IAP open letter

And again I think that could be applied across both.

 

Not really. Our app is currently three dollars. When it went to one dollar, after the initial publicity on appshopper, our downloads quickly settled down to about double. ie a net loss.

A year ago we tried our previous game (also normally $3) at $5 and sales dropped off a cliff. Meanwhile over on our forum there is a thread from our customers begging us to add more iap just so they can pay more. (It's here before you call bullshit: http://www.rubicondev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=789 and there are several others)

Is it fair to extrapolate that to every developer? No. But I'll bet most others will tell you a similar story and in any case it's better than using "I think" all over the place.

 

Ignoring everything thats been said over the past few pages, and to respond to the OP, another reasons for IAP (other than just being money grubbing etc)

Prevent piracy (I personally dont believe this makes as big a difference in lost sales as some might have you believe, but it has SOME impact nonetheless). Also for those who say IAP is easily hackable, perhaps, but it is also easily preventable I think if they include proper checks and balances.

Sustained income - Tons of work put into these games, why make a buck or two one time when you can get a steady flow of 99 cents every month. order and chaos did this for awhile and I thought it was smart (better yet it was surprisingly reasonable). Outwitters sells extra unit packs or whatever. Personally these are examples of IAP done right. I HATE consumables.

 

IAP can be ok sometimes like extra level packs. If I see a $1.99 download for a level pack that gets released at a later date I wouldnt say that's abusing the system.

 

in the interests of not repeating myself by replying to points made a number of times, I think I'll leave you to your freemium crusade. It's all becoming a tad overcooked. You'll hear and read what you want to regardless.

 

Yeah, it's a pain when people counter guesswork with data and then won't leave it alone huh.

I agree though, I think we're done here. Thread is now troll city.

 

Trying to not repeat a lot of already made points.

For me, one of the main reasons I have a huge appshopper wish list waiting for price drops is because Demos seem to be a real rarity on the app store.

I have no problem at all spending proper money on a game, but I want to try it out first to see if I actually like it. So not really talking about .69p games here.

Look at XBLA, every single game - you can download a trial which has a button to unlock the full game for however many MS points it costs.

I would also echo the previously made points about over saturation, Ive got shedloads of games on my wishlist. All games I want to play, but ive also got shedloads already bought on my iPad waiting to be played !
I don't really see any solution to this, as they are all good games - not rubbish app store fodder.

Anyway..

 

This, I think, is the best idea in this thread.

If the average dev team spends a year really making a quality game (as we did), the $99/submission breaks even.

If you churn out derivative crap every few weeks, then you better hope people like your derivative crap.

I also like the idea of enforcing a minimum price, even if it's just 99c. If the system was like XBLA or XBLIG where every game has to have a limited free trial/demo, free to play would still work as advertising for your game, but would hopefully convert players of quality games into paying customers.

Of course, those games will still be full of IAP...

 

Given that I'm clearly in the "pro choice" camp here, just to add some balance and maybe confuse a few people who don't get where I'm coming from...

http://toucharcade.com/2012/11/12/gameloft-announces-littlest-pet-shop-arriving-november-22nd/

I find this abhorent. Adults and even teens can make their own minds up as I've already advocated, but designing a game with expendable virtual currency to exploit little kids makes even me shudder. They should be ashamed.

As you were.

 

Thanks for a much needed chuckle, really.

 

Dear RUbicon,

You take us for idiots? People begging you to add IAPs....epic HAH!!!!

Gave me a nice laugh, but I tell you what...your credibility as game developers has gone down the drain. Greed has overcome your mindset.

IAPs for unlockable content is fine...IAPs for consumable content (this includes coin doublers etc) is TERRIBLE.

 

Well the only idiot here seems to be;

 

Actually, unlockable content often bothers me more than convenience IAP. It really depends on other factors, particularly whether the need to purchase an unlock is well-documented.

As to why some games use a freemium model, one thing to keep in mind is that there are plenty of people who are willing to and DO buy games that are 10 dollars or more but may have free games among their favorites. If they like those game as much as a 10 dollar game, it's not at all far-fetched that they would be willing to spend 10 dollars on those games considering they are no worse to them than a game that cost 10 dollars.

 

I have to avoid IAP currency games because you never know what you're getting into.

