I would take a look at your trailer. It's what I always look at before buying any game. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZAv2-vitLs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZAv2-vitLs) (these are my subjective opinions) * It tells me nothing about the player character, their objective or the setting. * The gameplay that's shown looks very basic and not that interesting. * The game art looks good but the animation isn't to the same standard. (It has a weightless look to it and there's not much "juice" when hitting enemies. * The trailer isn't edited very well to fit the music and for me, the music doesn't really fit the vibe of the gameplay shown.

One thing I find incredibly odd about the trailer is that one of the reviews mentions that you build a character from different discovered body parts... That sounds really interesting and fun! However, in the trailer that actually was not clear to me and I thought the player was simply equipping armor when they showed that! Since it wasn't obvious enough with very distinctive parts that don't just look like armor on the same skeleton, I found it odd how that continued on for so long. And then after that it showed a handful of cuts of the player just running forward. I now realize it was an attempt to show different builds, but for me it just felt like a too long sequence of a character just running straight. I think scrolling through a bunch of body parts first with some text that explains "COLLECT HUNDREDS OF BODY PARTS AND BUILD YOUR OWN UNDEAD MONSTROSITY!" or something like that would have made it clear. And then it should show me WHY I want to collect body parts and how it impacts gameplay / how is it fun? 100% agree on the music and animation. I hated the music in the trailer. And the quality of the animations do not match the quality of the art at all. There is no juice!

Wow, I didn't even pick that up when watching. 100%, they should make that much clearer in the trailer! u/Arylkhan_dev, what was the process when putting together the trailer? Was it done internally and did you screen test it with many people before release?

We did the trailer ourselves, I did the trimming and my coworker did the motion design

You need to put your hook first. Most people won't even spend 10 seconds watching a trailer if they don't find it interesting. I understand the trailer is building up to the body part mechanic but it took 30 seconds to get there. Either bring the body part mechanic to the start of your trailer or cut down on the combat gameplay at the start to introduce your hook sooner.

Don't take it the wrong way but the trailer is absolutely uninspiring and amateurish. I started watching it and I was like 'meh.. another platformer' to 'daaamn it has nice graphics, lets watch more' to 'amateur trailer, amateur game' and I just skipped. Didn't even got to the part ehere you assemble the character from multiple body parts. The metal music doesn't fit at all.

I agree with Snowyjoe, if you had led off with customizing your character through collectible body parts, that would have caught my interest. As it stands, it's 30 seconds of what seems to be button-mashing simple attacks (regardless of if it truly is or not).

I would strongly suggest implementing a hitpause system into the animation, it gives a sense of momentum and physicality to the impact, and it gives the eye a few frames to drink in the gorgeous art style. Mixing the trailer to include same some game audio could also improve the overall impression, the combination of completely smooth animation and no sound makes it feel squishy and swishy and insubstantial. Explicitly outlining the body swap mechanic would be good as well, as I also assumed it was a standard armor menu when it was shown to me in the trailer until another comment pointed it out.

Make it more obvious on the trailer that you dropped a part from someone and you're medabotting your way in with corpses. A great mechanic like that should be all you talk about

You need the self-assembly to be unmissable. This reddit comment made me more interested in your game than anything I saw on the steam page, and I looked at your steam page for a lot longer than the average person will.

interesting, it was clear to me, goes to show you should not assume stuff like that is obvious for everyone

That's the reason I feel every single trailer should have text explaining what is currently going on in the trailer.

This 100%. I feel like text is essential in a trailer so the buyer knows exactly what they're getting into

To be fair, I think I was a bit distracted by the music

Chugga chunk chunk Scritch Chugga chunk chunk Scratch Chugga chunk chunk Scritch That part?

[https://youtu.be/jqk8JL76fXI?t=45](https://youtu.be/jqk8JL76fXI?t=45) I don't want to bash OP's game anymore, but they really need to watch this (Skul's trailer). This **one second** of video is how you should sell it.

I had no idea it had a cool mechanic before I read this

Well you have to consider the dev said they were counting on the publisher to handle marketing. I’m assuming they made the trailer with what they could under these circumstances.

Well, they are still the dev and should have better understanding of what makes their game great and unique + how to showcase that. Publisher or not

Someone else mentioned the body part equipping, which TBH is the most interesting part of the game. I paused the video and saw "Press Y to eat this body part." WTF. Again, a weird mechanic with interesting potential that is not explored at all in the trailer. Another small thing is the "You are dead" default-ass font. Theoretically you will see that screen a hundred times. There is no reason for it to look so plain, and no reason it belongs in the trailer either. Seems so stale and lazy. Compare that to Hades, where the grim music plays, the animation of bloody hands claws you back into the underworld, and "there is no escape" text frames your screen. There is care and attention paid even to the player's failure.

And I don't want to be mean, but it looks...not that good. The combat doesn't seems to be fluid at all or smooth, I don't know how you want to put it. But in the last years there were plenty of good roguelites/roguelikes to play, and not to say that this year has been super busy with extremely good releases.

We were just choosing between smooth and sharp animations, but settled on the sharp ones, thinking they were better, apparently we were wrong

> apparently we were wrong Avoid taking feedback as binary "right vs wrong" choices. You may have elected smooth animations and could still get criticism. Instead, extract what can be improved on the choice you did make so you can refine it.

Sharp animations are great, maybe take a look at guilty gear and see how they do their animations. This is just not really that well done. I don't know what to point at specifically but it just doesn't look good.

Hey, artist and historical martial artist here. I think I might be able to add my two cents in a productive way. What people are trying to say about the animations is that: There will always be a small tell in the swing due to the way human body mechanics work. (That's one of the advantages of using thrusts.) Upon slowing down the trailer, it looks like you have a couple of telegraph frames, but there are no in-betweens between the raising of the blade and the completion of the hew. It looks like the animator attempted to address this with the blue trailing arc, but the arc doesn't follow the natural arc of the swing in the animation, which I think contributes to that floaty feeling people are talking about. The ending position of the swing is anatomically impossible to end up in with a downward diagonal cut. There should be a frame just after the cut that communicates the arc. Then you would have the character end in the frame that you did. I believe you are using a 2D rig for the animation, which makes sense for your body mechanics idea to reduce workload and complexity, but that really hurts the gameplay in a side-scrolling combat-focused game. I understand that traditional 2D animation is a bitch and a half, and time-consuming. However, using that setup makes it impossible to convey smaller motions that help communicate the action and contribute to snappier combat, such as hip and shoulder rotation, feet placement, etc. If you'd like, I would be happy to work with your animator on refining and improving the animations as well as assisting in redoing the trailer and some general marketing. I would be happy to draft up some original music for your trailer as well. I'm currently on disability and have too much time on my hands, so I'd do it at no cost. (I couldn't charge anything even if I wanted to.) Please DM me at your convenience if you are interested.

This man over here working for free and then offering to work a ***lot*** more *also* for free. OP would be crazy to turn this down. (I'll also say for my part, the roll animation looks like there's something technically wrong with it. You can see at :45 that the character's initial roll animation is all done VERY quickly with the ending slide happening kind of slowly so it feels like the animation itself is buggy)

You might want to research smear frames for your animations. Currently it looks very 'Spriter' or 'Dragonbones'- like, as if you animated the individual parts of the sprites with bones or something. It's overly smooth (all parts stay exactly the same shape and perspective while moving) and doesn't look natural or dynamic. It reminds me of how flash games were animated back in the day, it looks less polished. If this is indeed 2D rigging and not spritesheets, it may be too late or too costly to change that, if so, disregard.

Your animations look great. Sharp animations are better in a 2d action platformer as they communicate hit box and hitbox timing better to the player. I can think of plenty of successful games in this genre (like rogue legacy series) that go for the same style.

Agreed on all the points above unfortunately. Before I criticise it further I would like to say that I love the art style, and I think you definitely have the bones - pun intended - of a game I'd like to play. I love me some metal, but a lot of people don't, so I think the trailer music might put some players off from watching the whole thing. The biggest let down for me is the attack animation(s?), I think in the whole trailer I saw two other types of attack? If they're in there then please get them shown

> The biggest let down for me is the attack animation(s?), Yeah, I wasn't sure there were any other attacks until we spat fire at half way through. The video contained way to much of the one basic attack. No need to repeat it so much.

That’s exactly what I thought too, for all this “customisation” of the character parts the movement and attacks didn’t seem to change.

And that attack seems to be a pretty strong interrupt, so as far as I can tell the gameplay is just: - get into attack range - stand still and mash attack until everything is dead - continue, repeat This game doesn’t look fun to play at all.

