Are we that bad?

[Raneth]

I think a lot of this also come back to the dilemma of "unprofessional" made art, where we as consumer don't value it on the same level as art with big production behind it. For example; i read a lot of fanfiction, and have fund some that i would rate higher then any books i have read, yet i have not given a dime to those creators.

 

[megaplayboy10k]

Even a "minor" mass market game likely had 20+ people working on it for at least 6 months, with a budget in the high-six to low seven figure range. The biggest of them all have hundreds of experienced people working for 2-5 years, with a budget comparable to a blockbuster film. I don't think there's any adult game dev team capable of matching that, even on the low end. So, in that context, whatever they do come up with is impressive when it works.

 

[freedom.call]

Yes I think it's different for the big game houses, they obviously lose money for every pirate copy made.

 

[User_365148]

Sorry to break it to you all, but the exposure stuff is BS.
On patreon you have a little page that shows you where your traffic is coming from.
For me traffic from f95 never broke the top 50 sites. And from speaking with some mid tier devs, the story is the same.
I think you vastly over estimate the exposure one gets on this site.

Also on the exposure side. It's not like every game out there doesn't have a free download that's a couple of versions older. I don't see why the latest version of your game has to be out here for people to get an idea if they like it or not.

It's hard to say how big an impact this site has in terms of how many people would put up some cash if they couldn't get it for free. But we can gauge the positive impact in terms of publicity. And that's negligible.

 

[Raneth]

Sorry to break it to you all, but the exposure stuff is BS.
On patreon you have a little page that shows you where your traffic is coming from.
For me traffic from f95 never broke the top 50 sites. And from speaking with some mid tier devs, the story is the same.
I think you vastly over estimate the exposure one gets on this site.

Also on the exposure side. It's not like every game out there doesn't have a free download that's a couple of versions older. I don't see why the latest version of your game has to be out here for people to get an idea if they like it or not.

It's hard to say how big an impact this site has in terms of how many people would put up some cash if they couldn't get it for free. But we can gauge the positive impact in terms of publicity. And that's negligible.

fair enuff, what are the top sites?

 

[User_365148]

fair enuff, what are the top sites?

Reddit
Google
Patreon

 

[Raneth]

Reddit
Google
Patreon

maybe i should one day give reddit a chance

 

[DarthSeduction]

Sorry to break it to you all, but the exposure stuff is BS.
On patreon you have a little page that shows you where your traffic is coming from.
For me traffic from f95 never broke the top 50 sites. And from speaking with some mid tier devs, the story is the same.
I think you vastly over estimate the exposure one gets on this site.

Also on the exposure side. It's not like every game out there doesn't have a free download that's a couple of versions older. I don't see why the latest version of your game has to be out here for people to get an idea if they like it or not.

It's hard to say how big an impact this site has in terms of how many people would put up some cash if they couldn't get it for free. But we can gauge the positive impact in terms of publicity. And that's negligible.

What about links from your game itself? I mean, we released our game for free on patreon, and I advertised it on reddit, it's on svs and a few other pirate sites, but we have analytics showing how many people followed from the game to our patreon, and it's high. Reddit probably has a higher number of people who might be willing to pay than a piracy site, but as a person who wasn't really playing games at all till I found this site I'm gonna have to disagree with you based on the evidence we have.

 

[User_365148]

What about links from your game itself? I mean, we released our game for free on patreon, and I advertised it on reddit, it's on svs and a few other pirate sites, but we have analytics showing how many people followed from the game to our patreon, and it's high. Reddit probably has a higher number of people who might be willing to pay than a piracy site, but as a person who wasn't really playing games at all till I found this site I'm gonna have to disagree with you based on the evidence we have.

You can't tell where they got the game from, if it's a link from the game itself.
And given the number of pirate sites out there. F95 isn't even the biggest one, I don't think. It's a bit much to assign that traffic to it.
You're making an assumption. That's not evidence.

 

[DarthSeduction]

You can't tell where they got the game from, if it's a link from the game itself.
And given the number of pirate sites out there. F95 isn't even the biggest one, I don't think. It's a bit much to assign that traffic to it.
You're making an assumption. That's not evidence.

As far as I've heard, from Sam, I believe, we get more traffic than Newgrounds. So unless SVS can compete with that, we're definitely getting much more traffic than you think.

