Introducing GameSalad Direct

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Comments

  • quantumsheepquantumsheep Member Posts: 8,188
    jonmulcahy said:
    at $50 an app, it'd be cheaper to just buy a dev license if you make more than 2 apps. That's something they need to be competitive against.

    Jon,
    It breaks my heart that you might leave. I've always enjoyed your games and your level-headed input here.

    It's not my fault, but I can't help feeling 'sorry'.

    Sorry :(

    QS

    Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home...
    Twitter: https://twitter.com/Quantum_Sheep
    Web: https://quantumsheep.itch.io

  • design219design219 Member Posts: 2,273
    I just want to add a tag.
  • Koda89Koda89 Member Posts: 275
    Eh, I'll probably move away from making iPhone games once my Apple Dev license and GameSalad license expire. Next stop for me is using XNA to make Xbox 360/PC games.

    God help me.... D:
  • magic101himagic101hi Member Posts: 713
    tee hee look at the tags ------------------------------------------------------------------>
  • BackUpAndDownBackUpAndDown Member Posts: 685
    Has anyone considered using one of those "free petition maker" websites for this matter? Maybe if we can get a list of names of the people who will stop using Gs if it continues down this road we will be able to make a larger impact.

    Just a thought.
  • design219design219 Member Posts: 2,273
    I just thought of another concern with the GameSalad Direct publishing setup.

    What would happen to everybody's games should GameSalad go under?
  • magic101himagic101hi Member Posts: 713
    //scared face
  • joshmiller602joshmiller602 Member Posts: 206
    magic101hi said:
    tee hee look at the tags ------------------------------------------------------------------>

    I am thinking half of those were added by GS. They are not all user generated. If so...insulting your customers because they are unhappy will achieve the opposite of your intended goal, and is a horrible business move (one that many companies have went down for).

    You should take it as a compliment that people are even loyal enough to stick around and complain while they await your update.

    You mentioned that Apple took a month before releasing details of their new product...but they also had over 2 decades of quality products behind them. You have a buggy beta version, and a small co. that is fighting to stay afloat. During this struggle, right at the precipice, you decide to alienate your existing customers (chop the legs out from underneath you), then insult them while they are down?

    I have defended GS on here, as I am in business myself. But could never imagine insulting a client, while stringing them along, while raising prices, etc. This is what they write books about...what NOT to do in business.
  • quantumsheepquantumsheep Member Posts: 8,188
    joshmiller602 said:
    I am thinking half of those were added by GS. They are not all user generated. If so...insulting your customers because they are unhappy will achieve the opposite of your intended goal, and is a horrible business move (one that many companies have went down for).

    I have defended GS on here, as I am in business myself. But could never imagine insulting a client, while stringing them along, while raising prices, etc. This is what they write books about...what NOT to do in business.

    You are basing this accusation on an assumption without any evidence at all.

    Cheers,

    QS

    Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home...
    Twitter: https://twitter.com/Quantum_Sheep
    Web: https://quantumsheep.itch.io

  • joshmiller602joshmiller602 Member Posts: 206
    quantumsheep said:
    You are basing this accusation on an assumption without any evidence at all.

    Cheers,

    QS

    Hence the "If so...". Thanks for pointing out the obvious.
  • BackUpAndDownBackUpAndDown Member Posts: 685
    quantumsheep said:
    You are basing this accusation on an assumption without any evidence at all.

    Isen't that what all 45 pages of this topic are filled with, accusations without evidence?
  • Your games stay on the App Store. You are free to continue to update your games for the rest of your existing subscription term. Once your subscription expires, you’ll be able to move your games over to GameSalad Direct.

    It is not possible to "move [our] games over to GameSalad Direct".

    Why you ask?

    Apple does not allow the transfer of apps between iTunes accounts.

    We would have to delete our apps off of our iTunes accounts and re-publish them under GameSalad.

