are your games selling?

Your app should be doing better than that. Did your initial release do ok for a few days at least? If not did you time your release date to coincide with when Apple approved it ( post date it enough and set it back immediately upon getting your ready for sale email? )

Do you have a secondary category set?

Also. To maintain sales you really need to have weekly updates.

Also2. Others can disagree here, but I'd put it at 99 cents.

 

btw, I too, have this fear of appeal causing my game to not sell whether it's good or not.

edit: lima3b:

Geez, this should've occurred to me insantly, but why not import the project into Unity, convert to mouse function, and export this as a web app for those shockwave type sites?
While the iPhone may choke, a PC should run the game brilliantly.

Then you can link to iPhone version.

 

The game completed 2 weeks at appStore. I've started with a higher price to see what would happen. It started seelling one or two copies a day. My first thought was to decrease the price to 0.99. It continued to sell one or two copies a day and the only result was that my income decreased a lot. So I decided to raise it to an intermediary level and watch what would happen. It kept the same performance. Its really nice to have some feedback about the performance of the game, since i cannot afford to have all the different devices to test the game on. The only device where i've tested it was in a iPod Touch 2nd generation. Thats why i thought the game was ok. I was not sure about how it would perform on different devices. I've already did some tweaks on the physics settings and improved the frame rate. I'll upload an upgrade as soon as possible.

 

I've already tried to submit a previous version to shockwave but I dont know if it is because I am in Brazil, I didnt even received a feedback if they had received it or not. And if it all was not bad enough, for bureaucratic reasons, the game had not even been published in the brazilian Appstore yet.

 

Release an update. The day it gets approved, set the availability date to that day. It sounds like you failed to get your app to the top of the new releases for the category. When you rerelease it, set the price for .99. Right now the reason you are getting 1 to 2 sales is because people need to be searching the keywords in order to find your game. Right now the sales might be the same if you sell it for .99 or 1.99, but that is because they are already looking for you game before they buy it. If it gets pushed to the top of the new releases, you will start getting impulse buys. The cheaper it is, the more sales you'll get, and get a better chance of making it on the top 100.

I wouldn't expect a whole lot of sales for this type of game, because there are other games that are similar available. It's not the type of game that people are going to buy every foosball game available. If someone already has a good foosball game, they'll stick with it.

 

I wasn't expecting a lot of sales. I was just not expecting one or two sales a day. I confess I am very frustrated with that kind of results. There has been a lot of wise advice here. I'll try some of them and I'll keep posting the results. I believe it will be useful to all the community in order to avoid the same traps.

I've already started a topic about the game at Touch Arcade, spent some money at Admobs, and changed the copy at AppStore. Tomorow we will see what kind of results that modifications had on the sales.

 

Getting the game done and on the App Store is half the battle. Marketing and exposure is the other half.

 

I agree, 1 to 2 sales a day is rather low, but not uncommon. My first game went the same way. Which was disappointing. As I had written two non games first, and both of those had sold moderately well. I had high expectations for games. I think the games market is very tricky. There is a false expectation that a game published on the appstore is going to automatically sell when it's released onto the appstore. That was the case a year ago. Today it's a much more difficult. In order to do well, the game needs to be unique and exciting. A quick search brings up over 10 different foosball games. So you have some major competition.

You might find that you will do better by releasing a completely free version and use admob to generate revenue. If they don't like the ads, they can purchase the paid copy.

 

Well... the results are: amazing 4 Copies! Considering that some might have been purchased from people watching this thread, i can conclude that AdMob is a FRAUD.

You're right. Just really, really unique indie games and very lucky developers have any chance to succeed nowadays, specially considering that the majors are now investing huge amounts of money at iPhone games.

Few indie games will be able to compete with MetalGear or the Sims.

I was aware that there were other foosball games. But as in my opinion they were graphically poor, I believed there might be people interested in something with a better polish. Looks like i was wrong. At least, there's still one or two people a day interested.

 

Our first game Hoopster : http://www.redknightgames.com was released a week 1/2 ago and has had conservative but consistent sales. They seem to be relational to rank which has been hovering at basically the same spot since we have launched +/- 10.

We took the approach of pricing the app @ 2.99 under the philosophy that value is perceived by price. Ultimately not sure if that was the right call due to the incredible pressure down to .99.

We are still considering a "sale" to grow rank, but have a lite version waiting on approval that just gives people a taste of the mechanic. I have a few concerns that the consumer is so spoiled on FREE that they will feel cheated by not having a game mode in the lite version... but then again, our game (currently) is just focused around one mode so it makes no sense to give away the farm.

Our idea was to do one thing... and do it well so it becomes everyone's go to basketball app. It was an interesting comment made earlier that the consumer may just be fine with the basketball app they already have (regardless of quality), we shall see. The frustrating thing to see is apps that are getting negative reviews or that are clearly not as well polished (selling at 1.99) are enjoying both a higher rank and being featured in the Best Sports Game categories!

