I think this might be a direct question to Chris Jones.
Can anyone answer it? cos I personally I dont know
Thanks
It's clearly stated in the FAQ section of the manual.
QuoteQ. What's the deal with the license? What does it mean in plain English?
A. Adventure Game Studio is now pretty much freeware. That means you may use it freely for non-commerical games, and you don't have to send me anything in return. There is one requirement - if you want to SELL a game you make, for profit, then you must contact me beforehand as there are some licensing issues which you may need to be aware of. When you finish your game, feel free to post it on the AGS Announcements forum so that everyone can give it a go.
Also, there're already several commercial AGS games made.
The licensing issues in question is that you cannot use mp3 codecs in your game (unless you want to buy a license from Frauenhofer who own the format). So you'll have to compile your game with the mp3-less version of the editor. This is not really a problem since ogg vorbis offers superior audio compression anyway.
The real question is 'Do people want to buy your games.' :P
Quote from: Gamer_V on Thu 24/05/2007 15:21:52
The real question is 'Do people want to buy your games.' :P
i am still learning how to use AGS ;D
Quote from: Gamer_V on Thu 24/05/2007 15:21:52
The real question is 'Do people want to buy your games.' :P
Only if it's the best gane i the world.
Quote from: space boy on Thu 24/05/2007 16:37:23
Quote from: Gamer_V on Thu 24/05/2007 15:21:52
The real question is 'Do people want to buy your games.' :P
Only if it's the best gane i the world.
You mean, like something with a penguin in it? Possibly with some kind of laser attachment...?
no, just a complex storyline which seems out of place at first but starts to come together and has a few twists at the end and suceed in not becoming too complicated. A full-length game with every genre, has amazingly beautiful graphics and interesting characters. Oh, and multiple playback value.
I dont think that great gfx are a must. If a game has interesting puzzles which are not boring and nice storyline it has the right ingredients.
Right now I am scripting the storyline and drawing some sketches. Should be starting development soon. ::)
mp3? thats the only trouble? So if i dont use Mp3 on my game i can sell it without problems or restrictions?
Of course mp3 its not a big problem. Really, its not a problem at all.
JpGames
Well it's more than just that... I mean- if your game's crap, no one's going to want to buy it.
Are you sure? Millions of people pays $ 3 for really sample games for their mobile phones. More millions pays $ 1-2 for things like just 1 porn video. And thousands just copeerate with some $ to some free MMORG's (like astrowars, for example).
The key? all this payments can be made in a very easy way, usually with a phone message or using PayPal. I believe that if you can find a easy way for the people to pay your game, you can sell it for some money if your game is only NOT BAD (3-5 $). Maybe you will not be rich, but at least you will feel the satisfaction to get something for your work (when usually the game maker is just looking for personal satisfaction, not for money)
Of course, you need create the game, then probably translate it into multiple languages and finally create a place to sell it in internet (create a webpage, stablish payments methods, etc). The cost? Thousands of $$ !! Of course, you need sell too many games to recover that money, and usually no one can or want take the risk to lost money. Specially, when usually the creator have the feeling that the quality of the game is not enough to pay for it.
Just a thoungt. We are creating a full-lenght game and we stimate that it will cost around $ 3,000 before we finish it, without calculate hundreds of hours of self-work. We want make it commercial, but we dont expect win money, just, if possible, recover some bucks to create the next one.
JpGames
QuoteAre you sure? Millions of people pays $ 3 for really sample games for their mobile phones. More millions pays $ 1-2 for things like just 1 porn video. And thousands just copeerate with some $ to some free MMORG's (like astrowars, for example).
That's true, I guess; but those mobile phone games aren't adventure games- they're platformer and action-style games. If you want to make a commercial adventure game, it has to at least be decent in order for you to expect money from it. For example: Herculean Effort's latest game, Super Jazz Man sold for 5 or 6 bucks (or a few more than that, I forget how much it cost). The game was very polished, with high quality gfx and music, and it sold for a very low price.
Quote
Just a thoungt. We are creating a full-lenght game and we stimate that it will cost around $ 3,000 before we finish it, without calculate hundreds of hours of self-work. We want make it commercial, but we dont expect win money, just, if possible, recover some bucks to create the next one.
Well I've seen some of your work in the CL, and no offense, but I don't think that it would cost $3,000 to make that kind of art.
And without even playing your first game, I noticed the sprites ripped from another game- that's a big no-no if you're planning on selling a commercial game.
