iOS Gaming November 2013: Runs in 1136x640 / 2048x1536 natively, no up-scaling needed

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What I don't understand is that for example Kingdom Rush developer can produce a more complete experience (even though it features all that IAP I never felt I need it to complete the game nor I felt like I am particularly missing out on content. Buying a wizard was a bonus more than anything) for less than 5 euro and be seemingly very successful financially.

The key part of any business model for a game is the quality of the game itself, but you can't really judge that after the fact when the risk has all gone.

If Kingdom Rush had been crap, or at best mediocre, they may have got basically nothing back on their investment. It just happened to be pretty amazing so it all works out nicely.

You might think the obvious answer is to just make amazing games, but few companies have found the knack of doing so and even fewer have been able to do it for long.

I don't play games with IAP anymore, I've had my fill of the ios experience, I'm over it to a certain extent and I'll only be looking for games that better fit the model I like.
But if there are plenty of people still out there opening their wallets, I can't blame people for making games for them.
 
Well Pik Pok is not charity, I think we shouldn't treat them as an indie company - they are here to make money - and what's wrong with that? This is a tough market. And that's how mainstream works, sadly. I don't know if they are going to win Gaffers over with their approach in IAP here in this topic, though.

I don't exactly like it, so I don't play their games, simple. Having limited budget I'd rather support full game experience and pay 8 euro on a single game than spend a single euro on IAP that's going to last for an hour at best. Well it's not even the matter of economics, I don't approve of this kind of model. The second I see a second in game currency, the game gets deleted usually.

What I don't understand is that for example Kingdom Rush developer can produce a more complete experience (even though it features all that IAP I never felt I need it to complete the game nor I felt like I am particularly missing out on content. Buying a wizard was a bonus more than anything) for less than 5 euro and be seemingly very successful financially.

Yeah, I feel mostly the same.

Though I think even indies are trying to make money. Nothing wrong with that. Hard to survive in this world without money.
 
Can anyone recommend or point me to a list of good games that are ipad only (if there are any)? Just got a new mini retina and its lush!
 
Flick Kick Football: Legends is now on top of my worst games of 2013 list. The game is literally everything what I hate about the games industry at the moment, which is remarkable, considering the original game was sooo good.
 
I was pretty excited to hear about the Ace Attorney Trilogy sale, I own the first title and I'd love to add the rest to my collection. But I can't! The app is free, with the individual episodes or entire trilogy available as IAP's, and apparently I can't buy the trilogy since I already own the first one. The option is greyed out. Individual titles are 6.99 vs. 4.99 for the entire trilogy. Who do I complain to about this?
 
I was pretty excited to hear about the Ace Attorney Trilogy sale, I own the first title and I'd love to add the rest to my collection. But I can't! The app is free, with the individual episodes or entire trilogy available as IAP's, and apparently I can't buy the trilogy since I already own the first one. The option is greyed out. Individual titles are 6.99 vs. 4.99 for the entire trilogy. Who do I complain to about this?

@aceattorneygame ?


I guess you could create a new iTunes account but this is pretty dumb.
 
Well Pik Pok is not charity, I think we shouldn't treat them as an indie company - they are here to make money - and what's wrong with that? This is a tough market. And that's how mainstream works, sadly. I don't know if they are going to win Gaffers over with their approach in IAP here in this topic, though.

I don't exactly like it, so I don't play their games, simple. Having limited budget I'd rather support full game experience and pay 8 euro on a single game than spend a single euro on IAP that's going to last for an hour at best. Well it's not even the matter of economics, I don't approve of this kind of model. The second I see a second in game currency, the game gets deleted usually.

What I don't understand is that for example Kingdom Rush developer can produce a more complete experience (even though it features all that IAP I never felt I need it to complete the game nor I felt like I am particularly missing out on content. Buying a wizard was a bonus more than anything) for less than 5 euro and be seemingly very successful financially.

Ironhide studios are also only 3 people. Based on the FKL crwdits, at least 28 worked on the game, invluding qa, etc.
 