We will give the Lite version a chance then look at dropping price to stimulate rank. We have been getting good critical/consumer reviews, I think it is just lost in a sea of apps right now and needs to find its place.

Anyways... the next game is now in the works... and we think the concept is much more unique and targeted towards the "Die Hard" crowd .

BTW, we have tracked over 10,000 game sessions since launch which is really out of whack with the number of purchases, even though I know there has been a good deal of high score leaderboard back and forth. I have seen sites with hacked/jailbroken versions of our games, but assume this is just a fact of software development life (to some degree), anyone else experienced low sales but high plays?

MJ

 

great hint! always wondered, why i am on page 2 or 3 already (within the category) when i get the email. so changing release date backwards have not to be reapproved by apple?

 

Agreed. iQuarterback recently got featured in Best Sports Games. This basically doubled the rate of sales. Getting a website to review it was another 2x multiplier on sales.

 

I don't think so. From my understanding the availability date is used to postpone your release.

 

Hi Matt,

Based on our experience with Crazy Snowboard I would drop your price to 0.99 to coincide with the lite version release. That's what we did and I'm convinced the combination of the two helped us get into the top 50.

 

Has anyone here had a decrease in sales after releasing a lite version?
What do you think is the best timing for releasing a lite version?

 

Yes, I've been tracking unique installs. From my analysis it seems about a 5:1 (stolenaid) ratio. A lot higher than I expected. It's definitely a significant problem. Everyone want's to believe that the people pirating are people who wouldn't pay for your app anyways, but I think it's gotten so easy for people to download and install pirated apps, that it is beginning to take a small chunk out of sales. Even if only %1 of the people who pirated my app wound up buying it instead. It would still be a significant amount of sales. My Biggest concern however is that when I release my multiplayer game, I want to keep pirated copies off the server. If only apple would send us the device id of the purchasers, we could come up with a system for keeping them off game servers.

The thing about these pirate sites is, they are basically running unknown code on a device that has no protection. So very easily someone could upload an app that will brick their iphone and there's nothing to stop it. Personally I don't see how anyone can see pirating a .99$ app worth it. I think it's just a matter of time before the malicious element comes out.

 

Piracy is definitely a problem , if you google "rasta monkey" the first result you get is :
RASTA MONKEY CRACKED FOR IPHONE IPOD TOUCH IPHONE 3G torrent ...
I know that Stinkbot's iphone enhancement pack has some sort of protection. but I am not sure how well it works.

 

our game Whack-A-Groox has been cracked and run as demo mode. limited to 5 waves using the CheckIPA from the enhancement pack.

 

I'd be interested to hear about this, because as a customer, I don't buy games without a lite version or video review, and I'm much more likely to do so if both exist.

 

With german google search i get a massive amount of reviews! But nothing about piracy

http://www.google.de/search?hl=de&q="rasta+monkey"&btnG=Google-Suche&meta=&aq=f&oq=

This search gives me new links to possible sites to contact for a review

 

I checked it again and this link moved to page 3 on google.com, and page 5 on google.de
google has tons of servers with different databases , so I guess it was only on a few of them - or it was updated.
Oh and don't believe all the reviews, only the good ones !

 

i don't see it as a problem, thats why i have complained so often to companies which want me to insert cd's or dongles or crap that anoys me as paying customer: no copy protection works, and people that copy your game, would not have bought it anyway. ofcourse it always hurts to see something like this happen to your own application, but i would bet even a 100% secure copy protection (which does not exist) would not affect your sales in a major way that is worth the extra effort.

 

I think piracy has it's place, I did my share of it (not on iphone),
And I think that overall it helps to spread the game around. I just wish it to be a bit hard to pirate the game so people would rather pay the dollar or two instead of being hassled.

 

To my "pirating" is only a way to really trial an application / technology.

If I like it, I buy it.
If not I kick it anyway as it is not of use to me.

If companies would stop to offer trials that pretend to be something the real application (and especially game) is not, I would not forced to take such drastic measures.

Its thought a pretty rare thing. At best once per year if at all as I normally only buy expensive stuff very seldom and when really required (last two were Unity Pro + iphone Advance + asset server and a T3D preorder license, both things in which I believe anyway due to past experience)

Using no-cd images for games I own is something I don't see as pirating. Its my good right to protect my disks from beeing damaged. Our law grants me the right to do backup copies and use them.

 

I'm not as concerned about the piracy when it comes to individual sales.. but the hacked games showing up on the network server bother me. Since it's hacked, it's also possible that they could implement cheating. I suppose this is nothing different than with traditional desktop software. However I do think apple could virtually eliminate piracy if they included the device id in the sales report.