Quote
Well I've seen some of your work in the CL, and no offense, but I don't think that it would cost $3,000 to make that kind of art.
And without even playing your first game, I noticed the sprites ripped from another game- that's a big no-no if you're planning on selling a commercial game.
Thats the reason why we are wasting money: creating the graphics. We found a young local artist and he is creating the BGs, chars and animations. Any 320x200 BG (really good quality)costs around $15, and the game needs 116 !! The game also have 13 chars, all full animated, and around 100 animations. We also need someone who translate it into english, and it will cost around $300-400 more (more than 2000 lines of dialogs only). We were lucky to find an artist so cheap! :) Only creating the BGs for the intro and some chars and animations we spendt more than $700 .
Of course, we could create the BGs ourselves (like in our first game) and take some chars from the juncmodule collection (as we did in our first game), but then it will be not a commercial-quality game (again, as our first game was) Paul Quest was created only to begin using AGS, and we maked it in only 9 days (thanks again to the people who helped us in the forums) But like i were trying to explain before, to create a good game, you need spend money, and you will VERY PROBABLY not win nothing for that even, if you sell your final product. But im sure that you could sell some copys. Thats the point.
Lucky, a fan game maker do not create games for money, just for the satisfaction to know that someone else could play and enjoy his game.
JpGames
Art costs loads more than that, too. An hourly rate for a graphic designer is often over $40/hour, especially if you're freelancing. And personally I would say creating a really good-quality bg takes at least a working day (8h) to accomplish. $15 in euros is roughly 12e, which is a pretty standard hourly pay for starting workers (at least in Finland).
Quote from: ildu on Sat 26/05/2007 07:04:01
Art costs loads more than that, too. An hourly rate for a graphic designer is often over $40/hour, especially if you're freelancing. And personally I would say creating a really good-quality bg takes at least a working day (8h) to accomplish. $15 in euros is roughly 12e, which is a pretty standard hourly pay for starting workers (at least in Finland).
Venezuela economy: Here you could win 40 $ weekly in a job, maybe 80-100 $ if you are professional. The artist who is working for our game have his own job (not as an artist, of course) where he win around 50 $ weekly, so he win an extra money creating graphics for our game. Also, we found him via a common friend, so he agreed to cooperate for that money.
Here, if you win 40 $/hour in your job you are REALLY RICH, and REALLY LUCKY ;D
JpGames
I checked and I found out that the minimum wage in Venezuela is around 614,790.00 VEB = 286.669 USD per month. So you should be getting at least some $70 per week no matter what you do (if you work full time). That's still very low for a minimum wage. It's a third of the official US minimum wage, and that's already considered very low in a civilized country. But I guess living expenses aren't that high in Venezuela?
To comment on the previous comment regarding cellphone games - the reason that people are more willing to shell out cash for their cell games is this: It's difficult to get a game on your cellphone without doing so. There is an overabundance of computer games. The market is essentially saturated, so if you want a computer game, it's very likely that you'll be able to find one that's free that also is as good as a fair number of commercial games. People are becoming less and less inclined to pay for a product when the alternative is so much less costly.
Now, this isn't to say that cell phone games are impossible to get for free - it's possible to program a cell phone game and upload it to your phone through a data transfer wire (or at least that seems to be the case here in Japan, but the actual rate of free cell games to pay games is astronomically low. Once cell games become more accessible - which is to say, when people figure out how to get cell games without paying one way or another, the sales of cell games will drop.
Another thing that cell games have going for them is that they're portable. It's not to say that I can't take my laptop with me to work and open it up to play an AGS game during my lunch break, but the cell phone is a lot more convenient because it fits in my shirt pocket, not to mention that it's less conspicuous. So I'm more likely to pay for a game on a cell phone in order to have something I can play while I'm sitting on the train, or waiting for a friend. That's the charm of portable game systems. I bought a Nintendo DS instead of a console, for example, because the DS I can play anywhere, but the console is anchored to my house, for all intents and purposes.
Now, as far as selling games is concerned, there has been no shortage of conversation on the topic, but what I believe it boils down to is that a game will do well depending on its demographic. You're likely to make most of your sales of AGS games within the AGS community, I imagine because we're slightly more willing to pay a little extra for a game in order to 'support the community'. I'm still planning on buying copies of 'The Shivah' and 'The Blackwell Legacy', once I've got a little extra space on the ol' credit card, though it's entirely possible that they'll remain largely unplayed (not because I don't enjoy them, but because I don't have time to play games at home so much anymore).
