some wacky chair which doesn't solve any problem and is a weird shape and you think it's cool, chances are you are going to have far fewer people who actually want or need it.

You're going to have to work extremely hard to try to build an audience for that product, simply because you have to CONVINCE them that they need it, rather than them naturally already being interested. So while it may suit you to `make a game you want to make`, and to then later figure out how to grow an audience, that's the really hard way to do it and most people will fail this way. It is far easier to identify a genuine audience and to give them what they want. Then the demand is there, the need is there, the motivation, the interest, and you're providing a service. I think if you make a game thinking all about the game itself and not about whether there is need or demand to fill, then you release the game, it's just going to flop. Obviously it will flop because nobody wanted it before it existed.

So now look at how many game developers approach product development. You make some cool game you like and maybe you vaguely think about who its for and you really dont know much about the audience or if it even exists, but maybe you can see that there are some other games along similar lines out there (which means nothing if they don't have any sales), and so you throw your game out there and you're like ... someone please sell this for me, and sell it to as many people who previously had no interest in it as possible. That will take a LOT of convincing and effort to convert people to want your game. App stores DO NOT market or sell your product, they provide shelf space. That's all. Even Unity's app store barely markets asset store assets (but they do some).

And if your game is just sitting there on the store shelf with you crossing your fingers hoping someone will bless you with generosity... guaranteed failure. You might by chance get some hits based on search engine relevancy or lack of competition, but that's relatively minimal. That's basic business sense in any business not just games. You can't sell something nobody wants without a major struggle. Notice here that the desire or NEED for the game already exists OUTSIDE of the game and should be PRE-EXISTING in the audience already - otherwise you fall for the trap of thinking it is purely your game on its own merits that convinces people they should want it. They don't want to worship your game like its a God, they want it to provide them with a service for their own needs and reasons. That's a hard sell to try to get people to worship you, and its arrogant. Your game should be supplying the SOLUTION to the need that people have, it should not be trying to invent a need that isn't there. Unless of course you are so super amazing that you are creating a whole new industry or genre etc, which is rare.

Also when you put your game on a store you are basically letting the store 'sell it' for you. They don't. They don't market it, they barely curate it, they show it to people in a largely irrelevant way and you might randomly by chance happen to get some interest. Is that how you do business? You build something and throw it to the wind and hope someone might happen to like it? That's business suicide.

There are many parallels also between app store search engines and website search engines. Gone are the days of building a website and hoping people will find it. It's a needle in a haystack. You can't just throw it out there and hope people find you. Same with games. The reason is there is just so much noise and chaos and randomness. The search engine is supposed to employ a sophisticated algorithm to try to read your mind to figure out what your intentions are and what you want, and to match that up with the piece of content/product that most closely matches what will provide the very best most high quality useful answer, ie solution to their problem. If you are not that person with that content/product, you will not rank as highly. Every search engine is algorithm driven - its a search algorithm, and that means if you can learn how the algorithm works you can at least play to what it most ideally `likes` to see, and perhaps exploit any weaknesses or blind spots that it has. This is called Search Engine Optimization in website land, and there's a massive industry around it. For game app stores, it's far smaller, but people are still starting to get into this. You need to at least learn 'what apple wants' or whatever similar to how you'd learn `what google wants`, so that you can be on your best behavior and appealing to the gods to recognize you as the most worthy search result.

But it also goes beyond just being relevant and optimizing what you're offering. You can definitely climb in the rankings of Google for example by having the best content available. It must be authoritative, original, high quality, thorough, of fairly significant length, feature high quality media - images/video etc, be highly relevant, address a need, and be 'share-worthy'. How does that apply to games? They need to do much the same if you want the search engine to smile upon you. It's akin to being the tallest skyscraper in the city... everyone is wowed by who is the tallest. Is your game the best example of its genre? How tall is your building? The biggest skyscraper will get the attention. Once the search engine recognizes that you are providing the very best answer to the user's query, they will rank you the highest, and then you will get traffic and sales (or leads at least).

