How many of us make a living out of gamesalad?

steve86steve86 Member Posts: 806
edited November -1 in Working with GS (Mac)
Hey guys.

Last week I bought pro and I'm starting to work 10-12 hours a day on GS. I was wondering how many devs in this forum are in my position. I took the leap to try to make amazing games full time and make a good living out it.

Regards to my fellow devs.

Steve
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Comments

  • tenrdrmertenrdrmer Member, Sous Chef, Senior Sous-Chef Posts: 9,934
    I like it but I wish I could do better. I have a huge weakness with artwork and cannot seem to find the right partnership with an artist so I think once I lock that aspect down I will do a heck of a lot better.

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  • mynameisacemynameisace Hull, UKMember Posts: 2,484
    10-12 hours a day Mon-Fri and occasional weekends here ;)

    Ace
  • steeler0038steeler0038 Member Posts: 153
    Im currently an unemployed college student, i'm hoping that i can make some money with gamesalad. I work around 3-5 hours on gamesalad Mon-Sun.
  • steve86steve86 Member Posts: 806
    steeler0038 said:
    Im currently an unemployed college student, i'm hoping that i can make some money with gamesalad. I work around 3-5 hours on gamesalad Mon-Sun.

    I'm almost in your situation, except that I graduated 1 year ago, and I saved some money from my previous job and I'm trying to start a mobile apps company that will mostly do games. Right now I'm a one man army from my bedroom but I hope that can change in a year or two.

    I'm 24 so I still got a couple of years until my parents kick me out of the house lol.
  • CrazybreadmanCrazybreadman Member Posts: 674
    College student here too. I get by with what I earn as a dev but no huge success yet. I'm hoping to get a hit game sometime this summer before I start classes again in the fall. But heck, it beats a min wage job any day.
  • sparkzillasparkzilla Member Posts: 152
    I am a 44 year old guy. It seems that making the game is the easy part. Promotion on the other hand is extremely difficult.

    -----
    Sweepr: Simple. Fun. Addictive!
  • HadiDaManHadiDaMan Member Posts: 115
    i am 10 years old and dont make any money out of this cos i dont have apple developer thing
  • calvin9403calvin9403 Member Posts: 3,186
    liverpoolrule said:
    i am 10 years old and dont make any money out of this cos i dont have apple developer thing

    than if you want to make money, buy an account
  • JamieOneilJamieOneil Member Posts: 877
    Well my age isn't on this :P im 13, but this is how i get money. :)
  • CrazybreadmanCrazybreadman Member Posts: 674
    liverpoolrule said:
    i am 10 years old and dont make any money out of this cos i dont have apple developer thing

    calvin9403 said:
    than if you want to make money, buy an account

    Tell someone older with money that it will be a great investment in your future ;)
  • mynameisacemynameisace Hull, UKMember Posts: 2,484
    Crazybreadman is the best name... EVER!

    Ace
  • Metronome49Metronome49 Member Posts: 297
    Uuuum. I'm confused. Maybe I have a different interpretation of what "make a living" means. I don't think you can say you make a living via GameSalad until you are actually making the money to live on via GameSalad. Working full-time is a great start, but you could easily not make any money.

    I have a 9-5 in the Design/Web Design business, and Freelance the same, and am now teaching myself GameSalad and working on some games for supplementary income. My 9-5 is the only way I can make a living right now, someday soon it would be nice to make enough money freelancing and on the App Store to quit the 9-5.

    So how many people "make a living" on GameSalad according to my definition? TShirtBooth? I would guess. QuantumSheep? The ePig guy?
  • Metronome49Metronome49 Member Posts: 297
    @CrazyBreadMan

    I would love to have an additional, nearly-passive, minimum-wage income. How much time to have to put in managing something like that after it's in the App Store? How much time do you spend marketing?
  • CrazybreadmanCrazybreadman Member Posts: 674
    Metronome49 said:
    @CrazyBreadMan

    I would love to have an additional, nearly-passive, minimum-wage income. How much time to have to put in managing something like that after it's in the App Store? How much time do you spend marketing?

    I started about a year and a half ago and have created apps on the side along w/ school. I have 3 somewhat successful apps out now and one unsuccessful app. Also a couple free versions of the paid ones. 3 have been featured by Apple in New and Noteworthy and one hopefully will soon (just released it on Saturday). From that I've made about 15K U.S and I'm still selling apps that I created a year ago w/ little to no marketing. I only paid $70 for adds once... came out even. I post on Touch Arcade forum and twitter. I also submit to several review sites. Takes a few hours. Thats it for marketing. As far as hours I put about 80-100 hrs into each successful app (including updates) and the unsuccessful one was a quick 15-20 hr project. Time wasting on the forums... eh probably more than actually making the apps ;) But yeah, I have 0 time during school so they apps maintain themselves and sales are lower but consistent w/out any additional effort. I also have clients that I work w/ on their apps so that's made me another 10K. It's been a great job along w/ school for sure.
  • RedlerTechRedlerTech Member Posts: 1,583
    I'm 13 ;)
  • DizkoDizko Member Posts: 498
    Very few actually make a living using GameSalad.