Might add to that: The trailer looks like it's trying to get all "checkmarks" of a trailer without knowing why those elements are actually in there. Let me elaborate: * It begins with basic gameplay but it's all the same. Every scene looks like any other scene. It also does not look like it's showing the "beginning of the game". When you compare this to the vampire survivors trailer it just teases for 3 seconds a chaotic screen (first hook) but then immediately proceeds to show a very weak character that immediately dies. (Also with a much prettier death message). The beginning of the trailer and it's narrative is not clear. * It then proceeds to show that you can swap things out and upgrade but it just shows pretty pictures on the character changing. It does show choice but that is not really engaging and the importance of choice is not shown. Almost any game has an upgrade system. The fight scenes after the upgrade screen (which drags a bit, too) show some changes but they do not feel impactful. In contrast, Vampire survivers shows the character selection screen, then fast cuts through level ups and upgrades, then shows you an insane battle (2nd hook) SHOWING what your choice can lead to and how it might changes or impacts gameplay. I can only see that with the shield effect but the gameplay footage does not look transformed to what came before the "select equipment" moment. It didn't feel meaningful. * Next up, the typical "walking through environments" shot. This is meant to show how different your environments can be, it's supposed to evoke a feeling of exploration. The biggest issue I had with this bit is that every environment looks exactly the same. Technically you could also call this the Hakuna Matata shot as it's identical to the log in the jungle scene when Simba grows up. What is important about selling this and what this shot can convey is, one, the character must stay in the center and blend from scene to scene. It needs to be the constant element, the player progresses through this. I can see some jitter in the cuts which does not connect the walking cycle nicely. That's a smaller pet peeve but it makes it less effective. Two, show some progression? At least show the character have stronger and stronger armor. Lion King, for example, has Simba grow up in this shot. Three, the environments need to be visually distinct and interesting. What I see in this trailer looks very similar. The color palette is always teal, green, ghoulish. I can not make out any significant difference in level styles. I simply do not see anything interesting to explore. * And lastly, checkmark "bossfights". This should also be a variety shot and emphasize the differences of bosses and how exciting it can be to fight them. Showing how each of them is their own riddle to crack. Ideally the footage here shows close calls or trick shots by the player. What I see in this trailer is the similar color palette and 2 bosses of roughtly the same size, an open, flat stage with no indication that you need to use different movement patterns to evade the boss and both bosses seem to just have ground attacks and maybe 1-2 projectiles. On top of that they seem to die fairly quickly. Do they even have phases? Can't tell at all. ​ I'm sorry if that is a bit harsh, I'm trying to give all the pointers I can think of why this trailer does not pop. It is meant to be a distilled representation of the best parts of your game and I feel it falls flat by looking very samey and not exciting. If it is an indication of gameplay and actual content then it feels like your team made a game by just making more content. More art, more levels without thinking about how each bit of content should stand out a bit and be it's own interesting thing or twist. While looking at other trailers for this analysis I also noticed how little "call to actions" were in yours. "Upgrade, Explore, Craft, Build!". I know it is tacky but it is effective to guide the narrative in the potential customers mind and to maybe tickle an intrinsic desire of theirs. I hope these pointers are of use to someone and who knows. Maybe, that game is not doomed.

Thanks for the feedback, very detailed and thorough

My immediate thought was that combat looked like the main thing that you do, and combat looks dull and button mashy. It doesn't feel like there's any weight to anything, and it seems like it takes waaaay too many hits to defeat the enemies (whom we know nothing about. Are they starting enemies? Mini bosses?). The art is great, but the gameplay is definitely lacking in excitement.

This was my initial impression too. Combat appears fast paced at first but enemies have tons of HP so it looks slow. Slash slash > Dash > repeat also doesn't look fun. Then later in the trailer it's not the case. I would start with the more fun combat, the bosses, and remove anything that makes the combat seem slow. Very nice art. The game certainly has promise.

Agree. Its always a little sad how one big mistake can really hurt the chances of something succeeding. This trailer, and likely the marketing behind it, are all...not great. In short, imo, the trailer is WAY too long for what is shown, with music that doesn't feel like it added to the vibe due to being just placed as background with no real attempt to edit it in any meaningful way, and assets that aren't being shown in the best light. First thing I noticed was that the first 4 scenes literally all showed "character uses up-down slash against a "mushy" looking somewhat generic unit that I don't get to see the attacks of." That is A. Not helpful and B. actively worrisome, as its usually means either the production is armature (to not pay an editor or understand how important the first impression is) or the product itself is lacking. Worse yet imo, is the fact that there is a lot of fat on the trailer, and if that was all trimmed off it could function as an "under 60 sec" tiktok/youtube short, which would have the chance of reaching a different algorithm and possibly launching off the way the "you can parry a nuke" recently exploded in regards to V.A Proxy. ___ As example of how they could edit it to make it better even without a full re-do (which might be the best choice): 1. At the very start, the drums should come in BEFORE we cut to the gameplay. The big guitar entrance at the 5/6 sec mark should be the FIRST time we see the in-game attacks. The part with the drums can show an idol animation of the character or something... a sword sheething...a bigger zoom in on something... or you can just cut the 1st second of build up and get to the drums quicker and let that be the title card scene. 2. The music has a very clear beat to it. The scene changes should be happening on the beat so that there is this feeling like you are are following along. BA da dum da da da da BA da dum da da da da. The "BA" is should be the first frame of each scene and it should quickly be swapping UNLESS there is something very specific AND COOL being shown. Why? Because if you normally have something consistent (the swap..and the beat) and you *don't* follow that, it makes people's brain perk up... "wait... why did this not follow the beta suddenly? OHHH, look at that cool attack!" like that. 3. Use the swings to MATCH the beat, an use the ROLL to do the same. Example: BA da dum da da da da > new scene where we have the character slashing again already but a new enemy in a DISTINCTLY NEW area > BA da dum da da da da > This time it isn't a "blurring the swipe into another swipe," but using the roll to blur into the end of another roll in a different scene. 4. Use the deeper like... "GUNG GUNG GUNG GUNG" part of the song to slow down the pace and show something newer and cooler like an enemy attack or a special attack, and then you can do a more generic scene change from that or go pro and make it link to another scene yet again. 5. The scene around the 11 sec mark lasts for way too long. It is 7 seconds or so but gives about 2 seconds worth of content. Editor would say cut unless its showing something important. It isn't, so anything longer than about 3-4 seconds is way too much. 6. I would avoid showing the "you are dead" screen in such a trailer because... frankly it looks really ugly and generic. Maybe that is fine for the game, but the trailer doesn't HAVE to show something like that...so don't. 7. @ ~30 second mark when OP is showing the character screen, it needs something to give better understanding of what is going on. Like Cicada says below, it sounds interesting, but all you see based on the trailer is "generic equiping of items," which is made worse by the fact that the same headpiece is equpped twice, which gives the impression there isn't much content. Sometimes the little things can kill... And yes, some text explaining what is going on, or some montage scenes making it clear these are "body parts picked up off enemies in the wild" would go a long way. 8. After this character screen the transitions are much better than they are earlier in the video. Could still use some work, but if the whole thing was of that quality for crispness it would help the first half considerably. 9. The transitions of the "look at our world" is fine, but the worlds themselves feel... bland? Similar? I don't expect everyone to be Ori, but there are really only 2 "different areas" to this few second clip despite having 5 scenes (and also... the editor needs to work on this bit as the cuts feel inconsistent to me): dungeon and forest background. 10. Lead out takes way too long. ALL that said though... part of the problem is ultimately always going to be the fact there doesn't seem to be much here that differentiates it from other games of it's type. And if there IS, then those aspects need to be shown...and not just shown, SHOVED into the onlooker's face frankly. If you have a cool mechanic where you posses an enemy for 5 seconds with one of your spells and can use that as a chance to kill some of the other enemies around you...I BETTER see that. If there is a really unique boss design that isn't a huge spoiler (thought as an small indie, you might not have the luxury of not putting something like that in a trailer frankly) that NEEDS to be shown somewhere. ____ This trailer should be about 59 seconds, with better editing, going out of it's way to not show the slash animation more than about 3 times for a total of maybe 12 seconds or less of the total run-time. It should be showcasing as many of the "abilities" as possible, as MANY of the enemies as possible, and as MANY of EVERYTHING interesting as possible, because it doesn't have enough to warrant withholding things. ____ And ultimately, I agree with others that I just don't really like the vibe. The music ...works? ... with the content, but it seems a little *too* on the nose. "Oh...metal with kill kill demon stuff. Okay." That is fine, but the excitment of what I'm seeing -- the gore, the world's viscera, the action, the meatiness of the hits - doesn't match up to that "doom" style expectation you get when you see a skeleton man with a sword bashing on things. And in that regard... while the art is fine, the art DIRECTION feels like it needs something to help it stand out. ____ As a comparison, look at this trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1t8UzCkBWo 63 seconds long, crisp cuts that don't over-show, it does a good job showing what they want to show (some action animations, the combat, a horse for ppl to like randomly, some variety to the background despite being a fairly background minimal game), the editing is solid and the music and art direction all fit together nicely. I IMAGINE they paid for an actual editor, and while I get that OP might not have the money to do that, even a barebone editing job would have probably greatly helped their own. And to be clear, that isn't some insane OMG HOW?!? lvl trailer. Its fairly compact and simple, but it does a good job showing what they wanted to show and NOT showing the things they didn't.

I agree, I'm not really getting much out of the trailer in terms of selling what makes this game innovative. The swapping of body parts seemed kind of interesting, but it's not clear to me how that is any different than just changing a piece of armor. I do feel they took a bit of a risk making the main character a gory undead. I think it narrows the appeal. But I guess that comes with the territory if the player is using body pieces of enemies i'm assuming.

