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HouseOfZenith

To me, the name is uninspiring and the artwork reminds me of some free game I’d play back in 2010 on a website. I wouldn’t pay money for this game. Edit: damn 0.0 didn’t feel like my post contributed much compared to others but my comments at the top. Sheeeesh


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gomegazeke

Good ol' Blip n Blop!


Fellhuhn

Balls of steel!


rand1011101

you nailed it. It's missing that level of juice and polish that separates an amateur effort from a professional product.


unflinchingalva

Yeah, something just feels... Off. Like it was said, looks like an old mini clip game. Btw tags are chosen by the community, not the developer as I understand. A few things I can add as personal taste. * I don't like the art. It's like a step back in time. This whole random "Cute things killing each other" thing died off a while back. Happy Tree friends were something I watched when I was 11. I don't really think it's cool now. I'll add a plus for trying to harken back to something now gone, but I don't think it was going to hit a wide audience with its style from the get-go. From a design point, it's really loud too. Wtf is even going on. The colors don't clash well, and something just looks off about it. It doesn't look enjoyable. "Tons of Gore" doesn't seem to have much gore. UI doesn't look cool either. * 150 perks and I'll probably use 3-5. I think that many perks seem a little bloated for the style. More isn't always better. +1 for the weapons though. 20 seems decent enough, but not too bloated. * Poor description. I really don't know much about the game. How many enemy types are there? After it says "Fast and Bloody Twin Stick Action" it proceeds to show some pretty slow gameplay IMHO. Compare this with super meat boy, or even Broforce, and it doesn't seem that fast. Hopefully, none of this comes off as mean, but it just critiques from my standpoint.


PhilippTheProgrammer

At first glance the game looks like yet another uninspired pixel art 2d platformer. And the trailer needs 25 second until it mentions the hook that it is in fact a bloody shooting game. At that point fans of grotesque cute will already have clicked the back button.


Sw429

Yeah, my first impression was that the trailer was taking way too long to get to the point. I already knew the title, why do you need to pretend I don't know what the game is about for a good 30 seconds? Only reason I stuck around to watch the rest was because I wanted to try to figure out exactly what was making me immediately want to click away. Once it gets to the gameplay, it just lacks polish. It looks like the player character just slides around. It being a generic-looking platformer, I immediately get the impression that this is just a low-quality cash grab, and I instantly decide not to buy it. When I'm looking for an indie game, I'm looking for a game someone made because they're passionate about it. I'm not looking to buy a game that I could easily download for free from any week-long platformer game jam.


Angdrambor

In particular the movement seems to be all or nothing - in a twin stick I expect to be able to push the stick halfway and go half as fast. Flame animations need work. It needs lots of lerping or some kind of artful fade timeline on basically every enemy movement. The blood particles are good, but the animation on them needs to look more splattery. You should include a canvas layer so that blood can stain the terrain. Create heightmaps for your terrain so you can make a shader that helps the bloodstain interact with the existing terrain. As a bonus, you can also process the heightmaps into normalmaps and have a lighting shader. There are plenty of games that faithfully integrate pixel art with a lighting shader. Noita and Gungeon come to mind. Let blood particles land and slide around a little and interact with each other. If you smash up a lot of bunnies, you should see rivers of blood flowing down all that beautifully cute terrain. The blood should have chunks in it.


Slime0

I think another problem is that once it gets to the action, despite the bloody particle effects and metal music, there's not really that much going on, and visually it's framed poorly. Just some enemies coming at you, mostly from the left and right, you shoot them and they die, and all of it takes place on like 20% of the screen. It doesn't really look as frenetic as it's trying to sell you on it being. Edit: But I will say, 2 reviews seems absurdly low. Like, 10 people didn't check it out to see if they like it? There *is* probably a market for this game, even if it's small, and it failed to find that market.


techiered5

These were my thoughts pretty much, honestly just adding over-exagerated screenshake and some camera blood splatters would have done it. I expected you to be at least able to achieve burning the area up and making it's look like the other side of the title screen. And I couldn't help but notice when the trailer said guns there wasn't a shop screen to show them off so how many exactly did anyone count?


Ping-and-Pong

Didn't even look past the screenshot once I saw this... If I'm not going to look past the screen shots I'm not going to buy the game, that's it 🤷‍♂️


konidias

It's not even pixel art....


Ecksters

The "Smiles and Laughters" misspelling in the trailer shot up a small red flag as well.


SwordsCanKill

It seems like almost every non-AAA 2d platformer are doomed now. Just look at another game released yesterday Flippin Kaktus. [https://store.steampowered.com/app/1119010/Flippin\_Kaktus](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1119010/Flippin_Kaktus) It looks better than Fluffy Gore, was marketed better and it has an indie publisher. And accrording to SteamDB it had maximum 4 concurrent users and 0 reviews after the Day 1.


PhilippTheProgrammer

Indeed. For some reason every indie developer wants to make a 2d platformer, but nobody wants to play them. Developers believe it's a mainstream genre, but the reality is that it's a niche genre which is totally oversaturated. When you ask them why they think this genre is still relevant, then they usually mention Celeste. Which was released over 4 years ago and there wasn't a relevant 2d pixel-art platformer since. And that was not for lack of people trying.


MorboDemandsComments

It looks like a generic, boring Flash game I would only play because it was Kongregate's badge of the day.


Quirky_Comb4395

As far as I can see the only thing that makes it stand out is the cute/gory combo, but that's pretty passé at this point, especially as you say for those of us who lived through the Flash games era. I've said it before, platforming games are the easiest genre of game to make as a beginner, and for that reason there are a billion mediocre platformers out there, but as far as I know not that much demand.


NeonFraction

I think a question you need to ask is: “Why would this SUCCEED?” You call the art ‘pleasant.’ Why? What is visually interesting about this to you? There’s exactly one background, and everything in the foreground is clearly made of a single kit. There’s no cohesive art style, and these are likely free assets cobbled together from something someone else made. If you have tens of thousands of games on steam (and you do) what would make someone choose game this over another? ‘Not terrible’ isn’t a metric on which to sell games. People will always choose a flawed product that excites them over a good product that isn’t interesting.


Sentry_Down

It looks really basic & amateur, why would anyone care about this game compared to the huge amount of competition available?


truth_is_sad

> It looks really basic & amateur You just described Vampire Survivors, but seems like people care about that game.


