Re:Steam Deck OLED
by johnnyanmac on Thursday November 09, 2023 @11:50PM
(#38215181)
most indies don't (and usually shouldn't, unless mobile) target casual gamers, and they can't bet on "stumbling upon a random game" to sell.
That stuff isn't easy but fortunately Valve isn't the only one offering that, and pretty much every other storefront offers lower rates if that's important.
What I mean by “should” is if game sticker price is $10 and as Indy game dev you can get $7 basically for free if casual stumbles on your game.
I assume such dev can and should also use all other available promotion options of course.
So from my pov 30% is fine to pay. Especially that after initial effort of putting game in.
Re:Steam Deck OLED
by johnnyanmac on Friday November 10, 2023 @11:14AM
(#38220634)
Sure, but when your game is selling in the double digits, that's not something you can bet on. Discoverability is a multiplier and if an indies' is very low, Valve doesn't help there. You gotta pay $100, so I need at least 14 people to "stumble" and buy my game just to pay that back. Then I need 140 people so I can get that $100 back.
If valve wants to earn those 3 dollars, they need to ensure my game can be discovered to begin with. "becsuse there's a lot of people on steam" doesn't cut it these days. That was valuable at one point but I'd say aroind 2014 or so it ceased to be so.
As a casual gamer I am not willing to dig around the internet to look for games.
But if I stumble upon something random on Steam there is a chance I will buy it.