Puzzle Saga is a good example. I got all the way to the last level and suddenly the difficulty ramped up so high that it's almost impossible.
Yes I got a lot of free fun out of it but I want to beat the game because I'm pretty good at it but they made it unfair so people have to pay a lot of money to keep trying on the last level. The IAP isn't required but what they're telling me is I have to either pay or suffer through about 20 hours of grinding if I expect to get any further.

it would be much more fair if there were just one IAP somewhere in the middle to unlock the rest of the game. But that's not what this is about it's not a convenience IAP it's more like a shakedown. And if I pay them how do I know they wont try it again?

 

In the top 20 paid apps in our region only 4 are at the the $0.99 mark, I think it's 6 for the games section itself. The second top grossing is a paid app, although where the $$$ factor kicks in for hopefuls is there are only 4 paid apps in the top 20 grossing, the rest are freemium. Most I've never heard of to be honest.

Still, it shows that the $0.99 gamer argument, at least in this point in time and in my region is a little stretched. Seems people are fine paying higher for product they want.

 

Did you miss the bit where I provided a working link? Grow up!

 

No, Lad. It's YOUR rep which just went down the drain completely.
Calling people "idiots" just because they want to support their favourite devs or simply appreciate the devs work is more than dumb.
Even I asked a few developers to add IAP to have the chance to donate some money to them - I got their games for free but wanted to give them at least a token of appreciation for their good work. Two friends of mine also did asking for IAPs.
An example? I got ARC Squadron for a lousy buck - and I felt I've somehow robbed the devs cause I played the game two complete evenings with lots of fun and I am still playing it. I was actually glad to have the chance to buy the 550,000 ARCBucks pack - even tho I didn't need the in-game money. I also was really impressed by the devs donation to Red Cross and wanted to give a bit back. I just hope the devs earn enough to produce more high quality games like ARC Squadron.
If that makes me an idiot, ok, so be it.
What Rubicon said is true. You are wrong.

 

So.. I haven't read everything going on in here, but just to put my two (0.99?) cents in...

As far as the OP goes, let's use the Turbografx Gamebox as an example. Of all the apps I have on my iPod at the moment, I have sunk more money into that app than any other one app because a) I love the games and b) I want to see more games released for the emulator.

I have read many user reviews on iTunes giving one star for not knowing ahead of time (even though it is pretty obvious) that you get one free game and the rest are $2.99.

(p.s. I know that Hudson isn't a small dev like, say, Rubicon - it's just to make a point)

I am not fond of the 'you can't beat the game unless you buy x number of gems/coins/whatever' model that is out there in force.

The 'you can beat the game with out IAP's, they are just here if you are impatient' model is just fine by me - even if I DID pay 1,2,3 or what ever dollars.

And I really like the 'this IAP complements the game, but isn't necessary' model.

I can't really think of any games I got for free that were not paid at some point, If I did get an app for free, I got them because someone here on Touch Arcade posted a price drop/freebie deal. There are a few exceptions, but for the most part I paid or the game was made free for a bit.


Even if I pay ___$ and then someone else grabs the game for free, I don't feel like I paid for them to free load off of it.


And like a lot of people here in the forums, I do feel the dev's deserve much respect for putting in soooooooooo much effort into something that - in reality - would go for $8 - $20 on PSN/XBLA/Steam/GOG/3DS etc. and then occasionally I get it for (next to) nothing. And like many in this post have pointed out, then people still bitch about it. Yikes!

Coincidentally, I just watched Indie Game Story yesterday (and was quite moved - it's really more about the struggles and psychological idiosyncrasies of the people than games) and I could never think about shitting on a dev (not that I could before, mind you) when I'm getting something for really cheap or free.

I saw someone else mention how we take so much on the app store for granted because of the 0.99 pricing model. And I have to agree - before I sold most of PSX/PS2 collection I sunk thousands into the games - that same amount of content on the app store might command a few hundred. If that.

To make a point, a while back the Ravensword 2 devs were asking forum people to give opinions about the pricing come release day. Most people thought that $8 was about right, but I mean look at RS2: its basically a current gen game, and people thought that $10 would be too much! Are you kidding me! If that game came out at $20, I'd be like "yeah, makes sense to me" and also if it was on the PS3/Xbox it would be released at $50-60, and no one would question it.

But I digress - this topic and the back and forth brought a lot of thoughts out for me. Sorry my post is so all over the place.

 

Way off topic, but when does that fantasy SRPG you are doing come out?

p.s. I don't know why I quoted that - soz.