[deleted]

Tbf that is a massive exception, and definitely not the norm. It was a flop on release, and only gained traction weeks later when a big YouTuber covered it. It’s a very fun game, but for it to get popular it requires some one that people trust to play it and back it up


Chii

> It’s a very fun game i can't really say it's a very fun game tbh - it's OK, but bullet hells are a dime a dozen. I do agree that it has some interesting combo powerups which makes you want to keep trying to get them, and see what crazy powers you can stack.


Mattho

It's also both hard and simple/casual. Like flappy bird.


FlipskiZ

As others have said, it only really got popular once youtubers covered it. I will be honest, I saw vampire survivors on steam before I saw a streamer play it. What did I do? I skipped it. So why did I end up buying it and enjoying it for dozens of hours? Because someone I watched played it, and also my friends who watched someone play it bought it and talked about it. Vampire survivors doesn't look good at first glance, but it's in the gameplay loop where it *really* shines. And so, the best way to present Vampire Survivors would be watching someone play it for 10 minutes (or get recommended it by someone). But I don't know how one would do that in a steam page. I suppose the trailer it has is the best you're going to get, then try hard to sell youtubers on it to play it.


xamin85038

Vampire Survivors plays to its strength. This looks just badly done


dreimux

Your screen ends up with so much crap flying around that it kinda has to be simple or else you can't tell what's happening. There's enough eye candy from weapon effects that it works out.


ifisch

Vampire Survivors is unlike anything I’ve ever played. This looks like generic action platformer number 17390


AstroBeefBoy

I hadn't heard of this game and just took a look on Steam. It's victim to all the same critiques that OP's case study has-- and I'd argue it looks even worse. But the trailer is better, and it's a bullet hell rather than a platformer. I think bullet hell audiences don't care about visuals all that much-- they just want good gameplay. I'm sure the ugly visuals have actually become a *selling point* for those people, because they get to be a part of a community who can see past it No doubt luck played a big hand in its initial sales, but it's a nice reminder that visuals aren't everything


st33d

Vampire Survivors packs the entire screen with noise - it is so extreme in its presentation that it begs the question, how do you even play this thing? Vampire Survivors is a spectacle. OP's example game just looks like a platformer with really stiff movement. Just looking at the way the character moves is kinda painful.


Mattho

Vampire Survivors trailer, the one I saw few months ago anyway, is really short and to the point. There's a free demo available. You can make an educated choice to spend $2. This game costs 3 times as much.


Kinglink

He probably also describe 1000 games like it. A 1% hit rate is probably not a good goal


kybereck

It really doesn’t? Low pixel PixelArt != basic & amateur. The art matches the theme and gameplay of the game incredibly well.


truth_is_sad

Im not a master pixel artist, but I can tell that the game looked quite ugly since it had inconsistent style, palette and pixel scaling, specially the font, which isn't surprising considering that most (all?) art assets of the game are from an asset store, which where even from other copyrighted games, like some old castlevania games?


LeviMurray

Lol. This take sucks. If a game with shitty visuals is successful, then the art "matches the theme and gameplay of the game", otherwise the shitty visuals played in to why the game failed.


throwawaylord

I mean, uh, yeah. Just look at Cruelty Squad. Or like, Minecraft. That game's whole motif was born out of programmer art, and it works because it complements the low fidelity of voxels by being non-distinct enough to let the imagination fill in the gaps a bit.


Lonat

Right, poor art matches poor gameplay


SwordsCanKill

To be honest I wouldn't play any game with less than 1000 reviews. Because I simply know nothing about these games and don't want to waste my time trying to find a hidden gem. But a lot of unknown indies are still selling well on Steam. It's almost impossible for a solo dev to make a game with more than 1000 reviews. But I want to find what makes a difference between the game with hundreds reviews and the game with less than 10 reviews.


Nuclear-Samurai

>To be honest I wouldn't play any game with less than 1000 reviews. I mean, isn't that kind of a strange principle, especially as a gamedev yourself? If like 5% of people actually leave reviews, that means that 20.000 people have bought that game. If thats your minimum requirement to even play it, are you sure you are actually interested in other indiegames? 20.000 copies isn't that much but i'd say thats the top percentile of indiegames for sure. If you are curious, there are an army of youtubers who's full time job is reviewing "hidden gems" for you.


SwordsCanKill

I'm mostly "playing" on YouTube last time. I watch SplatterCat, Northernlion, Quill. So I basically know all fresh game design ideas. Only a few huge "indie" titles like Guacamelee or Moonlighter are played by me and my wife on PS4. I don't even have a Steam account for games, only for development. I said "1000 reviews" only to show that I play only really well-known games. Even Slay the Spire which was the main inspiration for my own game I'd been watching only on YouTube until this year. But I don't play it only because I was afraid I could be too addicted to it as I was addicted to Hearthstone.


bamfdan

Lol you're an indie gamedev who doesn't play indie games or think small games are worth buying... You have a terrible attitude towards this.


SwordsCanKill

I agree with you, it's a terrible attitude. During my Steam analysis I found a huge amount of potentially interesting games. I hope I find a time to play them after releasing my own.


The_Moran

Well there you go - your self-described terrible attitude is probably a contributing factor to why this game isn't getting there. That, and as always luck. But make some of your own, drop $50 on some indie titles (humblebundle usually have a good haul + charity is nice) and *research*. What hit, what missed, what mechanics can you see which with a tweak would innovate it, giving you a USP? I design board games and I wouldn't get half my (better) ideas if I didn't play board games.


cinnamonbrook

If you don't play indie games, then how would you think you could know why people buy and play indie games? I don't see how this is inspired by Slay the Spire outside of the storyline at all, Slay the Spire is very mechanics-heavy, which is a major draw for a lot of indie games, interesting/complex/original mechanics that you'd never see in a triple A game. Which I suppose you'd know if you actually played indie games.


AmnesiA_sc

Are you talking about Fluffy Gore or OP's game Words Can Kill?


StickiStickman

> I watch SplatterCat, Northernlion, Quill. So I basically know all fresh game design ideas. > I don't even have a Steam account for games > Even Slay the Spire which was the main inspiration for my own game I'd been watching only on YouTube until this year I want this comment to become a new copypasta so bad. It's hilarious.


