arrogancy:

And what do you think is the reason why you never heard of that indie game? (this game: Youtube Link )

It is because without an Independent Games Festival award push, which gets an indie game press from the GDC, it's hard for an indie game to get the mainstream attention that makes them financial successes. They make some money, yes, but a winner like Gish, Aquaria, etc. typically make more money than something rated similarly or higher across the board that did not get that push. Marketing.

We're in that same boat with Community Games; it's the PC indie scene all over again, just with a different platform, with the 360 serving as a distribution network or portal. A DBP push is similar to the IGF push - it is very, VERY helpful in getting a few games noticed by the mainstream.

And I'll tell you once again, it's a lot more intricate than "good games sell." The highest selling game every year is Madden. A good football game yes; but is it the best game? Braid is the highest rated XBLA game, but is by no means the best seller. Sales never equal quality, ever, in anything. Never assume something sells because it is good, or doesn't sell because it is bad. That's just a pet peeve of mine, which is the only reason I'm harping on it. It's a correlation/causation fallacy - sales can correlate with quality, yes, but great things go unnoticed all of the time and crap often rises to the top.

There is always two sides to each coin.  I happen to think Madden is a great game.  A really REALLY great game.  I think that because I'm a sports fan.  You think Noitu Love is a great game because you are a platformer fan.  Personally, I watched the video and wouldn't have bought the game because I'm not a fan of the art style.  And there in lies your fallacy.  What makes a good or great game is subjective to each person.  Earthbound, you think is great.  Me, not interested.  Braid, had high ratings ( selling well by the way for it's target market ) yet I downloaded the trial and will not be buying it.  See, some of the good games you speak of are good games, just to few people.  Some of the games you speak of as crap are good games, just not to you.

A great game and can have average gameplay but an incredible game premise.  A great game can have awesome gameplay but average graphics.  Who are you to say?  Britney Spears sold millions upon millions of cd's.  Didn't sell a single one to me because I don't think they are good, BUT millions of other people did.

Sometimes, a big issue with indie or low selling games is thinking we are better than we our, when we really just didn't understand the market.

Keep in mind, the correlation/causation fallacy is something you created in your head.  I never said anything of the such you are harping on.

A correlation/causation fallacy means that you are confusing the direct cause with a symptom, parallel, or partial cause. By saying that if your game is good, it will sell, you're saying that quality sells as a default, which is 100% not true. That's basic marketing, that's never the case with any product, ever, period.

A populism/quality/marketing mix sells. Spears sells because of a mix of the three. Madden sells because of a mix of the three, etc.

Also, I said nothing about Madden being a "bad" game. I asked you if it was the best game.

To bring this back to XNA, those of us that are selling our games on CC can't just plop our games on there and hope that they do well. It would serve us to enter indie contests with those games, try to jump up talk about the games, create relationships with journalists, etc. whatever. There's a lot more to selling a game than just "putting it up" and thinking that if it's quality, it will sell on its own. And nobody should just try to sell based just on quality - you're cutting yourself short by default.

arrogancy:

It would serve us to enter indie contests with those games, try to jump up talk about the games, create relationships with journalists, etc. whatever. There's a lot more to selling a game than just "putting it up" and thinking that if it's quality, it will sell on its own.

I know that I personally plan to purchase and send out Microsoft Point codes to various podcasts, blogs, and websites as a sort of "review copy" system (so they can go on XBLCG and buy the game) who I think can help sell copies of the game. I'm also going to be creating some banner ads to put up on various sites that'll have them. I'm definitely taking the marketing approach because I do realize that marketing is a big part of selling games. If nobody knows about your game, nobody can buy the game. So I'm going to try and get my game out there everywhere I can.

I think we both agree that marketing is very important to sale a game, if not the most important thing.  Where things got off track is when you took my statement good games will sale and bad ones won't as an absolute 100% truth.  It is not and one would be a fool to believe such a thing.  In general, the statement has a lot of truth to it and I'm sure to a certain extent you would agree. 

Also, I do agree that the more exposure you can get your game through contest, media, etc the better.

But, I do believe if you make a really good game that a lot of people will want to play, you can put it out on the marketplace and get decent results if you play your cards right.  I think a game like Dishwasher is a great example.  Build a game of that calibur, do decent promotion, and the rest will take care of itself.

....

I do like Nick's ideas.  I've been trying to think of some myself.  It'll be interesting to see how the most visited game news websites cover Community games.

