I'm thrilled with my results. Trial + Full downloads is nearly 10,000 and my game has just been up for less than a week!

I attribute a lot of that to the Flash version I made of the game for advertising. There are quite a few sites where you can play the Flash game, but for those of you curious what I did you can check it out here: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/488037. According to the ads I put in there (which also serves as a way to get stats) the Flash game has had around 100,000 plays so far, with roughly 12,000-15,000 now daily.

That's given the game a massive amount of exposure, which I think was essential in its success. That and the 2 months of polish I put in the game which really helped the conversion rate I think :)

Murudai:

I attribute a lot of that to the Flash version I made of the game for advertising. There are quite a few sites where you can play the Flash game, but for those of you curious what I did you can check it out here: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/488037. According to the ads I put in there (which also serves as a way to get stats) the Flash game has had around 100,000 plays so far, with roughly 12,000-15,000 now daily.

That's given the game a massive amount of exposure, which I think was essential in its success. That and the 2 months of polish I put in the game which really helped the conversion rate I think :)

Freaking genius! Is the entire game on Newgrounds?

I don't know about the app store still, it seems that 10k DL * free game = $0, I'd like to know what kind of downloads someone gets for a non free title, I dropped my iphone project.

I think that if we had more quality, polished titles like Solar we'd have more exposure, more traffic and more sales. Like I said in another thread I am pleased, My project will pay my bills for a little while, enough time to get another decent project out there. I know I limited myself to people who have drum controllers basically, so I am really very surprised at the numbers. I am also surprised that being on the top 10 is still not all that many sales. I know someone said that we don't have to worry about larger developers, I would welcome larger developers, bring on more customers, and more quality stuff and this will be viable for those that make a polished product.

DarthCheesiest:

I've got to go to sleep soon, but I think that if the conversion rate was higher I wouldn't be disappointed. When I am off work(Monday) I may post the download not sales numbers.

I think you really suffered from being a launch title. I know Organon was the first community game I ever started and I was quite impressed with the amount of polish. I decided to buy it sometime, then went on to check out other games. I came across Artoon and that game pretty much consumed all my time and points. :D In fact I didn't even think about Organon until I saw your postings in this thread and searched the forum to find out which game you developed. Well, what can I say? I just bought Organon. It's a great game, maybe a bit too shallow (i.e. there's not much variety in gameplay or levels) but that's what most community games suffer from. So I think your game was just in the right place at the wrong time. Pull it, release it with minor enhancements (mostly different levels, maybe spheres as well) under a different name and I think it will sell better because now it will be more exposed than with dozens of (mostly crappy) launch titles.

I'm just glad you didn't pull Organon so I had the chance to finally buy it.

JDPCreations:

Thank you Microsoft, be prepared to write a much bigger check for my next game!!!!!!!

- JDP

Hey, I'm still waiting for the harder difficulty for Couples Sudoku you promised me. :D

Running Pixel:

someone was expecting to make enough money to do this as a work, and the dream disappeared with the evidence of the reality. Actually you have to do a forever top-selling game to live on this. (or a top seller every week)

Sorry, but that thought was pretty much wrong from the start. Only 10 % of all games (retail) sell enough to make up for development costs. So to expect that a new service like community games could be a platform where you can make a living is not the best thing you can do. The name suggests that it's laid out to be a platform where independant amateur developers can create and publish their own 360 games. Any maybe create games that are good enough to get attention from a Publisher to get an XBLA contract or the chance to make a professional game for XBLA. And I think if you're a dedicated programmer/designer/whatever that created a community game in his spare time you can be pretty excited about an additional income of $1000 or more. If you've got employees to pay it will be quite devestating.

The way I see it those that want to live from making games will move on (and probably be pretty disappointed), those that are in it for the fun and to make some money out of their hobby will stay. Which is fine by me, I think XBLA is the platform for pros and CG for amateurs.

Nick Gravelyn:

I see encouragement and potential here as Microsoft continues to build awareness and add to the XNA Game Studio and XBLCG ecosystem. I'm working on two game ideas right now (one for fun and one for DBP)

I'm glad you'll stick around. Awareness is one of the biggest issues. The community games launch got overshadowed by NXE+Avatars and Keflings. It would have been much better to release the service at a different time but I hope with games like Kodu Microsoft will take the chance to promote community games in a much better way.