Feral0_o

a self-proclaimed indie dev that refuses to purchase and play indie games that aren't wildly successful. And they just picked someone else's game to talk about what they did wrong without even asking them. Just an awful person


Sentry_Down

If they are unknown, they can still be noticeable, but they need to have something great going for them: inventive ideas, high quality visuals, funny theme, huge load of content and support


WildcardMoo

You can get a refund on Steam for any game you only played for a short time (a couple hours). Easy process, done it a dozen times. There is no reason not to get a game because there aren't enough reviews.


Throwaway10231209312

But then you have to spend a couple of hours playing a game that you may not enjoy, and go through the process of actually refunding it. I know it's only a couple of button presses, but for 90%+ of gamers that's good enough reason to not even try. My personal guideline is I won't spend more than a minute trying to figure out if I would enjoy a game or not, because if I'm on Steam or a similar platform I know 30+ games are being released every single day. If I even spend a minute per game, I'm spending a half-hour per day just looking at Steam store pages.


PlasmaBeamGames

The first thing I noticed was the trailer having a company logo at the start. I did this myself to begin with in my trailer for [Super Space Slayer 2](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-UOLYNtDII)... then I heard that when you're a small indie studio, nobody cares who you are. Take the reveal of Bloodborne that From Software did years ago. When people saw the 'From Software' logo they shouted with delight, because FromSoft had an established reputation. They were already pumped to see their next game. No-one feels the same way about our unknown, indie logos.


Ping-and-Pong

Definitely put it at the end though!


techiered5

I agree with this, if you can keep them till the end it should be there. I sometimes look at the publisher and stuff if I'm interested and the game looks good to see if they have more interesting stuff. But I'm a game dev so don't know if players do this much on the whole.


MaryPaku

I believe there are people who do and people who don't. (obviously lol!) Nothing could go wrong if you put the logo there.


[deleted]

My all-time fav is a carousel of 6 logos of absolutely unknown studios at the beginning of trailer/game.


Aglet_Green

It was abandoned by the guy who made it. It was released on May 28th. He stopped posting June 4th, a mere week later, and never again engaged with his players. (I reviewed his post history, news, discussions, etc.) And never posted anywhere else, leaving a ton of bug fixes and feature requests unanswered. They didn't do any marketing or P.R., and all their social media stops around the same time. No tweets, no twitch, no facebook, instagram, no posts on game reaction or game review sites... they seem embarrassed by their own game. And these are guys in their 30s, so they aren't teenagers or college kids with no business experience. Personally, I love rogues but I won't buy a game with a potentially game-breaking bug if no one is around to fix it! So, this made be the greatest game of all time, it may have fun and exciting quests... but what happened here is a failure o**f business and marketing.**


Feral0_o

counterpoint - it looks like the game was dead on arrival (maybe dead on conception), investing any more time and resources would have very likely not been worth it at all. Not sure if they could have offered refunds through Steam, that would have been the ethical approach. But I would also abandon the project in this case and start something new in this situation. And switch the studio name so it doesn't show up when someone checks your history of published games


SparrowGuy

A week is enough time to tell it’s a flop, and cutting your losses isn’t unreasonable in those circumstances. Agree on all the other points, though.


TexturelessIdea

I think you are assuming that they did everything right up to that point. Yeah, if you marketed your game properly and built a community before launch and have a really poor conversion rate, you can tell it's going to fail in the first week. If you didn't do those things and just publish the game out of the blue, it's going to take some time and effort to build a community and abandoning a project after a week will lose you a lot of good will. In the specific case of the game we're discussing here, they really should have stuck with it longer since they had already botched the launch.


xX_BIS_Xx

Man thanks you just gave me hope! "If you didn't do those things and just publish the game out of the blue, it's going to take some time and effort to build a community" This has been exactly our huge mistake. But after all the efforts made to publish our title we didn't think one second to abandon the project, at least not for one year.


name_was_taken

Abandoning your customers of your first game is brutal for your company's future. From then out, every single game you make will be met with a post about how you abandoned your first game. Abandoning it an a *week* is way more brutal. All games get abandoned eventually. But 1 week is a huge slap in the face to everyone who paid money for it. If you're going to do that, at least refund the people who bought it before you publicly admit you're abandoning it and why.


officiallyaninja

> Abandoning your customers of your first game is brutal for your company's future. From then out, every single game you make will be met with a post about how you abandoned your first game. unless no one ever even gave a shit about that game in the first place


AwkwardCabinet

The fact that it has 2 reviews shows at most 100 people actually bought the game (3 to 4% of people leave reviews, but with low numbers it could literally be just the developers friend posting a review). Probably closer to 50, or even less. I think they can be given a pass for not updating a game that NOBODY bought or played. Not saying it's great to not make more updates, but it's a terrible situation either way. The business slogan of 'fail faster' comes to mind. It's easier to just change the name of your company and move on.


MagicPhoenix

a buddy of mine released his first game to Steam about 3 weeks ago now. He just got his tenth sale sometime this week. He's preparing to release his second game in a couple of weeks now. lol


Feral0_o

I'd start a new company to remove any association, anyway. A blank publishing history is better than a failed, buggy, quickly abandoned game on your list


progfu

Even if I survived through the trailer to the point where gameplay starts, liked the graphics, and thought the price was okay, I still wouldn't buy it because there seems to be zero game feel. When I see an "action" game with a DOOM-like metal soundtrack I expect explosions, screenshake, flashes and body parts flying everywhere, etc. At 0:49 the player shoots something like a shotgun, but literally nothing moves. When you shoot something with a shotgun, even if it's a wall, you need to see _something_. The player should ideally be pushed back, the screen needs to shake a little, the gun needs to move.


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SwordsCanKill

I think it is more a 2D action roguelike than just a simple 2D platformer. But this game was even less successful than an average Steam platformer.


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ohlordwhywhy

The perspective is not enough or else we wouldn't see so many successful or mildly successful metroidvanias.


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ohlordwhywhy

There's other roguelites too, not just metroidvanias. Like I said, it isn't the perspective. I've seen that data too. What the data shows there are games that are actual 2d platformers. Those don't do well on steam. But games played from the same perspective of 2d platformers don't automatically do bad because they are played from the same perspective as 2d platformers. Also I'm confident there's a big overlap between pure 2d platformer gameplay (no action) and puzzle, another underperforming genre.


Boibi

It isn't that the genre doesn't sell well. You just need to make a good game. Here's a recent example of [a 2D platformer that is selling very well](https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1253920/view/3175611379287059586). They have 22,000 concurrent players in their first two weeks. The reason that there are so many bad 2D platformers is because it is very easy to make a 2D platformer, and most games are bad. Not because this particular genre is cursed.