Just google "free mobile java games" or something and you'll be able to download games to your computer and from there to your cellphone via bluetooth or some cable.
Since there are some very good adventure games for free around here, your one must be THE GAME for you to profit from it :) And I fear it means that it must kick *&% in ever aspect possible.
Quote from: ildu on Sat 26/05/2007 08:52:03
I checked and I found out that the minimum wage in Venezuela is around 614,790.00 VEB = 286.669 USD per month. So you should be getting at least some $70 per week no matter what you do (if you work full time). That's still very low for a minimum wage. It's a third of the official US minimum wage, and that's already considered very low in a civilized country. But I guess living expenses aren't that high in Venezuela?
Here in Venezuela you cant buy $ or â,¬ (or any other) in a currency exchange; the goverment have the foreign exchange blocked, so if you want buy it you must pay it in the "black market", around 4000 VEB / 1 US$, not the "official" 2150 VEB/ 1 US$ you can see in the offical change.
And yes, here the living expenses are cheap, but not enough to compensate the difference.
I could speak you about the difference between live in Finland and Venezuela, but i guess this is not the appropiate place.
JpGames
I like your gas prices JpGames!
Venezuela Caracas $0.12
Good luck with your game.
JpGames, idlu, just some pointers from my head... ;)
(and Steel drummer actually).
Games maybe rubbish, or maybe not. AGS is not meant to create "state of the art" todays games. No matter how hard you try you can only end up somewhere in the 90s or so... Something to consider I guess...
There have been examples of commercial attempts in AGS in the (recent) past. Of all the games that went out I only know that the shivah got some attention. Promotion is far more important than the game being rubbish! Honestly!
Now on the prices issue...
I charge a lot to what I do. I do this for a living. When a game is commercial I'll charge what I think is right for the time I put into my work. I've seen prices like 5$ per finished track! which was highly ridiculous, cause then the guy was setting himself to get 1$ per hour! (<-bad for the industry).
On the other hand though, there are perfectly capable composer and artists, that indeed live in a poorer part of the world, thus can bash the prices down, as well as having a 2nd job and doing what they feel like...
While in the UK or USA it could be hard to get an artist for 15$ per BG, I doubt that it IS that impossible really... It is doing wrong to the whole industry, as to themselves, but this is life, and let's face it. High profile professionals are not looking towards AGS to get saved really, are they?
(PS. Just for the record I don't charge money if it's a freeware game, ok? Just so you know)
Im pretty sure that 15 $ per BG its a very good revenue here. Maybe, if we were a games company, we must pay more than that, but this in only a project from 3 persons who loves the adventure games and we thinks that we could create something really nice, even if it costs money to us. A lot of people spend money on their hobbies, think on that (paint ball, for example, is a very expensive hobbie, at least here or in Spain, were i live too)
If we finally believes that the game is not enough good to release it as a commercial one, we will release it as a freeware for sure. What we are looking one to tell you the history, not win money or enter in the games industry.
Anyway, the game is still very far and i try to not mention it to avoid make publicity here :)
JpGames
Quote from: JpGames on Sat 26/05/2007 06:00:16
Quote
Well I've seen some of your work in the CL, and no offense, but I don't think that it would cost $3,000 to make that kind of art.
And without even playing your first game, I noticed the sprites ripped from another game- that's a big no-no if you're planning on selling a commercial game.
Thats the reason why we are wasting money: creating the graphics. We found a young local artist and he is creating the BGs, chars and animations. Any 320x200 BG (really good quality)costs around $15, and the game needs 116 !! The game also have 13 chars, all full animated, and around 100 animations. We also need someone who translate it into english, and it will cost around $300-400 more (more than 2000 lines of dialogs only). We were lucky to find an artist so cheap! :) Only creating the BGs for the intro and some chars and animations we spendt more than $700 .
Of course, we could create the BGs ourselves (like in our first game) and take some chars from the juncmodule collection (as we did in our first game), but then it will be not a commercial-quality game (again, as our first game was) Paul Quest was created only to begin using AGS, and we maked it in only 9 days (thanks again to the people who helped us in the forums) But like i were trying to explain before, to create a good game, you need spend money, and you will VERY PROBABLY not win nothing for that even, if you sell your final product. But I'm sure that you could sell some copys. Thats the point.