Now, this brings us to another major factor. Once you have great content/game, you also need to prove that you are great by developing evidence. That means you must prove people like your stuff by their demonstrated behavior. e.g. they like your stuff, they share your stuff, they link to your stuff, they engage with and dwell upon your stuff, they comment about your stuff, they write blog posts about your stuff, etc. This all shows the search engine that you are popular and are a recognized authority and now you rank higher. If you can get the combination of best quality content plus tonnes of inbound links and social proof, you will shoot to the top of the rankings. Very similar methods should apply to any app store with a decent search algorithm.

Also beware of the trap of thinking that the only way to develop traffic is to spend advertising money. Advertising and marketing are two different things. Marketing is about identifying the audience and finding a market and trying to get their attention. You can do that without spending money on ads. But ads do also work. So if a big game company spends tonnes on paid advertising, sure they will rank high... but that doesn't mean its the only way to rank. e.g. you can buy google ads, but you can also get free traffic from many different sources.

One other thing to bear in mind is how you find and leverage audiences. It's not a good idea to develop your game thinking that your audience is the final end user. That means you're going to try to convert a complete random stranger who has no attachment to any other kind of outlets or communities, to spontaneously decide to like and buy your game. Instead, you should seek out the places where these people hang out, because those places are where they've already decided to show an interest in certain topics, e.g. games. This could be bloggers who have a following of people who like RPG's, or a popular youtube channel, or some influencer on instagram who has a lot of people following them, or some pinterest board that is quite hotly shared etc.

You target the people who are already leading a committed audience of followers who have already developed trust. If you can get those leaders to share your stuff with their trusted followers, they will have far more likelihood of taking an interest in your content/offering than you standing on a street corner with a sign saying 'anyone? anyone?`. Relevancy is the key. So you should not just be making your game thinking of who the end gamer is, you should make your game for the kind of people who have audiences that would like your game.. so in effect you're providing a service to that website owner or blogger or influencer and appealing to what THEY want, rather than just what their audience wants. Again this is an existing audience with a committed interest that you're tapping into, rather than trying to build your own exclusive following from ground zero. Major mistake most game developers make I think is starting from scratch and trying to please EVERYONE in a totally unfocused irrelevant way with one big generalized message. You have to speak to the people who are interested in the way that they are interested using the means that appeal to them in particular. For websites this is more to do with addressing the 'long tail' and finding niches and tapping into them, rather than hoping that anyone who types in 'games' will find you. Fat chance.

I think in a way this is why it's a good idea to have a website for your game because you can build web traffic and increase your audience online without having to play by the app store rules, then direct them to the store. You can also take the opportunity to showcase your game far more thoroughly and with much more flexibility than you can on an app store. Plus once they're looking at your site, you don't have millions of other apps right nearby vying for attention. For sure I don't think many people can succeed by just throwing chance to the wind and hoping someone will like you. The stores make it easy for you to take that path and it's really not in your best interests. But you have to also beware of the trap of doing everything inside your website - think more about a distributed approach where you put content/media onto lots of platforms and sources with lots of established audiences. You can't expect everyone to come to your little tiny corner of the web, or that little corner in an app store where your app is taking up 1 square inch.

 

@imaginaryhuman TLDR?? where is it..

 

And that's exactly why you'll never get anywhere important. Doubt kills dreams, fear can put you in the Hospital. So I refuse to let things like that determine what I can and can't do.

Unlike most people - time isn't that important to me, we're all gonna die. Well I'd rather not waste my time doubting and living under what I know I can do.

Just because you can't/wont do it doesn't mean someone like me can't do it.
So what if it takes you 4 weeks to make a decent fork model, (I really hope it wouldn't take you that long). But nevertheless, with the technology out and about now days, it wouldn't be that hard to make any of that.