I was pretty excited to hear about the Ace Attorney Trilogy sale, I own the first title and I'd love to add the rest to my collection. But I can't! The app is free, with the individual episodes or entire trilogy available as IAP's, and apparently I can't buy the trilogy since I already own the first one. The option is greyed out. Individual titles are 6.99 vs. 4.99 for the entire trilogy. Who do I complain to about this?

I spaced before I went to bed last night, remembered hearing about the sale (but didn't really remember how it worked), and bought stupid Phoenix Wright for $5 instead of the whole trilogy. Didn't even realize my mistake until I woke up this morning, ha-
 
I spaced before I went to bed last night, remembered hearing about the sale (but didn't really remember how it worked), and bought stupid Phoenix Wright for $5 instead of the whole trilogy. Didn't even realize my mistake until I woke up this morning, ha-
The good news is that's a different app, so you could still buy the full trilogy for $5. Apple support might give you a refund if you explain your mistake and show them you purchased the full trilogy separately.
 
Ironhide studios are also only 3 people. Based on the FKL crwdits, at least 28 worked on the game, invluding qa, etc.

What I get from that is that studios like Pik Pok, despite their manpower, just aren't very good at making games. I don't mind that there's a market on iOS for profitable mediocrity, but it's one of the main reasons I'm no longer checking for iOS related gaming news and just stick to the big releases like Fiesta Run and Infinity Blade 3.
 
After having completed the 3 'shorter' scenarios, some online games and now deep into the full campaign, I can safely say Drive on Moscow is simply outstanding.

The full campaign is particularly mentally draining .... you are always on the verge of conquering Moscow but then the mud hampers you...the winter arrives and at -40 the Russians counterattack is really brutal.
AWESOME.
 
Thanks for your feedback.
Hey Mario. There is a small bug in your game where the iPhone 5 thinks the screen is flipped. If you hit the volume button you'll see that it's upside down. If it doesn't happen for you I can provide a screenshot.

edit: nm. It happens when you lock the screen upside down.
 
Well Pik Pok is not charity, I think we shouldn't treat them as an indie company - they are here to make money - and what's wrong with that? This is a tough market. And that's how mainstream works, sadly. I don't know if they are going to win Gaffers over with their approach in IAP here in this topic, though.

Well, we target most of our games in the casual to midcore range, so GAF falls mostly outside of that.

For the most part, given the sensibilities of people in these threads and the gamers we are actually targeting, the best we can do is try to offend people as little as possible.


muddream said:
I don't mind that there's a market on iOS for profitable mediocrity, but it's one of the main reasons I'm no longer checking for iOS related gaming news and just stick to the big releases like Fiesta Run and Infinity Blade 3.

I'm not sure I follow you here. Both those games have user ratings less than or equal to Flick Kick Football Legends, and have an up front premium cost plus IAP.

What are you trying to suggest exactly?
 
What I get from that is that studios like Pik Pok, despite their manpower, just aren't very good at making games.

Can't compare them like that. PikPok has more people, but they also release dozens of games a year, while ironhide releases maybe one game every one or two years.
 
I appreciate the suggestion, but having had a lot of experience with the paid model I can assure you putting a $5 price tag on the game would not recoup our development costs.

There simply aren't enough prepared to pay premium prices for this sort of game, especially when people have massively high expectations for even 99c (including myself as an iPhone game consumer).

I wasn't realistically suggesting a $4.99 price point, just an indication of what I'm willing to pay. I'm sadly aware that I am in a tiny minority in that respect on this platform, and games on it have been designed to reflect that.

All the best with the game though, I'm still dipping into it now and then. What happens during a match is fun enough, it's what's surrounding it that bothers me.
 
I have to agree with the people saying Flick Kick Football: Legends is ruined by iAds and IAPs. Seems like it could be a fun game otherwise. Shame since I liked the original.
 
I am fairly tolerant of f2p mechanics. I've played and enjoyed quite a few free games, even buying IAP if I feel it's fair, but Flick Kick Football Legends is the worse kind of freemium. It's filled with ads, timers and it puts a paywall in front of you very soon with very expensive cards and gameplay rewards so stingy that would make any grind heavy game blush.