Lucky, a fan game maker do not create games for money, just for the satisfaction to know that someone else could play and enjoy his game.
JpGames
Well most AGS game teams aren't made up of people that are paid. They just do it because they want to have the satisfaction that comes from making a game. :)
I'd like to make games with commercial quality (Great backgrounds, storyline, gameplay, etc) and give it away free.
But if I really need the money or couldn't go to colledge, then I'd try anything, including trying to make a living with AGS.
Can I just suggest one thing. If you're going for high-res backgrounds, you might wanna consider Wintermute. They've recently made it free for commercial use. And it's a little more mediasexy for commercial ventures than AGS.
Quote from: SpacePirateCaine on Sat 26/05/2007 13:38:44
You're likely to make most of your sales of AGS games within the AGS community, I imagine because we're slightly more willing to pay a little extra for a game in order to 'support the community'.
You'd be surprised, SPC. The AGS community makes up a small chunk of my sales, but the majority comes from folks who have never even heard of AGS. The folks on this site are used to playing free games, so that was to be expected. The first thing I noticed when I started selling my games is that fewer AGSers were playing them, but they got noticed by more "mainstream" gamers. A commercial game generally attracts more attention than a freeware game would. You'll get more press, but that doesn't necessarily mean more sales.
As with most things, it comes down to marketing. It's not a matter of releasing the game and hoping for the best. It's almost been a year since Shivah was released, and six months since Blackwell was released, but I still try to get them reviewed or mentioned on gaming sites. The initial crazy buzz has died down somewhat, but it's important to keep getting the word out or people will forget you even exist. It kind of sucks, actually, because while you are working on your current project you still have to support your previous projects.
The important thing is to not be discouraged when people don't start buying your game right away, or start complaining that you are charging money. These things take time.
One important thing is to talk to people. Contact other indie developers, pick their brains, and ask their advice. I've learned so much just from chatting with people in the game industry, and I'm always happy to pay the favor forward. Feel free to PM me, if you like.
Quote from: Dave Gilbert on Tue 29/05/2007 15:26:44
Quote from: SpacePirateCaine on Sat 26/05/2007 13:38:44
You're likely to make most of your sales of AGS games within the AGS community, I imagine because we're slightly more willing to pay a little extra for a game in order to 'support the community'.
You'd be surprised, SPC. The AGS community makes up a small chunk of my sales, but the majority comes from folks who have never even heard of AGS. The folks on this site are used to playing free games, so that was to be expected. The first thing I noticed when I started selling my games is that fewer AGSers were playing them, but they got noticed by more "mainstream" gamers. A commercial game generally attracts more attention than a freeware game would. You'll get more press, but that doesn't necessarily mean more sales.
I concur. Same exact thing here. Not to say we didn't get any AGS community-related sales of course, but the majority of the sales were from more general adventure gamers and gamers.
QuoteCan games made with AGS be sold?
I certainly hope so. (http://www.adventuregamestudio.co.uk/yabb/index.php?topic=27489.0)
Interestingly, the fact that "outsiders" buy commercial AGS games to a higher degree than AGS-ers is pretty understandable.
AGS-members live in a huge symbiosis where everybody helps eachother, and where one specific creator's training ground is made up by the collection of material he's taken part of (for free); all the art, music, games, tutorials, etc.
Since I don't charge for my work in the critic's lounge (where I've provided feedback ever since the board was created - a progress I was involved in, if I'm not mistaken) I'm not going to pay people money just to support their careers as game-creators.
I will, however, pay for games if they appear interesting enough.
Hehe, well said Andail.
Yes, AGS games can be sold, the question is, should *cough mystery manor cough* they be sold!
Quote from: Andail on Tue 29/05/2007 17:56:23
Interestingly, the fact that "outsiders" buy commercial AGS games to a higher degree than AGS-ers is pretty understandable.
AGS-members live in a huge symbiosis where everybody helps eachother, and where one specific creator's training ground is made up by the collection of material he's taken part of (for free); all the art, music, games, tutorials, etc.
Since I don't charge for my work in the critic's lounge (where I've provided feedback ever since the board was created - a progress I was involved in, if I'm not mistaken) I'm not going to pay people money just to support their careers as game-creators.
