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GAMING NEWS

"Pay Whatever You Want" Model Is Not Successful, Says Indie Developer

Posted on Tuesday, October 4 @ 14:11:04 Eastern by


Having only sold his game on his website, Joost "Oogst" Van Paren, the indie developer behind the critically successful Proun, was not under any contractual obligation to conceal the financial success of the game's "Pay What You Want" model. But as much as the game was downloaded an incredible amount of times, he's thoroughly disappointed by the results:

But didn't I make a lot of money with Proun? More than ten thousand euros, isn't that a lot of money? Yes and no. To me personally, Proun did incredibly well. That is a lot of money to make with a side-project, and since I get to keep most of it myself... wow!

However, over 250,000 people played Proun... Through Ronimo and through my connections to indie developers all over the world, I know what kind of money a game that achieves that kind of success can make. If I would not have done the Pay What You Want model and would have done a fixed price on Steam instead, I think I may have made 5 to 10 times as much money. That is while even taking into consideration that without the Pay What You Want model, the game would have generated a lot less buzz and much fewer people would have played it.

While the Pay What You Want model is a "tremendous marketing tool", it resulted in only "1.76% of the players" paying for Proun. One of the main reasons is that "the free version did not require a Credit Card transaction and was thus way easier to download".

Joost predicts that he would have made a lot more money if the free version was removed and if the minimum purchase was set to $1. Do you think that would have made a difference?
Related Games:   Proun


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Comments
  • Bras
    Bras

    Joined: Jul 2008
    Posted: Oct 4th, 2011 at 3:19 pm
    I support him though I must say that I have a lot of things for free (like Firefox) and don't even donate to the suppliers of stuff that keep me entertained/educate me, but I don't have credit cards to pay for things like these online.

    But on the other hand I listen to a lot of music and buy a lot of CD's from the groups I really like even if a friend "lends" me the CDs, so I don't know what I would do if I lived in your northern countries. Maybe he's right and a minimun price should be charged.
  • MrrClean
    MrrClean

    Joined: Aug 2010
    Posted: Oct 4th, 2011 at 6:10 pm
    I think its fairly ridiculous for the guy to whine that people did exactly what he let them do. If you say "Here, have some free sh*t! You can pay me if you want, but you dont have to..." then of course people are just gonna take it. What he's actually done is made some cash, and made himself a name that people will pay attention to next time he makes something. And next time, he can be smart enough to set a price tag, even at something like 3 bucks a pop, he'll make a bunch of cash.
  • tinymhg
    tinymhg

    Joined: Jun 2011
    Posted: Oct 4th, 2011 at 9:16 pm
    Very good point!
  • MarkyBee
    MarkyBee

    Joined: Mar 2007
    Posted: Oct 4th, 2011 at 7:28 pm
    The important rule to remember is "Never Work for Free" and he didn't.
    If you work for free, you'll start to resent the work you're putting into something, maybe not do the best job you can, and end up hating the project. It's a great idea to do some super-cheap work initially to get the word out though, and that's as MrrClean said above.

    The best business is return business! If he had a return customer handing him his $1 per download for the next game he produces, that'd be a sweet deal for everyone.
  • tinymhg
    tinymhg

    Joined: Jun 2011
    Posted: Oct 4th, 2011 at 9:29 pm
    If what you mean by "Never Work for Free" is never do anything without getting paid money, then that shoots down every volunteer worker, pro bono lawyer, and any other person who donates there time and/or talents. Yet if what you mean by "Never Work for Free" is never do anything without getting something out of it, even if it is the enjoyment of doing the job or the warm fuzzy of helping people, then I agree "Never Work for Free".
  • Bras
    Bras

    Joined: Jul 2008
    Posted: Oct 5th, 2011 at 12:02 pm
    I would correct that by adding "Never work for free if you have financial expectations"

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