To compare the App Store with CG is difficult for a couple of reasons. For example iTunes is available to dozens of millions of users. Community Games are open to the less than ten million Xbox Live users in the markets where it is available. And looking at the download numbers most people don't even know community games exist.

Do you plan your cart game for DBP?

Pandapadawan:

Hey, I'm still waiting for the harder difficulty for Couples Sudoku you promised me. :D

Panda,

I actually tried to make an update a few months ago. Here is what went wrong (I am good at saying that).

1) The puzzle generator slowed down so much that puzzles took way too long to generate and the result was only slightly more difficult puzzles, like a couple of extra blanks.
2) I attempted to add online game play to a game that was never designed to support it and didn't vision control the code
3) The company I work for has been in crunch mode for several months, which is why I haven't had time to even see my family let alone code. :(

I wish we had PM's on these forums. :P

- JDP

Jenkmeister:

As we talked about in our press release at GDC, there are a number of games that have made more than the average yearly US Income. That's more than $30000 or so based on numbers people have quoted in other forum threads.

Given that, it seems as though a decent game or application, that appeals to our consumers, that hooks people past the 8 minute trial mode, can make money and is worth finishing...

That's still quite small. Microsoft really needs to do some exposure to their downloadable games service; there's no reason that none of their commericals on television show that the 360 has downloadable games, for instance. One of the reason that the Ipod app store makes so much is that all of their commercials show people using apps on their Ipod. 360 has no commercials that have a blurb simply saying "hundrds of downloadable X-Box Live Arcade and Community Games updated weekly" on there, which is majorly important for the casual gamer as far as exposure goes since they won't necessarily go digging around on their own constantly. 5 seconds of commercial time would raise revenue and awareness on the service a great deal, and it's a shame Microsoft hasn't done that, which is hurting us.

My second game should be in playtest next week, and unlike the first, is actually a "real" release that is set up to get some serious sales. We'll be working on marketing ourselves, but it would be nice if somehow Microsoft could help push the service in general so that people know it's there.

Point well received. I'll do some poking around to find out what our future advertising plans for our marketplace is...

Sean that would rock! I think Arrogancy is right on--TV commercials would help a HUGE amount. It would help Community Games and Arcade.

I can't even count how many iPhone game commercials I've seen, and I only watch maybe 2 hours of TV a night. I see them all the time on network TV (no cable here). It pains me... to see them and to think how well Arcade has done after several years and they've never tried TV ads--which would help EVEN MORE! It's just patently obvious that TV commercials are going to help (yes, cost lots of money, but hopefully get recouped in sales) and there is Apple going right for it, with tons of ads. And I bet their sales are making up for it.

Good luck Sean, thanks for looking into this, and thanks for the work done (to you and all on the team) on getting us sales numbers.

Jenkmeister:

Point well received. I'll do some poking around to find out what our future advertising plans for our marketplace is...

Thanks for listening. It's not just Microsoft, either - there's really no reason that Nintendo and Sony aren't doing the same. It's a missed opportunity, especially since all it takes is 5 - 10 seconds of commercial time, and helps to push the brand in general. Saying "hundreds of low-cost downloadable games and free demos available in Live Arcade and Community Games" to raise public awareness helps to market the system AND the games, as the "low cost" helps sell to parents who are price conscious. As a marketing-design guy by trade, seeing that missed opportunity kills me :)

edit: and just to reiterate for clarity - not a full commercial, of course, but sticking blurbs at the end of the regular commercials would be cost efficient and would probably increase in dividends

arrogancy:

Microsoft really needs to do some exposure to their downloadable games service; there's no reason that none of their commericals on television show that the 360 has downloadable games, for instance. One of the reason that the Ipod app store makes so much is that all of their commercials show people using apps on their Ipod. 360 has no commercials that have a blurb simply saying "hundrds of downloadable X-Box Live Arcade and Community Games updated weekly" on there, which is majorly important for the casual gamer as far as exposure goes since they won't necessarily go digging around on their own constantly.