I suddenly feel extremely guilty... :(
In my defense, I did create a free game for everyone to play so I'm not a complete leech. I also offered CJ payment for the privilege of using AGS, but he politely refused to accept it. I honestly wish I could afford (in terms of time and money, which sometimes is one and the same) to keep creating free games, but I can't. I saw the opportunity to do something I'm good at and enjoy a lot for a living, and I honestly believe I have what it takes to make it happen. I realize I'm sort of taking advantage of other people's hard work, I'm grateful to all of you and I don't blame you if you look down on me.
My wish is to create a great game that will become known to the wider public, hopefully something you'll all be proud to say "it was made with AGS". In fact, I wish more people tried to create commercial games; some of you have much more talent than the average commercial gamemaker. I want Chrille Blomqvist to do Monkey Island 5, Gabriel Knight 4 and Indiana Jones 5 next year.
Naturally, I don't expect any AGSers to buy Diamonds in the Rough unless they're 100% sure it's worth the money.
Rule #1 about indie dev: never feel guilty about doing what you love, or about charging for it. :) I felt that way myself, once. If you read enough books about game dev, you'll see that "Indie Guilt" is a very common thing.
I didn't mean to induce some sense of guilt, I just offered an explanation to why AGSers will be less likely to pay for indie games.
I think it's beneficial for our community if people actually succeed in selling their games. Unfortunately, lots of people (maybe not on our particular scene, but in many other indie-environments) nurture practically impossible dreams, and end up trying to sell crap products which just damage everybody's reputation. Some people just don't realise what it means to actually start charging money for their products; some can't cope with the pressure and demands, and how all the feedback suddenly turns 150% more critical.
So, making good games commercial will create good media attention and facilitate for future projects. Trying to sell bad games will have the opposite effect.
I support Dave 100% in his commercial ventures, maybe especially because I know how commited he's been to this indie-scene of ours (not to mention his patronage of the RON community).
I stand happily corrected. I'll admit, I like the fact that there are more sales outside of the community - the logic is certainly sound, and I'll also admit that it was mostly hypothesis, so it's good to know that I was wrong. Now, that does, I'm sure, lead to some semi-unfounded feelings of guilt from community members who are essentially taking and not giving, but such is the nature of a producing community. I'd like to rely on outside consumers to pay my bills, as opposed from hand-outs from people I know.
I approve of what Andail said - reputation is a very important thing to think about. AGS is a vastly varied community, and the level of quality ranges from Rich Phycho to Amazing, which means that you can only expect that you'll see all of the above (and most likely a lot of the prior) most of the time. I personally have very little faith in my own ability to produce something of the level of quality that should be expected in a commercial product - and this is why I don't imagine I'm ever going to sell my work. By and large, everything AGS that has had a price tag so far has been of the quality to expect that price tag to be respected - and in my opinion, the bar needs to be raised for the products to be taken seriously.
I like that the major share of available releases here are freeware - it means that I have plenty to play without needing to use up my own money to do so. Five dollars isn't very much in the grand scheme of things, especially for hours of work on a labor of (hopefully more) love (than anything else), but I'm still reluctant to pay with so much free available to me. What do I want to pay for? Something I know I'll get the money's worth from. That's why I like demos - I know that if I play the demo once, quit in the middle and never play to the end, I probably won't want to spend the money. If I get all the way to the end of a demo and want to see what's still to come, I'll be much more ready to shell out for it. I have heard some people say they don't like releasing demos (though I'm hard-pressed to find good examples), but in my humble opinion, it's imperative (for me at the very least) to let me taste the ice cream before I buy a cone.
I honestly don't know exactly where I've been going with this post - It's near five in the morning, so it's very possible some comprehensibility has been lost. To sum up, I understand how I was wrong - that's pretty groovy - and the logic is pretty sound, on a second mulling-over.
Yeah, there's nothing wrong with wanting some compensation for your hard work. If we weren't selling Super Jazz Man, from the overall viewpoint we'd be losing money (webhost costs, not to mention our time which could be spent elsewhere).
Slightly off-topic but still in topic, wasn't 'Echo Night' (Playstation) made with AGS?
If they did, how the hell did they port it to PS2?
That probably means they didn't...
OK, I feel a little bit better now.
Regarding the reputation of AGS, I'm fully aware of the danger and I regard the whole project with a sense of responsibility.
...I re-red the article, It was called Adventure Player Studio...right...
"Adventure Player will run adventure games that user can create themselves on a PC with software called Adventure Player Studio. Several sample Adventure Player games will ship from From, the first of which appears to be Echo Night. Sounds pretty cool!"