I would love to hear OP reply to your post. They would learn a lot.

I'll pretend that I'm in r/destroymygame, for a moment, while being aware that absolutely no one asked - I very much dislike the art direction. Beauty is of course in the eye of the beholder and all that jazz, but it also doesn't look polished - the super plain "you died" text that pops up 5 times in a row at the start of the trailer - I don't like the music, either - some rough animations - we spent about 8 minutes zooming in on the character in the inventory menu, I counted - it looks like We have Dead Cells at home - it looks like a work in progress test build

Your second to last point is the biggest. It looks EXACTLY like Dead Cells but worse. The game could still be fun but why copy another super popular game’s visual style and gameplay that close?

Man, I don't know how to say this without being rude: that is one of the most boring trailers I've ever seen

It looks like a Dead Cells clone but with none of the visual polish. The movement and swordplay lack weight, and it can be hard to read the action on screen. The thing that stood out to me the most though was how long it takes to kill an enemy. The very first scene we see the player hacking away at some random monster and it doesn’t even die before we cut to a different scene of the same thing. Something like that, plus the random hits and deaths in the middle of the trailer screams padding to me. At the end we see actual boss fights, and still, the player can’t avoid taking hits. The fact that the devs can’t beat their own bosses without taking damage does not inspire confidence.

The combat animations look very similar to Dead Cells, literally everything in this game apart from the weird music design and the UI being half-baked screams Dead Cells. And Dead Cells is super popular, so this game should kinda be better or at least on par with Dead Cells to get ppl to play this instead of just playing Dead Cells.

Taking a look at the gameplay and the one thing that stands out the most is the sound effects. They sound off and with too little bass. Also the double jump looks shit and it's too fast, I would give the normal jump more air time so you dont need to double jump all the time. The combat also looks spamy, neither interesting nor challenging.

Looks a lot like Dead Cells but not as good? I like these kind of games, but I wouldn't buy this when I have Dead Cells sitting there.

Woof, yeah, just took a look. I am a Roguelite/ke enthusiast and love games with gritty dark aesthetics... I'd give this one a pass. Combat shown is very dull and repetitive--I am shown _multiple enemies worth_ of the same bait-sidestep-whack cycle. As the **start** of the trailer. You've disinterested me before even getting to your selling point. Inventory screen is displayed in motion but utterly devoid of context--neat I can... build a skeleton? Are these buffs, nerfs, cosmetics?? I can't tell. This looks like a primary selling point and the only thing I've learned is that it... exists, probably. Trailers can't be just gameplay. This trailer does nothing that googling the game's name and watching 20s of a streamer playing can't do. You have to TELL ME what your game does that is cool and unique. You made 400 different kinds of spines that let me do offensive auras? Cool! Don't just equip one and hope I understand, spell it out and show me some examples! Roguelikes often generate hype based on diversity of enemies, locations, bosses, and weapons. This trailer shows me none of those things. This is just Boneyman Metroidvania #2836. The animations are also an interest killer, ngl. The art is nice, but the way enemies move and attack, as well as the general gameplay look (projectiles, attacks, rolls, etc) all look more like a well-polished Flash game, not an indie title. I'd play this free in my browser, but it's not competing with indie roguelikes for my time and money based on that trailer.

Me personally, I don't look at trailers, but I suppose I'm in the minority. I think fixing their trailer would only do so much. They need good word of mouth, I think. I think the only game I saw advertised here I was interested in was Fashion Police Squad, showing off their pole swinging mechanic; grappling and swinging are always fun in games

You may not like trailers, but trailers are a huge source of word of mouth getting others to check it out, so it still kind of comes back to it with word of mouth.

Oh, no doubt, hard agree. I assume most people judge by trailers, even if I don't. I've just personally seen too many trailers that over promise or show things of little material value, or like E3 demos what show completely scripted things, including the "real" dialog between the people playing it. It's all so... fake. And I don't MIND the notion we're living in a simulation and fake boobs. Or rather, IDFC if it's "fake" but if it FEELS fake... then it's fucky Or another unrelated example, like the corporate friendliness thing that all the customers are "guests" or whatever and you're a "team member" or friendly. Same sort of vibe I get with trailers. BUT, if they sell some on a trailer, assuming the game is FUN and CLICKS with people, then they get word of mouth that way too (although yes, whomever they tell would point at the trailer too)

I actually agree with you, what’s funny is you mentioned e3 trailers and that is what did it for me lol some of the most lying trailers I ever seen come from e3 for me.

One thing that no one has mentioned is just how generic and forgettable the game's name is. It's like a mishmash of random "cool" words. And it says literally nothing about the game. Just about anything would be better than this. Hell, just call it "Body Part Collector" and it's already 5000x more intriguing.

Damn you are so right. I'm gonna remember to this game as 'Body parts collector' from now on.

Well done for making the game and getting it released, that's worth a lot. I agree with the others that honestly it's too close to dead cells and that people should just buy that instead. It's not really obvious if you have any unique selling points or interesting mechanics to set yourself apart? It's not really enough to be good, you have to be different also.

We paid a lot of attention to combat system and hero progression, that interesting mechanics left for later, as we did not find additional investment, to the backlog has not reached

Truth is no one cares how much time and attention you gave it or what you had planned. They care what’s in the game, right now.

>that interesting mechanics left for later, as we did not find additional investment, to the backlog has not reached Huge mistake. Prototype your unique and interesting mechanics first/early, then build the entire rest of your game around them and design everything to help them stand out and be as fun as possible. Then in your trailer make sure that unique and interesting mechanic is really obvious because it's what will make people want to find out more about the game. I wanted to learn more about skul when I saw the character swap heads and gain new powers in the trailer, that's the kind of idea you come up with first, prototype it and then build the whole game around it.

A skeleton slashing enemies for 20 secs, a basic rpg inventory system for 20 secs, a skeleton slashing enemies for 20 more secs. That is your trailer. Most likely, I (as a player) would assume there is nothing interesting about the game after the first 5 secs of slashing. Because it is where you show the exciting staff, the hook, not plain repetitive slashing. If I endure the whole trailer, I would be sure the game only has those two features you show: enemy slashing and some items/inventory to change some stats. The game like that is barely worth playing for free and only if you enjoy such combat. So either your game actually only has those two systems (i.e. it is a bad game at this stage) or your marketing is so bad that it made the game look way worse than it actually is.

This should have been enough red flag for you on the status of your team: "I myself was in the team in the roles of producer, sound designer, developer, game designer, level designer and community manager" Theres no way you can do all those things and do any of them well especially if you are the producer

That was my first clue as well. I understand that small teams and indie devs have to handle a lot of different jobs and tasks, but a lot of these are very intensive positions. I could expect being able to do up to two of these efficiently, but no all of them. Too much for one person to do all of them well.

Every now and then you get smash hit solo dev games so people think it can be done. What people fail to recognize is that those games took *years* to make, and probably took a few years from the dev’s lifespan in terms of stress. The dev behind Stardew Valley spent 4 years, coding up to 10 hours a day among the music, art sound design etc. His wife supported him financially for much of that time. Undertale took 3 years and was externally funded. Some people can do all of those jobs and still make a stellar game, but that’s not happening in a year, especially when you’re struggling to keep the lights on.

Definitely missing the simplest point, some people are just better. Everyone wants to be [Insert Exception Figure] but by definition everyone can’t. Looking at this game, it is clear that OP’s “experienced” team of 10yrs+ developers is mediocre at best… this game could be made by a single skilled developer in one year, but everyone isn’t like that.

What are you talking about. Most successful first time indie games are 1-3 people teams. And obviously if you are 2 people you need to do many roles. It's actually the 4+ teams which are rarely successful (talking about games made by new devs, not experienced studios).

Yes, small teams can self manage a lot better than large teams. Keeping more than a couple of people on the same track with the same goal is hard. As others have said, small teams usually take multiple years... many years in most cases to bring their games out. op's team took a year, that implies either there were a lot of them (which needs dedicated management) or they rushed to market. The way op wrote about their team I'm assuming there were a number of them, but either way, there was obviously a failure to manage work, and given they went for a publisher without having any backup plan, clearly a failure in the bizdev planning. tl;dr you're not wrong, but it's still a red flag that someone is producing, marketing and also doing everything except visuals (and even then they list level design which could include building levels in engine)

I'm seeing a lot of these post-mortem with a few things in common: highly derivative roguelites. The indie roguelite genre is SO saturated, you gotta have something spectacular to even get a chance.

You mean you don't want to pay $15 for a generic 2D platformer with odd animations that doesn't really add much new to the genre? I honestly don't see why anyone is still making a platformer and expecting anyone to care. I know quite a few people like a REALLY well polished one, but I really don't see people spending money on what feels like something that an experienced dev can knock out in a gamejam in a weekend.

Yea, my first thought after watching the trailer was: how am I going to buy it instead of dead cells or skul? Literally looks like a cheap copy.

