Tips for a successful game dev

[HonoluluBoy]

I've played through the game 3 times, my 3rd playthorugh I'm at 2018 and my company has +300Million in cash. Here are a few tips to help others out.

Don't over expand too quickly, its easy to go into debt early off and lose the game. I've found that 4 staff is enough to get the company profitable early on.

The key to your income is game sales (duh). I've found that you should do atleast one or two updates to a new game (right after completing development). This tends to bump the sales or keep them going. You should do this before developing your next game, as the development cycle tends to be a bit long and usually your last games sales are petering out by the time you finish the next game. Too late! Gotta smash those bugs and update copy protection on all games right after develpment. I used this technique all the way to 2018 and games sales have been very good!

Another tip I've found is don't spend valuable money early on to develop an engine. Save that for later with you've got money to burn and want to build your own specialty games & boost your porfit. Just buy the early engines and save the features research for later in the game when you can afford to build your own engine.

Training! As soon as you have some breathing room and aren't sweating to pay the rent, start a training room. Start out small with two desks and rotate your staff in there. It makes a big difference, as your games will start to be rad with the increased skills of you dudes.

Let me know your thoughts!

[nerdistmonk]

hehe i usually end a game with 2 billion dollars myself. :D

[james64468]

Here is my problem I gain fans to quickly. I end up with a customer support group. In the first garage thing that you start off in. How do you keep from gaining so many fans that you need customer support.

[nerdistmonk]

Originally posted by james64468:

Here is my problem I gain fans to quickly. I end up with a customer support group. In the first garage thing that you start off in. How do you keep from gaining so many fans that you need customer support.

Make lousy games? :D thats sure to run off fans, otherwise if its that big of a problem, simply ignore them, you can always get them back later.

If your doing good enough to get so many fans, its likely time to get a nicer place to work from i would say.

[HonoluluBoy]

I don't believe gaining fans too quickly is much of a problem. Even if the support face is unhappy, the more fans you have, the bigger the game sales. I didn't even bother with building a fan support until mid or later game. All it really does anyhow is give you more fans at the cost of money. I feel the money is better spent on always attending the convention and going for the largest space you can afford.

[nerdistmonk]

Originally posted by HonoluluBoy:

I don't believe gaining fans too quickly is much of a problem. Even if the support face is unhappy, the more fans you have, the bigger the game sales. I didn't even bother with building a fan support until mid or later game. All it really does anyhow is give you more fans at the cost of money. I feel the money is better spent on always attending the convention and going for the largest space you can afford.

Idk i usually make enough money that it doesn't matter anymore, also i only go for the biggest building if i need it for publishing, and since i hate dealing with publishing that means i stay in one of the mid-size buildings.

[Doofus]

Wow, good to see a real community devoted to this game, discussing strategies and such! Very cool.

[Ephasius]

5 billion by end 2014 and own all other developers. Don't produce your own games. not worth it for space and capacity. Dev rooms should have at least 6 desks. Always make 2-3 patches for games. Build your own engines from time to time to enable you to make the best games. You should rarely get a review below 90%. I've had 98% plus sticking with the 3 star areas i'm strongest in. Ignore trends. Ensure you have in each dev room the strongest skills possible from each category ie a really strong designer, developer, sound guy, graphics etc. Once training starts place 6 desks and recruit 6 members of staff. Train them up in all skils except office to 70+. Place a new dev room and get to work. They should be working onstantly. Ultimately you want a games factory in full motion. Once MMOs come up switch to MMOs every single release. You can choose two types ie RPG, strategy etc. Your game engine you should release every 3 upgrades or so. Obviously for research focus on technology first. Your games should have the primary type the same as your engines optimisation. The other can be anything. Be creative lol.

[Ephasius]

Originally posted by james64468:

Here is my problem I gain fans to quickly. I end up with a customer support group. In the first garage thing that you start off in. How do you keep from gaining so many fans that you need customer support.

Jmes - Fans are good. Get some guys with office skills and train them a couple of times then put in customer support. Even with 1-2 million fans you'll probably find 6 desks of near 100 skill office workers will do the job.

[odetojamie]

dont mess up

[HonoluluBoy]

:D