I was reading this article… about business in general, but applicable to the many failed dreams and broken hopes in trying to make money from games… sobering, clarifying… hopefully helpful… whenever you are thinking about what you want to do with no regard for whether other people want what you do… think again…
Myth #1 Follow Your Passion and the Money Will Come!
Myth #2 Work Hard and the Money Will Come!
Myth #3 Believe in Yourself/Be Confident and the Money Will Come!
Myth #4 Be Unique/Create Something New and the Money Will Come!
Myth #5 Be Positive and the Money Will Come!
Myth #6 Do What You Are Best At and the Money Will Come!
All these qualities (passion, work ethic, confidence, and others) are important for making money… but here’s the thing that people often miss: a real demand. You also need the demand, because if you have a passion for making something no one wants then it’s not going to help you very much.
Rather than saying: having passion, work ethic, confidence, and others will not make you money! Life is so simple that there’s just ONE thing: meeting a demand, and nothing else matters.
It’s pretty hard to meet any demand at all if you lack those qualities.
I think you have to follow your passion, and work hard, and believe in yourself, and create something new, and be positive, and do what you are best at, and meet a real demand. Then you might make some money. Still, the fact that you need demand is a lesson that some game devs appear to need.
Demand won’t make a business successful if the person attempting to meet the demand isn’t any good at it.
Arguably without passion, a strong work ethic, confidence, determination and creativity, attempting to meet/address the real demand will not result in success.
Yes I agree with you personally, if the demand is there ANY you make a good product through whatever drives or desires etc, then you could be successful. I feel though that many fall into the trap of only doing that and wishfully thinking that it’s going to result in success, when there either a) isn’t enough demand, b) isn’t enough talent etc to make a good enough product for what the demand demands, or c) there is demand but there’s already too much competition meeting it well.
I posted just to basically be helpful a bit and help some people realize where they might be being unrealistic or taking a shot in the dark. Not trying to be click-baity. I myself have fallen many times into the trap of just making something cus I think it will be cool and then there being basically no audience for it. Also it seems a lot of game development is kind of a big shot in the dark - without any sense of an audience of who is demanding or what they want, it can be like working inside a dark box sometimes with no idea if anything will even be well received until you suddenly take the lid off at the end, reveal it to the world, and then find out that nobody cares, we totally misunderstood the audience or just are throwing it to the wind and hoping for some luck. It shouldn’t have to be such a shot in the dark if we are a bit more realistic about what’s going to happen or who we’re making this for.
It wasn’t fresh. Angry Birds were based on someone else’s idea that failed to gather much attention (the original game was said to be called Crush the Castle).
Yes. Fixed. Be Lucky + Follow Your Passion + Work Hard + Believe in Yourself/Be Confident + Be Unique/Create Something New + Be Positive + Do What You Are Best = Money Will Come!
Simple to write, Harder to do.
Angry birds, since it’s being discussed, wasn’t just based on Crush the castle it was also based on all previous 2d artillery games with destructible environments, which date back many many years. But it did go about presenting the interaction with the environment in a different way (a one-sided battle instead of vs), destructibility using coarse physics objects with greater meaning attached intead of generic small pixels, etc. An evolution in a certain direction. They also capitalized on the fact that destructible environment games were ‘rare’ and were very stale/lacking in creativity in their typical form.
Anyway… you can forge your way with something new… In fact, the human brain takes the most notice of things which it has not encountered before. When you experience something truly ‘new’ to you you’ll be somewhat awestruck, partly because you don’t have a huge historical background of memories projected on top of it to obscure your awareness. Things which are more jarring … and you can read that as more upsetting (dark, egocentric, fps games … will get more attention from the brain than something you have seen and processed many many times over. The more exposure you have to something the more your brain learns the neural networks to produce familiarity, and familiarity can breed contempt, but moreso a state of complacency and semi-unconsciousness. If you want to get attention, it’s always been true that something that at least appears new will engage people more, at least at first until the honeymoon wears off.
Going back to the original post… making something new/previously unseen will give you a boost, but now you’re in the territory or forging a new path and there may not be demand initially - and this has a lot to do with “going viral”, where it just organically grows and spreads as a new buzz instead of just tapping into an existing story. Everyone who makes games probably thinks they’re doing something new and original, but it’s not that easy, or to do something new very well. People go gaga when they see something like “crossy road” for example - and many iOs hit games are things that the audience has ‘never seen before’ even though it may be based on old game designs. It makes people take notice. But there has to be some sort of tie-in with demand, either people knew they wanted it or they wanted it but they didn’t know they wanted it, or something like that. You can ‘hit a nerve’ to go viral, ie tapping into some existing ‘like’ that may be laying dormant in people, or they can relate to it. If they don’t want it at all and can’t relate and don’t want or need it, bye bye.
So true.
Sometimes there’s just no real demand until people realize it actually matches their taste.
But even though that’s true, you might still wanna do a more or less extensive research in order to still meet some existent expectations. Otherwise you’re just another one hoping to be the lucky one creating that new trend.
Most gamers don’t want something new. They want a new theme on the familiar. Same with tv, movies and the rest of entertainment.
The vast majority of audience in all media is just looking for something to spice up the things they already love so they can enjoy them again. Same with food actually, most people don’t want or like truly new flavors or mixtures of flavors. They have a set of tastes they developed early and they want food that uses those familiar flavors in familiar ways.
Making something ‘new’ has nothing to do with success.
A professional does not need ‘passion’ - a professional produces professional grade work for money.
The most of the successful people I’ve known, never really worked that hard (although there are a few exceptions). Most of them were either born with money or a well connected family.
There is no secret to making money or success.
The best way to find moderate success is avoid significant risks and follow tried and true paths:
Get a decent education in a field that is growing
Go on job interviews and make yourself appealing.
Get to work on time.
Don’t piss off the person who signs your checks.
The best way to work toward larger scale success revolves around building an effective social network. Big success is almost always predicated on social capital.
Just checked Wikipedia to see what the difference in release dates was between the two games. Crush the Castle became available a few months before Angry Birds as a flash-based game, but Angry Birds beat it to mobile platforms. I wonder if it would have become as big as Angry Birds had it been available on mobile from the beginning.
… will get more attention from the brain than something you have seen and processed many many times over. The more exposure you have to something the more your brain learns the neural networks to produce familiarity, and familiarity can breed contempt, but moreso a state of complacency and semi-unconsciousness. If you want to get attention, it’s always been true that something that at least appears new will engage people more, at least at first until the honeymoon wears off.