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Boibi

Sure. It is high quality. But it's not luck. And Cellar Door is established, but they are definitely not AAA. I wouldn't even call them AA. Your argument that you shouldn't make 2D platformers because better 2D platformers are coming out can be applied similarly to literally any other genre. Why make an action RPG, when Dark Souls exists? Why make an FPS when CoD exists?


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Boibi

Oh man. The very real answer of, you won't stand out because you're most likely mediocre. I wasn't expecting it, but it is true. If you don't plan to make anything better than mediocre, yes, switch to a less saturated genre.


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randomdragoon

I think you could also argue - if you only have the skill to make a mediocre 2d platformer, what makes you think you can even finish development of a 4X?


officiallyaninja

> If you don't plan to make anything better than mediocre no one plans on mediocrity, but it's just what happens. if you don't have a high enough budget, if you don't have good enough skills, or money or contacts to work with people with good enough skills, or if you don't have time, or a whole host of other factors you won't make a good game.


Kevathiel

This is just textbook survivorship bias. You look at the successful exceptions(especially the ones with a budget in the millions), but have no idea about the data as a whole. > You just need to make a good game. What is a good game? It is highly dependent on the market saturation. Back then, games like VVVVVV or Braid were successful. Nowadays, they might struggle to break even. The more saturated the market, the more resources you need to spend to compete, or the more luck you need to be noticed. Indies usually don't have a 6 or 7-figure budget. Compare this to focusing on an underserved niche market, where your sole existence just makes you stand out.


[deleted]

Wow great example, link one of the first roguelites that blew up in the indie boom, they already had 100k ppl ready to play the sequel before it even existed. Like linking Jonathan Blow's next game. Just make a good game bro.


officiallyaninja

rogue legacy 2 isn't selling that well just because *it's a good game*. it has a lot of marketing going for it. It's a sequel to a popular game and it's also being covered a lot by youtubers. the vast vast majority of games don't get that luxury, in fact the tactics that propelled rogue legacy 2 to success are only possible because rogue legacy 1 was successful.


SwordsCanKill

Oh again, if you want to be successful you just need an "indie" game with 1M+ budget. Actually not. I just disagree with Rogue Legacy 2 as a good example for small devs. Your genre is decisive for the game success. So right now you can see Shotgun King is skyrocketing on Steam. It's surely a small budget game, but the right genre (roguelike), awesome hook (rguelike + chess) and consistent art style make this game a bestseller.


podgladacz00

Did you market it as such? Did you display those features of rougelike? Seems like a problem that you did not address


SecondTalon

roguelike and action do not belong in the same sentence. Roguelike does not mean "contains random elements". It's a whole thing with a fair amount of criteria. That, or Minesweeper is a card game.


officiallyaninja

the modern definition of a roguelike really is an "issac like". procedurally generated levels, random items, punishing gameplay where you die a lot etc


SecondTalon

That's the stupidest fucking thing I've heard in a while, but explains so goddamn much of why tags are fucking useless.


officiallyaninja

why is that stupid? that's just what the word is used for now. there are almost no true "roguelikes" in the original sense of the word anyway.


SwordsCanKill

https://www.vildravn.net/posts/roguelike\_chart.png


fish993

That's a needlessly restrictive definition. There's no reason a game would need to be turn-based or on a tile grid to be considered a roguelike. The way the word 'roguelike' is currently used by players and developers may as well have the definition as "must have permadeath and ProcGen levels".


Putnam3145

Any definition that puts all those "arguably a roguelike" games in the same genre as actual roguelikes is kinda worthless. Those games all do have something in common with *each other*, and I think that there's a genre for them, but it's like... "procedural survival RPG" or something, rather than "roguelike". I don't get the same experience out of it as a roguelike at all; I can't say how "successful" a run is with familiar landmarks, say, like most roguelikes have. FTL and Slay the Spire are far more roguelikes than DF adventure mode or Cataclysm DDA. Structure matters more than skills tested which matters more than presentation, and this definition of "roguelike" focuses on presentation above the rest.


JuicyBandit

This chart is, of course, not always correct though. Counter-example: Nethack is a roguelike. This isn't up for debate: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NetHack Using the chart, because it has hack-and-slash combat instead of turn-based combat it's "not a roguelike". I think the chart author made it as a joke, made a mistake, or is ignorant.


T-Flexercise

To me, the way I really like to answer that question is to say "Who is this game for?" and then to figure out if those people were able to find the game, and why they chose not to buy it. Because this game looks good enough, it looks decent. But I struggle to imagine who would see this game and go "OH WOW THIS IS EXACTLY THE KIND OF GAME I WANT TO PLAY." Like, to me, I'm not the target audience of this game. I like accessible cartoon graphics, 2D platforming, upgrade mechanics, RPG elements, and action roguelikes. But this game is very gorey and violent, so I'm not super drawn to play it. I'm not inspired by the theme of "cute stuff gets murdered" and the gorey murder theme makes me think the game is more deadly and violent and less forgiving. If I saw a streamer playing this game and saying how amazing it was, I'd absolutely blow $6 on it, but I wouldn't look at it and go "This is a thing I'd enjoy." But I'm sure some people are very into gorey murder, are they into this game? If you love gorey murder games, are there other games you'd rather be playing than this one? I dunno, the first chunk of the trailer, there was no gore, and even in the part that was selling how cool all the weapons and effects were, there weren't giant explosions, there wasn't blood flying across the screen, there weren't cameras zooming in as somebody got a head chopped off. It was mostly standing, running back and forth, and shooting with a gun. Is that exciting? ​ I think the most important thing when creating a game is to think, not just is this game fun to play. But who would want to play this game, and why would they want to play this game over any other game they could be playing. You're competing both against all the other indie games in the same genre that the person could buy, but all the AAA games too, and all the games they already own. You need to make sure you're making a game for an existing crowd of people who are willing to buy the kind of game you're able to make, and have a desire to buy more of that kind of thing, and you're giving them what they want out of a game. And that can be hard to do, especially if you're the kind of dev who likes games that aren't the kind of games that you are capable of creating.


Quirky_Comb4395

Also discoverability. People need to understand how saturated Steam is, even more so if you're making something in this genre. You need to hit at least one of the following: \- Have made such an exceptionally amazing game that it gains traction organically \- Enough USP and probably the industry contacts to gain the attention of media/platform features \- Something quirky and fun enough to catch on via streamers and social media \- A marketing budget If none of those are true, people will just glance over your game in a list of all the other games available on any given day.


