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Review of 2009

Review of 2009
3rd Feb 2010 - 06:42	by sneeze
I said early last month I wanted to write a review of 2009. Here it is! The money Firstly, I may as well start with the money - from 1 Jan to 31 Dec 2009 (this doesn't include computer repairs). Outgoings: £931.16 The outgoings include ongoing server costs, which amount to about £550 (including domains), and a new laptop at £330 and a printer at £40. The server costs, obviously, will occur every year. I hope the laptop costs won't, but there'll always be incidental costs. I've also spent some money on art materials and books, although that's not much. Income: £4020.49 This is almost entirely from adverts: either Google AdSense, MochiAds or Kongregate. Roughly £3000 of this is Mochi, Kongregate is about £650 and Google about £350. The Kongregate includes about £250 in prize money, the rest is revenue share. So. Last year I made a profit of about £3000. My total costs are about £7000, including both living and business expenses. This isn't all that great, but actually doesn't tell the whole picture. For example, in last three months of 2009, I recieved more than £1100 from Mochi; in the first three months I recieved just £70. AdSense is more damning: £240 from the last three months, and £0 from the first three. Of the three incomes, only Kongregate is falling currently. All in all, these are very positive figures. I am pretty certain now that, bar a catastrophe, this year will be see me earn more than enough to live on from the games alone. What went wrong I'll think about what went wrong first. It's very simple what went wrong: The games. If I look back on the year, there have been two successful games and two moderate successes. The successful games are Qilox and Colourshift, both of which I wrote in 2008. The moderate successes are Blue Lighter Cult, which while not a huge income, didn't take me a massive amount of time and achieved it's goals, and Stonewall, which again I wrote in 2008. So of all the games I produced last year, the only real success is Blue Lighter Cult. The other major games - Mobster, Rhymetime and Spaceman: Prelude - really didn't do well. Even 52 card pickup, which I wrote entirely as a joke, has done better than some of these. I didn't even publicly release Mobster. When I look at it all, though, I started a lot of projects that went nowhere last year, and spent too much time on ones that weren't going anywhere. I've had a go at tower defence games, world conquest games and match 3 games, but not produced any results, and I've not made the best of my shooter engine or thought how to improve my CCG. I spent ages on Rhymetime, which I could have known was too quirky to do well (I do like the game, though, and I'm quite proud of it). Whereas the few card games I did last year are chugging along nicely, and Blue Lighter Cult is a useful engine which I really need to get on with using for another couple of games for Busy Slacker. So what I need to improve here is my motivation and work ethic, as well as my approach. I need to have a complete game in mind rather than an engine, and I need to not waste time when I know something isn't going to be great - get it out of the door, and get on with the next thing. All easier said than done, but it's good to think about. The other minor disappointment, that is related to my failure to produce another decent game, is that Red Tower Games is not particularly successful. It needs a constant stream of visitors, and that needs new games that are on the big websites. Currently, it makes less than 50p a day, and it takes me at least a couple of hours a week to run. I've scaled down the time a bit on that though! What went right I'll not mention Qilox and Colourshift, since they're mainly 2008 work. There is one -big- success this year: Rosamund's Bower. Rosamund's Bower is currently making me about £4 a day. It's not much, but this is for, ultimately, no work at all. It also massively increases the value of my card games as I produce them - even if they're not massively successful individually, as a whole they make the website work. The API on RB is another good feature - people really do come back to my site. And while there's not much communication between people at the moment (the forum is pretty dead) there is a lot of competition for the highest scores on some games. Rosamund's Bower is worth my putting time into to improve or advertise; people use the site. It currently has about 3000 visitors a day. It also pays for my server costs! It also reinforces some work I did last year: the card game engine. That has consistently made it easy for me to write new games. I currently have 29 patience games, and almost all of them have hundreds of plays a day; in total usually more than Colourshift. Each (past the first) has taken me less than three hours to write - I have more of a problem finding and learning a new game to write than actually writing it! Even Red Tower Games, although not really earning its keep at the moment, hasn't done too badly, and it does give me a good outlet for my unsponsored games. I've not mentioned Busy Slacker yet. I think that is something that has gone right, really. Although neither I nor ST make any money from it, I'm not really losing money from it either and, while it's only making a few cents a day, it takes time and internet presence to build up a comic. And a few more spot the difference games! If it all works out, it might make a bit of cash. If it doesn't, then it's definitely been fun. The final thing that went right was that I have vastly improved my programming and game design skills. In particular, in the last year I have finally used proper graphics in games, notably Rhymetime and Spaceman: Prelude. I know I'm not the worlds best artist, but I think I also know now that I can draw and I can make things look prettier. The overall polish level of my games currently is much higher than it was at the start of last year. Conclusions and Next Steps There are two obvious conclusions here. Firstly: Rosamund's Bower is a good thing and needs to be encouraged. I have some advertising options that are probably worthwhile. I need to continue to find and write patience games, and perhaps consider some more flowery patience games that are more appealing to a mainstream audience. I need to fix the API and think about adding features to the site. I can't spend too long on it, but a few hours a week will pay dividends. The second obvious thing is that I need to sort out my games. Last year was a disappointment; I didn't produce them properly. There simply was not enough direction, not enough actual releases and not enough single minded production of games (other than card games). So far this year I have produced one game already - it might not be a great game, but it's out there, complete, and I can work on another one. Who knows when I write my next Qilox? But I'll never get another one if I don't release things. One thing I have learnt last year, but not touched upon, is distribution of my games. Several of my older games have benefitted greatly this year by submission to new sites, Qilox on mindjolt being a case in point. I need to make sure that I don't just leave games by the wayside, even if I think they're not that great. They need to be out there, and you never know what might happen. So, there it is. One review of a year, and some thoughts for this year. With a bit of luck, next january (or february, knowing me), I'll have some much higher numbers to quote! One final thing: A big thank you to all of you who've played my games, given me feedback and used my sites. It's nice to know people enjoy what I do!

Replies: |1-10|

3rd Feb 2010 - 11:02	by Ding
That all looks very highly encouraging! I'm no mathematician or economist, but it's really good that the numbers going out are smaller than the ones coming in! Congratulations on an overall successful 2009! I've got a good feeling about 2010. :-)

3rd Feb 2010 - 12:55	by jansic
So what I need to improve here is my motivation and work ethic, as well as my approach. I need to have a complete game in mind rather than an engine, and I need to not waste time... I've been trying to avoid the engine trap, as described by this blog here, using this approach has helped quite a lot. On the wasting time front, my project is a bit bigger but I don't depend on the income, so I suppose I don't get that pressure. Maybe if I did I'd be done by now :)

3rd Feb 2010 - 13:51	by Jordax
That was a fascinating and entertaining blog entry. Maybe it's my secret love of business, but I liked hearing about your many successes, shortfalls and the lessons learned in between. I didn't realise you had quite so many projects on the go either. Hopefully this year will give you even more growth and profit. :)

4th Feb 2010 - 21:41	by Oliver
I think its a big well done overall. You are well on the way to being able to support yourself by doing some thing that you actually enjoy.