8 copies, I think it's basically dead at the moment save from the few people stumbling in on one of my ads, a discussion like this or by random winding up on a site where it's mentioned. I am hard at work with the first update, and hopefully that will lead it picking up some more sales. I am considering doing a lite as the general feedback has been very positive. It just seems people are cautious buying the thing even when it is visible. Perhaps do to the graphics, subject matter or whatever impression they get of the app...
i find it funny how people get offended if you say the numbers you posted are not good by faar.. a single day of 200 sales is what exactly.. thats 140us dollar before income tax any any other stuff you need to pay.. and thats a single day.. alot of indies do not take the time they spend into developing something into account, they only cound hard money they spend for something, hardware, outsourcing, etc. but that gives a wrong view on things.. the time you've spend on developing game x could be used to earn money with a "job". so maybe for an absolute hobbiest thoose numbers are good because he sees it more like pocket change he gets from his hobby.. but for anyone who takes app dev. just a tiny bit more serious he would end up with the same results as nick.. especialy with the frontpage on TA the adds and the hodapp i thought this would get more attraction.. but apparently not.. so this is a prime example that even being on the ohhh so mighty frontpage does not mean anything.. touch arcade is still a tiny drop in the big ocean of iOS so for mental support i'll send you mr.Squid ..
The numbers definitely are a reality check for me. Now divide that by 4 and we got our next project What I can say as an average customer, I don't feel the main character that enticing at all, since it's mostly purely black. That combined with the also black enemies and obstacles kinda ruins the picture for me. I know it can be a style decicison to go the silhouette way, but I think you really missed a chance there, with not having the squid colored. I've read somewhere that even changing the icon of an app had an enormous sales boost, so that's something you could think about too. I think you could make your icon pop too. Also your GUI and main menu is kinda not at the same quality as the ingame graphics imo. So if you rework some things, you might wanna tackle that too. Sure it's a matter of how much time/money you can invest on this very update, but especially the main menu looks like it was done last minute (and literally took 1 minute). It's kinda a huge letdown for me. And it's weird because the actual game trailer suggests an awesome level of polish and quality. I mean, yeah, it's highly theoretical and I don't even have a single game out there, I just think even only as a possible average customer I can kinda analyze things quite well. And again, for me the biggest letdown is the maincharacter has that black color, yet wants to achieve that cute look, and the main menu and gui kinda lacks the polish of the rest of the game. I know you haven't asked for any reasoning, I jus felt like blabbering, so sry for that Just consider me as mr. average customer, that (over)analyzes things before purchasing
Not sure if anyone have actually signaled that they've been offended in this thread Herr Hässlich. (?) Fair point, but I guess a lot of us small timers enjoy the developing process a lot more than our daytime jobs. I'll readily admit I'm hoping to turn a profit somewhere down the line, but personally this is my main hobby although I spend more than enough money on it to upgrade it to at least a "jobby". I'd be lying if I said I didn't expect some of the reviews to account for more downloads. I was quite pleased with myself coming up with the evil Hodapp scheme. A lot of the things I hoped/planned went according to plan for this release, but it's fairly obvious that my planning was flawed. I got a lot of good reviews and on some of the major sites, but it still didn't translate to the kind of sales-figures I was hoping for. Now, if I was younger and had bet my livelihood on this I'd be devastated. When it comes to money-spending my philosophy is quite simple, I don't spend any money I can't afford to lose, but I spend most of the money I can. So here I am, still hoping to be able to turn this into a job at some stage, but no closer to the goal. Luckily my life is very nice on most other fronts and I love development as a whole. At some stage I might have to reconsider the amount of time I spend on this however, as well as the cash I put into it. As I'm sure most people here agree that it takes a lot of hard work polishing an app to make it all that it can be. And I'm still in a place mentally where getting good reviews and "fan" mails (yes it happens!) spurs me on. Oh, and thanks for the Mr. Squid, I love it kind of an "Edvard Munchian" take on the squiddy.
To paraphrase Henry Ford: "You can have the squid in any colour as long as it is black". Nah, just kidding. Always love to hear what people really think, even if it can be a bit rough at times. I'm pretty sure you're right the silhouette graphics are a turn off for some people, but they have been singled out in reviews as both "ugly" and "beautiful". I personally think the silhouette style helps me avoid becoming another bland looking app. It might be the wrong call of course, but at this stage I think it's advice better kept in mind for the next title than completely redoing this one. Definitely redoing the icon, and will probably return to these pages for some feedback before submitting the update to Apple. A bit hard for me to see this myself, but you're probably right. (Your impression is of course dead on as your impression and can't really be argued). I have added a certain amount of "bling" to the menus already, but haven't changed the actual graphic-design of these. Funny you think the trailer is polished though, as that is probably the least worked-through part of the whole campaign. Hard to tell if you are really an example of the average customer. (We all like to think we are). Still appreciate the feedback (and would welcome more). Cheers!
Well polished in "clean and crisp" Yes I am average customer - period ! I did some more research the last 15 minutes - wow you really have so many great reviews, yet it doesn't come back in sales. That kinda bums me out Anyways, we all know it's rare to be sucessful within a small range of titles already. I'm amazed at how much the quality of your games have improved already. Definitely interesting to see what you'll come up with next. Don't waste no time
I think the squid character is very cute. You don't have a problem there. Midian is on to something with his "coming soon" suggestion. Update the game regularly (biweekly or so.) Just little things; collectable hats and such. It took Doodle Jump a very long time to catch on with fans. It took Pocket God a long time to catch on with fans. Even Angry Birds took a long time to make it to the top. One obvious thing they appear to have in common is that they are all updated frequently with bonus content.
hehe we are not.. not even close.. thats another problem of alot of indies.. they think they have the gutfeeling to what "they" out there want.. which is usualy very wrong ;D
I think Acumen is right. To be more direct and useful I would say you NEED an artist on board. Your first update should be a reskin. The theme is really good. The design and execution is bad. I wouldn't buy this app based on the art quality shown in the screenshots alone.
