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Welcome to this third Equilibrio Dev Diary. You can read our previous entries at the following links: Entry 1 and Entry 2.Today I’m going to talk about a slippery subject: defining the price of a game on the App Store.
As independent game developers, when you start development on a new game, one day or another, you’ll have to face the following questions: What will be the price of this game? What will be our strategy to make a good game as well as a financial success? What?! This industry is not just fun and joy? Uh… In what world are you living in? Developers are not only making games for the sake of entertainment, it is also a business, and people are living off of it.
Independent studios should be careful thinking about the price, costs, Apple’s cut (30% of the price), and marketing budget amongst other expenses as not really an option.
So, defining the price is not an easy task, especially if the price varies a lot like on the App Store where you have really good games at $0.99 and some lesser quality games at $7.99… It is difficult to define a price that will make your game stand out. You have to correctly analyze what other games propose and find a way to interest the gamers into buying your game.
There are different marketing strategies. Some “bigger†games have the following commercial principle: start with a very “high†price point, which they lower every month or so thanks to the App Store’s flexible system. Other games remain at a high price point. Some other games offer different versions of their game with more or less content depending on the price (lite, normal or premium versions).
For Equilibrio, we are thinking about launching the game with a low price point (less than $5). We also want to explore the option of providing additional content packs, which can be purchased and downloaded with new bonuses and levels. We plan on making content packs available for less than $2.
We think that this way, the game stays accessible for a wide range of gamers and their budget while those who enjoyed the experience can invest more money if they want to.
Don’t hesitate to post comments if you want to share some ideas and comments about the price and trends in general on the App Store or for Equilbirio. I think it would be very helpful for Fishing Cactus and the whole iPhone developers’ community.
See you in two weeks, we’ll talk about some IGF.
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