A quaote from the site: there's the link:
http://dreamdawn.com/sh/key_view.php?key=News
You'll have to look at the bottom though, it's pretty old. Perhaps APS was the old name for AGS? Or maybe it's just a coincidence?
EDIT: no, it's totally unrelated to AGS, it's just a coincidence.
Also, the old name for AGS was AC, Adventure Creator, so it's not APS.
There weren't many games in the AC era though, so it's safe to assume there're no commercial games in that period.
Quote from: Geoffkhan on Tue 29/05/2007 21:01:58
Yeah, there's nothing wrong with wanting some compensation for your hard work. If we weren't selling Super Jazz Man, from the overall viewpoint we'd be losing money (webhost costs, not to mention our time which could be spent elsewhere).
Greg, as you know it's hardly that...
As shown in a different thread sfx (good ones) cost. Same goes for sound libraries, instruments, a WACOM, a good screen, etc... all these things coincide to making better art/music... And having the best elements in a game, although not suficient alone, would justify a game being commercial...
I am somewhat "hurt" by the fact that commercial AGS attempts, are actually not supported by the AGS community. And as far as I know, all commercial attempts have been preceded by many freeware games (Dave, and Herculean Effort, don't know about the banana man, or the zone II).
Now in order to explain something:
I have a burning need to make a game (you propably seen this already). I have the story 95% ready, 70% on the puzzles, music/audio is no issue. I know 1-2 programmers, who have promised to help me, so I'm on the safe side. However in order to get the artists I need in order for the game to be what I envision it (and I'm not a kid to be fooling around), I have to pay! Same probably goes for the programmer. I would never ask anyone to waste 1-2 years of the lives for free, while I won't have the ability to put pressure on (one of the bad things in freeware games). Believe me that I would like nothing more to take on board an extra 3-4 persons, that I know can make the quality I want, and make a brilliant freeware game. But this is impossible and probably bad:
Producing a high quality freeware game, while other AGS games are being sold, creates a problem in sales.
There are very slim chances of getting someone to do such a load of work for free
There are extremely slim chances that I can find the x000$ needed to hire 2-3 artists and get the job done!
I know that AGS can pull of 95% of what I want. For the other 5% I'll have to slaughter my programmer on his desk...
Now the only solution in my head is 1: Go commercial!
I offer fees and/or percentages to get the best people on board, plus have them on contract so they won't leave midways
At first I thought that I would only want to make as much money as to get my expenses back, and actually promote the game as such, but then why should an idiot buy a game, while waiting will get it for free (after the expenses are being done)?
Of course my first problem just lies that I don't have enough time to deal with such a project, so it's more of a rant, than anything else, but at least some insight in my head, might prove helpful in this thread...
Quote
I am somewhat "hurt" by the fact that commercial AGS attempts, are actually not supported by the AGS community.
I would hope that people who release commercial AGS games would prefer people to buy their games out of a love of their work and a desire to play, not out of charity.
Becky, you are right, that comment of mine appears that way indeed.
But the excuse that Andail gave was what bugged me:
QuoteInterestingly, the fact that "outsiders" buy commercial AGS games to a higher degree than AGS-ers is pretty understandable.
AGS-members live in a huge symbiosis where everybody helps eachother, and where one specific creator's training ground is made up by the collection of material he's taken part of (for free); all the art, music, games, tutorials, etc.
Since I don't charge for my work in the critic's lounge (where I've provided feedback ever since the board was created - a progress I was involved in, if I'm not mistaken) I'm not going to pay people money just to support their careers as game-creators.
It is understandable, yes, but at the same time, it just feels that commercial AGS games are treate unequally with the rest...
Of course, nobody should support anyone for the meer reason that it's AGS (although in the case of Dave, it appears that it's...Dave, so it's ok), but I would expect an insider to be actually more at ease at any potential problems or faults in a game from AGS compaired to a "real commercial".
But by all means, I wouldn't want anyone buying anything out of pity! I just wish to make this clear!
Quote
I would never ask anyone to waste 1-2 years of the lives for free, while I won't have the ability to put pressure on (one of the bad things in freeware games).
Yes, this is the kicker. Enthusiasm is GREAT, and can really move things along, but when the enthusiasm dies down there has to be something to take it's place. Usually, that something is cash. Offering a royalty/percentage of sales isn't the best idea (at least, not by itself), because there's no guarantee that the game will get done or that it will sell incredibly well.