    The problem with that is every single user who purchased our apps would have to re-purchase the apps under their new publisher.

    Can everyone please spread this message so that GameSalad will see it?
    Heck, copy & paste this post if you'd like!
  • vegasmike1vegasmike1 Member Posts: 192
    The process has begun, Game Salad is moving forward, they have apparently a plan that is "not carved in stone" SO they are being somewhat liquid with the movement they are making and it will change. But they are, and I find the most important fact, WORKING WITH APPLE. So they are probably NOT the only ones that are doing this. It is going to get down to possibly the music business, publishers and apple. Indies will be less. There is nothing that say, that we or some of us could not do the same, if Game Salad does it, then another collective can do the same thing. There are many aspects of business that a publisher might give you and edge with. Maybe not, its for each to decide.

    I for one congratulate Game Salad, they realize they should have been a bit more declarative, this last email was closer but it is not complete however the plans are not firm so we will continue to way, and make games. That is after all, as a community what we do.

    MY only concern at this point is the code itself, I am not worried about the biz model, whatever happens, happens and I can choose to publish or not with GS. So that part is simple.

    I want the code fixed, I dont want it to blow up all the time, I want a better organizer so I can sort files and get things tidy, I want a better physics engine, that can deal with alpha and not just a big square ojbect, I want a whole bunch of stuff. Just like you no doubt.

    IF they give me the BEST tools, and the best environment then I am good to go and will have no issue of publishing with them, But if they release the code and the new biz model under the present code situation, I think they will fail. I dont want them to so my only hope is that while they have been having all these biz meetings I hope the smart guys behind the curtain, the programmers of GS, are killing buts, making the code stable, and giving me access to the entire device, gps, keyboard, camera, etc etc. That in my opinion is the deal maker or breaker and I for one, will stay put until I see the truth of what is going on with the code.

    Out
    M
  • DjangoZDjangoZ Member Posts: 40
    Count me among those who will be okay with a revenue split (assuming it isn't too much) if:

    - the tools are better (editor doesn't crash every 10 minutes)
    - performance is better (faster load times, better memory management in general)
    - we have the key features we have been clamoring for (gamecenter, analytics, facebook, email, etc.)

    Sounds like we might get all of those, so cool beans.

    One thing: not a good idea to announce a change like this and not announce the revenue split % and details. It sends shock waves and panic through your community and we end up discussing what might be instead of what will be. We can always imagine more horrible things that might be than we what will be.

    Perhaps there was a reason you felt compelled to announce it as you did...but I hope it was a lesson learned. Kinda like the Gap and their new logo. :)
  • AfterBurnettAfterBurnett Member Posts: 3,474
    DjangoZ said:
    Count me among those who will be okay with a revenue split (assuming it isn't too much) if:

    - the tools are better (editor doesn't crash every 10 minutes)
    - performance is better (faster load times, better memory management in general)
    - we have the key features we have been clamoring for (gamecenter, analytics, facebook, email, etc.)

    Sounds like we might get all of those, so cool beans.

  • DjangoZDjangoZ Member Posts: 40
    One last thing: don't use the "democratizing game design" language in a follow-up to clarify things. Save that for the press releases.

    We're a fairly savvy group here. You'll get alot more trust and support if you communicate with us straight up.

    GS wasn't making enough revenue with the old model, you know the tool needs to get better and requires more investment to compete with other options out there, other publishers have shown that a revenue split model can work. So you decided to expand and offer more services for more money. Entirely reasonable and would have had a much better reception here.
  • PuschelFriendsPuschelFriends Member Posts: 19
    I got the email newsletter from gamesalad today.

    So, it says, we cannot update our old games in our old account, if we run under gamesalad direct. If we want to update, we have to move our app to gamesalad direct.

    It doesn't says where we get our money from (Apple? or GameSalad?)