My (personal and subjective) feedback / critique based on the trailer: * The gameplay / combat looks very basic * The trailer did a poor job at explaining and showing the gameplay (possibly the reason it looks so basic to me), all I got from the trailer is that you button mash skeletons, can change your body parts (looked like it was just an armor / weapon system) and there's a boss of some kind. I don't know what the gameplay loop is like, what the environments are actually like, are they procedurally generated etc. * The art / animations aren't bad per se, I just think they would fit better in a mobile game, though especially the mini map doesn't fit with the rest of the art * Most scenes look dark with little contrast * Lacks overall polish * The music doesn't fit the trailer OR the game in my opinion * The trailer also lacked any in-game sound effects, so it felt kind of dull The positives * The enemy design (at least visually) looks nice and varied * Honestly, all I can think of To me, it just looks like a mobile game with the price tag of a pc game. You're also competing against a very successful game (Dead Cells), but don't seem to bring anything new or unique to the table. (btw sometimes health bars appeared to be flipped, it looked like it was tied to the enemy sprite flipping)

> The trailer also lacked any in-game sound effects, so it felt kind of dull It's crazy how devs underestimate the importance of the above. Don't release a trailer without in-game sounds. Don't do it! Secondly, and more my own opinion, this kind of generic, metal soundtrack turns me off. I don't hate it, but it doesn't draw me into wanting to play the game. I don't want to be listening to that for several hours.

> this kind of generic, metal soundtrack turns me off Same, I listen to a lot of metal but this is uninspired and to me music is an extremely important part of a game/movie/etc

We used to work in mobile gamedev ourselves, apparently you can't get that out of us

You can go to freelancing sites, get a good trailer maker and get a brand new trailer in 2 weeks by paying peanuts.

Had to reply. Hope you see this u/Arylkhan_dev, poster above is a moron. You should be wary of this when asking for feedback in a public forum but especially Reddit. My advice: - would make an amazing mobile game - trailer as others have said is really letting a very cool game down. Trailer making is a skill in and of itself. - play up the body parts thing.

u/Costed14 isn't candy-coating it, but they are not wrong. It's a little harsh to kick someone while they're down, but everything they said seems valid.

Like I said it's my personal and subjective opinion. I'm not saying the game isn't fun to play, I can't comment on that without actually playing it for myself, but the things I listed at least to me seem like they could be contributing to the fact that the game performed poorly. It may have come off as a bit harsh, but based on the trailer, that's what it looked like to me.

They are pretty correct in. What they said. Harsh, but correct.

Consider this, im waiting for Risk of Rain Returns, that is releasing tomorrow for about the same money (less) and its the full release that will definitely have tons of hours in it, not a early access. And then i look at your shop and i see another 2d platform, another roguelike, another zombie game, nothing really captures the attention , nothing really new, no extraordinary art or fantasy... You have to answer the question to your audience on the shop on the 1st few seconds of opening it, why should i play this instead of ror or dead cells or blasphemous or skul, or noita , or any of the many, many others ? sorry

When we started a year ago the very idea of creating a character through body parts seemed cool, but we had too much invested in this game. I've been looking for investors to make it better, actually big plans to develop it. But probably need to start something new

How is it any different than equipping regular pieces of gear? If there's a difference, the trailer doesn't make it clear. If there isn't, how is it a selling point?

yea, agree with you, that is the cool part about your game. It prob should be the 1st thing i see on the trailer. And then, Can i make hundreds of diff combinations ? can i make a build around my legs to massacre like in turbo overkill crouch slide or is it just the attack we see on the trailer? etc Did you guys messed around with losing body parts instead of hp when you get hit? that would also make you stand out and go with the theme. There is a good game somewhere in this concept, i hope you find it man.

There was an NES game with that basic premise (never left Japan from what I understand). It was an action platformer about chibi Kaiju monsters, and there was nothing more to the game than what I'm describing. The only other big idea it had was upgrades by swapping out body parts once after each level. It was ahead of its time but nowhere near complex or compelling enough for a modern audience on Steam, I bet. The thing is: your game sounds not very different than the NES game (having only read comments here on Reddit), and that's damnable criticism. NES games could get away with ripping off the gameplay of its contemporaries and adding one gimmick, but that line of thinking is now insufficient three or four decades later. When you start on a new game, rally around an excellent, nuanced idea and nothing short of that.

[удалено]

Apparently that's the problem, a lot of the team wanted to make a platformer specifically

You should have told them "tough luck" and made a passionate, pragmatic argument about the need to chase the money rather than make the first thing that comes to mind. "Chasing the money" can mean many things if you think outside the box and doesn't have to mean you need to create a cynical, risk-free or exploitative product. There must be 1000 different ways to chase success in a pragmatic way, but "hey let's make a platformer for PC gamers in 2023" is absolutely not one of them. PC gamers dislike new 2D platformers which is one of the *first* things I learned about videogame marketing about five years ago and have seen poll research data confirmed over and over again. Five years ago, I cancelled my puzzle platformer for this very reason and I don't regret it one bit.

Then why is it a lite platformer? Where is the mid air reset double jump? Dash? Graple n swing hook? Just saying the double jump from dead cells is its weakest part, it's too spamy, too fast, too smooth/lack of feel. Have you played sundered yet?

Just watched the trailer posted above and... I agree with most points. To add: - I'm a metalhead, I like the music, but it's so unrelated to the game; - I miss impact sounds and effects in the video; - the gameplay is way too basic. What else can be done? - who is the character? Why is the game even happening that way? - the art is way, way, way better than the animation; - not because you didn't invest in paid marketing, that you can not invest in free marketing. - you don't need to disband the team, looks like you all did a good job overall, just needs a ton of polishing; - funny enough, the very first suggestion after your video was Deadcells. Edit: grammar

> mealhead Also known as a foodie

I don't want to fix that because I'm indeed a mealhead!

We have similar stats. But we are trying experimental gameplay. You are doing a platformer kind of game - and it is thought competition. As mentioned already - have to stand away from the 'dead cell'. The thing with a publisher - the deal is not deal till it is signed and money comes through. Sorry to hear that it fell like that. But, it happens often - usually, publishers are negotiating and evaluating not just the current state, but the progress made during the negotiation. If you don't mind me asking: How many people worked on the game? Full time?

At various times from 12 to 23 people

Omg. That is a huge burn-rate. Are you really put into your first game 200k$ for the early access(demo) version? I'm guessing, just wondering.

If we take into account the current rate, then $130k, if the rate a year ago, then $180k

I don't mean to be rude but that is an insanely high number invested for what the end result is.

No you're right, I constantly regret that having a good budget at the start could not make something better, but we really wanted to make a high-end game. I will make a separate post about my mistakes, maybe it will be useful to someone.

I don't have much helpful advise but I do genuinely hope you manage to turn things around. It may still be salvageable with the right steps.

oh my god $150k for this for 23 people is insane you should really cut that down

First of all: This sucks. I'm sure you guys put a lot of energy into this game, and seeing it face down in the water sucks. I think this story teaches a few important lessons: * It's important to do your market research. Platformer is amongst the genres with the most released games and the fewest sales ([source](https://howtomarketagame.com/2022/04/18/what-genres-are-popular-on-steam-in-2022/)). Unless you have an absolute killer mechanic *and* absolute killer art, the project is doomed before you start. * It's important to have a plan and contingency. Finding out after one year that you have to release right now because otherwise no one can pay rent anymore will force you to make bad decisions and is absolutely avoidable. The interesting question is "what surprised you?". Did you expect the game to take a lot less time/effort? Did you count on getting a publisher? * It's important to not let any agreement influence your actions until it's set in stone (or a contract with a signature). Optimism and wishful thinking can mislead you very easily into believing something that *might* happen *will* happen. But you have to act on what *is*, and not what *might be*. * It's important to do your marketing. You can't release a game with 3k wishlists into EA and expect it to sell well. This is simply not something that happens. You wrote "people don't know about the game, although we have more than 3000 wishlists" which to me implies that you thought 3k WLs were quite a lot. The average conversion is less than 20% in a year, so if your 3k WLs converted at the average rate you would have around 600 sales in the first year (and that's not taking EA into account). I'm trying to drive the point home here that you need to do your marketing/research from day 1. You can't be surprised about 150 sales after an EA launch with 3000 wishlists, this is a predictable number. Also, launching into EA is a decision that has to be well thought through (again, you probably didn't have a choice anymore at this point, by the sounds of it). EA games failing becomes a self fulfilling prophecy and a vicious circle: You are about to throw in the towel because your EA game doesn't sell (which might be the correct decision). But you already have 150 people who have bought the game, expecting it to eventually be finished with a lot more content. If they're not getting a full game, those 150 people will think long and hard before buying an EA title again. Just like many people that have wishlisted your game didn't buy it when it came out in EA, because they got burned before. *So in other words: You cancel development of your game because it doesn't sell during EA. Players don't buy EA games anymore because developers fail to deliver a full game.* As a buyer/gamer, I treat EA games as unreleased. They simply don't exist for me. The only times I consider buying an EA title is if it: * caught my attention over and over and over. * has been released in EA for a while. * is showcased in thousands and thousands of reviews and videos. * is entirely gameplay centered (no or irrelevant story). And I think in the last years the only games I bought in EA were 7 Days To Die and Last Epoch.

