I have watched the Share your sales numbers thread with much interest.  And Dean's post got me thinking:

Noogy:

Everyone also has to remember that the holidays are quickly ramping up.  Listening to podcasts and going on message boards, it's clear there is no shortage of quality retail titles on shelves.   It's going to be difficult competing with the onslaught of games these next few months.  And it's not going to be easier at the beginning of next year, where even massive publishers have pushed their titles.

And I agree with the sentiment that pricing your game low doesn't guarantee sales.  Remember David Edery's Talk, where the consumer actually has a number of options for cheap (and even free) quality gaming nowadays.  In some ways this will limit the number of "hey, I spent 4 days on this game" titles, and force developers to make something that stands out.

Everyone has a favorite game coming up.  Mine is Forza 3.  Next one is Splinter Cell Conviction.  For others it's Need for Speed Shift (already out), DJ Hero, Assassin's Creed II, Halo: Reach, etc...

So now that Duality ZF is going to be released soon, I have to ask, when is the best time to release it?  Is it better to sell when game purchases rise but have a big bite taken out from retail launches, or is it better to reverse what the major retail releases are doing and sell after the fact.  Gamers may have little money left over come January.  I have heard no major titles sell in January and February, is this true?  (I have not paid attention to the market before.)  Is that a good time for us to release?

This does not just apply to our game, but all Indie Games...  When is the best time to release?

I would release during a lull in AAA releases.

It's a very tough question that I don't see any easy answers to.

An alternative to the above school of thought, is that gamers might receive MS Points as gifts over the holidays and might have extra to spend on Indie Games.

I suppose that if you don't have any significant PR plans for your game, it's best to release as early as possible (once it's 100% finished mind you) so it will be out there longer. That way gamers will have a longer time to download it, and even if they don't have cash on hand to purchase it, they might hold onto the demo for when they next get Points.

But it could very easily be the flip side, where they're so busy playing the AAA games they don't even bother to check XBLIG, and any games released from now till next year will be largely ignored.

Then again, if you have a non-mainstream quirky title, it might be a great time to release since your target audience won't be bothering with the big AAA games, and will have less competition!


I suppose all of these cases will happen, it's just important what cases will happen most often. ;)

_{(and I can't wait for Forza 3 either! :D *clutches preorder, anxiously glances at the calender*)}

This is defintly going to be a one when you look back in hindsight and decide you chose the wrong choice.

I don't think there is a correct answer, there will be pros and cons for each side of the argument.

Personally if the game is ready I would say release it, let it get the market share and publicity, people will start to review it etc, and then if someone has some points for xmas they might buy your game.

Either way I wish you the best for your sales.

Seems like when Halo 3: ODST came out, sales dipped for a day or two and then went back to normal.

On one hand, Christmas might be bad because people will be playing lots of other titles.

On another hand, it might be good because people will have giftcards (MS Points) to burn.

There probably is no right answer and you'll end up second guessing this whichever you choose. I think it's still early enough that you won't be too affected by AAA titles being released, but I'm not sure I would want to release in late December until a few days after Christmas.

I'm not 100% sure that the current "drought" on Indie games is mostly due to Holiday releases.  We really haven't had that many over the last few weeks where trial downloads appear down, not just sales.  It would be nice to know the traffic levels, and even total trail downloads across all games for a day so that you can gauge how much of off sales are due to less traffic in the section.  Other AAA release have really only affected sales a day or two from what I've gathered in the sales thread.

I think the bigger reason (and this is only my WAG) is the "zombie wave" is over.  When Zombies was going viral, many people were checking out the section. Now that's done, there isn't a "call to action" for people to check out the section and it's back to catching someone who is board and playing in the dashboard.  So I think promoting your game is more important than timing the release.

I think you missed the best moment which was this summer.


Imho you should release the game after january but 2010 will be a year full of great titles, on every season. So Good Luck.

Right after DBP would proably have been the best, but thats over and done...

Right now I dont think there's a 'best time' on XBLIG... you can get lucky and get a few extra days on new releases but it seems theres 2-7 games per day being released pretty consistently now and since you can't predict peer review times its hard to control. So if its done I say just get it out there.

You already have hype on this game, I say put it in playtest now and see how people react... if it looks like its going to be a fast passer then start the hype engine and get it in peer review.

I absolutely agree with ZMan on this.  The likes of us just don't have the financial muscle or industry contacts to make a genuine "launch event", and more or less everyone who's into xblig is waiting for Duality anyway.  Get her into playtest, guestimate the time needed to get through peer review (and to fix any bugs, of course), get the presses rolling and hope for the best!  My PR plans for Space Pirates include doing a lot of rain dances and sacrificing goats because that's basically what it comes down to if you don't know anything about PR, like what I do.

Regards,
Mike

Holidays are very poor for arcade/downloadable games. Wait it out!

Hard to say...

I have some projects (almost) ready to be playtested/released but I can't decide if/when release them. Looks like Wall Street Stock Exchange. There was a good time window last month but now looks like it is getting slow.

