Orangepixel has published an interesting postmortem analysis of Meganoid 2017 ($3.99). It covers the gamut of the game’s development, the project’s genesis, and how it did on various platforms. The whole thing is worth a read, but what’s interesting is the talk about how, as a solo developer, Orangepixel needs a steady stream of income. And his games’ long-tail performance is rather importance. So, Meganoid in many ways was built around being a quick-to-completion game, but also something that could serve as the base of other games. For example, there’s a project Orangepixel has that he describes a “funny viking-style game" that runs on the same engine, with some new assets and content, it could serve as another interesting quick project to help make some money. This is how Orangepixel generally makes money: make games that can do okay on release, and then help sell them long-term through a large library and through promotions such as sales.

Meganoid is near the expected goal for $6500 in sale for the game as of the postmortem, with $6200 made, helping to provide a buffer for the development of Ashworld, which has some new video footage released recently:

A couple other aspects worth noting: iOS did the best for the game, with the Android falling in second, though early access may have played a role in the game’s performance there. Meanwhile, the PC version barely moved the needle as far as sales performance went. Also, the mixed reaction to the game in the press, such as here: it was game of the week but given three and a half stars by the perfidious Carter Dotson. Worth noting as always that it’s not always the best game that gets game of the week, just the most interesting/noteworthy/cat-filled game. Jared does write the articles normally, for sure. Also, that Carter Dotson is evil and you can’t trust him.

Read the Meganoid 2017 postmortem here.