Or the full title ‘Why my first game will not be an instant success and why I am okay with it’.
If you have been following me on my blog or social media, you will have noticed that I have been working on a game called Retool. Retool is a game about altering electronic items by rewiring them to other items using computers. I am making this game, and any other future game I will make in the future, because I enjoy it. Making games allows me to be creative. It allows me to create a whole universe where I can say what the laws of nature are. To a certain extent, it allows me to become a God.
Yet not everyone gets into games to become creative and bring their vision alive. Some people get into games to make money. There is nothing wrong with that. Even I would like to make some money from my game. But if I don’t, it wouldn’t be the worst thing to happen to me. I will still continue to make games.
The individuals, or groups, whose main goal is to make money from games either emulate games that are already successful in the market (Call of Duty, Clash of Titans, etc.) or they do it because they think it is easy to create an indie hit game (Thomas Was Alone, Braid, FEZ, etc.). When these people/groups release their game and their sales/IAP/advertising is making less than they expected, they usually get down, and sometimes never return to make another game. This is because they expected their games to make at least as much as money as the games they were inspired by.
I don’t have this expectation. My goal with Retool is to make enough money to cover the development costs and the time I put towards the game. If I broke-even with Retool, I will count that as a success. The reason I don’t expect my game to become an instant success is that I lack one thing that other developers have, experience. Most independent developers have been working in the games industry professionally or have been making games for over a decade. Some also have been working in the games industry but not developing games (press). With all of this access to game development, these individuals, or groups of individuals, have gained valuable experience about game development.
I only started to make games in mid-2013. Before this, I would just play games. Not caring about how they work but if I was enjoying myself or not. I did not know where to go if I wanted to start making games, what I need to consider before making a game, or how long it even takes to make a game. Whilst I am making my first game I am learning lots and gaining valuable experience. All the experience and knowledge I will have gained, I will use it in my second game, which will make my second game at least 100x more better than my first game. That is not to say that my first game will be bad. That is just to say that I don’t expect my first game to be an instant success. But I do dream about it becoming an instant success.