Wishing you the best of luck for the mobile launch, so that all the deserved numbers get boosted up~! :D

I also hope it goes well on mobile for you.

I think the initial price in Early Access was too cheap. The amount of content is amazing and I would have been happy to pay more for the game. I do think a modest discount for people who are willing to take a chance on Early Access is merited though, I've bought a few EA games that appear to have been abandoned. Maybe 25 - 35% less as an EA discount.

GW

I'm really surprised and pleased with how open you are about sharing your journey through Early Access, particularly when it comes to purchase totals and revenue. I'm a little saddened that your game didn't fair better in Canada, but I'm glad to have contributed to our country's purchase numbers. Your passion never wavered throughout the development process, and I think that shows through with your final product. I hope your sales on mobile provide you a steady source of income, as I'd hate to see you leave the PC market due to lower profits.

Thank you for sharing this piece of information.

I have played the demo and I like it. I wish I had tried the demo during Early Access. I was very hesitant to try the game, because I was burnt a few times with PC games which were built for mobile, and I was concerned that your previous game was only available for mobile devices. If I had played the demo back then, I would have snatched it for cheap (I am that kind of guy ). This is a seriously polished piece of work! Congrats!

Edit: Actually, the demo was only added this month. I should have bought the game and used the refund window to ensure that it was not a game solely designed for mobile. Anyway, that is my lesson for today: use the means available to you to learn and make the wisest decisions.

https://steamdb.info/sub/486515/history/

Interesting to read! I do believe mobile version have loads of potential, it really fits so nicely on a mobile screen!

@malcolmmackay224 - Probably slightly too cheap, but I felt bad going too much higher considering it was missing 3 out of 5 heroes and the daily challenge mode. Maybe a *bit* more would've made sense.

@SexyPanther - I definitely plan to continue with the PC market for my next game! There are two things that are really unique and fun for me. 1) PC has a lot more streamers / content creators, and that's a great way to build visibility and support 2) PC has more of a 'scrappy' culture, where people are more willing to play early / cutting edge builds (that may be less stable) compared to mobile.

@Wok - The demo is very new, yeah. I ran out of time to complete it during Early Access but recently went back to it because we needed a demo build for TapTap (an app store in China). And yeah - I totally get the 'made for mobile' thing on PC. The earliest builds I think were mobile 'mobile' but I got a lot of good feedback to help improve the PC version and make it feel more natural. I'm pretty with where we ended up on both versions!

Друзья, это лучшая игра в которую я играл за последние пару лет. Оформление, задумка, сюжет. Спасибо вам.
По моему мнению, единственное, чего не хватает - интерактивного Крамита (Что бы его можно было тыкать мышкой и он возмущался).

Thanks for sharing stats!
Been wondering about these sorta things.
Really awesome of you, thanks.

Originally posted by slothwerks:

@malcolmmackay224 - Probably slightly too cheap, but I felt bad going too much higher considering it was missing 3 out of 5 heroes and the daily challenge mode. Maybe a *bit* more would've made sense.

@SexyPanther - I definitely plan to continue with the PC market for my next game! There are two things that are really unique and fun for me. 1) PC has a lot more streamers / content creators, and that's a great way to build visibility and support 2) PC has more of a 'scrappy' culture, where people are more willing to play early / cutting edge builds (that may be less stable) compared to mobile.

@Wok - The demo is very new, yeah. I ran out of time to complete it during Early Access but recently went back to it because we needed a demo build for TapTap (an app store in China). And yeah - I totally get the 'made for mobile' thing on PC. The earliest builds I think were mobile 'mobile' but I got a lot of good feedback to help improve the PC version and make it feel more natural. I'm pretty with where we ended up on both versions!

Quick question, while I love indie companies and seeing great games come from them I always questioned the revenue and you are the first to actually talk about it. In creating this game my question is from the money you earned vs the amount of hours vs the amount of people working on the game would you say it was profit?

@ocatagon: Profitable - yes and no. I think it'll be profitable longer term, as it reaches more platforms. Collaborators (art, sound, writing) are paid royalties based on a % of the sales. What expenses we did have I funded out of pocket, but that wasn't too significant during development and the main cost is of course time.

Of the current ~$50,000 in money we've seen since Early Access, if you take out all the royalties for art, etc... and publisher share (for the Chinese release), let's put a rough estimate that $25,000 is paid out to collaborators, and $25,000 would go towards the game design, programming, customer support, etc... that I personally put into it. At 1800 hours, that would be $14/hour - almost minimum wage.

However, that number does look a lot better when you consider additional platforms (iOS and Android), as well as future Steam sales - as we've never run any type of big discount for Krumit's Tale. I'd imagine that iOS and Android will at least equal if not exceed Steam. The other consideration is that the royalties can last for years, even with minimal support. My previous game on iOS / Android, Meteorfall: Journeys, still does about $45k annual revenue, and that's on top of the revenue from Krumit's Tale.

Ultimately, whether that's profitable depends on your perspective. It's certainly less that I could make with a full-time job as a programmer at a real studio, but it *is* a lot of fun and I'm very proud of what we built. I don't think it's enough to live off of in a HCOL area, or to sustain a proper studio, but I think the ROI is pretty good for what we put in, especially considering the long tail of royalties.

Slothwerks, how easy do you think it'd be for a fairly clever newbie to make a semi-decent small Unity game? (With a small amount of modding and programming knowledge behind them.)
(Feel free to add in variables and factor them in, if need be. Or to say: "Really hard to say. Can't answer properly.")

@Thos - I think it wouldn't be too hard! None of the technical challenges in Krumit's Tale were particularly difficult or used any advanced features of Unity.

I do know a lot of people find Unity intimidating. I think it's great, but it does have a learning curve initially. Some people prefer to start with Gamemaker or Godot, although I still think Unity is great because it's so widely used, and helps you build a very portable skillset.

The best decision I made was to find an artist I could work with. The different between a $10k game and a $100k is often the art. There are some exceptions, but screenshots are what get attention and you need a game that looks good in screenshots. (Not so much an issue if you're interested in just personal projects, learning, game jam, etc... - but if you want to sell games)

The other really important factor is just time. It's easy to make a 80% complete game but it's really hard to complete the last 20%. I spent a lot of time in the weeks leading up to release working on marketing banners, sending out emails, fixing obscure and difficult bugs, and doing stuff that a lot of developers generally find un-fun. You need a lot of dedication to get through that last 20%.

Most of my advice here is if you want to make and *sell* games. If you just want to make some games or learn Unity for fun, then yeah - I think it's pretty easy to get started in Unity. There are plenty of tutorials these days to help people get started with it.

There is definitely a big gap between making a game and being able to sell a game.

To be able to sell, I would add that you need a good game concept/design. Indeed, I see many games which do not innovate much, and it is obvious that the dev is learning as he is doing. Well, I bet sales for these games are not good, because players notice that lack of purpose.

A game concept is not sufficient. There are also decent looking games which fail totally. For instance, this game has ZERO review, although it was released in 2015 and looks kind of decent (not as enticing as Krumit ):
https://store.steampowered.com/app/331460/ROOMS_The_Toymakers_Mansion/

Can I share my experience? I used GameMaker Studio 2 to remake the 30-year-old classic Japanese game, Shisensho Solitaire (different to the dozens of Mahjong solitaire games available) and put it on Steam in October 2019.

Since then, I’ve sold about 830 copies, mostly during sales when it’s only 50 cents. So far, I’ve had one payout which, after bank transfer fees, didn’t even cover the cost of putting the game on Steam.

Since it was just a hobby project, I’m not too bothered, and I’m grateful that the reviews are all positive and people are enjoying the game.