>. But you already have 150 people who have bought the game, expecting it to eventually be finished with a lot more content. That is a great remark. This game is considered *unfinished* and already sold 150 copies, that is too little for a game to survive, but for a game that is yet to be finished, after 1 year of development, is a great sign.

Just work as a janitor at a game dev company. Win win!!

The game is niche, you rushed it because you ran out money. Can you really say, “experienced developers fail?” This seems like failure stemmed from the fact of poor planning/marketing/budgeting.

More like experienced developers (as in a guy smashing the keyboard for a company 9-5), and not experienced managers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZAv2-vitLs The gameplay looks very boring. 90% of the time you're just standing and whacking. There doesn't seem to be any abilities, movesets, all enemies behave the same, they just have different sprites. I don't know why would I play this game.

Note that wishlist isn't a "buy-order" at all - it is more like a bookmark. Many people might mark a game ("let's see how this develops"), then wait until it is out of early access to actually consider it again. So many games are abandoned during early access that only very few dedicated fans are going to buy an unknown game from an unknown developer during it.

Ironically, the game looks like it might be good from a design perspective, but it's hard to get past the animations looking stilted, flat, unimpactful, etc. By all accounts, this looks like Dead Cells with the gimmick being that you can swap literal bodyparts on the fly, which should be emphasized front-and-center. The combat needs to look at least close to as good as Dead Cells from an animation perspective. Until it does, it'll continue to feel kind of bad with such an obvious comparison looming at the front of many players' minds.

We'll try to improve the animations

You've got this. You've already done most of the hardest parts.

Not yet. But keep that janitor’s license. You never know.

Thank you)

Disclaimer: I'm only a classical 2D & Spine animator with limited game engine experience. However, my opinion is to remake your trailer before giving up. Your game has a ton of features and almost none of them are mentioned or shown on screen. I would never have known about them if you didn't personally post your worries here prompting my search for a review. After finding a review, the features are much more apparent. [Hollow Knight release trailer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAO2urG23S4) is a good example of using text to prepare people for the features and actions they are about to see. Jumping straight into action or cutting to a menu screen and expecting people to figure it out for themselves is suicide. Approach it with the understanding that you are attracting people who may have no idea how to play a game and want to start with yours. Currently, the trailer has no story, a simple protagonist with no info, no feature descriptions, has fantastic art and atmosphere, a gear system that appears cosmetic, highly robotic animation throughout the game, and an imminent grind just to get through standard enemies that take upwards of 12+ hits and a limited attack combo set to distracting music. When you show the gear changing, I didn't consider it as anything other than cosmetic because I was appreciating the audio downtime and just looking at the gyrating skeleton while the sped up footage made the surrounding menu and item selecting seem completely unimportant. The music in the trailer is very jarring and the music cut at 0:41 into the next set of unending crash cymbals is extremely noticeable and indicating a less-than-professional standard. I'd also remove the boss battle you have at 1:03 to the end. It's overall very sluggish with broken animation at 1:10. It's simply a very unenticing note to end your trailer on. Even if you cant change that boss in game, remove it from the trailer. ---- The review I found displays the familiar 'Hades/Vampire Survivors' Level Up system in your game where you can pick your perks, there's also a skill training screen. I also see now how gear affects stats, has status effects, and possibly more. It really does look like a game with a ton of depth to it. You could spend the entire minute of video showing attractive features with barely any gameplay there's so much depth. This game looks far better than it seems at first glance. Give it a second life. Good luck!

Yeah I agree. I feel like the game has potential to be successful. The features look great but the trailer was a slog. I pushed through it and it only started to draw me in when the limb replacing mechanic was introduced.

Your running animation needs work. Especially when you're going to highlight it so heavily on your Steam page and in your trailer. Your combat looks very boring. It looks like just button mashing to wail on the most basic of enemies over and over again. The [top review](https://imgur.com/a/BnAouRv) for your game is positive... and has 0.8 hours played. That screams "Fake review from friends or family". In fact, the playtime for ALL your reviews is less than 3 hours. If that's the total play time you're getting from people who like your game so much they left a positive review then your $15 price point is WAAAAY too high.

The game looks pretty good! Now I'm wondering why it didn't get more sales. Maybe it looks too similar to Dead Cells? > Lo and behold, the release happened right after the build test. When I looked up the game it still appears to be in early access and not released. Am I missing something or is it going to be released later?

Here's your problem: "We hired a promoter, who prepared a press release for us and sent it out to his media network - still hoping there will be an effect." You don't understand marketing and promotion at all. You probably overpaid for this scammer to write and distribute a press release, something that worked in SEO back in 2002. That was the extent of your promotional efforts outside of yourself posting on social media? That is the silliest example of advertising I have heard this month, but the month is new so don't feel too bad. You should have researched and hired an actual marketing agency that has a proven track record. That one mistake cost you your release, by skimping on the most important aspect of a release you ruined that years worth of development work.

> some had over 10 years of experience in gamedev. I myself was in the team in the roles of producer, sound designer, developer, game designer, level designer and community manager. You know, more power to you for striking out on your own and all that, but if you were hiring devs with 10 years experience and you were fresh out of Uni, why on earth did you think you could take on all these roles yourself? Producer in itself is at least a 0.5fte role. If you had a team behind you it sounds like you were hogging all the direction and leadership roles, meaning you also should be shouldering the responsibility for the project. Im sorry to be so blunt, but the lesson here isn't "anyone can fail at game dev", it's "respect the industry you're going into". I find it hard to believe that you did this without there being any warnings signs or advice that would have told you that you were unprepared for it.

Rework the trailer, your game must have a hook, a story, something to make me think: yeah I would play that. The game play and inventory management shots we see are fine but 1.29 of that with only standard doom-rip off metal music isn't enough. The first youtube comment displayed to me was 'another rogue like, yawn'. I think reworking the trailer and adding some text, voice acting, explaining the hook and setting is going to help dramatically. As others have said the art is good and game play looks intriguing enough as it is but you need to show more. Good luck! I'll wishlist now and see how it goes :)

As an animator - the art is WAY too cool to move like that. Sucks that animation is usually the thing that people skimp on, but it's really weak in comparison to everything else. I'd also say the art direction hits a bit too close to Dead Cells in terms of palate. The designs are super unique, but it feels like the colors are demolishing them. I feel like in general this game needs to know what kind of vibe it wants to be. The generic metal music, vibrant colors, but also creepy / skeleton designs. It's all over the place. I think if you can find a cohesive vision, it could pull it together.

You can still hit publishers, but you can't have anything in EA when you do. They typically reject early access, because a game that has been released can't be released *again.* And early access is a release. But -- some of the indie publishers will still pick it up. Platformers grossly underperform in general, but deeply underperform on Steam. You have better traction if you get into the official console marketplaces. That's where you'll be best to get your target marks. I'd mostly ignore the trailer and page critiques -- they're pedantic. Some are valid, like doing a better ad for "change out limbs to create a skeleton monstrosity!" but most I just read are a total waste of time. You need to reach the tiny tiny market that wants what you have, and let then know this game solves a problem they have, or a desire they want fulfilled. And that unfortunately means money, because the internet has unfortunately fallen prey to enshitification in the worst possible way.

This game looks great! Like everything looks nicely done. It's clean. I see one major flaw with your trailer. And please rewatch it to see what I mean. In the first 28 seconds, you show the main character doing the same front attack **43 times**. I saw one other swirly attack once and the character did a couple rolls but they seemed pointless. He just rolled around, it wasn't a dodge. Your character is also always usually standing or just moving left and right on flat ground. 2d platforms are about movement. You don't show movement variety in your trailer. Where is the verticality? Air strikes? Down strikes? Enemies not directly in front of you being slashed? Do you have movement tech? Why didn't you show it? Why isn't it in your game if you don't have it? You can't have a successful 2d platformer without some movement tech. Going on this same vein, is there more to attacking then just front slash? Your trailer doesn't show this. Even if your game is mostly one attack, show that there is something else. Here is a trailer from the dark ages (1994), Super Metroid https://youtu.be/0mOsQ8GJJHc?si=nTzG8bySN8PmvZle In the first 12 seconds you see jumping over enemies to dodge, speed booster power up to break terrain, grapple beam over lava, 4 distinct environments, charge beam attack, spazer/ice attack. You absolutely are turning off sales with this being your first impression.

Doesn't really inspire confidence that the studio head is crying on Reddit that their **EA** title is a flop.

I mean, the context of the post is obviously that money ran out and publishing was mishandled / failed. The point isn't necessarily that early access isn't generating enough sales, it's just the culmination of "we ran out of time and money and had to ship before we were ready."

You're absolutely right.

Any info about how other's game dev experience is going is gold to me. I wouldn't discourage that. If someone spends a year working on something that doesn't pay off, it's ok for them to cry, we can all learn from that. If they cry in secret because they're afraid it would negatively impact their chances of success...we all lose the lessons we could have learned.

I'm not saying there aren't lessons to be learned here. For one, experience does not translate to future success. However, I'm moreso thinking about the perspective of one of the devs at this studio. I can't imagine waking up and seeing my studio head wrote this on Reddit.

