I’ve lost years of my time before, wasting my time on bad games that wouldn’t make any money. When I sent my games to mobile publishers, they didn’t even want to test them because they were bad. However, it seemed fun to me while doing it and the feedback I got from those around me was always good.
The lesson I learned from here is that before fully implementing the game idea in my mind, I need to learn whether it will make money through a short demo. However, publishers generally prefer to test games that are finished and published in stores.
How can I know whether the prototype I developed will make money before I waste months?
Never ask your mom or boyfriend whether something you made is good, they will always say “it’s great, honey!”
Don’t ask open-ended vague feedback on whether it’s good or not. Add code that measures how long they play, what parts they spent the most time on, what actions they performed the most often. Find a more neutral group of people to playtest your prototype, asking for honest opinions of what they specifically thought was funny, annoying, easy or tough.
Generally, video games just never make money. 
I know everyone can name a few exceptions here and there, but these are occasional and rare.
That assumption is absolutely incorrect.
You can’t. You can iterate off of something else that is doing well on the current market to minimize your risks but you’d also be tapping into a base that’s closer to exhaustion.
Some current publishers advise taking risks, some others are fine iterating off of stuff that’s currently trending. They’ll feed you specs by the dozen if they feel you can execute them properly/you’re locked under PPP.
Yes, that is absolutely the right idea. Many publishers you work with will actually encourage rapid prototyping. The idea is that engagement is driven by the core gameplay. You don’t need all the fluff, just a strong core. They’ll test it and see if it has potential based on thousands of tests they have executed in the past. Most publishers test raw unfinished stuff precisely so that they can compare against other raw unfinished stuff. This way, devs on payroll whether it’s in-house or PPP can iterate over prototypes/kill faster and maximize the odds of getting hits for the publisher.
You can’t.
What you can do is test it to get information which will help you lean the odds in your favor. Take it to places where the public can play it, and see if they do. Put prototypes on places like Itch to see if people download it. If publishers are a thing you want, pitch to them early and only carry on with ideas as long as they have traction. Don’t just ditch ideas which don’t get immediate traction, experiment a bit to see what is and isn’t working.
But also, note that making games isn’t all about making money.
Thank you all for informations and correcting me.
Since everyone said I should make a short demo, prototype and analyze it i want to ask another question about it.
For example when making prototype should i polish it before sending people for feedback. Like my game have 2 mechanics
1- selection (like puzzle)
2- arrow shooting
should i polish this 2 core mechanic as much as i can from sound to animation or send people unpolished prototype
True polish takes aaaages.
But, it’s not an “or” thing. You can show it to people before and after you polish it, and at multiple stages in between.
My rule of thumb is that if people play something for a while and complain about details, that’s a good thing - I should focus on getting details right, i.e. polish. If they only play it for a little bit then regardless of the feedback, the details didn’t matter because the core thing wasn’t enough to hold their attention.
Of course there’ll always be some variance, and you just need experience to hone your sense of when to spend longer and when to not. Sometimes details are critical, other times they’re just icing.
Thank you very much, I understand very well
before putting a game online (Steam), I have it tested by a dozen testers.
This avoids having to make a bunch of updates before publication.
Short (30 seconds) gameplay videos are one of the best ways to judge interest in a potential game idea. Videos, including pre-recorded and live streamed, are essential to building buzz online. If a video of a game idea does not get many views, then it is unlikely the game will sell well.
Additionally, you can figure out which parts of a game to focus your efforts on by posting short gameplay videos of each part of the game. If the video for one gameplay mechanic gets a lot of views, that is where you should put your focus.
In these videos, keep the total length to about 30 seconds. Don’t waste time with logo screens, title screens, or any text or talking. Just record up to 30 seconds of something (such as a gameplay mechanic), and post it to YouTube. Then measure the response to each short video.
Assuming 2D or simple 3D put it on one of the WebGL sites like Newgrounds, then compare views/plays of other popular games with yours and analyze reviews both opinion and score wise.
Itch.io and Gamejolt are alternatives/additions to the WebGL route.
These are sites where people intentionally seek out games to play for free. This doesn’t necessarily correlate with revenue on paid platforms, but a good game will get positive feedback no matter on which platform it exists. You can then compare your results against other games on those platforms to determine how the game is doing amongst competition.
Mobile is the hardest market to break into imo since the top games lists are largely dominated by billion dollar publishers that have private content factories, which shit out a hyper casual game in two weeks.
EDIT: Also, from my experience, mobile publishers don’t want published games. They want softlaunched games in a single secondary market like Canada where you can prove 50-60% day 0 retention rate for casual games. Or 30-50% day 0 retention rate for mid-core and hardcore games. Day 0 retention determines if a game will be profitable. This requires a lot of knowhow and money for paid user acquisition to get these metrics.
Have you actually made money?
So… is actually a pretty popular and very effective thing to do these days. There are a LOT of “coming soon” games on steam that are basically polished prototypes. Enough to show what gameplay could be and a general art direction. Then based on reaction and buzz, that could inform continued development or even draw draw in a publisher. It works well (or conversely can save you money and time if there is no interest).
Like others have said: “one simply cannot”.
But … if you want your game to make money, the best way to increase your chances was and still is to make the game you’d love to play yourself. Because then you pour your heart into it, and that’s what’s going to make the game stand out.
If on the other hand you just follow a trend because it’s a certain kind of game or genre that’s being hyped, I can guarantee that almost always one of these things are going to happen:
- Your game will be regarded as “yet another” quick shot at making some bucks.
- Your game will not get noticed among dozens if not hundreds of similar hype-hunting games.
- By the time the game is released, the hype is long over.
Of course there’s a significant chance that it’ll be all three together!