    And we cannot publish under our account. I think they wrote nothing new in the newsletter. I will look for a new system for developing my apps today. :-(
  • gameviccigamevicci Member, PRO Posts: 306
    No please, I can't believe it....I love GameSalad, I paid 2000 dollars and I will pay another 2000 dollars next year... but I WANT TO PUBLISH UNDER MY NAME!!

    Please, LET THE USERS CAN CHOOSE between GameSalad Direct and GameSalad PRO with 2000 dollars payment.

    PLEASE, some other users would like this chance?
  • gameviccigamevicci Member, PRO Posts: 306
    Sorry again... but how can I spend 1000 dollars for a graphic artist, work 3 months on a game, make soundtrack and buy sound effects, and DON'T PUBLISH IT UNDER MY NAME???

    Please Gendai, I want to thank you for the great opportunity you gave me with GameSalad, I never could make the same games whit xcode... but let us choose to publish under your name or to PAY (also 3000 dollars!!!) to publish under our itunes account!!
  • ericdg123ericdg123 Member, PRO Posts: 156
    I think this has opened a lot of people's eyes. I for one, use gamesalad because it is a very easy and quick way to make games. Yes, much better games can be made in other ways, but they also almost always take much longer to develop, especially for a non programmer. Heck, that's why many of us were using gamesalad to begin with.

    This has opened my eyes because I have been making a comfortable living with gamesalad and was willing to settle with that. Yes, I always see other games making tons more money than mine and want to incorporate some similar features, then I realize much of that is not possible with gamesalad. So I was essentially being lazy. I was willing to settle with a moderate income without pushing myself to learn code and take the next step in game development. Without knowing how to code you are at the mercy of companies like this. I have been through this before with another product making windows mobile games. The company I was using was a no programming or limited programming required type app. Once they went under my games slowly started declining and went under with them.

    Like design219 mentioned, if they adopt this new business model and they go under, the same thing will happen to our games.

    I am going to keep using gamesalad but learn other programs and code as well.

    Since gamesalad is so much quicker to use, it still really holds a lot of appeal to me. I will slowly but surely learn other methods as well, so I can develop higher quality games without as many limitations and for multiple platforms.

    Who knows? If this new business models works out better than expected it might be an ok deal. If they have somehow worked out a deal with apple to let our existing customers be able to update the apps under gamesalad direct and if our apps can somehow stay in the same positions they are on the charts, then the only scary issue for me would be the revenue share, and of course the potential for shovelware bringing the gamesalad name down so low, nobody will want to buy anything branded with gamesalad.

    I make about 5K a month now and if gamesalad wanted 40% of that, I would instantly be making $2000 a month less. That would be hard to deal with. It seems to me that with this accelerator thing they mentioned and the comments made in the FAQ, that they will charge a lower percentage for devs that make more money.

    I'm hoping that with this lower percentage for more successful devs and the possibility for them to promote quality apps, it can offset the revenue share, or at least lessen the blow.

    Thats what I'm hoping for anyway. I would love to continue using gamesalad for years to come. I can always keep my dev account with apple and use it for the new games I make using other methods, and still use gamesalad for games that I want to make more quickly and that will still be quality games even with gamesalad's limitations like Bumps and Grisly manor for example, among others.

    Sure, I've gotten extremely upset with the bugs in gamesalad or trying to work around a limitation, but at the same time I've told myself, hey, I can't program yet, so for me none of this would have been possible without them. And for that opportunity they've given me, I'd like to say thank you, and I hope you make the right descision involving your current customers.
  • SpaghettiStudiosSpaghettiStudios Member Posts: 18
    GameSalad is in serious danger of shooting itself in the foot here. What will happen is that existing developers will start to look elsewhere (go down the sole path of GameSalad Direct and I'm off, no question). So GameSalad will have to start looking for fresh blood and what it will get are lots of shovelware that will ruin the GameSalad Direct brand and make nobody any serious money.