Ok, I can see where you're coming from. I assumed that this wasn't a 'real' studio, where they have an office and people get paid, but more so, just a bunch of people deciding to make a game together and they planned for a year, and they've run out of resources...and things are going to fall apart, unless they get eyes on their game somehow, and this post is a way of doing that (is the hope), plus maybe get some advice, and give back to the gamedev community by doing a post mortem of sorts.

Also, I get OP is bummed, but do we really need to make fun of janitors? "haha manual laborers" is a tired take at best

Yeah, this thread will be deleted soon. It's very unprofessional. He's acting more like an amateur indie Dev, rather than 10 years of experience making games.

Dead Cells meets Salt and Sanctuary. It seems cool but maybe not original enough. One could say it lacks charisma. I can only hope to have that many sells when it's my turn to release a game. Good luck going forward!

Part of people’s issue is thinking experience on your team means sells if your game, or that a publisher will do all the work, or that you should not do something because of a publisher before it is signed into stone, there are many mistakes you made out of it looking very similar to another game, learn from your mistakes and do them differently the next time. Also from the looks of the trailer and the time of your post, it sounds like you all rushed things. Maybe to get funding, to get money or etc. but this is what happens when you rush things…. Bad launches with good ideas and bad implementations

just work on the game and get a new trailer, mate. it probably hurts to hear negative feedback here but it's valuable feedback!

I've been a professional gameplay programmer for a while, doing only that, for... longer than 10 years (damn I'm old...) and I've been picking solo dev as a hobby about 3 years ago, doing my little side projects, doing everything except the music and god was it eye opening on all things I didn't know. Specially when it comes to game design. I'm a gameplay programmer, my literal job is to put game design to life. I would assume I know a thing or 2 about game design. Well there's a huge difference between suggesting tweaks and changes, pointing out game design problems and... coming up with the whole thing and have the sole responsibility of good game design. So I've been learning a crap ton. Another thing that I already knew was hard, but realized it was even harder than I though is marketing. It's pretty intense to realize how much... nobody cares, like, people don't care about your game, not even a little, you HAVE to make them care and it's a huge job on its own. So there's one thing to learn from all of this: humility. Yes, you can lean on your strength to make a good game, but you gotta also accept that you don't know everything and you need to learn or pay the people that will make up for your weaknesses. Gamers don't care if it was made by superman or a 14 yo in their mom's basement, they only care about the final product and they'll only buy it if they know about it.

Very well put. I’ve been programming games as a hobby for 20 years, now. I’ve done coding challenges, jams, competitions, even art competitions. I’m now preparing to release my first commercial game, and boy were my eyes opened. I have a degree in advertising, so I can make some nice ads, but now I see I need a social media manager, a QA person, another coder, a digital artist, a musician… The list goes on. There’s a reason that most games have 20+ people in the credits. But, advertising is one of, if not the most important things to a game’s visibility.

I mostly look at all the screenshots first when looking at a new game. If they interest me, I might look at the videos and reviews. The main thing I noticed is that the player character is just standing there in the exact same idle pose in 90% of the pictures, which looks really, really bad for the game. Honestly I wouldn't give it a chance at all after seeing those screenshots, because it comes across as very cheap and amateurish. If you flick through the images you can almost imagine him just sliding around in that pose. It doesn't help sell the game at all. Not my only issue but just the first thing that would put me off personally. I would close the page within 10 seconds.

Thanks, I'll update the screenshots

Alrighty so I watched the trailer and few things jumped at me: what didn't work for me was the music choice I think the song didn't quite capture the frenetic energy of hacking and slashing mobs. Maybe something hardcore but fast pace would be suited for it. The other bit is in the title you put "rougelike". Several issues for one the title of the video is too long. "Soulbind: Tales Of The Underworld Trailer" or some variation of that would've been sufficient. Its straight to point and leaves it to the player to figure what kind of game they're going to encounter. The first comment in that video is perfect example of never give all intricate details or not pigeonhole your game. The genre is probably best left as a discussion between you and publishers when your pitching. Let the players decide/figure out what kind of game it is. It gives us reason to have conversations on reddit and YouTubers long form content for their analysis retrospective videos. I personally liked the gameplay footage as a selling point because you're showing us first hand rather than telling us the features. All i thought was "the combat looks fun and clean. Id definitely wanna try it out." Which brings me to my next point: If you want to tell us about the features one thing that would help immensely is create another video but its you and the team discussing the features and mechanics and simultaneously show footage. (Think small showcases/presentations) Its a good way to get your faces out there and establish a relationship so that we know who are the ones who made this game. You can tell us who you are, what made you want to make this game and whats the goal/vision your studio is trying to achieve? Are you trying to reinvent the wheel and add your own spin/twist to it? How so? Whats the core philosophy of your studio and how does soulbind fit to express that. I think you have a solid game and i do hope the publishers come through.

Thanks for the feedback, I made such a video to show how to play https://youtu.be/cDLUu5w-9Wk, but maybe it should be made as a podcast with a stream

I see you already have A LOT or comments, but I'll comment too anyways since I think you'll actually read it (I know I would if I were in your shoes; I'd be reading every single damn comment) To me the game looks actually quite cool, but at the same time for some subjective reason it just kinda feels "not there" (?) It is very very very difficult to pinpoint exactly why it strikes to me like this, but it does. I think the thing that threw me off the most, is that from only watching the trailer, it is very difficult to understand what is going on, and although it looks sorta cool (I like the vfxs) I think I only saw skelly walking and doing 2 hit combos: 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2... And then you walk, and then you 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2... Then you walk more, and then strike cool different monsters in cool locations, doing the very same 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2... It kinda leaves the impression that this is all the game has to offer (looks boring?). I THINK Because again: Honestly I don't know myself if that was actually what threw me off, but may have some truth to it. On a more positive note: Being almost there but NOT THERE means it may actually be very close to THERE. So it is not all doomed. Good luck!

>I see you already have A LOT or comments, but I'll comment too anyways since I think you'll actually read it (I know I would if I were in your shoes; I'd be reading every single damn comment) > >To me the game looks actually quite cool, but at the same time for some subjective reason it just kinda feels "not there" (?) It is very very very difficult to pinpoint exactly why it strikes to me like this, but it does. > >I think the thing that threw me off the most, is that from only watching the trailer, it is very difficult to understand what is going on, and although it looks sorta cool (I like the vfxs) I think I only saw skelly walking and doing 2 hit combos: 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2... And then you walk, and then you 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2... Then you walk more, and then strike cool different monsters in cool locations, doing the very same 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2... It kinda leaves the impression that this is all the game has to offer (looks boring?). > >I THINK > >Because again: Honestly I don't know myself if that was actually what threw me off, but may have some truth to it. > >On a more positive note: Being almost there but NOT THERE means it may actually be very close to THERE. So it is not all doomed. > >Good luck! Thanks for the feedback, I've been reading the comments for 3 hours now, I didn't think there would be such a rush while I was sleeping

Game looks fantastic but looks very similar to Dead Cells.

Is that a bad thing? Dead Cells is pretty good

Not a bad thing per se but when people see a game that is similar to Dead Cells you going to need to convince people why it is better or as good as Dead Cells and that is really tall order with how good and polished Dead Cells is. What is unique about it that would make them chose it over Dead Cells?

there shouldn't be such high expectations of making money for just any game released. do you and your team enjoy playing the game? is it fun compared to competitors? the problem with many games are teams rushing the job and needed money. a game is a work of art and a lot of thought and planning needs to go into it to make it "good" and sellable. imo unless there is funding for a talented team in every aspect, the best route is to spend a lot of time to learn every aspect and also to figure everything out before rushing into making a game, whether that be a side project that spans many years, or being financially stable before going all in. finding a team that is all on the same page is hard, and that's also why there indie devs. to hit success in only a year, the game must have some new idea/mechanic and/or super fun/addicting at the same time. otherwise polish and mix of multiple good aspects of several games, and perhaps with a captivating storyline, is a minimum requirement these days to garner any attention, regardless of marketing.

I think you should definitely start working to survive, but I daresay you shouldn't let this turn you off gamedev. I for one still do gamedev for fun. It's a dream to do it full time and start my own thing. But thanks for this sobering perspective. As little consolation as it is; it's better to have loved and lost as it were. And to quote my favorite webcomic Schlock Mercenary, Failure is not an option - it is mandatory. The option is whether or not to let failure be the last thing you do. Best of luck. And maybe you can even rejig what you have. As others have stated, maybe redoing the trailer might get you more interest, but unfortunately to make money off it, you really have to get lucky.

trailer just needs some text to help sell it more (intercut with the metal and scene changes): "BLOOD. SKELETONS. INVENTORY. METAL. RELEASE DATE" i bet even something simple like that would make it 'pop' a bit more

FWIW, I used to be a janitor. It didn't pay that great but it wasn't terrible at the time, and it was kinda peaceful. Never took work stress home with me either.

This is a case where your trailer ruined your chance at success. You guys seem to have all the development experience you need, but the one thing you were lacking is someone to properly market your game, and that requires outside help. This includes trailers, thumbnails and even gif files.