I get that it's a difficult market for these type of games, but if Pik Pok can't make any profit without being this aggressive than I don't know if I feel bad for them or for the people paying them.

And frankly, despite the brilliant presentation and clever mechanics, the game isn't even that good. It isn't fleshed out enough, which is a shame because it could be something really special.
 
IAP and freemium is fine when done right, such as aesthetic upgrades, ads with a payment to remove them or other unintrusive options. Timers, ads that can't be removed and pay to win are where it goes wrong.

Not played the game in question, just my take on the model.

The best examples of f2p are on PC imho, TF2, Path of Exile, Dota2 etc... Mobile is a harder market for sure but I think some developers don't have publishers who bother with marketing. Discoverability is only an issue if you don't market yourself to the niches who spend money.
 
IAP and freemium is fine when done right, such as aesthetic upgrades, ads with a payment to remove them or other unintrusive options. Timers, ads that can't be removed and pay to win are where it goes wrong.

Not played the game in question, just my take on the model.

The best examples of f2p are on PC imho, TF2, Path of Exile, Dota2 etc... Mobile is a harder market for sure but I think some developers don't have publishers who bother with marketing. Discoverability is only an issue if you don't market yourself to the niches who spend money.
The best examples of F2P on IOS are Deadly Bullet and Beat Leap.
They're real free to play, no IAP, no ads, no timers, no freemium elements at all. Deadly Bullets was made by a Remedy dev who makes IOS games as a hobby and Beat Leap is a fantastic that's getting a huge update soon, with a level editor, new hazards and power-ups, etc.
 
I'm not sure I follow you here. Both those games have user ratings less than or equal to Flick Kick Football Legends, and have an up front premium cost plus IAP.

What are you trying to suggest exactly?

- Rayman and IB3 can be thoroughly enjoyed without ads and IAP.

- App store user ratings...wait am I being trolled here? How rude!

- I'm suggesting that you set out to make games that are profitable in the iOS environment, not games that are mechanically as good as they could be (like Kingdom Rush). You seem to be pretty open about this and I don't think it's unethical or shameful...I'm just disillusioned with iOS gaming as a whole.
 
- Rayman and IB3 can be thoroughly enjoyed without ads and IAP.

But you have to pay for those two game up front. And if you buy any IAP in Flick Kick Football Legends, it turns off the ads.

And you can "finish" Flick Kick Football Legends without spending any money.

So, what's the difference?


App store user ratings...wait am I being trolled here? How rude!

I'm trying to understand your rationale for choosing one game over another. There is an implied quality aspect to your statement that I am challenging, though it it is ambiguous in your original comment whether you consider all 3 games in the class of "profitable mediocrity" or only Flick Kick Football Legends.


I'm suggesting that you set out to make games that are profitable in the iOS environment, not games that are mechanically as good as they could be (like Kingdom Rush).

Yes, we set out to make games that are profitable.

Are you suggesting Ubisoft and Epic were not trying to make profitable games with Rayman Fiesta Run and Infinity Blade 3?

I'd wager the Kingdom Rush devs set out to make a profitable game too. It kind of underpins commercial viability.
 
HE449


http://store.apple.com/us/product/HE449ZM/A/moga-ace-power-game-controller?fnode=43

Out now for $99.95 via the Apple Store!
Compatible with: iPhone 5, iPhone 5c, iPhone 5s, iPod touch 5th Generation


Oh and you can pre-order the Logitech controller via Logitech now as well: http://gaming.logitech.com/en-gb/product/powershell-controller-and-battery


And a list of the 'best' supported games via Pocket Gamer

http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/r/iPad/iOS+controllers/news.asp?c=53994
£80 in the UK, a little rich but it does have a built in battery to extend life, and it's the only full fledged controller with two sticks and triggers we will have this side of 2013, need to think about it as no pay until friday.
 
£80 in the UK, a little rich but it does have a built in battery to extend life, and it's the only full fledged controller with two sticks and triggers we will have this side of 2013, need to think about it as no pay until friday.

Reviews said it feels cheap and flimsy. I would wait.
 
