Projects Category
-
Kyobi Flash vs. iPhone sales figures & #1 in BigFishGames Online Top 10
22nd Apr 200917
My match-3 physics game Kyobi went live onto BigFishGames today, and is currently sitting proud as the #1 game in the Online charts. At the time of writing it has a staggering 40,000 people currently playing it. I mean, whoa. That’s pretty incredible. That’s like the entire population of my home town all playing my game at the same time. I’m not sure how often the player count is updated, but it seems to be every minute.
Adding those stats into the mix the game has reached 1 million plays since release just under a month ago, and it’s not even out on the really big sites I’ve sold it to.
I’m well aware the reason it is currently #1 is because it’s the “New Game of the Day” – but so what, I still took a screen grab and will cherish it as my first ever BFG title 🙂
“How did you get so many sponsors?”
I’ve been asked this question quite a lot recently (along with “How is the iPhone game doing?” which I answer below)
When I put Kyobi onto FlashGameLicense.com (FGL) the interest was immediate and rapid. As well as having it on FGL I also spent time emailing sponsors directly. Most of them didn’t bother to reply, but 2 did and both bought licenses, so it was worth my time just for this. One of companies who contacted me was GameJacket, who offered a $1000 advertising advance on the basis that all other versions of the game I sold were site locked (which they of course are), and no-one else got the game before them.
I liked the sound of this offer. I was low risk to me, so I accepted it. This automatically meant that none of the other sponsors could have exclusive rights to the game. So I told them this and most of them re-adjusted their bids accordingly, understanding that they would get the game on the day of release, but on a non-exclusive basis. In effect, everyone got it at the same time.
So I persisted with this offer to the various sponsors and they all agreeded. I built custom versions for them all, with API work in some cases, custom logos and pre-loaders in others. All versions were packaged up and ready for launch day.
I also created a Media Pack they could download. This pack included a range of high resolution screen shots, game artwork, logo, description and thumbnails for them to use on their sites if they wished (and a number of them did).
To date I have sold Kyobi to 9 different sponsors. 5 of those had the game on day of release, 2 others contacted me directly as a result of having seen it on NewGrounds (where it got a Daily 5th Place Award) and asked for custom builds. The other 2 bought it via the FGL game shop service. Updated: 26th April (5 days after original article written) – Kyobi won 3rd place in the Whirled single player game contest, adding $1000. It has also been picked up by another 2 sponsors adding $600 to the figure below.
Combined I received $5,155 $6,755 (updated 26th April) from these deals. By making a lot of “smaller” sales I managed to effectively double what I would have got from the best “single sponsor” offer had I gone down that route. And of course the game is still on sale.
You can see some of the custom builds of Kyobi on Andkon Arcade, Hubits, Juegos Juegos, Whirled and even a dating site called Connecting Singles! A tie-in with GameJacket means a special version will also go across the Spil Group of sites shortly too.
2 very high profile sponsors are yet to release their versions, despite having had them for some weeks now. I’ll update when they do because I expect them both to deliver serious play figures.
Of course the GameJacket version carries adverts, and the daily income rate from those has been quite encouraging (at least compared to my experience with Mochi). It won’t set my financial world on fire, but it should earn back the $1000 advance relatively painlessly. And then the money from that point on goes directly to me. As I have a full-time job that I love, that pays all the bills money made by Kyobi is surplus income. After tax it helped pay towards a new kitchen and parts for me to build a top of the line Quad Core PC. Could I “live off” the income from this game? No, of course not. That is what Flash game dev contract work is for, but that’s another post for another day.
… and what about the iPhone version?
Kyobi was converted to the iPhone by my good friends at The Game Creators. The iPhone version is enhanced in several ways. It has a nice use of the accelerometer, more complex level patterns, blockers, bonuses and power-ups which improve the gameplay significantly.In short it’s a really nice game, and my agreement with TGC meant I’d get a decent percentage from sales.