    Ok, here are the questions everyone wants answering:

    1. Will there be no paid-for option to self-publish a title or will everything have to go through GameSalad Direct?
    2. Many GameSalad developers have set up their own companies, they have bought developer licenses from Apple and they have invested a lot of time in games they felt they would be able to self-publish for years to come. What do you say to this?
    3. You claim that you will offer a PR service. Well, considering you are making a rather poor attempt at public relations with Direct at the moment - and the fact messages from yourselves are rather sporadic - this doesn't bode well. Will you be setting up a dedicated PR company?
    4. How will we see how much our games are making and how will be be paid?
    5. GameSalad Direct may well become a byword for trash if anything can end up on it - it may become a brand to avoid rather than buy from. So will there be a filtering process?

    You should seriously think about offering GameSalad Direct AND a service that allows people to self-publish for $2,000. Very few of us would complain about that. It would appear sensible otherwise you may find GameSalad is about to run into some major problems and it may not survive 2011 given the depth of feeling on these forums.
  • ChunkypixelsChunkypixels Member Posts: 1,114
    Its no longer just a case of offering a Pro option alongside Direct... they still have to win back the trust and belief of customers that would use the Pro option.

    Its going to be hard for a lot of people to justify spending $2000 a year now on a product that they have absolutely no idea of how secure the future of the product is. If GameSalad can switch the direction of the product so drastically with almost no notice to the customer base once, then how can the customers rely on it not happening again.

    GameSalad needs to quickly rethink and clarify its strategy, so it doesnt turn customers away ....but its also got a big job on its hands to rebuild customer confidence too, after putting them through this mess.
  • LAdrianLAdrian Member Posts: 237
    @Chunkypixel: Exactly my thoughts, you don't just make a radical movement like that with no pre-warning. Right now my confidence in GS is almost zero.
  • quantumsheepquantumsheep Member Posts: 8,188
    joshmiller602 said:
    Hence the "If so...". Thanks for pointing out the obvious.

    Seems I'm in good company.

    Good luck!

    QS

    Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home...
    Twitter: https://twitter.com/Quantum_Sheep
    Web: https://quantumsheep.itch.io

  • jweaver911jweaver911 Member Posts: 439
    I have to say when I opened up the Newsletter email I was a bit hopeful, then quite dismayed by the end of it. They, once again, "successfully" said very little with high word count. They addressed so very few of the actual concerns of the paying customers that it makes me really wonder if they really do want to as they say: "listen to your feedback and concerns, and adjust the program features accordingly."

    There's just so many unanswered questions. Pretty much the only thing they did was say "I'm Sorry" in reference to a very ambiguous "mistake."

    Stuff we still don't know:
    • how our brands would not be affected(published under a GS name?)
    • all money related questions: cost, figures, app royalties, who pays out
    • release date

    New stuff they've brought up that only add more fuel to the growing flame of questions

    "They key benefit of this pricing model is that it allows more people to try their hand at making games because the tool is free, but also encourages quality."
    • How does any of this encourage quality?
    • All GS games get lumped together?

    I am continually baffled at how GS cryptically continues it's communication and at the same time slaps many of it's customers in the face by dancing the old dodge-the-questions-by-giving answers-without-answers-two-step.

    Now I understand business is business, and that they cant disclose everything on everyone's request. But this is still minuscule information compared to the bomb they have dropped on us.

    With all due respect to Gendai and their product, I'm still a bit disappointed and worried.
  • alcamiealcamie Member Posts: 53
    BackUpAndDown said:
    Isen't that what all 45 pages of this topic are filled with, accusations without evidence?

    Well I would say the FACT's or lack of, substantiate the accusations without evidence :P
  • inceptioninception Member Posts: 74
    I think Homer said it best:
    You don’t win friends with salad. In this case, GameSalad Direct.
  • quantumsheepquantumsheep Member Posts: 8,188
    inception said:
    I think Homer said it best:
    You don’t win friends with salad. In this case, GameSalad Direct.