Then when a client connects to the server you could record their device id. After the sales have been published you can lock out all the non paying devices. There really would be no way for a cracker to work around it.

 

One thing to note:

I have 3 devices for development/testing: an iPod Touch 1st gen, an iPod Touch 2nd gen, and an iPhone 3G. Whenever I purchase a game on iTunes, it always lets me sync that game on all 3 devices with no problem... (none of the devices are jailbroken or altered in any way). I thought this would be disallowed, but I guess not. I know most people don't have 3 devices, but I bet some have at least 2 (one as a phone and an iPod Touch 2nd gen expressly for gaming), and I could see some families sharing one account between all the kids, etc... that could explain some of that 5:1 ratio.

 

So to get back on topic: How are the iphone sales these days? Is it much harder nowadays because of the great amount of applications available?

 

err... what do you mean... 'nowadays'? original post was 3 weeks ago

do we have to roll up this topic from beginning every few days?

 

I will share my results, as Maze Shifter is my first release. I don't know if the problem is the target market, or if my game is far too boring. My app has been on the market for about 5 days, and I have had about 20 sales - most of them on day one and two. I have a lite version up for approval to see if that helps at all. I didn't expect to do great, but I didn't really expect to do this bad either. I submitted my game to all of the major (and some of the not so major) review sites, but have not been reviewed by any of the sites yet. I will let you guys know what happens when the lite version hits the app store.

-cD

 

I think you might have had the bad luck to release Maze Shifter shortly after Realmaze3D...sorry about that. There's definitely a market for this sort of thing, but when faced with two similar choices, I think--to be honest--people are going to go with what seems to have more "bling". Though I think yours has more "game" to it. I also had the major luck to get featured on TouchArcade (still not sure why), and a couple days ago Apple decided to put it in New and Noteworthy on the iTunes games category, which reversed its gradual slide down the top 100 games chart. I didn't expect to do great either, and while it's true I put an excessive amount of effort into it (and continue to do so for the updates), I'm surprised at the reception it's gotten.

--Eric

 

I believe from now on it will be harder and harder for independent developers to have big hits on the appStore. Since there are so may options to consumers, and the majors are investing large amounts of money to produce and promote their games. Even some blogs are charging to feature games on their pages. At least I had some proposals like that. Its hard to know if the investment would worth, specially when you are in a very limited budget. But for the majors is very easy to pay for whatever promotion they can afford. But there is always the chance to be lucky enough to be noticed and that your app is really good and original to be a hit. But my experience tells it is not an easy task.

 

I'll share some data from Hoopster which is our first iPhone game. We basically chose the concept because it would help us learn the process, it fell within what we felt was a very competitive market with the big studios (sports) and we felt it had a reasonable turn time for our production schedule. We wanted a competitive category so we could get a reasonable picture of what a small casual game might do.. and we are not very good at producing random fart noises.

We wanted to see what effect simplicity + polish would have on the market. We did a few things right and probably did a few more things wrong , but all in all we are very happy with the growth and visibility that we have experienced so far... that is where the back end marketing efforts and a little bit of luck come into play.

There is no doubt that being featured by Apple has helped propel us up the ranking list (this has happened twice in 4 weeks), I'm sure the Unity iPhone studs... Zombieville, Rasta, DHB, (I'm sure there are many more I fail to mention) would agree that being featured in conjunction with simple and effective game play are key factors to success. What makes Apple take notice and feature something... who knows?

We have learned alot about the "game" since the launch of Hoopster, but I would say the biggest key to success so far has been... don't try to do too much (at first) with your game, spend your time polishing and making your game have great curb side appeal. Just my 2c.

Hoopster current stats:
Time on market: 30 days
Updates posted: 1
Top 100 Apps: #88
Top 100 Games: #56
Game sessions between our Lite version and Paid version: 84,460
Units sold: Over 4,000

 

Thanks lima3b, that was exactly why I wanted to revive this thread as I assumed the marked had indeed changed since the last time I saw some sales figures.

Thanks for sharing matt, I saw your game yesterday and was curious about it's success. Looks like it's doing pretty well.

 

Lucky, you! By the way, Hoopster is a really nice game. Congratulations! I have faith there will be always a place and opportunities to good applications. But I am also aware that they will be exceptions and not the rule. Like it is in the game industry as a whole. Just for curiosity: 4000 units of just the paid app or adding the paid and free versions?

 

TYVM

Just paid, the lite is just an awareness vehicle for now, so I don't spend alot of time tracking that. I would love to know however how many lite users convert to paid users.

I'm sure there is a way to have all your apps talk to each other, so in theory we could know this, just haven't gone down the path yet

The number is a little deceiving right now because we are on an up swing, so we anticipate it being at least double this based on research of revenue to rank by the end of the month (if we can maintain rank).

