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[Vermeulen]

Hey everyone,
I wanted to get feedback on a project I've been working on for the last 2 months:
http://beta.indievania.com

It's a game marketplace focused on indie games, where developers sell games using their PayPal account (currently only PayPal supported, other services coming later). More info in a blog post here:
http://beta.indievania.com/blog/about-indievania

The site was developed after I tried a number of game distribution networks for Capsized and was unsatisfied with all of them (with the exception of Steam). The rates were too high considering the service they gave, I had no control over my own game pages, and getting paid was a difficult process. So I developed this site to solve that - very low fees (9%, I wanted to match fastspring/microbmt, but I might lower that further), payment is direct to developer, and the developer has complete control of their game/page on the service.

To go through the game adding process, go to 'Add Your Game' in the menu and register as a developer, then that takes you directly to adding a game. I am hoping this will be a great service to smaller games, with even $0.99 pricing, and also an alternative for current games for developers to get a higher profit margin.

I am really looking for feedback from other indie devs to see how they feel about the site - pricing/features/look/buying process, pretty much anything. Let me know any questions people have also

[Moczan]

Looks nice so far, I just hope it won't be flooded with crap 0.99$ games.

[Craig Stern]

Nice idea.

I have some feedback about the site's appearance. it looks pretty slick, but there's an issue with the text formatting in the animated previews at the top of the page. As you can see, text goes beyond the bounds of the image and gets cut off:



Also, I don't suppose there's any way to integrate the site with BMT Micro? I don't much like the thought of having to upload changed files twice, manage two separate sets of analytics, etc.

[Musenik]

How are you planning to drive traffic to the site?

[Vermeulen]

Craig: thanks for that, fixed

There are no plans to integrate with BMTMicro, the game has to be uploaded to our S3 storage for the site to keep track of and restrict downloads.

I should have pointed out though, that the fees are substantially less for this than BMTMicro. BMTMicro has a minimum fee of $1.25, plus the 9%, this has no minimum fee, and I think I should even lower the 9%.

The idea behind this is to develop a tool that indie devs can use to sell their games and get the highest profit possible. If it's the best option for devs, that will drive the traffic for the rest of the games. I think we are going to have special bundles to help drive traffic also (most likely a launch bundle), but the main goal is to make this the best option for devs to sell on.
The reason the fee can be so low is just how the site was developed - with drupal/s3 hosting/paypal apis, meaning the only cost to keep the site running is the S3 hosting.

[moi]

this sounds a bit ambitious , but good luck, it will be awersome if it works 

[theweirdn8]

The site does look sleak, but it doesn't really encourage me to spend.

[Evan Balster]

Good luck with this!  Getting traffic is difficult and the largest hurdle to such a marketplace.

[Inane]

I'd put less focus on top sellers if you don't want price wars driving the price down Does look neat though, will be keeping an eye on it.

[Craig Stern]

There are no plans to integrate with BMTMicro, the game has to be uploaded to our S3 storage for the site to keep track of and restrict downloads.

I should have pointed out though, that the fees are substantially less for this than BMTMicro. BMTMicro has a minimum fee of $1.25, plus the 9%, this has no minimum fee, and I think I should even lower the 9%.

Ah, okay, so you're looking to serve as a replacement to BMT Micro! Interesting. A few things I'd like to know:

--what sort of analytics will the site offer?
--what sort of control will developers have over their game pages?
--what control will developers have over pricing? Any pricing caps or floors? What about promotional pricing and sales? Will the site support pay-what-you-want sales?
--I notice no option to browse games by genre on the site (and actually, it looks like pretty much everything is categorized as Action + something else). What do you plan to use to steer customers toward games they're likely to enjoy?

EDIT: Oh, also--what about an affiliate system? I tend to get a fair few sales through BMT Micro by way of other peoples' sites.

[hanako]

If it's the best option for devs, that will drive the traffic for the rest of the games.

Not impossible, but unlikely. There are tons of "new indie games portal!!!" sites popping up. Most of them have zero traffic and are forgotten almost as soon as they're created.

Devs who want to sell directly through paypal already can, and without anyone else taking any more fees. You need something more to offer.

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

i agree with hanako -- sites like this have been tried dozens of times before, and they usually fail because of a lack of traffic. manifesto games is probably the most ambitious one of this type, but i've seen a lot of smaller attempts too

you really *can't* rely on the games the site has to bring traffic to the site. not even if they're exclusives. you need a marketing plan other than that to bring traffic to the site

the reason people put their games on steam and other portals is for the traffic. there's no reason to put games on a site that has less traffic than their own site, or a site which is relying on developers to send traffic to the site. even gog.com (good old games) doesn't rely on traffic from the games, and those games are famous. they do marketing to bring traffic to the site regularly, most notably that stunt where they said they were closing down, but also many other things

[Vermeulen]

--what sort of analytics will the site offer?
--what sort of control will developers have over their game pages?
--what control will developers have over pricing? Any pricing caps or floors? What about promotional pricing and sales? Will the site support pay-what-you-want sales?
--I notice no option to browse games by genre on the site (and actually, it looks like pretty much everything is categorized as Action + something else). What do you plan to use to steer customers toward games they're likely to enjoy?