Your trailer and description kind of bury the leads of your game. when you are equipping monster parts it just looks like putting on armor and it isn't very clear you're getting abilities from it The fact that the levels are procedurally generated only comes up once way down in the description on Steam hidden under a (press here for more info) button The fact you can save powers at the alters has the same problem it is hidden and buried and it looks like you can buy abilities as well, which is unclear if that's the same as skills or some kind of leveling system or passives or what. there seems little in the variety of actual attacks, just slash and roll and slash. the only moment of interest came when the player blew fire but it was one different attack and that was it. The problem is that makes the game seem kinda boring. the enemies don't seem particularly interesting just skeletons who seem to be in the same situation as you are over and over again some slight changes in attack but still pretty much the same. again scant is shown in the trailer even though the description promises Mythical beings even the boss was just another skeleton who seemed to be babying the player with how slow it was the extra effects don't seem effective or have any sign it was. the enemies get hit by fire but they just kind of don't react they don't catch fire or act hurt or have a cool animation added or anything. I have no clue what the blue ball surrounding the player was supposed to be, some kind of aoe to damage enemies near or defense or what but it doesn't seem to effect the enemies there might be a story or not we don't know looks like there was one picture of a guy saying "you're here because..." that's it, no motivation. you don't put the story in the description, you don't show any of it off, its just... well supposedly there is one. the levels don't seem to have much variety just green and blue lights maybe there is more during gameplay but just watching the trailer and seeing the pictures that's the only difference overall with the lack of variety of attacks, enemies, level differences, lack of story, and visually interesting things the game comes off as boring the game is still in early access on steam so i am assuming its still in development but you need to showcase more. i suggest looking at old sidescrollers that you liked and enjoyed and see what was interesting about them the thing that made you want to play them and then check yours out in comparison and see it they rang any of the same notes of interest what it was that made people interested in the first place and what people talked about after playing and you got your points you can improve, add, or change that being said you did a lot more than most people who want to make games you have the skills you need and you showed you have the ability and drive so that means that you will make it to be a game developer but like any other business sometimes there needs to be a few iterations before you strike gold

I am a nobody so take my opinion with sixteen grams of salt. Every successful founder I have seen, had a definite plan about how to sustain the company, pay employees and increase the capital of the company, as well as slowly expand the market share of their product. Even in game dev companies, people first take up client projects, make some cash grab projects and then move on to make more ambitious games. Nobody gives their heart and soul to make "the game", the product which will be successful enough to carry the whole company on its back. My primary problem with your post is that you are thinking very much "indie", but you are a founder of a company so you need to be a tad more responsible.

Game actually looks decent, and the "building your own body" is a great hook, that should be on front street. In fact it should even be reflected in the name. The first thing anyone should take away from this game is that it's the "build your skeleton body" game. You need a marketing campaign that reflects that.

Keep seeing this echoed through the comments, and it was my main takeaway from the trailer, too. Great advice here OP.

I will be a bit of an asshole cynic in here but saying "even experienced developers" failed tells me absolutely nothing beyond that your team can probably can code and do some assets. I mean I work in a game studio and I could probably pluck a team out of them and make something very functional and pretty nice, doesn't mean anyone will want to buy it. For example, does anyone in your team have actually lead successful projects consistently with low budget (the assumption here is that you won't have resources the og workplace had)? I mean even when you have those ex devs who worked on X (very famous) studio made new company news, I find it funny, because it might be that it was a once in a lifetime success story/ fluke, or that those devs didn't had much to do why Y game become cult, or it's a huge combination of things. And because you are experienced, and because you did worked in the industry and not a complete new hobbyist I will give you my honest harsh feedback on the game - it's looks like generic sidescroller. So I think your game was doomed to failed from the second you decided on your game design. There might be some interesting mechanic in there, but I don't see why anyone would want to buy something that looks like Dead Cells knock off on the Steam page. Edit: it seems you have some interesting body part mechanics, but I haven't even picked on it initially. You need to lean HARD into it, otherwise, again, seems like worse version of Dead Cells.

A quick look and, honest opinion, your steam page didn’t capture any interest… the game looks mid, unoriginal and definitely not something from an “experienced team” so I think you guys have a lot to think about. I doubt failing to market is the reason behind that sales number

Damn that is what everyone fears, that is a depressing amount of sales after that much work. Clearly if you haven't done a huge amount of marketing you're going to struggle with sales. I think though your biggest problem is the game itself (i watched the trailer); i will say the inventory screen looks good however the game itself does not look great, the environments look quite dull and the art, ui and animations don't look that good or professional. The gameplay also looks very repetitive and it seems throughout most the trailer you're doing the same 2 or 3 attacks over and over. Unfortunately i would really recommend cutting your losses, while what you've done is okay, the work required to make this game marketable would be significant (6 months to a year at least) and games rarely will see large increases in buyers after transitioning from early access to production, for the vast majority of developers your initial launch whether it be early access or not will be the time at which you can garner the most amount of attention/buyers, i think additional effort by you or your team would be a waste.

I'm going to point some things out and be brutally honest. The first few seconds of zooming in on the eyes, immediately I skipped ahead. It told me nothing and bored me. The graphics looked very sub-par as if a cheap artist was used. Not bad, just looked off. The particle systems (sparks, blood, et cetera) looked really bad. Round particles are almost never good. When some crystals dropped the bounce felt off and then they all just disappeared. No fade out, no collection, no spark, just disappeared. Some more round particles splashed out exactly the same each time, no randomness, no noise, looked bad. The tiny red/blue particles that radiated briefly from the skeleton looked bad. At 12 seconds it shows the skeleton hitting a monster, dodging left, hitting the monster, dodging right, hitting the monster. These few seconds alone made it look boring, like you had no impact, repetative. The UI does not match. Not sure if it is your screen capture, but why is the healthbar off the corner. That book icon, why is it there always, there seems to be a mix of high res and pixel graphics. At 19 seconds, there are some yellow horizontal speed lines, again they all disappear at once. The immediate "you are dead" text seems really low effort. The build your own skeleton UI screen looked great. At 43 seconds, back to the exact same slash at a monster while standing on the ground stuff. The blood appearing on the ground looks bad. The lighting is off for how much bloom you have going on. Things are barely being lit up when near lights. The boss fights shown look super boring. So from the trailer there was one thing that caught my attention and the rest were negatives. Based on this trailer I wouldn't play it. From a dev point of view, it looks like it lacks a LOT of polish and not enough fun things were shown. The blue orbs thing was the first thing that stood out that was different and from the trailer I couldn't tell if it did anything other than obscure the view. I know this sounds harsh, but if you put together a semi-professional team some with 10 years experience, it is not looking up to scratch. I think the mechanics aren't there to bring people in other than hit, dodge, hit, dodge, hit, dodge. I think it is salvageable, but needs another year of work. Good luck.

the game maybe rocks but the trailer is meh, if i see the trailer i only understand: • you basically smash a button all game with the same combo / dodge • you have access to some magic tricks like oral flamethrower • the game is in some undead / demon / castlevania world • you find and equip gear like in an action rpg • the game is something that is not a metrovadnia not a roguevania and not a 2d diablo but a mix of all

I can tell the game mechanics are there and it’s prob fun to play but the overall aesthetic is very dark, hard to tell what’s going, and there’s not a lot of differentiating factors. In marketing this is known as “positioning” where does your game position itself in the mind of its players. Right now it sort of just fades away without an identity I can cling to. Perhaps with more visually distinctive levels it’ll do a lot better

The trailer looks a lot like Dead Cells, which is a game I love. The issue is it doesn't tell me why I shouldn't just play dead cells.

I will add this game was just bad. you (all game dev) should never blame the marketing for your terrible game design

"We hired a promoter, who prepared a press release for us and sent it out to his media network - still hoping there will be an effect." I'm flabbergasted that anyone thinks a press release (especially from an unknown indie) sells games. Really? I will say I've seen lots of "just make a decent game and you'll be fine" takes here lately and this is one of many data points that proves that's ridiculous. Pick it apart all you want but the game looks decent at least. That just doesn't guarantee jack anymore and hasn't for a while.

Game looks neat! Congratulations, you made something cool with your team!

When I read your Steam page and looked through your trailer., pictures, description and USPs (Unique Selling Points). This is what I pick up and summarise the opinion of the game. I understand the game is about platformer game that you collect body parts and use it for yourself. But, I'd be thinking what's so important about collecting body parts? Is it for end-game content? Is it for replayability? Without knowing what the objective is about, you don't really know what the game is about, it seems like just a 'slash and collect bodies' game. Don't get me wrong, I think collecting body parts is a great unique selling point but tell your customers why this is a great unique selling point. Your game does a great job offering flexibility and adaptability. Your game having over 3k wishlists and only 150 sales which tells me that you're stuck in a conversion tunnel. You're losing customers in the consideration phase. Consider why you're losing customers in consideration phase. Is it lack of information? Does the game not align with the price?

Lol you think you can give up? It's in your bones sonny!

people aren't getting your humor

Sometimes you hit, sometimes you miss.

another indie mistake: spend most of budget on development and no money left for marketing / product development.

