(Check out Best Buy of any other decently sized electronics store if you don't believe me.) Also, until we had access to mass-market outlets like iTunes, we were never going to generate enough sales to survive at a lower price. However, all computer games get cheaper as they get older, even games that have only been to a few months. I'm expecting that some of our users who paid $25 on our site will be angry. If this grand experiment works well, we may make future games cheaper still, though I doubt any new game on our own web site will ever go below $15. Our next game, Avernum: Escape From the Pit will start out at $20. I have changed the price of Avadon to $20, and in the future we will very likely reduce the prices of our earlier games as well. This means I need to adjust the prices I charge on my own web site. It isn't the $1 or $2 price that I'm still sure would put me out of business. It's cheap enough to work as an impluse buy. By the standards of that market, it's a hefty price, enough for me to earn my living. So I'm charging $10 on Steam and for the iPad. But $20? I don't want to take kids' allowance money that way. If someone buys my game for $10 and hates it, I'm a little unhappy. It's too much money to pay for a game you aren't sure about. In these markets, charging $15 or $20 for games, like I want to, isn't feasible. That way, if they don't like it they aren't out a lot of money. People buy games on impulse, sight unseen. These days, a huge proportion of games online are sold for a low price without demos. When you're an Indie and Steam comes knocking, you don't say no.Ģ. I went into this trusting their judgment, because they know a lot more about selling Indie games than I do. However, at the same time, Avadon will be only ten bucks on Steam, the cheapest we've ever made our newest game for PC/Mac. I've written a lot about how I think it's important to not price niche games too cheaply, and I stand by that. But, the way the online games market is moving, something that seems like the right choice.Īvadon: The Black Fortress Is $9.99 On Steam The Steam Thing does mean that we are embarking on a great experiment, something that we never planning on doing. And I'll do all I can to be content with what comes. Will its retro old-school action take the world by storm? Maybe a lot. It's got a great story, interesting, epic battles, and a lot of cool stuff. Avadon: The Black Fortress is a very good game. (This change happened about the time the word ' shareware' disappeared.) After all these years, it was impossible to watch all of this excitement and not want to be a part of it.Īnd now, thanks to Valve, I'm going to be visible. Amazingly, people stopped acting like I wasn't a total loser for doing what I do. ![]() Many could make a living, and some got rich. (Having a big back catalog is awesome.) I was content.īut then the Indie boom took off. Writing Indie games has provided me with a very good living, and I don't have the right to complain about anything. ![]() Yes, there will be money, and that's always nice, but it's the recognition I'm sort of focused on now. With a real distributor, a nice trailer video, and everything. After 16 years of being a tiny, invisible, basement-dwelling bottom feeder, for a few precious weeks, I get to act like I'm a real developer. Unsurprisingly, I'm pretty excited about it. Today, Avadon: The Black Fortress goes live on Steam.
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