Also considering a sale right now to boost visibility even further...

MJ

 

Grats on getting featured by Apple, Matt. I haven't played the game yet, but the screenshots make it look really pro and polished, which is no doubt why you've been featured.

In my experience, doing a sale is very effective when you're on the upswing and you have awareness. Zombieville originally started to plateau around #30 on the charts when I had it at $3. Dropping the price to $1 for about a week more than tripled sales at the time - increasing both visibility and revenue. Once we were safely in the top 10, raising the price back up to $2 barely reduced downloads at all.

More recently I tried another sale in conjunction with an update in the hopes of combatting our downward trend, but it didn't really make much difference. I halved the price, and sales roughly doubled. I raised it back up, and sales roughly halved again. I think when you've been highly visible in the store for almost 2 months solid, everybody who cares about your game already knows about it and has either bought it or has no intention to.

So yeah, I think you're in a prime position to benefit from a sale.

 

Thanks PirateNinja, grats to your success as well.

I have been curious about this factor for awhile. Market dynamics would lead you to assume at the rate new consumers are coming into the marketplace that the life cycle of a successful app could be much more far reaching. I have noticed that traditional online brands like Bejeweled seem to hold their rank fairly well. I'm sure when Zombieville becomes a household name, it will stick there . I think a great deal of long term success for developers depends on the structure of the App store and how people with specific interests can get to what they like as opposed to settling for what is hot at the moment.

 

There is some great, very interesting info in this thread. Thanks to everyone who took the time to post thier data and experiences.

Something that I would be very curious about, but don't really know how to go about researching:

What affect does download size have on sales numbers? Specifically is there a measurable difference in the units sold as you cross the 10mb wifi threshold? I think it would be useful data to have access to during development of a new title, as it could affect your design.

Personally, when I see a game that is over 10mb that I want, and I'm not connected via wifi, I tend to go back later and purchase it, but in my particular case, many times I'm buying them more for professional reasons than personal, so my priorities are somewhat different from Joe consumer.

Anyone with published titles have anything to offer regarding this?

 

Great info matt.
Exactly what we're looking for.
I'll check out your game soon.

I'm also interest in what, if any, the game size's effect on sales is.
Mine's gonna be big.

 

Hello,

for now my Game Launch is a massive Failure. ( After months of work )

After almost a week, 23 Download ( most code promotion) and only 7 copies sold and last days with ZERO Download.

I failed to get my app to the top of the new releases, because the release date is wrong.. I think is a problem with release date i wrote in Itunes connect.

By the way , i hope not all is lost:

1- i'm preparing an update, with decreased price and when it will be ready i will change release date.

2- a Lite version in already in review.

3-I have (for now ) only good Reviews with 4 and 5 Stars on iTunes. ( From players with Promotional code)

4-i Could send more mail to other Blog and iPhone related web sites.

5-I Could add more Localization Language ( now is only English)

6- i Could improve design and user experience

7-i Could Join to Admod Exchange

8-i Could sell my games to other Developers

9-My Google Adwords related game have Zero click

10- i Should Search for a new job


For my next game (maybe last) i'm preparing Work in progress Video to
prepare the launch.

Andrea

 

@ Andrea

Non disperare !!! prova a scrivere un 3d su TouchArcade .

try in TouchArcade !!! maybe more luck you have .

 

My (few) good reviews are all from very nice Toucharcade users.

In any case thank you for support!

 

Hi, we have some game for iphone (SV MB)
but today i am asking if there is a forum to pubish my medical apps for iphone ?
thansk a lot

 

how is it going after some months?

 

How would you call one app sold per day? Massive failure?

 

Not really
<= 10 is the common you have to expect realistically.
Apps not on the top XY will hardly get higher than a dozen to a few dozen at very best commonly.
Thats why some at least try to keep their apps in the recent additions list through updates. This problem is raised by Apple not enforcing the category tagging to be correct which means that new games are just assigned to two categories where the second one is the "least frequented" one which is dead annoying for me as customer as I have to sort out 50 wrong assigned ones for a correct one (this recently got even worse with the "browser games" selling their ingame coins as standalone apps which is totally illegal)

I guess you didn't do too much exposure PR for it as well is that possible?
That blogs start to request fees is basically something I expected to happen much earlier. Thats just how PR works, if you want to get your adds in an established promotional channel, especially those from the big bang blogs like TouchArcade etc which have a massive impact on the sales.

 

hmm wasnt foosball 3d in the top 100?

 

Unfortunly not. Or Apple is ommiting this from my reports...

 

But it was in the sports top XY at least on the swiss ones from what I remember.

 

ok, but how long till this massive ammount of 10 per day drops to much less?

How is zombieville selling these days compared to it's best times?