I greatly enjoy Mick Garris (a horror director himself) Postmortem Podcast where he interviews a whole lot of horror directors, actors and special effects experts.
Imagine something like this with Ron Gilbert where he once a month interviews:
Tim Schaefer (not like that one you find on youtube)
Brian Moriarty
Warren Robinett
Howard Scott Warshaw
David Crane
Will Wright
Peter Molyneux
Eric Chahi
Roberta and/or Ken Williams (this should be interesting)
That´s season one of course. I´d literally throw all of the money on a podcast project like this.
And I sincerly apologize for my ignorance if there is anyone on there he wouldn´t be caught in a room with.
Well, I wouldn’t be very interested in seeing/listening Ron in the role of an interviewer but regardless of who the interviewer is I would add to that list the remaining two pillars of adventure games who are still making games: Jane Jensen and Charles Cecil.
Based on comparable projects I don´t imagine this to be like that. More like two seasoned interesting persons going back and forth with their experiences.
And of course active developers are more interesting, but I don´t think those retired ones I listed would be in any way uninteresting either.
When the podcast becomes popular, one could start doing the typical three ads like most of the ones I listen to. Relay FM is a popular network for this sort of model. Popular podcasts can command a rather large amount per add, e.g. $4K per ad. That’s assuming you have like 100K listeners, which is a ton in podcast terms.
That may not be where they’d like to spend their time, but interesting to discuss.
Pretty much, only I wrote about “not like this” because the situation would be reversed. But I think that might be interesting. And even more interesting if you don´t only stay within the adventure game bubble, which is why I listed people like Warshaw who probably only has having done an Indiana Jones game in common with Ron.
But. You could create a sequel. First part would be 1/4 of TwP (pretty much Loom length), and sell it for $10. Call it “Gallivantland” or what ever you like. That would equal to MI1, but a bit shorter. Sell the second part, also 1/4 of TwP, “Gallivantland: The Awakening” for $10. Also shorter that MI1, equal to Loom. And so forth. You’ll make twice the money just to divide the game into self-containing sequels.
I was putting some thought into this exact question.
Sadly it isn’t piracy that threatens adventure games - it’s market saturation of low quality micro-payment rpg games, and the fact that games like this now sell for well less than they did in the 90’s. And they have really lowered the expectation of the quality of these games and that they should be “free to play”. I think to compete with that market you would have to be able to release the game possibly as episodic for iOS/Android or have some other way to allow players to start the first Act for free as a playable demo and then purchase the remainder of the game.
However, I do think that a new game would benefit from the existing engine more than Ron thinks. Thimbleweed Park was initially released on PC, Mac, Linux, PS4 and XBox1. Not initially having iOS and Android versions would definitely have hurt the game’s potential to reach a wider initial audience. Especially as the game’s interface is perfect for tablets or mobiles.
In any case, I agree that Kickstarter is not the way forward. But I do think Ron should build on the momentum. One thing you could think about doing is releasing a short playable demo to your next project as an update to the game so that your existing customers would see it on the game’s load screen and/or as a link in the start menu. Of course that would only help promote the game when it’s ready for sale, it wouldn’t help fund it 18 months in advance.
I agree this model is better. If I am in an online store (like the google store), and I see that TWP is “free with in-app purchases”, I install it. Then, when I reach the point where I need to pay to continue, I am likely to buy it. OTOH, if in the google store I see the game must be paid in advance, I am likely to go on piratebay instead. Then, when I reach the point I need to buy, it’s unlikely I’ll go back on the store and buy (and replay from scratch).
I don’t use app stores at all haha, so the only games I would have on such a device are things I could put on there myself like Scummvm. That’s just not what my phone is for anyway. So do correct me if I’m wrong on this, but couldn’t you advertise the game as “Free to try, $20 to unlock the full game”? I think it would have been good to design the game from the start so that it had a nice confined starting section that allows you to explore a few different rooms and characters and is all contained within a “first act” that can double as the playable demo. I suppose you could add a new game mode called “start demo”, but that would require quite a bit more work now I would think, and it would be an annoyance not to be able to seamlessly continue from the end of the demo point once the game is purchased (you would also need to add the easy/hard option in-game at the resume point).
If I see “free with in-app purchases”, without knowing exactly how much it costs, I install. Otoh, if I read it will eventually cost $20, I’m much less likely to install.
It’s important that I discover the price only after I have seen how good the game is, experienced it. Then the price will seem justified, I’ll react positively to it.
after I install: when I get to the point where I need to pay the $20, if playing is only one click away, and 30 seconds away, I buy. But if I need to go back to the store and/or install the complete game, I am less likely to buy. (even more so if I need to worry about transporting savegames).
Ha, that was cool. The same issues raised. It should be less work for the next game though since the iOS/Android code for the engine will be written and ready to go.
@seguso - advertising games as “free” when they aren’t is misleading. You could be breaching consumer laws by doing that, and get fined even years down the line (as was the case with Valve here in Aus). That said, I’m sure you could release the demo separately for free, and offer the full game at the end of it for $20 without problems.
I’m interested in a new point&click adventure (Menlo Park + a valid addition) plus good touch support for desktop , DRM free, offline (and without spying), non-episodic … I’m willing to pay.
If you’re in need of ideas, take a closer look at the Thimblecon poster (or contact me). Crowdfunding range: $750k-$1m (50%?!, today’s budgets can make you feel lucky that video games took off at all). Invest into a basic but convincing pitch. TWP started after the gold rush. So, it’s some novelty vs. reputation (like, best KS adventure). Show craftsmanship, improve on the story/characters/writing/puzzles/assets/… and go high-res.
I don’t agree: It’s either a full time job or you won’t make any money with such an engine.
Not only you have to constantly fix problems or adapt something on some platform, the upfront costs to get it in an acceptable state usable for customers is high.
It’s not just the engine which customers need to be able to use multi-platform and getting their game packed for different all those different targets with and without debug possibilities, but you also have all kind of tools, tool chains and workflows which have to be made in a production-ready state so they can be used to actually great games by customers.
It’s called retirement plan.
And also they often want to own the IP and that’s definitely something Ron won’t allow anymore.
Yeah, the only way to release the engine IMHO without investing in maintaining it is to open-source it and find someone who wants to take over as its lead coder on GitHub.
Really interesting thread. Based on the incredibly supportive fan base for Thimbleweed Park I wonder if a new Terrible Toybox game could sell at a much higher price. It seems the game indusry has a decided that a $50+ game needs to be AAA with 40+ hours of playtime and amazing graphics, etc., etc. But if there is only one new Ron Gilbert game and it costs $50, maybe people will pay and be happy for the 15-20 hours of enjoyment they get from it - still cheaper than going to the movies
We don’t have the sales numbers but here are my estimates:
15,000 KS backers (plus many bought on on launch) so assume 15,000 super fans who will pay $50 price tag
Ron says game broke even. Games cost $1m. KS raised $600k so it must have made $400k or more. $400k / $20 price = 20,000 who will buy at ‘reasonable’ price
So here is how sales could look:
$50 price for pre-sale + first 6 months x 15,000 sales = $750,000
price drop to $20 after first 6 months and release on iOS + Android x 20,000 sales = $400,000
Not quite $1.5m but getting there.
Kick Starter accomplishes this a bit by letting some people opt in to paying a lot more money, but I think for many people they just pay the minimum tier to get the game, even if they would be open to paying more. I wonder if a Kickstarter would do better if it was just $50 for the game or $1000 for game + a really exclusive bonus.