I could make an even more realistic Buggy looking thing in just a couple of days. and that's with textures and all.
I'm not most people who can only work a couple hours a day, I literally sit on my PC 16 hours a day and maybe take a day off every few months and that's not even an entire day off. More like a few hours and back to work again.

 

@N1warhead

NO, you are wrong, you don't get it.

Take's me one day or two to make a set of pro props, from modeling to texturing and testing. A team of 10 peoples do what I do in one month in 3 days. And this don't end here, an AAA game is not only props, you need everything else. That's why as indie(solo or small team) you have no chance to challenge an AAA studio. Is not anymore a game, is a full product.

 

@Teo
You're not listening to anything I'm saying though, time is of no importance to me. Who cares if they make it faster, the end product is still going to be the same whether it takes you a month or 3 days to make it... If time was the judge, jury and verdict of course I'd loose.

I'm not trying to compete on time and quality together, only saying, yeah if it takes me 3 years and they could have done it in 1 year, the final result is still going to be the same no matter what on my end.

I'm just trying to say, don't settle for less than what you can do, if you can make absolutely gorgeous art - then do it.
If you can make outstanding scripts and optimizations then do it. Don't half-*** it and expect to get rich because you don't feel like spending the time to make it properly.

Like hell I was working on a game like CivCity Rome one time, I had made over 10 buildings, a road system, farms, etc in just a week. And if you play games like CivCity Rome you'll know it's only ever 25/30 buildings in total. So in a weeks time I had practically everything made and only thing I had/have left is Character logic for the little people running around.

 

Time is limited.

A AAA sized team would take 3 years to make a game. It would take you at least 15 years to make a much smaller version of an equivalent game. By that time your art assets will be old, and you would have to start from scratch. But then Unity 2112 will be out and it's going to be incompatible with your old code and you'll have to rewrite that and eventually your game design will be outdated and you'll have to scrap the whole idea.

And eventually you'll die of old age.

Time is a limited resource.

 

@N1warhead

Don't explain me that, I am not here to get rich, I make games for fun and hobby. And I don't expect anything. I try to be very realist.

Look, I did not question your skills, and nobody did that here, you can be AAA+, very good, I will answer you with same tone, if you think you are so good, then who keeps you to challenge a team like Dice or Rockstar?? Go for it!

 

@AcidArrow - Last i checked they are releasing crappy COD games once or twice a year. Must not take that long.
And Battlefield games they release them unfinished and all bugged out.

I think y'all keep having a miscommunication with me, I never said a finished product, only that you can still produce the same quality work, and if you can work fast enough or overwork your self (like I do), then you can get things done faster.

And maybe I should say I'm not talking about a single player game, I'm talking about Multiplayer.
There's not a bunch of random events in MP games, they are what they are and nothing more.
I could absolutely make a 20 map War game like C&C Renegade within a year and be way better looking than the original.

Now single player, I wouldn't even try to compete with that, that's just to much going on for me to even want to try lol.
I've always just loved Multiplayer coding, I find it easier and straight to the point.

@Teo ^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I really think we all had a big miscommunication, oops lol.

 

TLDR? ... maybe it's worth taking the time to read

 

Haha.. considering DICE team size, you think any indie would do it better???

Now you drop the weapons.

You started that, completely ignoring a lot's of details.

 

@Teo - Dices problem was they try to rush things before COD got released.
I agree with what some have said in the past, not to release a game whatsoever until all bugs are taken care of, etc. Like the old console games with no internet on them to patch things.

Yeah my bad - I've been up sense 2 AM so I'm tired, but I gotta keep working at least until 8 or 9, then go to sleep for like 5 hours and back at it again lol.

 

No, your audience would simply have to live with the fact that your assets are dated. Similar to how Dwarf Fortress has a dedicated fan following despite using ASCII-like graphics and a horrid control scheme.

