Question About Launching In Early January

I am almost afraid to ask this, but, is launching a game the first full week after Christmas and New Years holidays a bad idea? Specifically, launching a game on the App Store on Wednesday January 10, 2018. This is when I have been planning my release, and I am beginning to regret it, but I'm committed to it. I am getting the feeling that everyone (especially review sites) will be in holiday hangover for the first part of January.

Contacting reviewers either way before release or too close to release, my understanding, is that you will not be considered. But about two or three weeks before release is the sweet spot (so I have read), however, that coincides with Christmas and New Years for me. Ugh, I am afraid I will be overlooked. I read that there are Japanese and some European sites that will be on vacation until after the first week of January.

Anyway, does anyone have any ideas on great times for an indie dev to launch their game on the App Store?
Thanks for your participation.

And, if anyone is curious (please, please, please be curious) you can check out the press kit for the upcoming release at: https://potatotoot.com/asteroidasteroidpresskit/

I will make the official announcement on the 10th. (and I'll continue marketing before and after that date)

 

The gentleman who presented the GDC talk 11 years as a developer with out a hit game said release dates do not matter for his games. I think he has a niche game - and a 'set' niche audience that playes his games and that made the matter moot for him. I think it does matter - if the release date falls in line with other high profile games on the same platform, some type of scuttlebutt about the industry where all channels are discussing only that topic, or falls within a set time of a major event, new console cycle release, major game release, GDC, E3, Pax, etc. etc.
I don't see new years falling into any of these categories, but my logic could be completely wrong.

If I was in this position - I would expect the game to be overlooked. Anything else above/beyond that is a win!
However I would be hammering all the outlets requesting coverage, every other day now through 2-3 weeks after release. I would also revise the video just a little bit and the presskit to include the games USP.

This is a good discussion to have - what are your expectations for this game?
If the expectations for this game is to make any legitimate form of ROI -

Some cons right off the bat -
- The name is not memorable.
- There are 1000 asteroid clones on the market today this game will be competing with on first minute it is released.
- The marketing material (and you) have to SCREAM everywhere you can - what makes this game different from any of those games? The games USP - unique selling point.
- The press kit does not SREAM what is different about this game. There is no USP in the presskit. From the material available - it doesn't look like the game has a USP. Does it?
- The press kit does not have a catchy - one liner - the short, one sentence elevator pitch that makes people interested in the game - without ever seeing it or knowing about it.
- (imo) Tools and resources section of the presskit is just filler. Journalists care very little and do not write about tools and resources. I might be wrong.

Some pros -
- The presskit is well done (except for excluding the USP). It is clean and provides the material most journo would need to promote the game.
- The video is pretty good. Consider adding some overlay graphics to the video to sell some of the features in the game. i.e. 35 different ships! Swipe controls! Record gameplay & live stream on iOS!
- The images are good, especially the image with all the ships.
- Localization is great! Great bonus for this game which will hopefully result in more players.
- The recording/streaming features are nice - I don't know enough to comment on these features. You might consider changing up the vocabulary to 'sharing or share' instead of record. Does this feature auto-share to any social networks or just save to the local device?

Does Potato Toot LLC have prior products they have presented to journalists before? Since formed in 2014 have they (you) created other content that is memorable? This question is in reference to the sentence at the bottom of the contact section.

You might consider relating your game to another popular game - say something like "Crossy Road meets Astroids!"
That might make some journalists interested - and maybe some players too.
Maybe that is the elevator pitch? Astroid Astroid is Crossy Road meets Astroids!

Hope this helps. Happy New Year!

 

WOW! Thank you! I appreciate you taking the time to put in such a thoughtful response. I was reluctant to say the game is Crossy Road meets Asteroids, but you have convinced me it is ok to say it. I have been thinking about the USP...I thought the voxel art and swipe controls were the selling point (turning only 90 or 180 degrees I mean), I haven't seen any other games that look and play like this (that may also be a bad sign). When I started the game, the project was called Spacey Asteroid, but I thought that was too derivative - maybe I overthought that. As far as the localization goes, I kinda think that's a matter of having respect for the people that don't speak english natively. If I can localize, why not? The title is also easy to translate, and I figured it's so ridiculous that it would be easier to remember...It's too late to second guess those decisions, I can only learn from them. Once again, thank you very much for taking your time to give me your valuable insight. I greatly appreciate it.

 

@moodymagyar: I don't think it's legally unproblemetic to advertise your product by comparing it to existing trademarked brands. I wouldn't do that if it was my choice to make. You may want the critics to do that, but you can't do it yourself. You can prime them to think of certain things, but you should respect existing trademarks and be really careful about your words and how you name a product.

 

Thanks for that info. I was afraid of that. I don't have any copy that states the game is Crossy Road meets Asteroids, but I am glad that people can make that connection. I do mention the game is influenced by the golden age of arcade games (hoping the reader will infer "Asteroids") and I figured the art style and the icon will definitely remind people of crossy road (and any popular voxel game using the same icon "style").

On a total side note: the game actually came about while trying to tweak Unity's Space Shooter tutorial (trying to create a portfolio to get a job). I had only been making 2d games, the tut is 3d though it plays as 2d, but I wanted to include navmeshagent, which needs to be in 3d, so my sprite artwork, much stunk anyway, couldn't be used. So to test navmeshagent I needed a quick prototype, so I used the cube gameobject. Seeing I couldn't tell which way it was facing I used a couple more to make a ship. Eureka! [final artwork with magicavoxel] ...epilogue, the game didn't end up using the navmeshagent.

 

Well done on producing a nice looking game with your portfolio material. At least you gained experience with navmesh.
Did you get the job?

I just introduced my young son to this modeling package. It seems like a solid product for those who are interested and new to 3D.

 

Related but out of date based on publish date.
https://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/Uly...Timing_Windows_of_Game_Sales_and_Releases.php

 

Thanks. Making this game was a HUGE learning experience.

I did not get the job. Oh well, gotta keep moving forward... Doing pt work while still looking for something better and developing games when I can. My game launches on January 10 on the App Store. I tried to make it as polished as I could and wanted to address the expectations most mobile gamers have (like leaderboards, sharing, recording gameplay, IAP, rewarded video,...) I also completely localized the game (I'm sure you could tell by the different title images ) All of that was a lot of work, and really, it has nothing to do with gameplay. But I think it's important to do (especially localizing; seems like the right thing to do, if one is able to do it)

Magicavoxel is awesome. I highly recommend it. There is a good twitter feed of magicavoxel artwork (#magicavoxel) I'm amazed by what people have created with it.

 

Thanks for that link. January may be good afterall!

 

I'm releasing SuperTrucks Offroad on Steam on January the 13th, it was more to avoid the whole Christmas themed rush than anything else, and I would assume any AAA hit games would be released more in December if they were going to be released.