Halloween is not a good timing if you're not releasing a themed game, Xbox guys are pumping themed games. Look at the avatar wave too. If you're not releasing an avatar game and Xbox team pushes avatar games you may have some slots "taken" by these games.

Regarding major AAA title release... you can't fine tune your release day, you can only pray and hope to get approved a couple of days after that AAA release.

Let's start off with a few things that say "maybe don't release now", then move into my actual opinion

1. The highest time for sales of XBLA content on the XBox360 was during Summer of Arcade. It's when Microsoft promotes XBLA the most, and it's when the most people are going through those sections of their dashboards. This is the most sales of XBLA content though, not necessarrily XBLIG. Note that during this time a lot of high profile XBLA games came out and were highly promoted, and that is what leads to a lot of those sales, but I would not be surprised if people going to XBLA detour to XBLIG.

2. How much media coverage are you hoping for? This is tricky, because even if you could potentially get as many sales during this time of year, the possibility of getting featured on the major game blogs is likely lower. Why? Because there are no "slow news days" during this season. The major sites have a lot of AAA titles to keep them busy and to keep their audiences busy. Sites don't need to look for "hidden gems" when every AAA studio is flooding their mailboxes with press releases.

Now what do I think?

I think the season is longer than December and may end around late Febuary. A lot of big studios have gotten scared of christmas releases and pushed their releases to Febuary. If your game is ready, do you really want to wait half a year to release in a time that "may" be better? You probably won't have anything to compare it to either way! In most teams people don't succeed on their very first projects, and the learning experience of a release may trump whatever made-up reasons we come up with to choose one time over another. With a bad economy we may see more "thrifty" gifts going around like points cards for non-direct relatives, but we may not. With the amount of traffic XBLIG gets on new releases, your goal may be to get into and stay in the top 10 downloaded games, because you may need long term sales to make your time worth it. If that's the case look at the games that ARE at the top of that list. If a game stays at the top does it matter when it was first released? If you can only stay in the top 10 for 2 weeks, will ANY time of the year garner you enough sales in those 2 weeks to make it worth it? These are the kinds of things I've been thinking of for my own game (which is also nearing completion after a long dev cycle). I haven't come to a final conclusion for myself yet, but I'm leaning towards "sooner is better" nowadays.

Regarding releasing in January.  Look at what Capcom did these last few years.  Many of their marquee releases were in January/February, and they did PHENOMENALY well.  It's amazing that it took the rest of the industry to follow suit.

The problem now is that everyone has wised up, and we are seeing a large number of triple AAA titles coming out in the first quarter.  But this still means that the release schedule is front and back loaded, meaning the summers are still the slowest period.  Gamers have less news to wade through (except the hot periods like E3/PAX), and it's probably easier to make some noise and get noticed.  Once the holiday ramps up, I get the feeling that gamers are less likely to follow new game announcements as their plate is full, and in most cases, their money is reserved.

I wish I could offer a more educated guess, but I'm looking at it from the outside.  I do agree with the sentiment that Post-DBP would have been the best time.  Relatively slow games schedule, the obvious bump of having DBP in the news, etc.  Personally, if I had Dust ready to ship just a week after DBP, I'd have loved to see what kind of sales I would have received, but it wasn't so.

So my final (uneducated) guess would be to release in May-August, and spread your marketing announcements away from any major release.  A new Halo is coming out?  Make some noise during those few days when every gamer is waiting for their preorder to ship, frantically checking all the gaming sites for any bit of news. 

To be honest Matthew, I'd be afraid to release your game anytime soon.  As a gamer I've got a stack of unopened games sitting here, with preorders coming in at an alarming rate.  I own a PS3, Wii and 360, and the only time I can play games in on my DS.  From what I've seen, I feel pretty confident that Duality will makes waves and receive a warm reception.  But getting gamers to notice is going to be very difficult.  Personally, I'd make a chart showing the major releases coming out (don't ignore other platforms, Uncharted 2 for example was a beast), look at when the juggernauts are pushing their campaigns, and get your hands on XBLA/PSN/WiiWare release schedules.  Finally, a little prayer might be in order.

Keep in mind that this deduction comes from observing a 'hard-core' crowd, although in many ways, that's who we are targeting, as we don't have the luxury of putting up a sign at Walmart and hoping a parent thinks the boxart looks neat.

This is a tough question.  I have a game that I've been working on since February, and it only needs another week of development before it's ready to go into the playtesting phase.  I would like to do what I can to maximize my profit since I did put a lot of work into it, but I would hate to have a finished game just sitting around when people could be playing it and enjoying it.  I hope that if a game is good enough, it will get enough downloads and purchases on it's own merits, but I can easily see external factors having a negative effect.

I don't know if there is such a thing as a right time. I don't think that we have enough data to see the overall highs and lows as we are just now approaching the one year mark. I could say the best time would have been near to the release of Jame's game zombies, however too late now. All the AAA games are being released and I don't know how that will effect our sales, if really that much. If you are worried about competing with holiday releases I would wait until post holiday, february-march. I know that last year many of us had great sales during that period, however the offer was different then, no ratings, not as many games, and it was pretty new. During the summer holidays I also had some serious upticks.