    One of my fave Simpsons' moments - kudos to you, sir!

    QS :D

    Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home...
    Twitter: https://twitter.com/Quantum_Sheep
    Web: https://quantumsheep.itch.io

  • cavedawescavedawes Member Posts: 5
    Quite interesting the news Gamesalad announced of becoming a publisher instead of a software distributor. It's interesting because already as a developer the 70/30 cut Apple cites is a bit misleading as this is only the case for sales in the US. UK sales are more of a 60/40 split after currency conversion, so I wonder what the revenue deal with Gamesalad as the publisher will be and whether it'll be exponential depending on the number of sales i.e. upwardly escalating.

    I suspect Gamesalad as publisher will mean that apps produced using GS will be branded as Gamesalad apps in the store, a bit like others do e.g. Chillingo etc. Also the Adobe analogy isn't quite the same, when Adobe freed Desktop publishing they let creatives produce their own works using their software. After all even today using Adobe Flash doesn't mean branding a game with the Adobe logo, or selling games under their name. Adobe Director used to do this for some versions i.e. the educational version stated that it was made with Macromedia Director as it was then.

    Having said that I can quite understand the business model reasoning. Charging over £1000 for the pro membership could be seen as prohibitive and so this system could free the way for many would be games developers to create games, but for a seasoned games producer using GS as their method of app store delivery it could be cutting their opportunities to make real money if the royalties incurred as part of a GS are too high i.e. are they going to be more than the combination of paying a price for the e.g. existing Express or Pro GS software and Apple's app store cut. Spreadsheets will become the new weapon of choice as developers look to the potential dollar/pound signs they can only imagine, but hope to realise with the next great game!

    In some other media industries where companies are converting existing media to a digital app delivery they are trying out models where they use apps as a shell for content delivery, the content such as comics delivered from their own e-commerce set up app websites to avoid, one, using third part developers and two, paying out royalties to Apple!

    I guess Gamesalad developers can only wait and see what deals are going to be put on the table and hope as the team state, the announcement will be in favour of the developer.

    Also will all the games both good and bad be lumped together which will potentially devalue a good developer's brand which may mean GS have many defectors looking for other means of simple game app creation where they can market their own branded apps! I can only wish the team best of luck and hope they make the right decisions to help their loyal existing customer base as well as new game creators.

    Cheers,

    Nick
  • PhoticsPhotics Member Posts: 4,172
    The idea of GameSalad Direct® isn't bad. It's like third-party iBookstore Aggregators. For example, Lulu takes 20% after Apple takes their 30%. I think that leaves 56% for the author. It's not bad, if you don't want to fuss with getting an ISBN. If you buy a single ISBN, it could set you back $125.

    I decided to get my own ISBN for the Textbook. I'll have to sell about 40 copies to get that money back. It's possible that I might not sell that many copies.

    That's where GameSalad Direct® works!

    If you're not sure that your games are good enough to make back the cost of Apple's developer registration, GameSalad Direct is an excellent way to get started.

    The real problem is the elimination of "Pro".

    GameSalad Direct® is a great way to attract the newcomer. What happens when that developer matures... what happens when they want to be their own publisher? It's a natural progression, for which GameSalad Direct® does not seem to address.

    There's no debate for me... there's only action and reaction... if GameSalad eliminates the Pro option, I have to leave. I'm not looking for a publisher, not one like this. Here's the big mistake in yellow post logic...
    GameSalad said:
    First, once GameSalad Direct is in place, we will be able to easily connect players of one GameSalad game with other GameSalad games, increasing downloads across the community.

    I'm thinking the GameSalad brand would actually lead to a DECREASE in downloads. In the iOS gaming community, GameSalad games are viewed more like a disease. There are just so many bad games. If people can make them for free... without even an Apple developer registration... the level of shovelware will increase.

    That's a big difference from something like, "Hey, this is Chillingo, we want to publish Annoyed Tomatoes."
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