 

[Dr PinkCake]

Sorry to break it to you all, but the exposure stuff is BS.
On patreon you have a little page that shows you where your traffic is coming from.
For me traffic from f95 never broke the top 50 sites. And from speaking with some mid tier devs, the story is the same.
I think you vastly over estimate the exposure one gets on this site.

Also on the exposure side. It's not like every game out there doesn't have a free download that's a couple of versions older. I don't see why the latest version of your game has to be out here for people to get an idea if they like it or not.

It's hard to say how big an impact this site has in terms of how many people would put up some cash if they couldn't get it for free. But we can gauge the positive impact in terms of publicity. And that's negligible.

I'm a new dev, but I can tell you I get 100% of the traffic (and patrons) from f95zone as the first version was released here. It only shows as "Patreon" in my stats, likely cause they either clicked the link in my game after playing it or typed the address after playing it. You cannot trust those metrics blindly I believe.
Where do you get your exposure from if I may ask? Patreon are hiding our games from the public eye. I'm genuinely interested in knowing how you market your game.

 

[Dr PinkCake]

Only the short ones. :happyblush I have no problem with it tbh, but people want to try a little more before supporting.

Yes of course, they should. Note to self, release v0.0.2 as the first version for the next game.

 

[User_365148]

As far as I've heard, from Sam, I believe, we get more traffic than Newgrounds. So unless SVS can compete with that, we're definitely getting much more traffic than you think.

Sorry to break it to you. There is more than one way to tell the traffic a site gets. But MOZ is considered pretty reliable
F95

You must be registered to see the links

Newgrounds

You must be registered to see the links

Doesn't even come close.

 

[Raneth]

Yes of course, they should. Note to self, release v0.0.2 as the first version for the next game.

i legit don't download games with "V0.1" or rpgm as a tag

 

[Dr PinkCake]

i legit don't download games with "V0.1" or rpgm as a tag

Haha rpgm makes me shudder too. But there are of course exceptions to the rule.

 

[Raneth]

Sorry to break it to you. There is more than one way to tell the traffic a site gets. But MOZ is considered pretty reliable
F95

You must be registered to see the links

Newgrounds

You must be registered to see the links

Doesn't even come close.

you are gonna have to explain that one, don't know what it means

 

[User_365148]

I'm a new dev, but I can tell you I get 100% of the traffic (and patrons) from f95zone as the first version was released here. It only shows as "Patreon" in my stats, likely cause they either clicked the link in my game after playing it or typed the address after playing it. You cannot trust those metrics blindly I believe.
Where do you get your exposure from if I may ask? Patreon are hiding our games from the public eye. I'm genuinely interested in knowing how you market your game.

We can't trust those metrics, you say. Well, which should we trust?
No one is saying they are perfect. But they are the best we have. So unless you have some different metrics, outside of saying that you released the first version here, therefore all your patrons must come from here. Which doesn't follow. From here I'm sure it spread to other sites.

As far as marketing, I don't do any. I don't do this for a living. It's mostly patrons putting my links up on reddit and the like.

 

[Raneth]

Haha rpgm makes me shudder too. But there are of course exceptions to the rule.

No! rpgm/vx/mx/2000 is bad and they should feel bad , a friend once talk about making a (non-porn) game in rpgm, were upon i promised him i would write it in fucking LISP if he didn't.

 

[DarthSeduction]

Sorry to break it to you. There is more than one way to tell the traffic a site gets. But MOZ is considered pretty reliable
F95

You must be registered to see the links

Newgrounds

You must be registered to see the links

Doesn't even come close.

You must be registered to see the links

k but your data doesn't give me solid numbers for it's actual traffic, just sites that were linking to it. This is giving actual numbers.

 

[Dr PinkCake]

We can't trust those metrics, you say. Well, which should we trust?
No one is saying they are perfect. But they are the best we have. So unless you have some different metrics, outside of saying that you released the first version here, therefore all your patrons must come from here. Which doesn't follow. From here I'm sure it spread to other sites.

As far as marketing, I don't do any. I don't do this for a living. It's mostly patrons putting my links up on reddit and the like.

Sure I get that. However, I know that all of my traffic originates from here as it literally went from zero to 20-30 patrons within a few days of releasing it here while having it a patron only post on patreon (I had zero patrons/followers so this was the only source). Also, I only had the discord general community link in my signature here and most of those people happen to be patrons.
Of course it will spread to other sites eventually, but to say that this site is not useful for attracting patrons is just wrong.
But you are free to believe what you want. It will of course vary from game to game.