Well, people seem to know about downloadable games, they just don't visit the community games for one reason or another. I mean, if you look at Live games there are definitely a lot of sales there (though there is definitely a top tier that gets the lions share of revenues, like castle crashers and texas holdem). It's hard for consumers to separate the wheat from the chaff right now, especially on Community games where you only see games featured as DBP finalists, or as a new releases. While the "most popular" lists seemed to be behaving a bit oddly, if they gave a strong impression of which titles are good on the service currently those games that have substantial staying power would get at least bit more exposure for their efforts. Most people won't go to the "big browse list" either, as its just inconvenient with no graphical flourishes (yes box art will influence purchases). Ideally if you have a service where good things are easily accessible, you will get more overall sales instead of people giving up on the service entirely. For most people it's too much effort to trudge through many demos to finally find something that piques their interest.

Agreed.  A few short TV commercials focused on download games - "Hundreds of downloadable games starting at just $2.50" along with some 1-2sec clips of a dozen or so of the better XBLA & Community games - would probably do a ton towards helping both XBLA & XNA Community Games sales.

Stegersaurus Games:

arrogancy:

Microsoft really needs to do some exposure to their downloadable games service; there's no reason that none of their commericals on television show that the 360 has downloadable games, for instance. One of the reason that the Ipod app store makes so much is that all of their commercials show people using apps on their Ipod. 360 has no commercials that have a blurb simply saying "hundrds of downloadable X-Box Live Arcade and Community Games updated weekly" on there, which is majorly important for the casual gamer as far as exposure goes since they won't necessarily go digging around on their own constantly.

Well, people seem to know about downloadable games, they just don't visit the community games for one reason or another. I mean, if you look at Live games there are definitely a lot of sales there (though there is definitely a top tier that gets the lions share of revenues, like castle crashers and texas holdem). It's hard for consumers to separate the wheat from the chaff right now, especially on Community games where you only see games featured as DBP finalists, or as a new releases. While the "most popular" lists seemed to be behaving a bit oddly, if they gave a strong impression of which titles are good on the service currently those games that have substantial staying power would get at least bit more exposure for their efforts. Most people won't go to the "big browse list" either, as its just inconvenient with no graphical flourishes (yes box art will influence purchases). Ideally if you have a service where good things are easily accessible, you will get more overall sales instead of people giving up on the service entirely. For most people it's too much effort to trudge through many demos to finally find something that piques their interest.

Well they said they're working on that, which is fine. But, actually, the awareness of Live Arcade AND Community Games is relatively low. Enthusiast gamers can find it, but there's a whole casual market that barely notices it or forgot about it, and that's what really needs to be chipped into. Netflix was advertised to them, there's no reason not to take the step to advertise the other downloadable offerings at the same time.

I don't think I will even make the $150 cutoff so after I stopped crying I'm just learning the lessons.

Stegersaurus Games:

arrogancy:

Microsoft really needs to do some exposure to their downloadable games service; there's no reason that none of their commericals on television show that the 360 has downloadable games, for instance. One of the reason that the Ipod app store makes so much is that all of their commercials show people using apps on their Ipod. 360 has no commercials that have a blurb simply saying "hundrds of downloadable X-Box Live Arcade and Community Games updated weekly" on there, which is majorly important for the casual gamer as far as exposure goes since they won't necessarily go digging around on their own constantly.

Well, people seem to know about downloadable games, they just don't visit the community games for one reason or another. I mean, if you look at Live games there are definitely a lot of sales there (though there is definitely a top tier that gets the lions share of revenues, like castle crashers and texas holdem). It's hard for consumers to separate the wheat from the chaff right now, especially on Community games where you only see games featured as DBP finalists, or as a new releases. While the "most popular" lists seemed to be behaving a bit oddly, if they gave a strong impression of which titles are good on the service currently those games that have substantial staying power would get at least bit more exposure for their efforts. Most people won't go to the "big browse list" either, as its just inconvenient with no graphical flourishes (yes box art will influence purchases). Ideally if you have a service where good things are easily accessible, you will get more overall sales instead of people giving up on the service entirely. For most people it's too much effort to trudge through many demos to finally find something that piques their interest.