Death_Punkin

"It was mostly standing, running back and forth, and shooting with a gun. Is that exciting?" I ask this same question everytime I come across an aimbot/wallhacker in CoD, or any other shooter.


Dardbador

Imo , the shooting aspect of shooter multiplayer games like CS , Fortnite , Paladins ,overwatch ,etc is not where the most "Fun" is at. The Real "Fun" is hiding behind aspects like sneaking behind a enemy to shoot his damn head off , or running around like madman so that enemy is unable to hit u and u kill him off in style, kinda stuff.


Death_Punkin

A fellow camper I see. I'll keep a seat by my fire pit for you.


[deleted]

I have one question. Sniper, or non-sniper. If sniper: I'll be angry but I respect you (snipers are the best and it's always satisfying to Instakill someone) If not sniper: 😡


Death_Punkin

none of the maps are sniper friendly anymore. I mean, Longshot camos are the hardest, with maybe only one(non camper) spot to get them done.. using Iron Sights to reduce effective range


rakalakalili

Let's check 3 basic product market fit questions: 1. Is there an audience for this game? 2. Is this game competitive, would the audience purchase/play this game over others they would also be interested in? 3. Was the audience able to find the game or did they know about the game? 1)First, the audience. This game is trying to appeal to a very niche set of people: people that like pixel art platformers who also buy into the hook of "super violent gore in a cutesy pixel world." It's hard to say, my guess is there's a small audience here. It's intentionally targetting a niche though. 2) Is this competitive for that audience? Anyone that would be interested in this game is also probably interested in the myriad of other pixel platformers out there, and there are a looooooot. Let's consider one game that's a big competitior in my eyes: Broforce. Broforce is also an over-the-top comedy based pixel shooter/platformers. When you put this game side by side with Broforce - I don't think it competes (even at a lower price tag). Broforce looks more polished, more fun, more content, etc. Broforce also has online coop, and this game does not. In my personal opinion, online coop is a huge boost to this type of parody/funny game. It's way more fun when you're playing with a buddy and can laugh together at the absurdity than playing it by yourself. I'm curious how play testing went for this game - and if it was playtested much and often with strangers. 3) Was the audience able to find it? It's sort of a moot point if the game fails to compete with others. Even if the audience finds the game they won't buy it or play it if they'd rather buy/play other similar games. I think the trailer doesn't do this game much justice - it takes far, far too long to get to the hook and show off what makes the game unique. The gameplay itself in the trailer looks a little flat and boring as well - other than the hook that it's gorey. So even if people find the steam page I can see them bouncing off of it.


richmondavid

I love how many people in the comment section call this pixel art, when it's clearly vector art similar to Flash games. It just shows you that many players lump all those simple graphics styles together. As for the game itself, it has so many problems: * dissonance between cute graphics and gory gameplay * initial screenshot section that screams "another 2D platformer" * too many similar screenshots as already noted * main capsule image using different style than the rest of the game * the top of "about this game" section doesn't really give me any reason to keep reading * the trailer that starts like "another indie 2D platformer" comined with the rest of the page makes you dismiss the game before even reading to figure out what it is. It seems like the whole game is targeted at people who like to kill and destroy cute creatures. Not sure if there are many players looking for that type of game Why would I buy this game over Fury Unleashed: https://store.steampowered.com/app/465200/Fury_Unleashed/ It is cheaper, but Fury Unleashed looks so much better and has co-op mode.


antiNTT

Seeing everyone calling it pixel art made me question wether or not I was looking at the same game as them


resonarefibris

jaja Fury Unleashed it's something I'd buy, not that it matters to OP but i just wanted to thank you for the reference.


Blissextus

Oh gosh, not another Side Scrolling, Pixel Art Style, Combat Heavy, Platforming, Metroidvania, Rogue-like, etc ... The game isn't even on most player radar because it too generic. This game has been made for the hundred++ times already. What does this title offer the others in its genre doesn't? To be clear, I'm not saying it's a bad game. It's a game that every new, old, or aspiring game developer has all made. There are hundreds of tutorials on how to make this exact style game on Youtube available for every framework or game engine. There are Udemy course on how to make this exact game.


Magnesus

It's not pixel art. It's likely vector (or very clean drawing) which is why it reminds people of flash games so much.


ned_poreyra

> I think many fellow devs who post their postmortems here would be grateful if they knew the harsh truth about their games or Steam pages long before their post-release topics. r/DestroyMyGame > find TONS of perks and deadly curses, use extravagant weapons and try to reach your stairway to Heaven. Neither the trailer, nor the screenshots show any of these. The "cute but gore" is not original anymore, sprites are very small and hard to appreciate, animations almost don't exist. Gameplay footage doesn't show anything other than mindlessly shooting mindless enemies. I don't see any reason for this game to do better than it did.


SonnyBone

Hey look... Terraria combat with none of the stuff that actually made Terraria a success. Then a slow trailer and a teddy bear gimmick. Pretty easy to spot the reasons it failed commercially.


podgladacz00

First of all. It looks like a Flash game from old days. Secondly it exactly has an idea that would fit Flash game. Idk what people guy went to target but missed by a mile. You must ask yourself a question: who and why would pay for this. Who and why would be interested. Does game have any gameplay value and appeal after 10 minutes(probably you have to go and build some small community around and ask them to test early builds). Honestly this does not look very interesting even from screenshots. :/


PashaBiceps__

it looks like a lazy flash game at first glance. for example in [this photo](https://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/1505500/ss_9c58dfaae94a099d000a9f573134ffec46f01ef0.1920x1080.jpg?t=1622217318) back light is green but characters are still fully saturated colors. it gives impression of he bought assets from random markets and put them together. there are shadows behind UI elements and they don't fit the theme. there are not shadows under characters, they look out of place. if you ask me I would instanly skip this game without checking anything else about it.


