[newobj]

Thanks Rand!

1) It obviously varies w/ each dev's situation, but I think your sense of the value prop is a fair default one w/o context. In my case, there were four reasons: 1) having a partner to help with (to me) "the unknown unknowns" (i'm only a dev and a novice designer, literally anything else would be my first time doing it, so i figured having an experienced partner there would be wise) 2) the advance was nice just from a "bird in the hand" mindset 3) they helped me connect with a really good artist (critical to the project's success imho) 4) having a big name behind you can't hurt, and bigger publishers do have more relationships with the ecosystem (streamers, platforms, etc) to help your game succeed.

2) EA is appropriate for certain kinds of games. But I knew exactly what Ballionaire was going to be, and felt it could be achieved in a year. I knew that this mechanical space was going to be rapidly saturated, once all the games inspired by LBAL (including Balatro!) started appearing. So I was determined to get the game out before that happened, which set a certain scope and pace, obviating EA.

3) The trailers were a really good promotional tool, very effective. But most of the paid promotion was sponsored streams, not traditional "marketing" (ads). I think the game has a natural tendency for organic spread, due to its fun/simple premise, watchability/streamability, low price point, and so on. It's just an easy game to see, and say "ooh, I wanna try!" because it's instantly understood how to play, and IMHO is very inviting aesthetically.

My takeaway: Make sure your hook is glowingly radioactively good. Don't overbalance. Leave in some jank. Scope down and finish quickly. And avoid tropes. Stand out. (Of course this only works for a certain kind of game!)

[randfish]

"Make sure your hook is glowingly radioactively good. Don't overbalance. Leave in some jank. Scope down and finish quickly. And avoid tropes. Stand out."

Sounds like outstanding advice. I hope we can follow in your footsteps! (and thanks for the kind and comprehensive answer)

[mikeshi42]

Honestly sounds like good advice for almost anything new/creative :)

[Apofis]

How far were you into building the game before you began to approach publishers? YC speaks frequently about investing in the founders, and not the idea---but then dives right into well you need to have revenue and/or users and it's a bit of a double-standard---so I'm curious what stage you were at when you started talking to publishers and what state your product was in when you finally signed a deal.

[gcheong]

I'm curious about this as well so I took a look at the publisher's site and found some info: https://rawfury.com/talk/ under "Game Pitches". Would still like to hear from OP on any specifics though.

[JansjoFromIkea]

RE: "Make sure your hook is glowingly radioactively good. Don't overbalance. Leave in some jank. Scope down and finish quickly. And avoid tropes. Stand out."

For games with a limited run time is it possible to balance this against Steam's 2 hour return policy? Feel like we're now trapped in a position where you can make short little proof of concepts on itch but when it comes to trying to make something professional you have to bloat it in a way to minimise people abusing that.

[pc86]

This is very much personal opinion but if you can blast through all of a games content within 2 hours of purchase it wasn't finished / big enough to justify a financial transaction in the first place.

[tristor]

My PM perspective on this is that games are dominating the media market primarily because they are a good value proposition in our tightening economy. I think a good thing to shoot for is around 2 hours of game play per dollar spent, e.g. make it so that it's an absolute no-brainer for a customer to buy your game vs going to a movie. Replayability is a major aspect of this, look at how many hours people spent on LBAL and Vampire Survivors despite both having relatively simple mechanics.

[xvector]

How many people really would abuse the return policy like that? I can't imagine it's that many.

[acomms]

In your case, what do you think your glowing hook was?

[TomK32]

"Don't overbalance" is an invitation for Spiffing Brit to play yet another perfectly balanced game :-)