This is a letter to developers, he's not actually telling you that you HAVE to do anything. He says "please" and he says "I would ask you", he's not forcing you to do anything. He's not doing it to be your boss or to order you around, he's doing it because it's stuff he wants to see in the games he plays. I don't know why everyone is having such a hard time even considering advice and tips from a non-developer. This kind of "ad hominem" attitude is seriously BAD for everyone. As developers, we've gotta listen to our users more than anyone else, especially the ones who seem to have a good sense of what they like and dislike. He brought up a bunch of valid points, so let's debate those instead of just whining about the way they were delivered.
@ElectricGrandpa: You're right. The poster probably had good intentions, and I hope that the points he's made are considered by every developer here. All I am pointing out is that the advice could have been given in a more respectful manner. In fact, more developers might have been inclined to listen, if it was. These words are not what I would consider a polite suggestion. The use of phrases like "every game needs" and "MUST include" are authoritative statements on something the author appears to consider completely mandatory. Having said "please" in some other part of the letter does not make these statements polite.
I've received a few requests for profiles, so it's pretty high on my priorities list now. I think this is an interesting example of what we're discovering the iPad market will be. A family shared computing device.
Feature requests are great. In any healthy IT industry, when the customer asks you to do more, they usually understand that asking the developer to do more work equals additional compensation for the extra trouble. Which one of the features requested are worth a dollar? Is profile support so important that the developer can ask $1.99 instead of $0.99? Can the developer charge $2.99 instead of $0.99 if they implement profiles and virtual joystick customization? This isn't greed, it's simple survival: let's say you can make a game in three months with a small team, and the overall costs of development are $45 000. Now you need to sell about 70 000 copies to make back the development costs. Adding "a few simple requests" means designing each feature and how it fits into the game structure, coding it, testing it, fixing the issues, testing again until being reasonably convinced that it works as expected. Adding four simple things can easily take four weeks of development, now making the game cost $60k to finish for the same team. It now needs to sell 90k copies to break even at the price point of $0.99. Are the requested features so compelling that 20 000 more people will buy the game? Which features allow the developer to raise the price, meaning only 45k people are required to buy the game to break even? Let's not forget that the goal of any game is not just to make back development costs, but to generate profit so the company can become more stable, grow, and make better games in the future.
This was my point, only I hadn't written it so eloquently. I will certainly add profiles to my iPad games should I feel like it is the type of game that would benefit from that, but I can't imagine it ever being worth it for me on the iPhone.
It's curious why iTunes doesn't allow developers to charge for updates. In a one dollar market it would definitely make sense.
If you wanted to charge for an update you could only really get away with charging for additional content so it may as well be done via DLC. Charging for bug fixes would have the pitchforks out in no time
The guidelines forbid you to provide binary updates via DLC, it's all just game data. There is a difference between a bug fix, obviously you wouldn't charge for those, and an update that adds new features. Apple charges for iPod OS updates, but developers can't charge for their additional work... don't you find that inconvenient?
If Apple allowed devs to charge for updates, you'll definitely have some people not wanting to pay for an update. Then you probably end up with 70% w/ v1.0 and 30% w/ 1.1. Now if I want to push out v1.2 to fix a bug, I now have multiple versions to worry about. If I push out a paid v1.3, it'll splinter even further. There are a lot of people that don't even get the free updates, probably a lot less will get a paid update. I've gotten bug reports for things that were fixed 2 versions ago. DLC is definitely the way to go to charge for an "update".
What you just described is a normal software market. If you don't want Photoshop CS5, you don't buy it and stick with your current version. You as a developer are perfectly free to choose when to drop support for older versions. It is a matter of communicating it clearly to your customers. Nobody is forcing you to support obsolete versions of your software. Again, DLC does not allow you to distribute code changes or new features. It only allows you sell additional game data.
Have you been rejected for an update that introduced a new feature as DLC? I haven't tried yet, but have been thinking about doing it. If you want to do what Photoshop CS5 does, why not do this? Spin CS1 Spin CS2 Spin CS3 etc. For users that want the upgrade, buy Spin CS3. Continue with version upgrades for free for the various versions until you decide to drop it. Why ask for a new feature to charge for upgrades? Is it purely to keep the old ratings and reviews? It won't be relevant to the new version anyway. There is the unknown that Apple will reject each of the new version though for duplicate functionality.
It may work if the update is delivered free, but features are unlocked via the DLC interface. My point earlier is that you cannot download additional binary code as DLC. You don't really want to clutter up your software offerings with multiple versions. The customers would have a hell of a time trying to figure out which to buy. And the big difference between Photoshop and iTunes is that Adobe can stop selling the old version, and then you just won't find it on the shop shelves anymore. Pulling a title from iTunes would provoke a much more hostile reaction since people couldn't re-download what they've bought anymore.
Fair enough. I wonder about the psychological difference between "paying to download the update" vs "already updated, but need to pay to unlock". I think the latter will piss off a lot more customers. Take the game profiles example. A dev can update the code so it offers multiple profiles, but only allow 1 profile unless the player pays 99c. This achieves price segmentation, but will probably result in a lot of negative reviews. All the lower star ratings may not be worth the higher revenue. (Probably not too high to begin with) As far as paid upgrades, point taken. But I don't think there's a clean way for Apple to implement it so it's easy and intuitive to the customer.