This is where the user rating system will help, and to clarify, I think having user ratings is much more important than TV commercials.  If we get any advertisement for Community Games, I'd much rather see more ads in the Spotlight section on the NXE dashboard.  I'm loading up now and I see a Best Bet box for Fallout 3 DLC--if this was for Community Games and one press of the A-button took you there, a much bigger percentage of Xbox Live users would at least know the section exists.

And I do get the impression that a lot of people just don't know about Community Games.  People posting about games on the internet?  Of course they're going to have heard of it, they'll already be much more knowledgeable than the average 360 owner.  But as a section, Communtiy Games is a bit buried, and more casual users who don't stay on the up-and-up about things just won't know about it.

To summarize: User ratings to make it easier to find good games.  More prominent advertising on the Xbox 360 dashboard.

You know I wondered why Majors Minute didn't push the XBLCG more, I would think they would have a direct link from the front page of the dash. Perhaps MS doesnt believe we are ready for the exposure. They may want X number of games or more games that hive a higher degree of polish before they push it. Chicken & Egg, so I plan on making more eggs and see if we can get some chickens! or would it be other way around... : )

I never thought this would be a living yet... I do think it could be for some. I am however looking at it as another source of some income and will treat it as such, creating the best product I can, trying to rival XBLA.

So here is another question:
Not that I was ever complaining, but I too didn't sell enough to get a payout.  I made it about 2/3rds of the way.  The quater is about over.  I had an idea for an update to the title to make it a little better, and was gogin to add another level.  Obviously this wouldn't be done until a week or two, which will put us in a new quarter.  Assuming I sold relatively the same on the next attempt, woudl I then get a payout, or is the payout counter reset each quarter?  Does that make sense?

It's rolled over to the next quarter, until it does payout.

JDPCreations:

I wish we had PM's on these forums. :P

Word! Thanks for the info on Couples Sudoku, looking forward to your next release.

Murudai:

I attribute a lot of that to the Flash version I made of the game for advertising. There are quite a few sites where you can play the Flash game, but for those of you curious what I did you can check it out here: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/488037. According to the ads I put in there (which also serves as a way to get stats) the Flash game has had around 100,000 plays so far, with roughly 12,000-15,000 now daily.

I find it odd that you put ads in an ad. But you say it's a way to get more stats? There's no other way?

Schmaltzy Boy:

TV commercials would help a HUGE amount.

They are also pretty expensive. They could easily cost more than all community games together made until now if you want more than a single spot. :) I think for a start it would be nice if Microsoft released a trailer of a dozen or so great community games on the marketplace. That would already help alot because it's a way to show that community games is more than pointless apps and crappy games. And such a video reaches the Xbox 360 owners directly. Another thing would be to feature community games more prominently. Maybe add another category to the main NXE menu which links straight to community games. Or at least post a link to community games every couple of days in the marketing tab (I guess it's called What's new?).

I think things can only get better now. Community Games are still new and most people I know with a 360 don't even know about them yet.
Also every1's talking about their next games now they have some experience, so I think the next set of games everyone produces will be of higher quality

I have to say, I 100% agree with Anchorcast's comments I think user ratings are key here. At the moment there is no way to sort the wheat from the chaff, I don't play Community Games because I can't find the decent ones. The popularity list suffers from the chicken and the egg problem, to be popular you have to be on the popularity list... If I could go and see what's been rated highest by people playing the game I'd be far more likely to go and browse, and potentially purchase CGs.

I actually got just about what I expected.

Lessons Learned thus far.

1. Taking a guess on pricing with no pricing model available is a toss up.
2. I expected a little bit more of a PR push from MS on the whole CG thing and had I known this before I would have waited until there were more people aware of CG to submit.
3. I needed the data we just received to know that my pricing was not getting the conversion rate that I would hope for....next time I'll wait for the stats to be available before submitting.
4. puzzle games are a dime a dozen....and we cant charge a dime.

The guys at MS have done a great job of putting all of this together and I'd like to thank them for putting my game in front of so many people.  Money isn't everything and I'm pretty happy that so many people played and will continue to play my creation.