 

With the amount of effort you put in (and not just here and there but nearly every day it seems) you probably do have a good chance of at least reaching the so called AAA Indie status. There is no doubt a person can be very skilled like way above the normal pro level and a person can also put forth a level of effort way above normal. Those things definitely make a difference. And combining the two makes an even bigger difference. Many of these games may well be made by your average worker type people so it is possible that you may be the equivalent of 8 to 10 of them.

Looking forward to your Abductee game!

 

I agree....... It will get done haha, just may take some time, I hate when I get to working on like 10 different things at once. So I usually now work on something for a month, move to the next and work my way back. But fixing to start working on it again soon. Took some time off on it to think how I clearly want the level design to be. The Movie Fire In The Sky was a good example of what I'm trying to do. But the scenes are very vague with what even anything is it's hard to tell the type of architecture I want to make. Don't want Futuristic, I want dark and scary but still within the realm of be-livability.

Like Fire in the Sky the UFO looks seriously like a Rock Cave, but sometimes the Rocks look Metallic lol.
So I'm trying to get the happy median I like, if that makes sense?

 

@GarBenjamin - btw I did send you a message yesterday about something lol.

 

Yes it does. You're building something "special" and don't care how long it takes as long as it turns out the way you want it to be. And you're still figuring out some bits of "how you want it to be" along the way.

I will check it out tonight. I just popped on here on my cell for a brief brain break from work. I dive in and work like a madman for about 1.5 to 2 hours then need a brain break of maybe 10 minutes before doing another round. Everyone has their own best most productive way of working and this has proven the best way for me to get the max done in min time.

 

I agree, thanks man......... And yeah I hear you on that. My best way to work is work until i start having major typos in code. Then i just go to bed. Until then I just work, have a smoke break every 30 mins or so and keep working lol. I hardly even eat anything, I may eat once a day, and I eat at the computer so I can code while eating. If I'm not working on PC I start having like withdraws or something, I start to get massive headaches, I can't stop thinking of coding or working, hell I was even drunk one time (like tore up completely) as soon as I got home, I laid down in bed for 4 hours thinking of coding, it sobered me up and I started coding again lol.

 

I think in general we have to stop thinking about a game as some kind of idol to be worshipped, it's supposed to be providing a service - a solution to some problem or need that someone has. It's about filling that need, not starting out with a completely disinterested audience and trying to win them over.

As I look back over the years I can see how I fell for this attitude and it didn't work. I also can see that I initially had some success on the asset store because people had a real need/problems to solve and I provided a solution. But I wanted the greater excitement of making a game, yet it seemed like switching to a game was like switching off having any idea about who the audience is or what need I'm filling. So then I'd try to make small games and would get a little way into it and just get this intense feeling of 'nobody is going to want this' or 'who would want this?'. I was disconnected from the audience's need and trying to create some kind of idol for people to worship. They're not interested and I knew it. I had no idea what people really wanted or why I was doing it. I needed that sense of 'whats the point' that is more easily provided with asset development, but in the form of a game.

My strategy now is to be more aware of the needs of the audience, who they are, what they want, and providing a service to them - a solution to a problem - rather than being disconnected and hopeless with this useless shiny idol that nobody wants.

 

That is a real condition. I had it for most of my life until oh maybe 5 years or so ago. You are a workaholic. There were days I actually stayed at the office working (I mean voluntarily because I just wanted to work and grind through it all) and got home at 1 AM. Not sure what happened but at some point something snapped and I just said "no more". But man that problem actually helped me tremendously in my career. Learned things faster. Got experience 2 to 3 times faster. But also burns you out after decades. lol

 

Sure. That's fine. But I was talking more within the context of making a "AAA" game (whatever that means) and competing with "AAA" companies.

 

Yeah it does suck sometimes, I do get burnt out, but that's why I just go to another project temporarily, and bounce between them all, eventually I'll have all of them done at one time and have a mega release lol.
The day I'll stop working this much is the day I can live comfortably and do whatever I want.
Until then I'm on a mission to succeed. I take advantage of this - because not many people have the ability to not work and do this. I have months where things really pay off, and other months that make me question my sanity. But in the end I know it will all be worth my sacrifice of having no life.