Upscaled often also means that graphics have to be redone. When you speak to the developers, you not only speak to the programmers, but also to the artists. When making new graphics, they may need to add a lot of new details or completely rework everything. Don't even think about saying that's easy. What do you have against developers trying to release their applications at certain times of the year? There IS a difference between the amount of people who buy your app at Christmas and the amount of people who buy your app at any meaningless day of the year. Guess how many people get an iPod touch for Christmas. They start browsing the app store, and the chance for impulsive buys is much higher. Again, setting down the price at the right time might increase your income. Don't just think about the customer. You risk forgetting what effort the developers put into their apps. Also, releasing an app with basic functionality and adding content in later updates is not bad! It's not like the app is totally useless! And if it is, why do you buy it? Think about Pocket God. At the beginning, what you could do with the app was VERY limited, BUT you could have some fun with it (only for a few minutes, but that goes with any entertainment app...). Now this app probably contains the most content any entertainment app for .99 ever had. Other example: Red Conquest. The initial version had only roughly 25% of the content that is planned for the last update. Right now, only the first content update is out, which means it's about 50% done. And even before this first update it already was the most polished and well-done RTS game that ever existed on the App Store. Ask any owner of the game. No one will tell you that he/she would have appreciated it if the dev would have "finished" making the game and released it a year later. That's my 0.2 cent.
As a developer, I think the OP makes some good points. I'm not sure why everyone here is so sensitive about it. The subject even states it is a Plea, I don't see the soapbox here that everyone else is seeing. I think it's good to encourage this type of discussion, and not beat the guy down for not following correct feature request protocols in his verbiage. In the context of typical user feedback received via iTunes, I found this post to be markedly more useful. Personally I agree wholeheartedly with the virtual stick and profile suggestions, at least in terms of not assuming a single user. If developers hadn't gotten there yet with their own thinking, pointing this out could very well be useful feedback for them. As for the value question, it's not just a matter of charging more money or not to add these features, but also the penalty you pay for not including them, which could be poor user reviews. The iPad is a new beast and a new market, and figuring out how best to address it is in every developers best interest.
I'm personally glad to see your response, Venan. I also felt it was a quite reasonable "plea" (as it was denoted in the title) to developers. And I am a bit surprised seeing the responses, particularly from some who are against customer-requests when it means a loss of their time. I think this is the first industry where I've ever heard, "I'm not making enough money to make it worth my while." I've run product-based businesses, and I have quite a bit of experience making money from them, and that previous statement just sounds crazy to me. I can't help but get the impression that a lot of the developers who posted negatively in this thread are maybe unfamiliar with running a business. There is something I learned early on with my companies — there is one most important component of a business. Something that dwarfs every other element to the point of barely even mattering. A single thing that every business will either live or die by… It is your customers. They are the only cog in this big, huge machine where any money can ever come from, making them infinitely valuable and precious. If you can give them what they want, you'll be rich. But ignore them and your business will quickly fall apart. In my experience, this has always been the first rule that any successful business considers first and foremost. So, when I go about starting a new company or selling a new product, before I decide anything else, I consider how best to serve my customers; they will determine how I run my business, what kind of products I make, and how I sell those products. So not only do I provide my customers the best quality content I can produce, but also, a set services that I believe they should be expect from me; e.g., a fair returns policy, after-care support, a life-time of bug fixes, etc. — And I implement every single one. If a customer makes a request for a reasonable feature, I will do my best to implement it. Not just because I will be creating a loyal customer, and not just because he likely represents ten thousand others like him, but primarily because I'll be making a better product for every single one of my customers. It is the same for every single business: The customers are the only thing that matters to me. Just to finish with one last thought: My past companies have had global distribution arms, with very successful products, which have sold to hundreds of thousands of homes all across the world. And no, I did not sell my products anywhere close to 99 cents! In fact, it was the more expensive products, filled with more value, which sold the most successfully.
EssentialParadox, you make good points, but there's only so much serving you can do for those $0.99 before you go bankrupt, since the improved features don't necessarily equal improved sales, and actually charging for your work on new features is impossible outside of a complex DLC setup, or just releasing a sequel. The situation is difficult since content is so devalued on the App Store. Mentally, the typical customer holds very little difference between a full-price console game and a one-dollar game. They're both games after all. And from this ridiculous comparison, unrealistic expectations are often projected. What's even worse is that the same attitude is occasionally echoed by journalists who write reviews. For example, you can find reviews on websites where a journalist writes how a $0.99 game isn't really worth the trouble unless it had a built-in level editor or 2-3 times the existing amount of levels. Meeting expectations like above will easily double or triple your development time. Making a simple game for $0.99 might be a feasible business case, but setting up an infrastructure for creating user-generated content in the game and then sharing it is a project which is easily more complex than creating the game itself. So... meeting the expectations is something you can't afford, and raising the price of the product to meet its production values kills your sales almost entirely. Oh, but you can always make your game free, since that brings you more customers.
and app store reviewers offering to upgrade their one star to five if you 'just' add internet multiplayer...