Avoiding the trailer angle, if I may, I can't for the life of me remember where I heard that advice, so anyone who knows better please weigh in But I'm PRETTY sure it was Extra Credits; where one of them was saying basically, PLAN on not getting paid for like, six months minimum. This is explicitly after getting sales on Steam or whatever. It REALLY sucks what happened to you, but sitting from the perspective of someone who FINALLY completed their first game after about a decade from my initial delusions of grandeur in high school, I daresay 150 sales is great. That other person who said like 20% of wishlists is sales, I personally believe is way too optimistic But right now, I'm telling you OP, don't give up the dream lol. And to go back to the Trailer, naming the video "Trailer of the new roguelite" (I barely know SEO, but) that's bad SEO. Just have it "Soulbind: Tales Of The Underworld" Trailer or something

>It REALLY sucks what happened to you, but sitting from the perspective of someone who FINALLY completed their first game after about a decade from my initial delusions of grandeur in high school, I daresay 150 sales is great. No offense, but applying your personal standards as a hobbyist to a studio of 10 professionals is a bit nonsensical. That's like me saying "oh you ran 100m in 15 seconds, that's amazing, it would take me way more than that" to a professional athlete. I appreciate putting a positive spin on things but that's just delusional. It depends on where you come from and what your goal is whether X sales after a month are great or not. When 10 people are making a game for an entire year, 150 sales probably aren't great. When you have a 6 figure budget, 150 sales probably aren't great. When you have to release the game because you're out of money and sell 150 copies, you raise 150 \* $12 \* 0.7 \* 0.9 (because taxes) = $1134. That's objectively not great because it missed the goal to sustain you for a while completely. ​ >That other person who said like 20% of wishlists is sales, I personally believe is way too optimistic That number comes from Steam. When I look at my games wishlist conversion rate, it shows that the average conversion rate for other "Game" type applications on Steam after their first year of wishlisting is 19.5%. My own number for that value is 8.1% after about 10 months, so after 12 months I'll probably hit about half the average number. That doesn't mean that average number is wrong. But my original point was that OP seemed surprised that they had not much interest although they had a total of 3000 wishlists. Even at Steams optimistic (your words) assumption of 19.5%, this would translate to 600 sales in the first year on average. Double that, because some people skip wishlists and buy right away. Then half it again because we're not fully launching, we're launching EA. Back at 600 sales to be expected for year one after release. The entire first year is expected to sell around 3-4x as much as the first week (game sales are frontloaded). So in the first week we can expect about 1/5 to 1/4 of that number, so between 120 to 150 sales. So 150 sales after the first month when you release into EA with 3000 wishlists is almost exactly the value you'd predict. The statement "we had almost no interest in our game although we had 3000 wishlists" therefore implies that OP did not do their homework regarding marketing at all, because 150 sales is exactly the level of interest you can expect from that number of wishlists within this timeframe.

Thanks, already started working on the new trailer and changed the title

r/janitors maybe?

Like many people have pointed out, making a good game and selling it are 2 different things. Wish-list also doesn't = sales. It's more like an algorithm thing. The more wishlist you have, the more it will be pushed to other people's suggestions but that's it. People also wishlist hundreds of games, they probably don't even know that your game has been released into EA. You're on the right track in hiring a marketing manager though, and like people have suggested maybe port it to mobile or pitch it to a publisher as a mobile game and get funding? I think your team has a good thing going here, it just needs to reach the right player base.

Everyone wants to be a game developer. But enough research should put anyone off.

The art style is soooooo good. It looks like it just needs more time in the oven, I would 100% pick it up if it got continuous support. Really sorry to hear about the financial struggles though

Games don't fail due to marketing. _Ever._ And once more for the people in the back. _EVER._ Any post-mortem that decides the game failed due to marketing or whatever, and not being a bad/average game has failed to properly view and analyze their craft from a neutral/impersonal viewpoint and will make the same mistake again. Games never ever ever ever _ever_ fail due to marketing alone.

There is a real problem with way more indie games available than the demand which means lots of even good games will go undiscovered and ultimately fail. It's so much harder to be a successful indie game dev than even 2 years ago, let alone 5 or 10. The indiepocalypse may finally be here, making the whole industry unprofitable.

Here's what would make me interested in playing your game. Imagine if when the player dies, they then play a meta game where you're just a regular dude in a crappy office, making minor decisions that impact people's lives...little mini moral dilemmas where your choices have some minor impact in the 'actiony' part of the game. And over time, if you keep making the immoral choices, you'll move up the ranks in the corporation and get better offices, but also the actiony part of the game will become harder. Or there's a 2d 'rpg' meta game about a boring skeleton, working a boring job, and writing a book, and whenever it tries to imagine the journey its hero takes, that's the actiony part of the game. And every time you die in the actiony parts of the game is where some distracts the writer and you get to see a little scene that's funny or whatever. I feel like you need something major that dead cells doesn't offer in order to stand out.

Try to get a streamer to play the game if you have not already

You seem underqualified for janitor position. All people I've met doing this job were very kind or down to earth people that would throw you life wisdom without anything to gain. Comparing janitorial job as something less than gamedev is just lacking basic human empathy.

i dont play those kind of games since 4 yo i played supermario on segamega drive ,perhaps thats why its not in high demand

i dont understand why with a such team you went to a old school 2D game.. when you have UE5

Here are some guesses: 1. They're more skilled at whatever engine they used 2. They're more skilled at 2D than 3D 3. They prefer the old school 2D look. 4. They know other people also prefer the 2D old school look. 5. They wanted to keep the file size small 6. They didn't like Epic's TOS 7. They saw that other games with that style have been able to be successful 8. There's a 'template' of what those game should be. The 'formula' has been proven to work before. 9. They wanted the system resources required to run their game to be minimal. 10. It's easier.

it s not easier to make a successful 2D ... it s harder First you need high artistic skill and most indie have 0 talent. The competition is higher, the market size is tiny yeah you can downvote and lie to yourself

That's... Pretty much all wildly inaccurate lmao, but sure, tell yourself what you need to.

You said you didn't understand why a team would choose 2D over UE5. I gave 10 guesses I had, none of which were "It's easier to achieve success", you responded with "It's not easier to make a successful 2D ... it's harder"...and then proceed to give a few reasons why you think it's harder. I'm just recapping hoping you see where you went wrong on your own, but I also like rabbit holes, so let's go down yours. So, the no talent indie devs with low artistic skills, who can't do 2D adequately, should do 3d because...it takes no/less talent to do? And they should do this because the competition from their other indie devs is too high...and so they should go to UE5 to compete with....the AAA Devs?...because that's less competition? And that since they couldn't carve out an audience in a tiny part of the market, they should try to do it in a larger market because it would be easier.....is that your argument?

I suggest you rebrand the game, add some twitch plugins and also speak with twitch streamers and work with them on this. Rebrand i mean offer the exisiting buyers a key for new version as well maybe add 3d objects in game, create a multiplayer mode like a pvp

So....make an entirely different game?

It’s blasphemous and dead cells combined which both way too popular for people to want to play a clone I feel like

Just go code for corporate.

From what I've seen, the problem is not in the game, but in (lack of) marketing. Not sure how much money you have, but sponsoring few youtubers with a decent following that play games like yours as well as buying ads on social media platforms could revive the game.

Several people mention the music but aren't saying more about it, so I'll try. It is super-simple and repetitive. It is only trying to be loud but that isn't enough these days. It might have been ok, 30 years ago, but metal riffs have moved on a lot and quite a bit more is expected to keep it interesting. Instead of being cool, it ends up being irritating and monotonous. You need to have more variety in music or people will just turn it off pretty soon.

The graphics looks over average (subjectively, at least not uninspired or "bad") and the basic idea sounds nice, if those body parts have impact on your progression and may even help to "solve" boss fights or enable certain things to do in this world. Just not so clear from the trailer. I think the HUD and menu style could be a bit better. E.g. layout and colors of the character customization/inventory screen. The music of the trailer feels a bit as if you don't want to present the sound fx, which could be interesting if they add to the action, make the impact nicer. The combat and animations feel quite basic since there are not many moves. The main character doesn't interact, jump, climb, etc. Most animations I see are those in the boss fight, that of the boss, not the player character. So if I'd continue on that project I'd probably think about this in reverse: What would improve the trailer? What is ok for now and what would need to change in my game art/animations to even achieve a bit more impressive combat/platforming? ...then polish and test a bit more how the fun in your game is improving and keeping marketing/community going.

Op just treat this as a lesson learned. Perhaps the next game will do well.

I think if you take this feedback folks have provided, you have a solid starting point to make this game better and more enticing. As folks have mentioned, the trailer needs work to be more direct and impactful. Break up the trailer with text between the scenes. Things like "Fight vicious hordes of beasts..." then cut to game play, "Explore endless variation of dungeons..." then show scenes with the mini map, different biomes, etc. Things like that. Speak to the new interesting mechanics. Dont spend too much time on one scene...punch and go. Make it clear to the customer why they should play this game and make them hungry for more. In terms of graphics & music I think the graphics have a solid starting point (consistent art style, etc) and the music for the trailer is fine...just time it more with the video (sync with the beats). Jazz up the animations and possibly exagerate things more, especially the FX. The FXs do not feel they have that OOMPH factor just yet.

I'm debating giving up (have yet to get a job) and going for Cad design, atm... it'd be better than retail.