Further elaboration: Some collectables should be in game items. Some should be achievements for collecting x amount of y, or Accomplishing a in b amount of time Also, provide a form for players to email a friend about the game to receive a free, in game "I ♥ Squid" T-shirt! Oh my god, I want one! Marketing is so much fun!
Well I just bought the game. Mostly took the plunge thanks to positive reviews and word of mouth (and stumbling upon this thread). I think most people (myself included) are doodle-jumped out and getting sick of 'endless' style simple games. This one is quite good so far....variety will be key to see if I keep playing past the first hour.
I must say I'm quite surprised about the how little the TA review did for the sales of your game. Not even counting the fact that is was a very glowing review...
I'm not saying you're wrong, as you're probably a lot more capable to judge this than I would ever be myself. That being said: I have actually received plaudits for the graphics from early on the beta-period and from several reviewers... It is kind of confusing knowing which way to go and at some stage I have to go with my gut-feeling. (At least as long as there isn't a clear-cut answer to the general perception of the looks). This: "I wouldn't buy this app based on the art quality shown in the screenshots alone." is however something I need to look into, as it is the exact kind of thing that might explain the lack of sales-conversion from the positive press...
Isn't this basically describing the way the game is laid out at the moment? Well marketing is also a question of money, and giving away a T-shirt for every 67 cents I make doesn't sound particularly tempting.
I reckon you could mass manufacture in game t-shirt s for about $0. And yes, regularly adding new trinkets and such for your little octopus to collect would suit the game nicely. I never suggested reinventing the wheel; just make it a shinier wheel, with clickety-clackers.
Ah, sorry I didn't catch the "in game" bit. I have always considered to add more content in updates to keep the thing alive. At the moment I fear it's flogging a dead squid though. Seems I've missed some vital part of the presentation/impression in the way the game is presented. My problem isn't negativity or bad reception of the game, it's simply indifference. So, I'll try to make sense of the feedback I've received here (and elsewhere) to decide what to include in the first/last(?) update. I believe part of my problem might be that I don't particularly take to standard cute-craphics. The look of Angry Birds doesn't particularly appeal to me, but the general public loves it. To me it just looks bland. I love Tiny Wings' graphics though as the water-color effect makes it stand out among its peers.
game looks cute & fun! Though I will go on record and say that the dark-colored character are takes away from the potential appeal, esp. with the underwater sea-theme this could benefit from being a lot more colorful. Not surprised to hear that the TA review didn't give a significant boost, I think we are well past the days where that would have been the equivalent to "Johnny inviting you over to the couch." If anything, the best it is worth is potentially getting looked at by the Eye of Sauron, um, Apple and consideration for being featured as it's been said time and again that games which get praised on TA have been known to go on to the next step there. And you know what, even that is not the key to long-lasting success either (a nice short burst and that's it, sometimes) make your next Squid Drop run in Unreal and make him dual-wield and maybe it will find some success Of course I am being facetious, but as time keep going on the 2D stragglers will have a harder time running the gauntlet on this platform, unless you do something pretty far-out.
Being a gamer for over 25 years (and therefore from my point of view), I have to admit that I love gimmicks. Quick Hook appealed to me because I was able to put funny tiny hats on my character. Or Li'l Pirates. The game itself was boring - but clothing your pirates was actually very cool. A lot of gamers are loving it; that's a thing you can read very often in threads. Especially in the roleplaying game section, people love to see their characters appearance change when equipping new clothes or armor. Today, people even demand this feature. The first question is always "do you see the eqipment change on your character?" before "how's gameplay"? Look at the gigantic success of Pocket Frogs. You basically breed frogs and design habitats. You're just making frogs doing naughty things and cheer the new patterns and colors. Nothing more, nothing less. The Pocket Frogs thread has now nearly 19.000 posts. In daWindci, you can change the look of your balloon. That's not a neccessary gameplay feature, but people love it. Heck, it took me over 3 hours in Mass Effect before I completed the design of my characters look before I started to play the game! Shadow Era has 500.000 players, 'cause people like to collect cards. There are countless other examples. This shows that players do care when they have control over the look of things. Therefore, starjimstars idea was actually very good. A few bandanas or t-shirts for the squid would not change gameplay in any way, but it would definately add to the game's appeal. Humans are hunters and collectors by nature. Look around in the human society. Even today, there's nothing what people don't like to hunt and collect. Be it stamps, clothes (for women: shoes ), pressed flowers, pictures, photos, even cars, jewelry or strange little dolls filled with beans. Oh, and apps, yeah apps. people have hundreds and thousands of apps. They don't play the most (just look at MY backlog of games), but collect them. Not speaking of game archievements now. Feed this natural urge and you might win more customers.
thx for sharing. i've been following the development of squid drop and i'm sad to see it didnt do better. although +/- 800 in 11 days is still good. hope your daily sales from now on picks up and settles nice and high. "Feed the natural urge". i like that. that about sums me up(still playing diablo 2 )