My strategy is I have no strategy, I will release my games as soon as I can.

It's really all kind of a crap shoot. I am seriously surprised that you have not released yet.

I agree with Big Daddio. You can speculate, you can guess but I honestly don't believe anyone has enough information or enough of a grasp to really understand this new market we have and what factors do and don't affect it. It's a crap shoot, I would release when you're done.

I agree with the others that its mostly luck and speculation, however I still think you would benifit getting the game out when there is a lack of big AAA releases. Unfortunatley, things are pretty much packed up until next summer at least, and I don't think you want to wait...

From a buisnees POV I think releasing the game in March (ie. putting it into review mid-february) would be best becasue that is when all the AAA titles releases stop. You will have more time to polish your game and a better chance of getting featured anywhere, as well as more atention of the now bored gamer. I don't really thing money is an issue here because Indie games are cheap. The exact oposite could be argued: As gamers wasted all their money dureing the holidays, they will be more willing to pay up to $5 for an indie game than $60 for retail. Furthermore, if you really think DZF doesn't need anymore polish you can always start development on your next game while waiting or enjoy some of the AAA holiday releases!

Alas, this is only my no evidence, guesswork opinion - it is what I plan on doing with my game (given it still needs some work and playtesting I couldn't actually be releasing it earlier anyways).

Personllay I'd really like you to put Duality ZF up ASAP because I really want to play it! :)

Personally, I'm going with the "whenever it's done approach". Things always change. People are quick to catch on to trends. Once people find a optimal time to release something, guess what, soon everyone is doing the same thing. Once everyone knows the trick, the trick doesn't work anymore. Just try not to release too close to a major title.

Release it now and release your sequel (or whatever your next big game is) in March of next year. Best of both worlds.

And let me know when it goes up in review so that I can be one of the reviewers. :)

RainbowDespair:

Release it now and release your sequel (or whatever your next big game is) in March of next year. Best of both worlds.

The problem is that Duality has been in the works far longer than most other Indie titles.  It's not like a quick 3 month turnaround, which is why I don't agree that Matthew should just 'throw it out there' and get started on the next moneymaker.

I know they are putting their heart and soul into this thing, and a little research isn't going to hurt.

Noogy:

RainbowDespair:

Release it now and release your sequel (or whatever your next big game is) in March of next year. Best of both worlds.

The problem is that Duality has been in the works far longer than most other Indie titles.  It's not like a quick 3 month turnaround, which is why I don't agree that Matthew should just 'throw it out there' and get started on the next moneymaker.

I know they are putting their heart and soul into this thing, and a little research isn't going to hurt.

True, but all the work they put into Duality isn't just going to vanish; that's valuable experience that will carry over towards allowing them to make the next game better and in less time than the first.

Put another way, 5 months should be plenty of time to make an awesome game if you're part of the team that made Duality (assuming it's as good as the videos tend to indicate).

Just sitting on a game for several months seems like a bad idea all around. People tend to spend a lot more around Christmas time and this Christmas is unusually tame for big game releases since so many games have been delayed to next year. I would think releasing now or in the near future would be a great time to release a new game.

Just to quote an old movie (LOL)... "If you build it they will come".

OK, not really a relevant example, but I don't think it matters "when" you release a game.  If it is "good", they will come (at least until you fall off the new release/most popular/highest rated lists).  Crappy games tend to fall off the lists quicker.  I don't think release dates really matter as some would lead you to believe.  If I bulit the most awesome game ever built, people would stream in based on ratings/word of mouth/publicity/etc...  Even ODST wouldn't be able to stop you.  Just my opinion.  The "game with zombies init" should be a "decent" example.  ;)

BTW, my term "crappy" is not directed towards you.  "I" wouldn't call your game awesome, nor would I call it "crappy".  To me, it is sort of one of those in-between games (R-Typish except vertical).  Just being honest - don't hate me.  :)

[EDIT:  Sure, if you released "Let's Build A Snowman" in the middle of July, that would be a disaster, but that would obviously be your own dumb fault.  LOL]

Consider this as well... if you sit and wait for 1-2 months, you're losing 1-2 months of sales. Will releasing later make up for that many lost sales?

Kris Steele:

Consider this as well... if you sit and wait for 1-2 months, you're losing 1-2 months of sales. Will releasing later make up for that many lost sales?

Unless sales were constant forever (ie: every month you sell x number of games, where x doesn't vary) this doesn't make much sense. You must consider that the important number is the total number of sales in the life-span of the game and that there is a limited number of XBL users and hence a limited number of potential sales. If by releasing later this total number of sales is bigger then by releasing now (for various reasons mentioned earlier in the thread), then that is better buisness.

If you really want to get technical you would have to consider the lost on interest over these two months. In this case, if realeasing now or in two months would generate the exact same number of sales, then it would be better to release now (because "money now is worth more than money later"). However what we are arguing is that by releasing later he can potentially generate sales that surpass those of releasing now + interest.

By releasing later you are not 'losing' 1-2 months of sales. You are simply postponing them (and losing interest money on them).

Furthermore, he doesn't need to "sit and wait" he can very well be working on his next project just as if he had released the game.