Well, typically people's objection to IAP in this context, especially in a sequel, is the feeling that the game design has been altered so as to encourage purchasing the IAP. It varies from game to game and person to person, but often this makes the game frustrating in a way that it wouldn't be if not for the game design changes from adding the IAP.

This encompasses not only games like WMW2, which changed the fundamental structure of the game in order to add an obnoxious timing mechanic as a motivator to buy IAP, but also games like PvZ2, where there are long stretches of grinding if you don't buy the IAP. In an ordinary game without IAP, the grinding would presumably be much less because you don't want to flat-out frustrate the player. With IAP, you do want to frustrate the player to some extent because that might cause them to pay for IAP.

Our games aren't usually balanced towards forcing an IAP conversion because we use advertising to monetize non paying players (a lot of other F2P games don't). There is no wall or impossible grind you hit in any of our games.

And I'd certainly challenge any claim that Flick Kick Football Legends was any more grindy than Infinity Blade 3.

So, I think my question to muddream stands - what's the difference?
 
Our games aren't usually balanced towards forcing an IAP conversion because we use advertising to monetize non paying players (a lot of other F2P games don't). There is no wall or impossible grind you hit in any of our games.

It has timers right?

As soon as you make a gamer choose between their time and money the game is balanced towards IAP conversion.
 
It has timers right?

As soon as you make a gamer choose between their time and money the game is balanced towards IAP conversion.

It seems counter intuitive but the timers are actually included to make people play the game more. We seem to have been successful in that aspect in the beta and early live release numbers.

The monetization aspect of it is actually just incidental.
 
Hey, does anyone know if the Ace Attorney HD IAP unlock requires additional downloads to occur, or does it just unlock the content from the existing app size?

Just curious if I could do it in my apartment without Wi-fi, or if I should wait until the weekdays to do it. Crazy deal, and perfect for me who wants to replay them on the go.
 
I just got an iPhone 5S. What game would you guys recommend to buy to showcase it? That is, what's the game with the best visuals? I was thinking about Infinity Blade III or Oceanhorn... but maybe there's something I'm missing?
 
Our games aren't usually balanced towards forcing an IAP conversion because we use advertising to monetize non paying players (a lot of other F2P games don't). There is no wall or impossible grind you hit in any of our games.

1)Yes there is: timers. Those are unbreakable walls right there, which you can bypass if you spend money.
2) if the metric of good design is to make a game beatable without buying IAPs then that's a low and depressing bar to pass and be heralded as good f2p experiences: there's a ton of terrible f2p games which can be "finished" without spending a dime: is it enjoyable to do that tho?
No and unfortunately in the case of FKFL that's a resounding no... and you know I love FKF and spending a couple of dollars the game's way would only be fair to me, problem is that the getting rid of ads doesn't fix this terrible money-grabbing experience.
3) the reason we find it baffling to compare the game to something like Fiesta Run is because the latter not only can be finished, but is truly enjoyable and gives you a full, non-compromised gameplay experience without spending a dime over the original asking price. By contrast, spending ten times Fiesta's price still wouldn,' be enough to have a similar full experience enjoyable experience in FKFL. It's really a comparison which can't be made. I hold it against the original poster to have brought to the table a comparison with a game in a completely different genre and gameplay philosophy, and yes that makes a difference, but it is you who should have challenged him with a similar rebuttal; a more proper comparison could have been made with, say, Pitfall's Temple-Run clone, which is as guilty as FKFL and yet it still gives you more than the latter in terms of "full game experience" by the sheer simplicity of its gameplay. FKFL tries to give you more that that, otherwise it would've stayed as bare (not a negative of course, just a different approach) as the original FKF, but fails... unless you spend big. It's ok, the game's very clearly built that way and if we don't like it I'd say is not that hard to simply give it a pass, I just don't understand why you're trying to make it seem like the game and its f2p model are something they're not.
4) I have mad respect for you guys, I'm happy to see you be successful but you've got to understand that, with no bad blood, most of us gamers just can't wish you guys the best with *this* business model. I love my hobby and see this way of doing games as harmful and destructive, so you can see how I and others have a vested interest in seeing this kind of endevours fail hard: if I don't see you (*you* figuratively speaking of course, not you "you"!) as an asset and positive influence to this industry and instead as something negative, then I don't want you to be a part of it, it's that simple. I don't think that unfair at all.

