Just a shout out not to waste your money on assets that might be recognized by users, if you do that on Steam in a game it would be recognized by everyone in the world as this asset store asset, you will just get everyone on Steam hammering you, that’s what they do - you think the Forums here are harsh, they just hammer you to make you give your game away and using something like this leaves you very vulnerable, it’s too easily recognized, if it looks real and ordinary and not stylized or distinctive then no one can tell you bought it and hammer you on Steam, that’s just the way Steam is I can’t help the way they are. The more real and more ordinary and less recognizable the better then who knows if you made it or you bought it, otherwise it’s a waste of your money if they might guess you bought it they will hammer you, it is what it is.
If you make another low budged clone game with assets flip, and ready templates, you should expect nothing different from the community. People are tired of copy cat games. Or should I say copy cat templates.
But if gameplay is ineresting, or somehow original, no one will care about which assets are used. As long game is actually fun to play.
Can you show me a game you have developed and released personally that uses mainly asset store assets (that you didn’t heavily costomise) and has such great game play that it was a success and not criticised?
Actually, recognizable assets do decrease perceived value of the game, from player side, just like OP said. I’m speaking from player perspective here. For example, popular synty’s models have distinct style and are certainly subject to rpgmaker effect. If you’re looking at a VR game, and there’s a goblin you’ve seen in another title, that’s a reason not to buy.
In theory, it should be like you said - only gameplay matters. In practice it does not quite work this way.
Not my game, but Perfect Heist 2. Very Positive on Steam, 1700+ reviews, Synty assets. Or Polygon. Mostly Positive, 23,700+ reviews. Every game will be criticized by someone (even the current AAA darling Baldur’s Gate 3), but both of these games are unarguable successes. So, as others mentioned, gameplay matters.
people using synty assets probably do so because they dont have many options. And for the price they are a great value.
if your game isn’t fun it isn’t fun and that’s your own failure. Synty studios isn’t the one holding you back - they probably helped in a major way. dont try to redirect your bad feelings on somebody else because somebody wrote a bad review its not healthy.
I just realised this isn’t your game, funny. So to justify everyone buying and rebuying all these assets you’ve come up with 1 game from someone else not you that did 1,700 positive reviews in 2 years compared to 263,000 positive reviews in 1 month for the other game you mentioned that obviously doesn’t use bought assets. I was being nice when I thought it was you who made it. Very funny.
Ps I have nothing against any particular artist assets and I didn’t mention particular artists.
1700 reviews for an indie game means it’s commercially successful, which is confirmed by a steady stream of updates for the past two years since release of the game. Total reviews of BG3 or any other AAA hit game are irrelevant. And there is way more than just one successful indie game made with Synty assets.
1700 isn’t even starting to be commercially successful, you’d be better off working for minimum wage for 2 years you would literally earn multiple times the amount.
Again I didn’t mention any particular artist, look back at the thread and stop attributing it to me.
Unfortunately, it seems I’ve concerned everyone by demonstrating that we aren’t going to become successful well off commercial indie game makers here on the forums buying assets, sheeesssh let’s get real.
So Steadb estimates the games has 45.3 up to 124.5k owners per popular review related formulas. Playtracker estimates 214k owners. VG insights 67k owners. Steamspy 331k owners. So let’s lowball it and call it 60k owners for our purposes.
Looking at the price, 9.99EUR is the standard with lowest recorded price being 6,74EUR. They also have regional pricing, with the average of all regions being around 6EUR, so let’s take that.
60,000 owners x 6EUR = 360,000EUR. After Steam’s 30% cut they’re left with 252,000EUR.
I couldn’t find anything about the developers. Looking at itch.io they might be a solo developer. Anyways, let’s say they live in a high tax EU country, so 40% total tax burden. That leaves them around 143,800, which is nearly 6k EUR/month for two years for a single developer which is higher than what politicians are paid in my country. And 3k EUR for two developers AFTER taxes is still a lot of money.
And I’m lowballing the owner count, they could also have double that amount of cash. If that’s not commercially successful for you, then you are in the wrong industry.
And you called out “recognizable asset store assets”. Synty is probably the most recognized yet it’s still used in successful games. You not calling them out specifically is not relevant.