Being amongst the terminally short of cash, offering huge amounts of money to my team members is something of an impossibility. The main thing I have going for me is my reputation, but that's not always enough. So, I usually have to make some concessions.
1 - Low res graphics. Costs less, quicker to make, and the right artist can make them look fantastic despite the pixels. High res graphics take longer to make, require much more time and care, and are much harder and much more expensive. If I had the luxery of time/money, I'd go high-res, but until that happy day arrives... low res it is.
2 - Short development time. Enthusiasm wanes, and funds are limited.
A short development time means that there's less of a chance of a flake out, since your team knows they will see the fruits of their labors much sooner. Yes, the game will probably be on the short side, but it does make more financial sense to release a short game every 4-6 months instead of a massive epic every 2-3 years. Who the heck has that kind of time?
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It is understandable, yes, but at the same time, it just feels that commercial AGS games are treate unequally with the rest...
In some cases, yes. I have the greatest respect for the AGS community, and consider it my foundation. At first, it did kind of irk me that the only people to complain about the price were AGSers. Nobody else seemed to mind. But, for years this was a place to get free games. That's starting to change. There's bound to be some criticism.
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I would hope that people who release commercial AGS games would prefer people to buy their games out of a love of their work and a desire to play, not out of charity.
When your living depends on sales, you'll be totally fine with charity! :)
Quote from: Dave Gilbert on Wed 30/05/2007 14:41:05
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I would never ask anyone to waste 1-2 years of the lives for free, while I won't have the ability to put pressure on (one of the bad things in freeware games).
Yes, this is the kicker. Enthusiasm is GREAT, and can really move things along, but when the enthusiasm dies down there has to be something to take it's place. Usually, that something is cash. Offering a royalty/percentage of sales isn't the best idea (at least, not by itself), because there's no guarantee that the game will get done or that it will sell incredibly well.
The only reason I would
offer % would be the lack of funds! There is absolutely no reason to
accept %, myself alone. I can certainly understand someone not having the funds to pay for my services (which can be costly for AGS games), but a combination of the two plus the person who is hiring me is enough. :)
What is incredible for me is that, personally, I would never consider AGS an engine to create commercial games. Simply because of the sooo many lacking features. But you, Dave, and HE, and other people, sure showed me! (and I'm not kidding here). I do have to revaluate what exactly is a commercial game, even in the indie territory, cause I really doubt any AGS game could get out and be mainstream. And this is where my blockage comes in. As I know how hard it is to accomplish some things (man, I know people who would like to kill me for what I ask of them ;D) in their games with AGS, I can only applaud that effort and after that, buy the game. Part of it has to do with faith. I have huge ammounts for faith for most commercial game creators in AGS, and I know that with larger funds they could do wonders (example low res vs high res, in Daves case...). It's not that he can't do it, it's that he $can't do it$. Major difference. Thus I certainly don't see my buys as charity!
Regarding the commercial viability of AGS games, think of it this way.
There are movies out there that cost several hundred million dollars to make. They have the latest effects, the hottest stars, and immense marketing power.
There are also movies that cost a few thousand dollars to make. They can only hire smalltime actors, and can only afford basic lighting and equipment.
Is one film more commercially viable than the other? Becaues the indie film costs less to make, and isn't as "professional" as the high-budget one, does that mean it is worth less?
You'll still pay the same $9 to see both movies.
Why should games be any different? Just because my games cost around $5000 to make, versus the mega billion budgets of the high-end titles, does that mean I shouldn't bother?
Quote from: Nikolas on Wed 30/05/2007 14:37:10
Of course, nobody should support anyone for the meer reason that it's AGS (although in the case of Dave, it appears that it's...Dave, so it's ok), but I would expect an insider to be actually more at ease at any potential problems or faults in a game from AGS compaired to a "real commercial".
Or to put it differently, nobody should support a game for the mere reason that it's AGS, and nobody should
boycott a game for the mere reason that it's AGS!
On another note Nikolas, I'm amused to see that your English spelling is as bad as your Greek one. ;D
Quote from: alkis21 on Wed 30/05/2007 22:02:50
On another note Nikolas, I'm amused to see that your English spelling is as bad as your Greek one. ;D
:'(
When I quit making tons of tpyos and misspellings, then I'll say that I was an idiot who should learn how to spell properly. For the time being it's what defines me really. :p
I am not sure if this has been said already, but fatman was BRIEFLY for sale, and the shivah and I think another game by the same guy is for sale. just my input