I think that another area of consideration is that specific game genres aren't the end all to being successful. Look at how many concept style games have come out and do well, regardless of art style or central genre. Jelly Car, Katamari Damacy, Cookin' Mama are all examples of really neat games with no specific centralized genre. I think what will sell a game is the fun factor over all. I personally buy games that have a specific fun factor to them. the GTA series is fun to me because your not tied to the missions... You can go out and wreak absolute havoc. I didn't buy Castle Crashers because of its story line. I played the demo and thought it was a neat concept in the way that it played and it was incredibly fun to attempt combat at many different angles. If people can gain enjoyment from the concept, I think that they will buy it regardless of genre. I hate sitting down and playing long winded RPG's because of having to sit through dialogue, that doesn't mean that other people don't enjoy it. Then you have your players that are slaves to trends. There are people in the market who will buy any Square Enix game just because it is Square Enix. You have to factor in the captive audience of a genre regardless of quality.

Britney Spears sold millions upon millions of cd's.

Some of the best song writers, producers, engineers and backup singers in the world sold millions of CDs. And I have several of them, because I happen to like the song writers and the production values. Had it been Luciano Pavarotti, Sarah Brightman or Sheryl Crow singing the same songs, it probably wouldn't really have mattered (at least to me).

But I guess the main gist of it remains: the more centrist you can make something, and the more polish you can give it, the better the "average" will like it, and the bigger the potential market. I mean, I could write the best ever computer opponent for the board game of Go (well, I probably couldn't, but bear with this experiment), but the potential market in the US would still be infinitesimally small.

So, sales is probably more something like the intersection of width of demographic, depth of production values, and extent of marketing reach.

Nick Gravelyn:

I know that I personally plan to purchase and send out Microsoft Point codes to various podcasts, blogs, and websites as a sort of "review copy" system (so they can go on XBLCG and buy the game) who I think can help sell copies of the game. I'm also going to be creating some banner ads to put up on various sites that'll have them. I'm definitely taking the marketing approach because I do realize that marketing is a big part of selling games. If nobody knows about your game, nobody can buy the game. So I'm going to try and get my game out there everywhere I can.

Can you obtain MS Points codes for exact your game points cost?. All I can find are 2100 and 4200 points cards, and the other method, Credit Card, only allows to buy for yourself, so it is not transferable. So if my game costs 200, 400 or 800 points, how can I allow to podcasts to buy my game with no additional cost?, this is, how can I create/send a 200, 400 or 800 MS Points code?.

I think this should be added as service for Premium members (allowed to upload games to XBLCG) to create codes for their games at exact cost, charging it to your Credit Card. It would be a good idea that codes generated for members could only be used to purchase that game, but surely that is more difficult to be possible.

barkers crest, I didn't know the buyers rate the games, too.  That definitely help the good ones bubble to the top, as you put it.  And, "you don't need dream build play to make your dreams come true anymore" is exactly what I am counting on.  Dream Build Play would be a bonus, but not a requirment.

There is no end-user rating system that has been announced, that I'm aware of. If there is, please provide a link to where you heard this.

Dark Schneider:

Can you obtain MS Points codes for exact your game points cost?. All I can find are 2100 and 4200 points cards, and the other method, Credit Card, only allows to buy for yourself, so it is not transferable. So if my game costs 200, 400 or 800 points, how can I allow to podcasts to buy my game with no additional cost?, this is, how can I create/send a 200, 400 or 800 MS Points code?.

My brother has told me you can purchase Zune points at about 400 points, but I've so far been unable to find those cards. It might just come down to me buying 1600 points for someone to play my 400 point game. I'd rather waste that little bit of money than not get any exposure.

Nick Gravelyn:

There is no end-user rating system that has been announced, that I'm aware of. If there is, please provide a link to where you heard this.

http://www.joystiq.com/2008/07/22/joystiqanda-on-xbox-live-community-games/

 

This seems to be the applicable part: 

For all of the Xbox Live Community Games, you'll be able to go onto the web and assign the game a star rating. When the service launches this fall, this rating system will be web-only, though Multerer tells us, "We certainly know we need to bring it onto the console." As for whether or not the star ratings will be available to see, if not contribute to, from the console on day one, we were told the team is actually currently working on that, so it's undetermined as of yet.

"undetermined" for the console and the web-only stuff doesn't show quotes so I'd question the exactness of the info.