This post is a bit of a rant. Perhaps someone can give some insight or suggestions, I'm very open to these.
So, around two weeks ago I've released a free Early Access game on Steam, called J-Jump Arena. It's a 3D simultaneously turn-based action game - something unique for sure. Most people compare it to Worms.
As far as marketing goes, I was often posting stuff on reddit, did some small FB/Instagram ads but they weren't doing too well when it comes to wishlist conversions. On the day of release, number of wishlists was around 2000, which I'd assume is not great not terrible, considering the game is free.
After the release, I've been e-mailing a streamers and content creators with free DLC keys for their community. I think only 2 streamed the game out of over 80 e-mails sent, and these were people with not a lot of viewers. One german content creator Streamed the game and uploaded a Youtube video consisting of 3 games, including mine, it got over 30k views but I can't say it noticably helped the game get downloads from Germany. (Screenshot from my game was on the YT cover art video).
The thing is, most people who get to play my game enjoy it a lot. It's a fun party game, perfect for groups of friends. They have lots of laughs while playing it. I listen to the community, constantly provide updates that make the game better, more entertaning, more pleasant to play.
Right now, I have 146 Steam reviews, 89% of them positive.
It's been a little bit over two weeks since the release, and the game is getting 200-300 downloads daily. I'd need much more to keep the public multiplayer active and alive. Daily concurrent peak of players is between 10-20.
I've seen "worse", more generic free games released do much better when it comes to number of players, despite having much worse reviews.
I'm at a bit of a loss here. In my worst assesment I was hoping for 40 concurrent players on daily peak around a month after the release, because I know the market is sedated. But considering the ongoing rate, I fear my game will honestly just be completly dead after a month from now on.
If I knew my game just isn't fun and that people don't enjoy it, it would be easier to swallow, honestly. I'd know my idea for a game sucked, and I should move onto someting else. But here we have a game that people enjoy and see a potential in it, but it gets little to no exposure... The game is getting gradually less and less downloads and I don't think there's anything I can do to change things around...
Hey y’all. I’m a 30 year old looking for a career change, and I’m hoping for some insight.
I began my journey into coding a few months ago and realize how vast the tech world can be. I’m still learning the basics but I find myself in a bit of a paralysis when it comes down to what to specialize in, such as frontend vs backend, mobile, web dev, AI, etc. because nothing really excites me.
It’s really hard for me to study for a couple of hours whereas I can clock in 4 hours easily into gaming. FPS games are my bread and butter. So that’s where I thought maybe I could combine the two, and try game development. I was thinking maybe it’s better to enter a field that actually is exciting (to me) rather than be in a field that drains my soul.
After reading some posts I do have a few questions about the industry,
How true is the “starving artist” mentality in this field?
Are salaries ever as high as other SWE roles? Are they ever higher? What are your past salaries of you don’t mind sharing?
What are your thoughts on entry level jobs in SWE vs game dev?