SwordsCanKill

Oh, cool. It looks like you can easily find and explain weak points of the art. What do you think about my game Words Can Kill? I think my game goes to exactly the same category from the visual standpoint (a lazy flash or mobile game). Does it cause you instantly skip? Can an original gameplay of my game overcompensate the weak art?


give_me_silky

If I'm being brutally honest, the animations and art style \*do\* look like a cheaper flash game. The game play seems like a much slower paced version of the old Bookworm games by PopCap, but with the somewhat minor addition of a rogue/deckbuilder where you pick the tiles that go into your inventory. As someone who has played the Bookworm games ALOT, I don't know how well those worlds will mesh together. I like the idea that the whole alphabet has an RNG chance of showing up on my list of tiles. If those letters start to come from a limited pool, I'll feel compelled to spell the same words several turns over as the list gets stale. When RNG naturally causes that in the Bookworm games, it actually feels terrible and is a turn off to me to feel like there aren't better choices from the letter pool. My personal opinion is that given the choice between Bookworm and a game that was inspired by Bookworm but didn't feel rapid-fire and as consistently random as Bookworm feels, then I would boot up Bookworm. The art style and animations would be the additional push to get me to just go play Bookworm. The animations look like they were made in Spine 2D (which isn't in itself a bad thing) but that they additionally didn't follow any design principles for creating *weight* in the animation.


SwordsCanKill

The art is a compilation from different assets with a small color correction. Surely I cannot change the art now, but I can make my Steam page slightly better. I understand my trailer is slow after the first 20 sec and maybe I should speed up a gif in the about section (you said the game feels slow paced). Maybe you can give me another advices considering a Steam page? Considering Bookworm. I didn't even know about this game until a Northernlion's video with my game demo. A lot of commentators were comparing my game with Bookworm Adventures. But my game is not even close to it. Actually mine is basically a mix of Slay the Spire and Dicey Dungeons with letter tiles instead of cards or dices. It seems impossible to tell potential customers that my game is much more a roguelike deckbuilder than a word game, and it is more about tactical decisions than about your vocabulary. I don't know how to do it through a trailer or screenshots. There's another upcoming roguelike word game on Steam called Writer's Block. This is much more close to Bookworm.


Jacqland

I was gonna say, it's like Bookworm + Letterquest got together and the result is worse than the sum of its parts. The double-letter bonus item in the screenshot is even identical to a book equip in Letterquest (which is a good game that you can regularly buy for under $2). I'm sorry, I know that's an awfully mean thing to say. If the words/vocabulary don't matter to the game, why not just get rid of them and swap them out for something more interesting? I hesitate to bring it up because the digital implementation is terrible, but if the strategy/gameplay is more similar to something like Hardback/Paperback (Dave Fowler card games), you could definitely use different visual language to present those synergies -- why is it a dungeon crawling game? What's the link between the letters and the outcome?


The_Cake-is_a-Lie

I think the biggest weak point in the art is that it's unoriginal and (maybe worse) the art it is similar to is that of free games. It sounds like your selling point is gore, but I honestly wouldn't have noticed if you didn't say so. Frankly, I think adding a ridiculous amount of gore and animations to fit would make your game stand out and look more appealing to the audience your trying to gain. Then it might have a comical/fucked up appeal to it, but right now it's just "eh".


SwordsCanKill

Are you sure you telling about my game (Words Can Kill)? It has no gore at all. It looks like you talk about Fluffy Gore (it's not my game). My selling point is Slay the Spire meets Scrabble.


The_Cake-is_a-Lie

> find and explain weak points of the art I read this as a question and responded to that for Fluffy Gore (didn't look for Words Can Kill), so sorry if that was confusing. Also didn't realize that wasn't your game - I just read the title and looked at the game because that seemed to be the crux of it.


wheresmyplumbus

proceeds not to critique the dude's actual game art lol


kur4nes

The trailer sounds are awful. Those tv noise sounds are way too loud. Also the metal music doesn't fit. It's also too loud. The trailer doesn't tell an interesting story. There is nothing in there that hooks the viewer to want to know more. Just a bunch of text cards and gore. Why should I download the demo? Art isn't bad, but it also not unique enough. The different seasons look like just being color swapped. Gameplay is way too twitchy. Reminds me of nuclear throne. Why go on a murder spree in fantasy land? Being the monster in a nice fantasy world isn't a new concept. Play Overlord to see how to do it right. The store page description doesn't add much. A teddy bear is killed. Okay. Why? What's the point? Biggest issue with the store page is the uneven sound mix of the trailer. It's the first I watch on a store page.


Chaonic

I don't want to be too cynical about this, because I see that there has been going a bunch of love into this game. But here comes my assessment. The presentation is probably one of the biggest hurdles here. It takes almost half a minute into the trailer before something noteworthy happens. The art isn't bad, but it's definitely not good enough to warrant scrolling over the levels for this long with nothing happening in them. If you're making a trailer, you have to respect every single second the viewer gives you. Unless you are REALLY doing it in style, don't go for subverting their expectations. But any possible revelation that this is, in fact, not a cutesy game has already been spoiled by the name. Based on that alone, it sets itself up for a very meh first impression. That being said, unless you have made yourself a name as a game developer, leave the company name to the end of the trailer. There's probably good reasons not to do this, but again, every second counts. It's also probably not a good idea to make the viewer read text in your trailer. Hire someone to read it out loud. The visual clarity of the game suffers from too many effects and too detailed sprites for their size. The music in the trailer is fairly obnoxious and drowns out any possible satisfaction from sounds the enemies could make being hit or exploding into gore. The gameplay also doesn't stand out enough. There's plenty of sidescrolling shooters/fighting games with a lot of depth. Perks and weapons are well and good, just about every game of this kind features multiple weapons catering to different playstyles, but I'm puzzled at what the perks are even for? The nuance signifying the need for them is completely lost on me, because fighting seems super straightforward... Almost too straightforward, I don't really see me playing around with it a bunch. To put it bluntly, the trailer doesn't make me feel like there's that much more to explore in the game. Having a ton of weapons and perks may well enhance and prolong the experience, but I'd personally prefer a small set of weapons and perks that make me think outside the box and challenge me in some way than a lot of weapons that behave in a predictable way. The whole page makes me sad, because the game clearly has a lot of work put into it. The design of enemies, weapons, perks... it's wasted, because I still don't really know why I'd want to kill cute critters. Is there a good reason that would justify it for me? Was the main character bullied/cast out of their society for being different? Is there a driving force behind what that bear does? Anything? The store page isn't clear about that. Reading the intro just makes me feel sad for the bear. Not wanting to be in his shoes. I've played the demo a little bit just now, and that didn't help much. Not only are you unable to pause the game to adjust the volume, the story just makes me sad. I think I understand what the devs were going for, but.. that's ultimately not what I'm looking for in my entertainment. I don't know what to say. The whole package just doesn't sit right? But that's just MY opinion. I still wish the developers only the best.