Right now the only analytics are about sales, so you can see how the game is selling and who it's selling to. I am adding support for developers to see their own page's google analytics though, so I think that'll be enough.
Developers have complete control over pricing and their page. I should probably make a quick youtube video showing the game adding/editing process, but it's pretty easy.
Games have to be at least $0.99, though I could lower than to $0.50 if there is demand for it, but I think thats low enough.
I was planning on getting 'pay what you want' option done before the beta launch, but I didn't get to it, so it still might come soon.
And when it comes to browsing through games, I am hoping to develop recommendations based on the user's previous purchases/ratings, but that's not applicable for new users to the site. So I'll have to just focus on making browsing games as easy as possible for new users - http://beta.indievania.com/games (added genre/platform selection to the menu tonight), along with making sure the quality games are presented first.

[Booger]

Sweet, another Paypal-based no-Masters ecosystem like IndieCity!

My question is who is the "Seller" of the game -- can it be you?  I'm making my first commercial game and I don't want to set up an LLC until I know I can make money.  So I prefer a scheme whereby I'm the "Developer" receiving only royalties (and declaring as such on tax returns) and the portal is the "Publisher" who takes care of the VAT.

I go out of my way to support the underdog because they need funds more than the next overhyped indie game on Steam.  Although, I'm only in this position because I'm a hobbyist. If I'm a full-timer, no doubt I'll only gun for where the traffic is at.

I have another question... if the game is cross-platform is the standard one platform per payment, or for one payment you get 3 downloads (PC/Mac/Linux)?

[Vermeulen]

Not impossible, but unlikely. There are tons of "new indie games portal!!!" sites popping up. Most of them have zero traffic and are forgotten almost as soon as they're created.

Devs who want to sell directly through paypal already can, and without anyone else taking any more fees. You need something more to offer.

I definitely agree with you yeah. The main motivation for starting this site was all the emails I got from indie game stores after I released my last game. They were all asking for 30%/25% (usually plus their merchants transaction fees, which can be $1-$1.25), and just in general were badly designed. In some ways it's a saturated market just because of the large amount of sites trying to do ‘indie stores’. But that definitely shows demand and interest - and I really just feel something like this should exist and it needs to be done well. I don’t think any site is out there that is focused on the developers.
It could be a while before the site gets a large userbase, that is without a doubt going to be the most challenging thing about getting a site like this going, even with a lot of promotions/bundles. But just because it’s ambitious doesn’t mean it’s not worth developing

[ANtY]

On laptop

[TeeGee]

Umm, I don't get it. How's this a competition to BMT Micro? BMT is a payment processor, your website is essentially a portal. These are two very different things. Payment processor allows you to accept many different forms of payments when you sell the game on your website, some affiliate portal or otherwise. A portal is just a distribution method.

Indievania doesn't even compare to BMT Micro as a payment processor, as it only uses PayPal and doesn't allow me to sell directly from my website. And BMT doesn't compare as a portal, because it's not a portal in the first place.

That said, it can work, but you have to promote the hell out of it. Recently we've had showmethegames.com, indiedb.com, new gametunnel.com and indiecity show up. None of them drives much traffic or sales from my experience. How do you plan to promote your website? It certainly does look nice.

[BattleBeard]

 Hey, I'd totally sell my indie games on thar, bookmarked for being better than Steam.

Now just make a program for it, and you'd get 1000 internets

 Wait though, if someone buys a game, the download link would be easily sharable. That...doesn't sound safe.

[moi]

you would need something like  exclusivity.
Good exclusive games.

[Craig Stern]

Games have to be at least $0.99, though I could lower than to $0.50 if there is demand for it, but I think thats low enough.
And when it comes to browsing through games, I am hoping to develop recommendations based on the user's previous purchases/ratings, but that's not applicable for new users to the site. So I'll have to just focus on making browsing games as easy as possible for new users - http://beta.indievania.com/games (added genre/platform selection to the menu tonight), along with making sure the quality games are presented first.

Oooh--please, nothing lower than $0.99. Frankly, the fact that games are sold as low as $0.99 right now makes my stomach curdle; and I can't even imagine a game receiving a boost in sales from dropping lower than that, even on a smart phone.

About as pay-what-you-want: when you add that feature, I'd suggest giving the developer the option to set a minimum payment amount (e.g. pay what you want, as long as it's at least $1.99).

As for driving traffic: have sales and bundles, publicize them like crazy on gaming websites, and set aside an advertising budget. Also, it couldn't hurt to drum up some free publicity via interviews (e.g. this).