    To me there is a difference between putting spending money in the pocket of a few students' versus being able to pay the mortgage every month.
  • Metronome49Metronome49 Member Posts: 297
    @Dizko

    Agreed. Some extra spending money is what I expect to get. Being able to make a living solely on GameSalad would take some luck and some mountain moving.
  • idoistuffidoistuff Member Posts: 197
    I loved game salad at first, then realized how weak it really is.. I would also rather code my games instead of drag and drop (more respect, learn more, and you can do more with you game)
  • Metronome49Metronome49 Member Posts: 297
    @iDoiStuff

    Yeah, I'm still a little leery of how weak the platform is, with posts where people are suggesting removing "eye-candy" because of size-limits... it sounds like just asking to remove the polish. Still trying to figure out how complex a game can be before implosion.

    Now, I'm not going to jump in and start coding, as I'm a designer, not a programmer, and I don't have the time/motivation to teach myself how to code a game.
  • steve86steve86 Member Posts: 806
    idoistuff said:
    I loved game salad at first, then realized how weak it really is.. I would also rather code my games instead of drag and drop (more respect, learn more, and you can do more with you game)

    Have you seen the roadmap thou? Maybe right now it lacks some key features. But at the end of the summer it will be a pretty good contender IMO. I do know how to code lua but gamesalad will be able to make 90% of the games you can do in corona in half or even a quarter of the time once 1.0 gets here.
  • MagoNicolasMagoNicolas Member, PRO Posts: 2,090
    I Work on a LOT of Stuff, But now will start living out Gamesalad.
    Im working on my next huge project that will be released before March 30, and thanks to what happeed with ePig Dash, will have a huge success, at least in Chile, I Will cover it for FREE in al Possible MEDIA!

    But Now, Im rejecting a lot of other jobs, and dedicating full time to my ePigGames http://www.epiggames.com

    Cheers.
  • CrazybreadmanCrazybreadman Member Posts: 674
    Metronome49 said:
    @iDoiStuff

    Yeah, I'm still a little leery of how weak the platform is, with posts where people are suggesting removing "eye-candy" because of size-limits... it sounds like just asking to remove the polish. Still trying to figure out how complex a game can be before implosion.

    Now, I'm not going to jump in and start coding, as I'm a designer, not a programmer, and I don't have the time/motivation to teach myself how to code a game.

    If you learn how to be efficient w/ your GS programming you can do quite a bit on newer devices. I think I'm going to begin targeting iPad because only 3&4 gen iPhones can handle a complex GS app. I get negative reviews from people w/ older devices because it is too slow. So if you want to develop for iPad, Mac desktop, or target newer gen devices you can almost do anything if it's programmed well.
  • tenrdrmertenrdrmer Member, Sous Chef, Senior Sous-Chef Posts: 9,934
    idoistuff said:
    I loved game salad at first, then realized how weak it really is.. I would also rather code my games instead of drag and drop (more respect, learn more, and you can do more with you game)

    GameSalad is actually very powerful for what it is. and if by code you mean lua. I don't think "real" coders really give those guys any more respect than they do GS users. And really who cares what some coding developers think of you. Your customers thoughts should be your concern.
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  • mynameisacemynameisace Hull, UKMember Posts: 2,484
    +1 to what Tshirtbooth said...

    GS is like any other programming platform; it only does what the coder tells it to do.

    The only thing it's missing is some iOS features, it is an extremely stable programming platform that people who put half the work in and try blaming different things every week will keep moving on to different languages and never settle, always looking for something 'better' when it's the coder that needs to be 'better'.

    As to getting more respect, if you have pro, nobody would ever know that a well coded GS app was created with GS.

    Ace
  • DizkoDizko Member Posts: 498
    For what it's worth @Metronome49 I have a fair amount of "eye candy" in my game. As of now (about 70% done) it only builds to be about 8.5mb and runs on my old G3 phone at 40+ FPS. And like you I'm a designer (I work in television) so eye candy is important to me as well.

    Constraints really hurt performance, so if you pay attention how many of those you use, you should be able to do a lot without killing polish.
  • sparkzillasparkzilla Member Posts: 152
    +10 to TshirtBooth

    At the very least if you can't make a game on GS then you can't make a game with any other system.
  • SlickZeroSlickZero Houston, TexasMember, Sous Chef Posts: 2,870
    I guess it depends on what community you feel you are a part of. Respect from the programming community isn't a concern of mine, personally. Especially since I am not a part of the programming community. My only concern is that the people that buy my games, enjoy those games and don't feel like they wasted 99 cents. A tip of the hat from the art community, or the musician community for what I've done with a game would mean more to me than what a programmer thinks, and even then, I'm not out to impress any trade community, with the exception of the community buying my game. If I was a programmer, I know I would want the respect from the programming community, and this would be a totally different story.

    GameSalad even with its limitations, is powerful enough to bring my ideas to life without any compromise so far. May be different for others.
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  • Metronome49Metronome49 Member Posts: 297
    @Dizko

    This thread was part of what I was referencing.

    http://gamesalad.com/forums/topic.php?id=22094

    Very pretty game.
  • DizkoDizko Member Posts: 498
    Metronome49 said:
    @Dizko

    This thread was part of what I was referencing.

    http://gamesalad.com/forums/topic.php?id=22094

    Very pretty game.

    To be honest, I think his problems are from a design standpoint and not a limitation of the software. It's huge, and slow but I see no reason for that. Maybe his audio needs to be optimized, maybe his animations etc. Who knows really, but I don't believe that it's the software. GS is slower than other platforms for sure, but his project seems to be out of control.
  • Metronome49Metronome49 Member Posts: 297
    @Dizko

    But how do you know WHERE your project is out of control? I want lots of animation, and sound, and music. I understand to avoid constraints, but they have to be used to do certain stuff.
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