Sorry for the grammar and typos, it's past 4AM here and I'm sleepy ;)
 
I just got an iPhone 5S. What game would you guys recommend to buy to showcase it? That is, what's the game with the best visuals? I was thinking about Infinity Blade III or Oceanhorn... but maybe there's something I'm missing?

xcom is quite intensive too if you haven't played that yet.

if you like racing games gt racing 2, asphalt 8 are free 2play, but visual pretty stuff to flaunt the system.
 
I just got an iPhone 5S. What game would you guys recommend to buy to showcase it? That is, what's the game with the best visuals? I was thinking about Infinity Blade III or Oceanhorn... but maybe there's something I'm missing?

I feel like a broken record that keeps on repeating, but try out Asphalt 8 (racing genre, free2play). Its a blast to play and fairly pretty to look at. Although I'd say its harder to play on an iPhone than an iPad...but you only specified visuals so... :} Definitely grab IB3, its fantastic. Curious though, are you looking for a specfic genre to play, or literally just nice looking games?
 
toddhunter said:
What is the theory there?

At a high level, timer based gates with the right implementation create a tendency for more sessions on an ongoing basis because people return to the game more frequently throughout the day due to anticipation and curiosity, rather than exhausting their interest and attention in larger more infrequent sessions. The overall impact is this actually increases the average total time spent playing the game and improves long term retention.


1)Yes there is: timers. Those are unbreakable walls right there, which you can bypass if you spend money.

I don't personally consider it an "unbreakable wall" given you can get past the gate happily when the appropriate time has passed.

Besides, you can still bypass the timers without spending real money.


2) if the metric of good design is to make a game beatable without buying IAPs then that's a low and depressing bar to pass and be heralded as good f2p experiences: there's a ton of terrible f2p games which can be "finished" without spending a dime: is it enjoyable to do that tho?
No and unfortunately in the case of FKFL that's a resounding no... and you know I love FKF and spending a couple of dollars the game's way would only be fair to me, problem is that the getting rid of ads doesn't fix this terrible money-grabbing experience.

I never made the claim the measure of "good design" was whether it, at all.

I'm merely responding in the framing that someone else put forward.


3) the reason we find it baffling to compare the game to something like Fiesta Run is because the latter not only can be finished, but is truly enjoyable and gives you a full, non-compromised gameplay experience without spending a dime over the original asking price. By contrast, spending ten times Fiesta's price still wouldn,' be enough to have a similar full experience enjoyable experience in FKFL. It's really a comparison which can't be made. I hold it against the original poster to have brought to the table a comparison with a game in a completely different genre and gameplay philosophy, and yes that makes a difference, but it is you who should have challenged him with a similar rebuttal; a more proper comparison could have been made with, say, Pitfall's Temple-Run clone, which is as guilty as FKFL and yet it still gives you more than the latter in terms of "full game experience" by the sheer simplicity of its gameplay. FKFL tries to give you more that that, otherwise it would've stayed as bare (not a negative of course, just a different approach) as the original FKF, but fails... unless you spend big. It's ok, the game's very clearly built that way and if we don't like it I'd say is not that hard to simply give it a pass, I just don't understand why you're trying to make it seem like the game and its f2p model are something they're not.

I'm not trying mislead people around the business model for the game, at all.

I'm only clarifying our rationale for pursuing the model and the implementation.


4) I have mad respect for you guys, I'm happy to see you be successful but you've got to understand that, with no bad blood, most of us gamers just can't wish you guys the best with *this* business model. I love my hobby and see this way of doing games as harmful and destructive, so you can see how I and others have a vested interest in seeing this kind of endevours fail hard: if I don't see you (*you* figuratively speaking of course, not you "you"!) as an asset and positive influence to this industry and instead as something negative, then I don't want you to be a part of it, it's that simple. I don't think that unfair at all.