On the downside they renamed it from Kyobi to “Touch & Go”. In retrospect this was a horrendous move. Not only did it disjoint the brand, if you try searching for it on AppStore you’ll get about a million results back thanks to the generic title (have a guess how many AppStore games have the word “touch” somewhere in them! yeah, it’s a lot). Even direct searching for the exact title barely reveals the game.
It was quite literally impossible to find. The GameJacket release carried an advert for the iPhone game at the end, which helped lead to some small sales figures, but quite frankly nothing I could ever retire on. It was far removed from the “iPhone $$$ dream” the media hypes, to say the least. A “Lite” version was also released to help shift things along, but it of course suffered the same “invisible to search” problem.
So I pretty much wrote it off as a bad experience and forgot about it. That was until iDare hit the scene.
He who iDares, wins!
iDare is a free game TGC created over the course of 3 days. If you are old enough to remember the classic sci-fi film Aliens, you’ll remember the scene where the android Bishop holds down Hudsons hand on the dinner table, and spreads his fingers out and proceeds to stab a knife between his fingers as quickly as possible.
School kids worldwide at the time re-created this using everything from pencils to protractors! iDare is basically an iPhone version of this crazy game. It’s good fun, it’s original and it is free. Since release it has gone absolutely ballistic. Currently #1 in the UK charts and #2 in the Canadian charts and#4 in the US charts and still climbing – that is out of ALL free downloadable apps on AppStore. The net result of this is over 600,000 downloads since release and increasing every day. Edit Update: As of today (April 26th) iDare now has over 1.2 million downloads.
What does this have to do with Kyobi? Very simple: iDare was created with the express purpose of advertising the other games TGC had made, including mine.
I cannot give any specific sales data, but suffice to say that Touch & Go has gone from being flat-lined at a few sales per week, to selling 3 digits worth of copies per day (and the first digit is > 1). And of course the more it sells, the higher it climbs up the charts. And the higher up the charts it goes, the more it sells. It’s currently #19 in Strategy titles and edging ever closer to the magic Top #100 games. If it manages to hit that mark TGC and I will be very happy indeed.
At the moment direct income from the Flash version is greater than that of the iPhone one – but at current projections this could be reversed shortly. I’ll keep you all updated.
So in my very limited experience with the Flash to iPhone market here are a few bullet points to take away with you:
- Don’t screw your brand up! Keep the same game name where possible 🙂
- Ensure your game title and description is AppStore SEO friendly! Avoid this part at your peril.
- Don’t assume that just by existing on AppStore you’ll make any money at all. You need a method of promotion. Find what works for you.
- “Lite” versions are mandatory now. Create one. But again, the “free” app space there is flooded, so don’t assume just because you have one that “Full” version sales will increase dramatically. They won’t, but it will help.
- Promote, promote, promote! Find a way to pimp your game as best you can. If you don’t it will sink without trace, no matter how excellent it may be. If you have no promotion strategy then don’t invest a dime into your iPhone game.
- Just having a Flash version of the game doesn’t mean you’ll dramatically increase iPhone sales – yes the sales do cross over, but the conversion rate was pretty tiny for this game. Hopefully yours will fare better.
- Talk about what you are doing! Blog about your game, tweet about it, Facebook wall it, YouTube it, put screen shots on Flickr, write about it in forums. Do the whole social works. If you do this well enough it’s possible to build up a good “following” before the game is released, leading to an initial flux of sales that will give it a little kick-start up the App charts.
- Cross promote. If you know another iPhone game doing well, and know the developer, ask if they’d be willing to sell you some “ad space”. It could pay dividends.
- Be realistic. Even with a #1 AppStore download promoting your game, Apple still won’t be sending trucks full of gold bullion your way. That moment is gone. Live with it and set realistic goals, you’re in hell of a competitive market place.
- Please keep making games, no matter what happens 🙂
-
Flash Game Developers required at Aardman Online
22nd Apr 2009I’m cross posting this from our Online team. I know for the vast majority of you it won’t apply (because you’re not in the UK) but I thought it’d be worth a shot, you never know who is lurking!
