i recently updated to the latest version (i used to have a version from early may)
i started a new company but even with an average score of 9+ high marketing budget and medium boot plus 20+k fans. the games barely sell and i go bankrupt. (PC) its share is around 17 percent now, but the market seems very small. the profits are too small to be able to advance in technology, usually games sell only 60k max with a profit of 100/200 k
am i the only one noticing this or am i just crazy used to my other games 500m per game in profit
Since early versions of Game Dev Tycoon we have implemented some game balancing which most likely explains the changes in revenue and sales that you are experiencing.
Please make sure you are using version 1.3.14.
500M profits? Were you in post-game (35+ years)? Iâve rarely seen a game pull down half a billion in profit during the main game, and never when Iâm working in medium.
You mention a high marketing budget. Thatâs probably what youâre doing wrong. First up, hype isnât useful past 500 points. After that, everyone who wants to hear of it already has. Secondly, the value of hype is proportional to the number of fans you already have. I never do a campaign larger than sending out a few demos until I have at least 200k fans. I may not even bother researching advertising until Iâm ready to produce large games.
You mentioned these unexpectedly low profits as being on a new company. Early game strategies are not the same as late game strategies. Before you have huge legions of fans, you need to be cautious about your expenses.
Also, how do you have 2 conventions on one game? They donât take that long to produce. Besides, thereâd be so much wasted hypeâŚ
I still think youâre misunderstanding whatâs going on. MMOs have special handling in the code and balance patches on MMOs shouldnât have changed market sizes for all the games. Can you quote us the exact figures on some regular games?
Medium Game w/Publisher (i.e. <150k Fans) usually means you get a flat 15% Royalties, this is the first thing to keep in mind. As doing a Publisher Deal will ALWAYS be better when you initially move in to the second office so you can grow your fan base while selling 1-5million Units (depending on the games success)
As even when it says there is no Hype, the publisher still does some hype for you rather than doing the âSelf-Publishingâ where you have to do that all yourself.
No Hype = Almost No Sales
Still other things can affect it as well⌠such-as making a Young Game on the PC, doesnât matter if theyâre a Perfect 10 will max hype; theyâll have piss poor sales because that is a bad target audience. This is the same with doing a Mature Game too early (anything before STES Release in my experience is iffy for Mature games)⌠you also have the thing that early on, outside of the Gameling and Vena Gear Casual just flat out refuse to sell regardless of the ratings.
So there are things that can happen where you score high, you still get low sales.
I tend to experience this quite a bit in the late game, where review scores over 8+ doesnât seem to matter anywhere near as much as the hype; which generally has to hit a minimum of 400-600 to do well⌠in a way it feels better to have that the case as well, given generally true that regardless of if you make the most perfect game - if you donât market it, just wonât sell well at all.
Ideally this is what you want to be aiming to do as well, just get marketing to be alright or use publishers; then extra marketing actually tends to help ⌠perhaps not in making a bad game suck less but more often allows it to sell enough copies to break even
No hype does not equate to no sales. Not at all! Itâs not even worth bothering to advertise medium-sized games in Game Dev Tycoon. They sell well enough, and advertising costs are a pain. The extra sales you get are in that case only worthwhile if youâre trying to break a company sales record. Even once your company is established, itâs best for medium games to ride on the âfree hypeâ you get.
Your advice on Mature games has a problem with it, too. Mature is the best age-target for PC games and if youâre developing for the PC rather than another console itâs worth picking up the target market research as soon as possible to switch to Mature titles. I tend to focus there myself. I confess I discovered this by âroleplayingâ in the game - I like the idea of building a gaming company that courts scandal from the outset - but it turns out that it can be good business sense too.
As for marketing bad games, the worse a game is, the less hype you want it to have. The better the game is, the more hype you want it to have. Thatâs because hype directly magnifies the fans you gain (or lose) from a game. If your gameâs score is less than 6, hype is terrible for you, completely counterproductive. In any case, hype effects cap out at 500. Thereâs no benefit from having 600 hype that you donât already get a hundred points earlier. Spending too much on advertising just narrows your profit margins without further effect.
Finally, Iâve never seen a perfect 10 game be unprofitable without a perfect storm of bad production decisions. You have to overmarket it, target a bad console, AND target the wrong audience. Any two of those is insufficient to steal the profits from a 10-scorer. Game Dev Tycoon rewards its legends.