I never asked for anyone here to "wish us the best", at all.

I'm merely asking questions and challenging specific comments to help understand people's positions and to clarify ours.


Sorry for the grammar and typos, it's past 4AM here and I'm sleepy ;)

I appreciate your post, but I think you need to go back and read mine when you aren't so sleepy because you are reading things into my posts which I'm just not saying.
 
At a high level, timer based gates with the right implementation create a tendency for more sessions on an ongoing basis because people return to the game more frequently throughout the day due to anticipation and curiosity, rather than exhausting their interest and attention in larger more infrequent sessions. The overall impact is this actually increases the average total time spent playing the game and improves.

No wonder I keep returning to simulation games like Dragonvale (iOS) after discovering it 2 years ago. Thats a smart business plan. Thanks for breaking down the sociology of it. :)
 
At a high level, timer based gates with the right implementation create a tendency for more sessions on an ongoing basis because people return to the game more frequently throughout the day due to anticipation and curiosity, rather than exhausting their interest and attention in larger more infrequent sessions. The overall impact is this actually increases the average total time spent playing the game and improves long term retention.

Well, whatever works for you I suppose.

Do you think it is a sustainable model? I can see people falling for that once as they log in infrequently and draw their game time out. But when they finally move on to the next game and see the same timers, won't they pack it up and move onto something that actually tries to be fun?
 
xcom is quite intensive too if you haven't played that yet.

if you like racing games gt racing 2, asphalt 8 are free 2play, but visual pretty stuff to flaunt the system.

I feel like a broken record that keeps on repeating, but try out Asphalt 8 (racing genre, free2play). Its a blast to play and fairly pretty to look at. Although I'd say its harder to play on an iPhone than an iPad...but you only specified visuals so... :} Definitely grab IB3, its fantastic. Curious though, are you looking for a specfic genre to play, or literally just nice looking games?

I already have xcom, asphalt 8 and gt racing 2, lol...

I guess I will go with Infinity Blade 3 then.

As for any specific genre... not really. Just nice looking games to show at work :P
 
Do you think it is a sustainable model? I can see people falling for that once as they log in infrequently and draw their game time out. But when they finally move on to the next game and see the same timers, won't they pack it up and move onto something that actually tries to be fun?

Sustainable for a single game or for the industry as a model?

From a practical standpoint, in the short to medium term, I don't anticipate timers becoming problematic from people that already accept them.

Longer term, business models for mobile in particular and gaming in general will continue to evolve, and new techniques and mechanisms will emerge. At a high level though, I see it mostly continuing to shift away from the classic premium type approach and towards F2P, subscription, advertising/sponsorship type stuff with an emphasis on being "free" up front in order to capture an audience and monetizing somehow once somebody is engaged.


Also, all our games actually try to be fun too (and most reports that we get are that they succeed in that).
 
Anyone played The Shivah: Kosher Edition? It's from Wadjet Eye, the team that did Gemini Rue. It got a gold from Pocket Gamer, too. I mean...how can I say no to this?

lCrcKsAl.jpg

Not to get all hipster, but I played it on the PC back in 2006/7. It's really great, go buy it!
 
At a high level, timer based gates with the right implementation create a tendency for more sessions on an ongoing basis because people return to the game more frequently throughout the day due to anticipation and curiosity, rather than exhausting their interest and attention in larger more infrequent sessions. The overall impact is this actually increases the average total time spent playing the game and improves long term retention.

Personally I played about 10 games with timers and every single time I lost interest after playing them intensively for a couple of days.
The moment the game tries to influence my own time management with cheap tricks like that - off it goes. Maybe you find that it does make the players play more often, but do they stick with the game for longer?
(That this quote looks like taken from a generic guide how to make a profitable iOS game is another story)

I just feel you are trying to excuse this pricing model by making it out as something better than it actually is, instead of flatly admitting what your agenda is. FKFL seems to milk players' money just like WIMW, RR3 or other similar game, and according to feedback here in this thread it degrades the experience with the game rather than enhances it over from the original.