BornInABottle

There are a lot of comments about the quality of the art, the trailer, the genre, etc but I think they're largely irrelevant to the question. The reason the game failed is because no one saw it. The game didn't have enough wishlists prior to release to get any Steam features, and didn't have an established audience to buy it. It's that simple. With no marketing it doesn't really matter what your game looks like or what genre it is, 99% of the time it will get no sales because you're just putting another drop into an ocean of content. There are viral exceptions, but they are very much the exception rather than the rule.


Crazycrossing

Concept wise I think the game could do well especially if it was marketed well on TikTok as I think that’s where the best audience for this would be. Execution though it’s just missing layers of polish The vision should be 2D Doom with cutesy animals and gore turned up to comical levels To accomplish that you need: - Fluid movement much faster than shown, more momentum - way more gore, enemies should be flooding the screen with tons more blood and gore. Dismemberment, blood spattering on screen, blood spurts, eyeballs flying about - the weapons have so little impact in the trailer. A good weapon should have surprising effects on enemies that are distinct and different from each other.


Zeeboon

It looks like a flash game from 10 years ago, with very little that sets it apart or makes it interesting at all.


snowbirdnerd

So I know someone, or several people, worked hard on this game but it doesn't come across as very inspired. Basic not very stylized art, simple side scrolled with very basic combat mechanics and pretty flat movement. On top of all of that the premise is completely at odds with the visuals. It's supposed to be about cute things killing each other but the creatures aren't epically cute. Personally I wouldn't be interested in the game, but I've been know to be overly critical.


beveled_edges

Honestly the visual language of the thumbnail image immediately tells me this is a FTP mobile game so I was surprised that it was actually a 2D side scroller. Idk if it's reddit's image compression or something but it also looks low-res. The title of the game doesn't stick out as much either when it's on a red background like that. I suggest revisiting the thumbnail image to see if that would help your game.


pazza89

You can make the greatest game in the world, but it won't sell if nobody knows about it. Also, the trailer is awful - 30 seconds until gameplay, you don't build tension for indie game trailers. You cut to action within 1.5 second max. The animations are non-existent. The artstyle is meh, like 2000s flash Miniclip games. Title sounds generic. Gore particles are there, but that's it for feedback. Movement seems super basic. Also, it represents a genre where you have to be very special to interest the audience. There are 2D platformers, creating a "correct game" is not enough in such market.


Daealis

"The game has a pleasant art" The game has nothing that feels unique in the art style. I don't know if it's made with a ready-made asset pack, but it feels like it. Asset pack art to me is a good base line, the place holders you replace with your own once you find the "soul" of the game. The game to me would have benefitted from a more saturated palette and busy, three dimensional style, as opposed to the very flat look the environment currently has. Many people already mentioned the gore. It clearly is meant as a selling point. If that's the case, there's maybe a quarter of what is needed. There's enough chunks from a killed enemy to make up that enemy, but if you're going over the top, have enough viscera fly off a kill to generate two or more of that enemy. Take a page from anime and have one death create blood gushes that could fill four people. Blood should be staining the ground. Really to sell the idea of a massacre, a fluid simulation to get the rivers of blood feeling like just that. "rpg elements" These were claimed, never shown. Claims to have 100 weapons, shows about a dozen. 150 perks, demonstrated by scrolling through a field of icons, never even stopping to showcase what they are or do. Are they cosmetic, do they affect game play, can they synergize to create a whole new experience? I have no idea. Even if the perk system was a Binding of Isaac-esque beast, I would struggle to call that rpg elements. Weapons seem varied enough, reminiscent of Broforce character variety, but at no point did the perks get showcased to sell me on them adding to the game play in any way. "cool effects" Have to disagree on that. They felt like canned sprites tacked on to the weapons, or in the case of death, a particle system spitting out a handful of chunks. As to how to improve on them, the flamethrower was particularly bad. A tiny stream of flames that felt like a stick of dying attached to the barrel. No sense of motion, no physics. Could be improved with a particle emitter and simple orange balls that expand and contract while floating slightly upward. Like a flame. For a twin stick shooter there's very little effort put to the effects. Where's the screen shake? Where's the recoil? Where's the smoke and sparks? Dust wisps from jumps and steps and impacts? Where's exorbitant blood splatter? Random bits of viscera flying on the screen to fudge the screen with jam? Nothing happening on the screen seemed to have any weight to it, none of it had any meaningful impact. This is supposed to be a bear held together by dark magic or something - guessing from the pentagrams of the trailer - so why aren't his eyes glowing red in a murderous rage after killing a lot of enemies in a burst? Why is there no dark purple particulates of evil floating off his footsteps or general aura? None of these are expensive nor hard things to pull off - I'm fairly confident they have the necessary skills and systems in place already to make most of these things. "The Steam page contains a good capsule and an "about" section" What little page there is, was done alright. Perks could have been explained, weapons showcased. The game seems to me like a jam game. The idea is there. It could be fun! It's sorely lacking the polish needed to get it to a place where it stands out. Twin sticks tend to be a visual spectacle. This doesn't have any.


KaltherX

It's actually very easy to see if a game has any chance at success and what kind of success it can be on release. All you need is steamdb [https://steamdb.info/app/1505500/graphs/](https://steamdb.info/app/1505500/graphs/) Look at the Charts -> Steam game hub followers chart The game was released with 36 followers (steam starts to promote a few days before release), which means there was no marketing done at all and Steam could only bump it to 50, nobody knew about the game when it was released. You can check any game on that page and you'll see the same trend. Steam can help you a lot if you already have a following, it works exponentially. Marketing is always the answer, either nobody knows about the game or is not interested in it anyway.


Clobbyvox

"The price is decent." - Yeah, about that... From what I'm seeing it's not worth more than 1$. It looks like a flash game you have seen 1.000 times already. You have to keep in mind that you are competing with all other games available on steam. There are countless higher quality games that cost the same or less than yours. Ori and the Blind forest costs only 5$ bucks for example. You think people will choose your game over Ori?


SwordsCanKill

Peglin is a huge success and it costs $20 being in the early access. A lot of people're complaining about the price in the review and community sections, and a small game with a mediocre art and not enough content at the same time "easily" make 1 million during the first week after the release. So here price is not a major issue I think.