You haven’t demonstrated a single thing, you’re claiming something with 0 proof. And when people show actual proof to the contrary, you move goal posts or deflect with nonsense.
its always the dimwits who talk the most trash, isn’t it? Now patheneye has to do the maths for them.
As demonstrated, reviews are typically 10% of sales. So these people who spent, what 50 bucks? on synty assets made major return. They are earning comfortable upper middle class income from their game.
There is at least 2 multiplayer battleground type shooters that are massively successful, made with unity and using synty assets.
Yes, it is no secret if you can make good custom art, you’ll have easier time getting initial interest. You’ll also require 10x more money or 10x more time. So do the math.
Now stop saying stupid things on the internet and focus on fixing mistkaes in your next game. AI is learning from you, ya know.
No chance those stats from Steam are over estimated right and again 1 game that has made the developers probably a team of at least 4 about 1.5K a month each (6K in your words / 4) even if those stats you made up were real, which they most certainly aren’t. It’s funny the way people want to believe something they will just keep believing it. You’re not lowballing you’re massively inflating, overstating then saying I’m making things up.
Really it’s time to get realistic about the chances of success with store bought assets as an indie, come on this shouldn’t be world shattering stuff.
Of course it’s relevant whether I or anyone else should be bothering to spend my money on assets with very little chance of making money back, it’s like any gamble the odds are particularly bad on this one for the outlay.
Again, I didn’t mention any particular artist, stop attributing it to me, look back at the thread.
The difference is I’m pulling information from actual data, you’re pulling it out of your ass.
We don’t know the size of the team. It could be 1, it could be 4. Maybe they live in a 3rd world country and live like kings, maybe they live in a 1st world country and barely scrape by or do this in the evenings. There’s not enough information to determine one way or the other. But it’s plausible this is their full time job by information available.
It’s public information lol. https://steamdb.info/app/1521580/
I’m not inflating anything, I’m taking public information from data aggregators and lowballing the numbers shown there. Admittedly, perhaps I overestimated the average price, which might be a euro or two less assuming most sales are made when the game is discounted, but it could still be a full-time job for a developer or two.
It’s time to stop blaming personal failures on premade assets.
And again, that is irrelevant. You called out ALL recognizable asset store assets. Synty is part of that and the first association people have with premade assets.
No you’re just making it up you don’t know any numbers and I’ll say this one more time for the obsessed with putting words in my mouth, I don’t know who this artist you keep referring to is, nor do I care, I simply express the absolute truth that making any even moderately successful game with bought assets as the primary assets is a very unlikely if not completely no example in the whole world of any such reality.
No one but the original developers know the exact numbers, but we can estimate by information available. Those estimates often are very close.
That is kinda revealing.
You’re only expressing your personal truth, that you are unlikely to earn any money with premade assets/templates from the store.
We don’t even use premade assets, all custom art so I have no horse in the race.
30 seconds searching
It is quite evident that the OP is butthurt their game failed and they spent money on it, fully believing they’d make a return. Now they try to take some anger out on other developers who almost certainly would have told them the same thing they are telling us now - dont expect your first game(s) to succeed.
News flash - almost all endeavours everywhere fail. That is the norm. You should have planned for it.
edit: here is a review of a game that looks like it only uses synty studios packs which must be the most popular “asset flip” packages out there:
looks like they did some work to light the levels nicely but otherwise looks like just typical synty assets.
and of course battle bits remastered is the big fad right now that has earned in the millions. It is also using what looks like synty, or at least exact same style as synty.
So that rules out common assets being a determinant in success, doesn’t it? Well then what is the difference between these games and the failure?
From the post one, seems like issue on Ops part, trying to vent only, not for constructive discussion. As we see.
I have no intention further participating actively in this discussion.
How do you know BattleBit used bought assets from a store where is your link? But you did prove my original point about getting negative feedback on steam for looking like an Asset Flip.
When it comes to not accept the reality of failing at this, I don’t think it is me who is denying reality and I believe you are concerned because I have pointed out something you don’t want to hear.
https://steamcommunity.com/app/671860/discussions/4/3814034023682995809/
https://steamcommunity.com/app/671860/discussions/4/6717729343883845907/
You are right. Battle bits is not a roaring success because chubzero on steam said something mean.
I quit game dev it is hopeless.