What is the shelf life of Starscape?

[countingtoten]

I was reading an article, I think Death to the Games Industry (Long Live Games) in the escapist, saying that most games make 80% of their sales in the first two weeks. I was wondering how that compared to indie titles. Do people still buy starscape? Is there a trickle or the single person every couple of months? Also is there a chance sales might pick up if someone buys Mr. Robot, enjoys it, and checks out the Starscape demo?

I think that statistic is kind of crazy. There are only a select few games that I buy right when they come out.

[Poo Bear]

It's all about putting yourself in front of as many people as possible. Forget everything else. If you have the greatest game in the world and nobody knows about it then you wont sell anything.

Retail sales - a huge amount of interest generated around a game's launch blown out of all proportion using the awesome power of hard $$$. Everyone is geared up to go nuts over a game at launch (public included) and then like a pack of heyenas quickly move on to the next victim. So you get this huge enormous wave of sales and then 2-3 months later absolutely nothing, it isn't even in most shops so you couldn't buy it if you wanted to.

Indie sales - exactly the same but sadly only a faint reflection, take the same sales curve and pull it out until it is almost flat, then zoom in a 10000x, same familiar shape. You get the same launch buzz in micro, review sites, word of mouth on forums, etc. Then nothing (almost).

The big difference - we never pull the game from our "shop", sadly hardly anyone ever comes into our shop but the game is always there in pride of place and so it keeps on selling at a very low level until it stops working and/or loses all relevance with gaming culture. By updating the game you can prevent it losing relevance and keep it working.

Would having another product to sell help Starscape? Of course, having another launch brings a new wave of people to the site and rule 1 says "put yourself in front of people and they will buy". Now, they are here to buy something else so you wont sell as many as at the original starscape launch, but sales will go up. However, that only works if you still put the same effort into selling the old one too.

[countingtoten]

I forgot about the importance of reviews as advertising and tattooing release dates on your bicep. That's still disheartening.

[Japlish]

if you think games have shelf lives, then you are harming yourself.

art has no shelf life. realise that and you will realise there is more out there to experience and enjoy than you could hope for.

[Darth Dallas]

Its weird. The lemming experience that is. It doesn't always account for taste but sometimes it does

Invariably, when it comes to games (and one of the most recent threads highlights this about me), if I like something, I glom onto it. Chances are I'll still be playing games like Starscape when most people have moved on.

Speaking of Lemmings, remember that game? I miss it!

[Fost]

[Darth Dallas]

Its a shame there isn't an easy to use emulator or whatever. I guess something a little different than that where no matter the system, or OS your running, you could plug it in and it would work every time on a PC.

Oh well, consoles win out the most I guess, all you need is the console and the cartridge and your set. No fuss, no muss.

I was just thinking some more about my old games, if I could even get them to run, I guess that would answer the shelf life question (cause I'd be playing them right now). Too bad most of the time its a technological one. I mean, its never a question of wanting to play, its usually can you play?

*sniff* No Lemmings for me /*sniff*

[Fost]

WinUAE is the answer if you ask me. Lately, I'm playing some spectrum games through - it's actually cool that I can now save them, and so have a chance of completing a game like Knight Lore or (my personal favourite) Rana Rama. Back when they came out you had to leave the speccy on pause overnight if you wanted to take a break. I remember my friend got incredibly far in one game before his mum umplugged the computer to use the vacuum cleaner

Oddly enough, RanaRama has a somewhat similar structure to Starscape; perhaps I'm just seeing things like that now though...

[icarus]

[Darth Dallas]

[Magnulus]

I'm thinking Telltale did something smart on their hand with their episodical concept. The relatively short intervals between releases means that the average internet games consumer doesn't have time to forget about them before they come out with yet another release. It's an interesting concept to be sure, but one that is not always that simple to make happen.

Also, of course, you have expansion packs. That wouldn't work so well with only one artist on board, I can imagine, but here's an idea off the top of my head.

If you did get another artist to develop graphics for an expansion pack while Nick worked on the next big project, then it would actually be pretty cool if that artist had a distinct style from Nick's, which means you could basically, after a few games, maybe even market them as "Wossface's Expansion." if you know what I mean. I dunno. Maybe I'm just being weird. I just know that I am often more likely to purchase something with a name attached to it, even though I might not know that much about the person in question. Like "Sid Meier's Pirates!" sounds much more interesting than just "Pirates!". Let's say Nick made an expansion for Mr. Robot. It could be marketed as "Nick Tipping's Mrs. Robot!" or something like that. Just a thought. A poorly thought-out one, even.

[Fost]

[mowfax]

Answering a question from the first post...
Yes, people are still buying Starscape... at least I know that I did
Came to it through an interesting advertisement on Ctrl+Alt+Del, which I discovered quite recently, too.
I was quite impressed by the screenshots on the right side (I blame it on the bright colors ), and downloaded the demo right away. First thing that came to my mind when I got control over the first ship: "Aww damnit, just another Asteroids-Clone..." But I kept playing and was quite surprised. After the second 20min timeout I couldn't stand it and bought it

Btw, this is the first indie game I purchased in the end ( I played Darwinia before but it somhow didn't get me buyin' ) and I really love it! The price tag of 24,95$ didn't bother me at all (as sidekick to a thread in the starscape subforum).

I've still not beaten the game for the first time (casual gamer), but I would really like to upgrade to a CD Version of the game, I hope there will be some stock refill soon

I also have never seen such open and informative dev-diaries, so I was quite surprised here, too. Keep 'em coming

P.S. Hm... I don't know if all this stuff belongs here, but I had to express my enthusiasm somehow

[Fost]

[Magnulus]

Actually, come to think of it, Starscape was my own first indie title as well. After that followed Mount and Blade, Platypus, Oasis, Bone, Titan Attacks, Weird Worlds, etc etc etc. In a way, you guys are partly responsible for my upswing in indie purchases. I've bought more indie titles the last year than I've bought "industry" games in the last two or three years. Go Moonpod!

Either way, Fost, I think you'll agree that putting a good, long name in front of it makes it look a tad cooler, eh? Looks like an auteur-game.

Oh, and reworked cover art? Is there any way us previous customers could mayhaps download and print this for our own boxes? Just for the heck of it?

Just wondering; will Mr. Robot also be "printed" on regular green CD-roms, or will they actually be done in the... uh... what do I call it... "production-style" way with the clear surface? Not a big deal, really, just wondering. The fact that you have proper covers at all is enough for me.Titan Attacks was a home-burned CD in a paper sleeve with a dull black-on-white "Titan Attacks" printed on the CD. I almost always get physical versions whenever I order a game online, but with Puppygames, that's now out of the question. Thanks for caring about us collectors! Your game cover is wedged between WoW and Prince of Persia in my shelf. Titan Attacks is wedged between some backup CD and another backup CD somewhere in an anonymous pile. I really think that this makes a huge difference. Thanks again.