Aardman Online based in Bristol (UK) has a couple of freelance requirements. If you fit any of these descriptions can you email Rohini a portfolio of your work, as well as your rate and availability ASAP! For all roles, it’d be ideal if you can be based on-site at our sparkly new Bristol office, but for the right candidate we’d consider working from home if you are able to come to Bristol for meetings and briefings.
- We’re looking for an experienced AS3 developer to help expand a Flash Virtual World built on ElectroServer / AMFPHP. Previous MMO experience very advantageous, but not essential if you can handle digging deep into API docs. Basic php / mysql comprehension also desirable. Assets are packaged with CS3/4, development with Flex SDK.
- We’re also looking for 2 x Flash game developers, ideally AS3 but would also consider AS2. If you’ve had experience working with sponsor APIs e.g. Kongregate / Mochi that’d be ideal. Can you send me your portfolio or examples of any games you’ve made.
Market rate and start date is flexible for all positions.
Oh, and you’d get to work with me 🙂
-
Kyobi:Whirled Released
31st Mar 2009
Whirled is large social Flash world, full of multiplayer games, avatars, toys, rooms, furniture and all the usual kind of things you’d expect from a Flash MMO. Think Gaia / Habbo only looking like the complete visual mess of a typical MySpace page.Whirled run a developers competition. You can modify your game to work within the “Whirled”, upload it and be in with a chance of winning some real money. What’s more your game is up for sale in their shop, which means that other Whirled players can buy it and add it to their rooms, and you get a cut of the revenue generated by this.
After some sweet talking by Chris of FGL I decided to port Kyobi to the Whirled platform. Believe me, it was not an easy task. The Whirled API is very easy to use, but the fact you are locked out of referencing the stage was quite a shock. When I went through my code and realised just how much I rely on it, and things it inherits (like mouse coordinates, width references, etc) it nearly put me off converting the game at all. But I perservered and after a lot of trial and error, I finally managed to get it working!
I don’t expect to win the competition, but the more I worked with Whirled the more I liked its anarchaic and freeform nature. If I create a new Whirled game it’ll definitely be written to take advantage of their system from the start, not applied at the final stage!
If you’ve got a Whirled account feel free to play / rate Kyobi here: http://www.whirled.com/#games-d_2076_c
-
Kyobi is now live on GameJacket
26th Mar 2009It took a lot of work and coordination, but my latest game Kyobi is now live and starting to appear in the wild.
In the end it was jointly sponsored by GameJacket, Kongregate, BigFishGames, Oberon Media, King.com and Bunnygames. Oberon themselves are responsible for the game content of MySpace Games, Orange, Yahoo Games and other big sites.
Believe me it was hard work producing all of those variations of the game! But the end result was worth it, both in terms of combined income and exposure the game will eventually have.
Right now you can play Kyobi on GameJacket (I’ve also embedded it below the jump), and it should start appearing on the other sites in the following days / weeks, as each site has a different release schedule.
My thanks to everyone involved in the game (Alex, Lindsay, SomaTone), my beta testers and you. Feel free to leave your feedback here.
-
Kyobi re-branded as “Touch & Go” and released onto iPhone
19th Mar 2009
I’m pleased to announce that my latest game ‘Kyobi‘ is now available for the iPhone / iPod Touch from the Apple AppStore.
The iPhone version was developed by The Game Creators. It has been re-branded as “Touch & Go” with a new set of graphics more suitable for playing with your fingers.
Touch & Go is available as a free Lite version and the full version costing £1.79 / $2.99.
For those without iPhones this video shows how the game looks and plays:
For those with iPhones here are some links 🙂
Lite Version (should be available any day now)
Full Version
Hire Us
All about Photon Storm and our
HTML5 game development services
Recent Posts
OurGames
Filter our Content
- ActionScript3
- Art
- Cool Links
- Demoscene
- Flash Game Dev Tips
- Game Development
- Gaming
- Geek Shopping
- HTML5
- In the Media
- Phaser
- Phaser 3
- Projects
Brain Food
