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[Destral]

Depending on how long you think it's going to take you to finish the free version, you could always try kickstarting it.

Or you could work on making one boss and put that up as a standalone on Kongregate or something, and keep working on more bosses and releasing them individually (if you make the bosses somewhat complex to defeat, like in Shadow of the Colossus, they might warrant singular releases like that). Once you have a few, you might then create a free android/iPhone version, with additional bosses as microtrans, as you already pointed out. Depending on the amount of gameplay, complexity, and amount of explorable space with each boss (design space: different tactics, different ways of beating the boss, etc, not physical explorable space) $1 per boss might be warranted, but some people might think it's a tad steep. Perhaps you can release additional 'Boss Packs' with 2-3 bosses for $1. The exact details are up to you.

I'm happy to see you're still working on this, one way or another! 

[Chris Pavia]

The main issue I see with a per-boss transaction system is that, prior to purchase, the player doesn't have a way of knowing how to use that boss/if it fits their playing style/is it fun. For example, I wouldn't want to pay money to unlock Chun Li just to find out I hate her playing style. If you can find a way around that, like a try before you buy system or something so the player is informed as to what they are buying, it'll better serve the player.

Just to toss out an idea, how about a system where the player can unlock all the bosses in-game (by grinding or some kind of time-sink system), but the player can pay a small fee to instantly unlock everything?

[Melly]

The focus of the game is still in the multiplayer, one player as the boss and the other as the hero. Bosses are planned to all be fairly elaborate. Buying the boss would give you the ability to play both with it and against it. I'll have to make sure that's very obvious in whatever marketing I do, since I feel that kinda doubles the value of the boss.

The plan is also to go all mega man up in this and have the hero being able to collect abilities from defeated bosses. So buying a boss also buys you a new ability for the hero.

'Try before you buy' can work, and I agree it's a good idea to give people a chance to see if they'd really like to have a new specific boss. Not entirely sure how I'd accomplish that, but it's something to keep in mind.

I honestly don't like the idea that all the bosses are unlockable, but can also be instantly bought. First, I hate repetitive grinding. It's an artificial way to extend a game's lifetime, it has you trade too much of your precious time for in-game stuff instead of skill, and have that time not advance anything else. Second, I don't like the idea that you can either buy something to get it instantly but you can also get it for free with some work. If I make people work for getting something, I'll feel compelled to make that work worthwhile. If I let people also cheat their way through with money, I'm undermining my own effort and design, and they're undermining the experience they could have with the game.

[Chris Pavia]

Second, I don't like the idea that you can either buy something to get it instantly but you can also get it for free with some work. If I make people work for getting something, I'll feel compelled to make that work worthwhile. If I let people also cheat their way through with money, I'm undermining my own effort and design, and they're undermining the experience they could have with the game.

I can understand why this idea leaves a bad taste in your mouth, but (putting my commercial designer hat on for a moment) I can tell you from experience that it works financially (or has for where I work anyway). People are more than happy to pay money to bypass the grind if the perceived value is great enough. Moreso if the base game is free. This is one of the keys of social games.

Just thought I'd point out my experiences in case anyone else can benefit from it. It can be tough as a designer to create a system intended to make things tougher for the player, but if your goals skew more toward financial success than critical, it can be useful. My 2 cents.

[Melly]

While I want to be successful financially, I don't want it to be at the cost of the game's design. While just making a game with the intent of selling any part of it already changes your mentality toward its development, I want to limit it to "make it polished and balanced so people will actually want to pay money for it and not just download it as a curiosity", and not have it extend much beyond that.

That suggestion kinda reminds me of how free mmo's tend to work. I've read about them, and how the design works in there. It's entirely built around profit, built around exploiting logical fallacies, emotions and social interactions to get the most people in the game and as many of them spending as possible.

I'm not saying that this is what you're suggesting I do. I'm just saying that I don't want to have anything close to that mentality. Doing so would go against everything that made me love this medium in the first place.

[Chris Pavia]

I understand what you're saying

Having to think like that at work is what got me into indie development in the first place, so I could think more about engaging the player instead of exploiting them.

[mokesmoe]

TF2 has a pay-to-get-it-faster system, although I don't think the system would work as well with an indie game.

[SundownKid]

IMO, pay-to-play wouldn't work unless people got a good dose of the core gameplay and want more. So, buy the game, fight 10 bosses and have to buy new, harder ones = OK, but having to buy each boss one by one = not OK.

[battlerager]

Sounds like a really cool financial model, man.


Why not make it so you can play against the boss even without owning it? After beating it you get the message "BUY NOW BLABLA" and DONT get the Megaman-ish item. But you can buy the boss now to unlock the item and play as that boss!


Its a lot like when you unlock achievments in Xbox Live Arcade games.


"HEY MAN GOOD JOB. But if you want to keep that achievement and not lose your awesome progress, you better BUY THE FULL VERSION BEFORE YOU END THE GAME."


This way, you can see the boss and his attacks, see what weapon you would unlock, but to play as the boss or with his weapon, you buy it.
If its cheap, this should work for impulse buys.
Imagine you tried to beat this boss like 20 times in a row now, and if you buy it NOW, you get to keep that weapon you worked so hard for.

Also, you can see his attacks and think "hmm, this looks like it could be fun".



Profit? 

[HD]

I was going to suggest the same thing as battlerager.

On another note, you should think about player psychology if you want to pay your bills. To me, pay $1 to extend gameplay is not good, I feel like I am being fleeced before I even start playing. But pay for a new character is A-OK. Perceived value is important.


Edit: lol oops @ random smiley

[battlerager]

Oh, also, "Guardian Spirit" sounds just fine to me

[Mega]

...IMO, pay-to-play wouldn't work unless people got a good dose of the core gameplay and want more...

I agree.

[Melly]

On another note, you should think about player psychology if you want to pay your bills. To me, pay $1 to extend gameplay is not good, I feel like I am being fleeced before I even start playing. But pay for a new character is A-OK. Perceived value is important.

Mmm, could you elaborate?

[Tuba]

I think the business model depends a lot on the platform you're working with. People that play games on Facebook, for instance, are used to paying for stuff inside games and would accept that, can't tell the same about flash portals like Kongregate and Newgrounds.

[Triplefox]

The main point of going away from a conventional one-price scheme is to price discriminate.

This is a big part of why carving gameplay up into unlocks and resource grinding, with "accelerator" items for sale, has been successful for a lot of F2P games: if you don't really want it you can grind for it instead. Facebook games extend this strategy by forcing a viral loop into play(invite x friends to get...) and that acts as a second kind of price discriminating behavior; players can spend "social capital" instead of "monetary capital" to continue advancement.

When doing this it has to be put in an appropriate context - are the features you selling the "real value" of the game? i.e. is it something that is expected to be basic functionality(save games) or is it a thing that makes the experience substantially different(multiplayer)? The more people percieve value, the more likely it will be successful at monetizing.

I think selling characters is right at the borderline, to be honest. The main reason why this is likely to offend people, is that because the game is multiplayer, new characters will be perceived as advantageous. So the game becomes "pay to win," and many players want "grind to win" instead because they have time and little money(13-year-olds...) or they are interested in a pure-skill competition(most core gamers...) Balancing both types of player is really tough, and so a common alternative is to focus on monetizing outside of the "pure competition" aspects - visual customizations, socialization features, etc.

So, in my opinion, it isn't actually a matter of whether monetizing in this way can work - it's a matter of which population of players you are primarily aiming to capture. That's going to depend on the context of the game and who is most likely to see it.