The fact that you tried to prove your argument using user reviews from the app store isn't very convincing either.

Rayman and Infinity Blade come from much bigger, publisher backed studios so it's not a fair comparison.
Vlambeer for a game that could easily pulled off F2P model decided to charge €2,70 making one of the best games available out on iOS. It seemed highly successful. I don't know the figures but I wonder if they did worse than any of your titles? Similarly, Pixelbits seem to be a small studio, their Junk Jack X is a massive game that required lot of testing yet they charge 4,50 for premium, full experience package. Of course there are IAP but they are bonuses some were happy to pay for but most of the time they don't enhance the gameplay at all.


I hope that the premium based model will continue to thrive - after all it's mostly 2.69 - 4.49 that I see as of late featured on the main page of the app store, not 0.99 as it's used to be. So I think some people are willing to spend more for better experience and I hope this niche stays and grows separately from F2P, because I am happy to support it.

Hey, does anyone know if the Ace Attorney HD IAP unlock requires additional downloads to occur, or does it just unlock the content from the existing app size?

Just curious if I could do it in my apartment without Wi-fi, or if I should wait until the weekdays to do it. Crazy deal, and perfect for me who wants to replay them on the go.
For me it seems like it just unlocked the content. I'd rather have just the game I am playing at the moment but oh well, it's not that awfully big. I wanted to only buy Trials and Tribulations but at least I paid less for the whole thing than just the single game.
 
Maybe you find that it does make the players play more often, but do they stick with the game for longer?

Yes. That's the whole point.


I just feel you are trying to excuse this pricing model by making it out as something better than it actually is, instead of flatly admitting what your agenda is.

I'm only defending accusations and assumptions people are making which are just wrong with respect to our process and motivations.

As to our "agenda", we are a commercial game developer. We love making games, but in order to do that we need our games to be profitable on an ongoing basis and are trying what we can to make that happen. I personally believe our games are very "fair" and non exploitative, and also think we give away a lot of high quality experience away for free.

I don't expect everybody to agree.


The fact that you tried to prove your argument using user reviews from the app store isn't very convincing either.

I'm only bringing that up as a tangible metric in response to people suggesting our games aren't good. All I'm trying to "prove" with respect to that is "people disagree with you".


I hope that the premium based model will continue to thrive

Its not thriving though.


Edit: I think some people are misconstruing some of my questions in previous posts as disagreement on my part or similar, I'm actually genuinely interested in people's positions and understanding their rationale for holding them.
 
Would it be viable for you guys just to add an IAP to unlock a premium version of the game for something like $4.99? Possibly, that way you can still have the large player base of a F2P game and at the same time satisfy the more core gamers?
 
Would it be viable for you guys just to add an IAP to unlock a premium version of the game for something like $4.99? Possibly, that way you can still have the large player base of a F2P game and at the same time satisfy the more core gamers?

There is no "premium version" to unlock though. It would be easier to create a completely separate app (which then introduces new issues).

The third party ads already turn off with any IAP purchase though.

I guess you could get closer with an additional "disable timers" purchase or something.
 
Tiny Death Star running out of quests before you've even built all the imperial levels?

Final straw for me to stop playing. I even built another imperial to see if it'd unlock more quests... nope. That's some major bullshit right there.
 
Tiny Death Star running out of quests before you've even built all the imperial levels?

Final straw for me to stop playing. I even built another imperial to see if it'd unlock more quests... nope. That's some major bullshit right there.

That sucks. I know they don't have a good track record of adding things to their games but I didn't notice it saying "coming soon" when looking t's the levels. So maybe they will add more levels and quests down the road.
 
That sucks. I know they don't have a good track record of adding things to their games but I didn't notice it saying "coming soon" when looking t's the levels. So maybe they will add more levels and quests down the road.

Oh, I can continue to build levels. It'll let me do that.. just there's no reason too.. as there is no quests to fulfill with the parts you make. The levels make no money in any other manner than crafting ingredients for the quests.

There must have been, 10 quests in total? Something like that.. and even built a new imperial to see if it'd open up more.. nope.
 
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