I strongly believe what Arnold Schwarzenegger says 'if you're out partying, at that same time there is someone working harder' and some other words he said. But pretty much - don't let anything with todays life slow you down, going out partying with your friends isn't gonna get success, only hard work and and realizing the convictions that there are no shortcuts.

 

I get it. Only because I had the same "sickness". If I wasn't working I basically felt like something was missing. Kinda felt incomplete or something. Truly I was happiest only when I was working. Even after staying at work late while driving home I'd be thinking about work figuring out some problem and by time I got in house I wanted to turn around and go back to work. lol So yeah basically you are insane as I once was. But that is okay. You will get a LOT done in any given year. lol

These days I don't do it. In fact this week I find myself drifting into Holiday Mode. Mind not so focused on my job. But hey that happens. Of course, at the same time I find that I am thinking about working on my Christmas game project and look forward to working on that tonight.

 

Would you like me to record Silent Night on the Violin or Wish you a merry Christmas?
You can have it free of charge haha.

May not happen today or tomorrow, but I'll do it if you'd like?

 

While it's true that there is a new COD game yearly, that is not reflective of the time to develop. It's around 3 years for those games, and the staffing on titles like those are actually much higher than just the core title dev team, the engine and support teams are part of the dev-hours in a project like that. It's not the same team on each title and not even the same studio. There probably 4-5 COD games in development at any given time across teams and studios.

Even if a single developer has the expertise across all disciplines required, and the resources (time, living and software/hardware), you are still looking at probably a ~100 developers working for 3 years. Assume you don't have any significant challenges or setbacks and, no changes to original design, and work weekends only sleeping 4 hours a night, you are still looking at nearly 100 years to accomplish the same amount of work. And that also assumes that you have the same level of performance and expertise as about a dozen professional developers in key fields.

The simple reality is that time makes all the difference. Assuming all things being equal, a team of two can build build a game twice as large in scope as a single developer. A team of 10 has 10x the output, etc. Ultimately there is still a fixed amount of time it requires to produce a game, and there is a threshold that can't be surpassed. Like the old saying that you can't produce a baby in month by adding 8 more women to the process. Games are the same. Tasks only break down so far. Larger teams are usually reflective of larger scope, not faster production times.

No, a single developer can't compete with a AAA studio on scale. A small studio can't compete with a big studio, nor a single developer compete with a team of two developers on scale. It's just math. Gameplay and general game experience is a different matter.

 

You know how you know it's not just devs buying indie games you wouldn't ever see dumb games like goat simulator, or shower with your dad simulator get so popular.

 

Why not? Indie Game Devs made those games. Those same Indie game devs and many others like them may like those kind of games.

Still I do think there are a lot of non-devs playing Indie games these days. Mainly because of mobile and Steam.

I only agree with the idea that Indie game devs (from wannabe dreamer to active developers) are probably more likely to buy more Indie games in general because first they are likely to actually be "in the know" about more of them than your average Jane or Joe. They probably buy games (like @anselmo.fresquez stated) they see and think "I could make that" just to more thoroughly check it out and see if they really could. They probably buy them just to support other Indies. They probably buy them sometimes for research to help with their own games. And they probably buy them just because the gamer in them wants to play the game. So basically there are just more reasons why an Indie (including wannabe) would buy Indie games. I think that is what @anselmo.fresquez was talking about.

 

Team effectiveness do not scale linear though

 

Why did you necro a 3 year old thread to say this -_-

 

He didn't. There was a spambot.

 

Though 3 years old... that is why I said ‘all things being equal’, which they never really are. Scope purely meaning developers hours. Two people can spend twice as much time as one. How effective those hours actually are is different story altogether. The effectiveness closer to a bell curve in reality.

 

ahh, my apologies to @AndersMalmgren then, it was all cleaned up by the time I got here