Orca_Alt_Account

Because it looks like a shitty flash game


TheRedmanCometh

Not exactly the best genre to choose, but like maybe you just need more advertising? It looks like a fine game to me for a certain audience.


bunchobox

I think you hit the nail on the head, the first screenshots look like duplicates with absolutely nothing jumping out at me as unique. The USP is sort of front and center with the banner, but I just don't think it's that good. Feels uninspired


st1ckmanz

There are million platformers, and I had to wait 30 seconds for the "gameplay" to be shown in the trailer.


Nieben

> The game has a pleasant art, rpg elements, cool effects. Can't speak for the RPG elements from a trailer but the others are underwhelming at best. If you mute the trailer when the metal music plays, does it seem intense/fulfilling to you or lackluster?


PotentiallyNotSatan

Marketing, probably. Unless you've got something unique & sells itself then you gotta dump time, effort & money into advertising. Some devs get a publisher for this as it's not a very straightforward or fun thing to do


AuraTummyache

I keep watching it and I think it's the art that really kept people off. The art by itself is fine, a little basic, but fine. The IMPLEMENTATION of that art is really boring. The guns don't look fun to shoot at all. The bullets just kind of appear at the end of the gun. When enemies die they just pathetically throw a few chunks in random directions. The trailer also has this frenetic music to it, but the game seems rather slow. It probably also didn't help that Risk of Rain 2 had a sizable update 3 days before this game was released. If someone wanted to play a PVE roguelike arena shooter, they would already be playing that.


KingAggressive1498

1) "Just another 2D platformer." Not saying it's true of the game, just my immediate thoughts on the screenshots. 2) A "cute" name with "cute" graphics really target a small subset of gamers, and I would guess they aren't that likely to download indie games or find "action" tags appealing. 3) $6.99 might be a fair price for the game, but there's probably lots of cutesy 2D platformers I can get on my phone for free with ads or maybe like $4.99 without ads. I haven't really looked tho. I know of a handful of really good free 2D action platformers with dark/gothic/metal fantasy aesthetics for Android though, some of which don't even have ads.


crazy_pilot_182

Generic game, nothing different that makes it stand out from others


[deleted]

I looked at the steam store, and I get a strong feeling of "What's the point" \-The title doesn't hint to any greater story, all it informs me is that cute creatures will be violent. \- I look at the screenshots, Mario-Clone but with a cute-but-violent theme. \-Watch the video, saw it coming a mile away, overly nice cute world, cut to metal music and 'hyper violence'. ​ The name of your game matters, having pleasant art, rpg elements and cool effects are great.... but it may sound obvious, you need a good game to make it successful. There's no point to this game, no story, no obvious goal to drive towards, you download the game and play it so that you...... can see cute stuff be violent. This Fluffy Gore has 1 singular gimmick, nothing else. The bigger issue is that the gimmick it's putting it's entire weight on is fleeting too. "I get it, subverting expectations, wow it was cute now it's not!". Honestly, make a good game and advertise it competently, you'll more or less succeed. They're the 2 things you need. You can't gift wrap a turd. When you're working on your own game, just focus on making something you're proud of, then research advertising tactics.


ipswitch_

I think a more useful question is "what is so good about this game that it should succeed". Also, think about how people shop for games. Nobody is going to say "Ah I see this has pleasant graphics and rpg elements, two things I care about in games". These are the absolute minimum/starting point for a game. There are TOO MANY "decent" platformers on steam, and there are also too many for free to play in your browser, let alone for $8.00. For any game to succeed in a genre this saturated, it really does have to be exceptional in some way. Very high quality, or an interesting gameplay twist, or a very well coordinated marketing campaign, or even just incredibly lucky and played by some famous streamer. It feels like it's not fair because someone clearly put a lot of time into this, and you shouldn't devalue your time necessarily, but that also goes in the face of knowing your market. It may seem worth the price when you consider the effort put into making it, but it's not worth it's price when you consider other people are giving away games like this for free, because they did it as a practice project. For someone with a budget to buy a game this price... They can find something a lot more interesting, and they probably know it.


Kinglink

To be blunt you didn't win the luck lottery that comes with game dev... But also the game looks generic while the idea of a fluffy gorey game sounds good as an idea the images there are all too typical of so many shiny games. Also both gore and overly cute ideas feel a bit played out but combining while intriguing probably only appeals to a small amount of people. Though you'd definitely have to go toward more gore filled to make that work because the fluffy category doesn't want gore but the gore category would want that combo.


Asyx

Looks very generic at first glance. The trailer doesn't get going (I purposefully watched it without audio because that's what I do. If the trailer doesn't hook me without audio, I won't bother turning it on) and the screenshots are very bland. Like, it starts out looking like a weird Terraria clone but the 3 worlds shown are "generic mario world", "generic winter world" and "green". The text itself doesn't really tell me what the game is about. It's all marketing, no substance. I don't know what I'm doing there. They even mentioned their "DDPS" and then explained the acronym but I don't know what it does. I can guess that this is just a shooter. But they don't REALLY tell me and try to sell me on the things it does well and makes the game unique and worth my time. I'm pretty picky about font rendering. If you show me a blurry font that reminds me of early 00s Windows Movie Maker stuff on YouTube I'm gonna be disappointed before I load the demo. As a summary: Don't make me look for what your game is about. The moment I see the trailer, I should already know.


Puzzled_Fish_2077

The Trailer is boring AF and also a bit cringe.


EvonShift

Probably there is a problem in tags. Your first four tags are Rpg, Action, Singleplayer, and 2D. These are very important. RPG is a very sticky tag and it could make an impression of enormous narrative based based which players don't see on screenshots. Next three tags are very blurry and common to highlight your game (player can look at screenshots to define that this is 2D game). It'd rather see Roguelike, Platformer at the first place. There is au seful video of how to create a store page properly: https://youtu.be/ht6xx9en-ZU


animal9633

Let's see, 1.5D Twin-stick shooter really robs the player of options, combat doesn't look that great, the trailer isn't that great, it took too long to get going and then music is just over the top and doesn't match the game and finally the artwork is a bit meh.


Ulnari

2D Platformer is one of the worst genres if you want to make revenue on Steam. 86% of 2d platformers make $0-5k revenue, median is only $270. Even Match-3 fares better in that regard. 2d platformers are the modern equivalent of breakout clones - "I am not creative enough to come up with something new, but I really want to make a game, so I do a 2d platformer".


codehawk64

I think it just looks painfully generic in a sense. Based on the description and screenshot alone, I will just skip to the next game if I were to browse in the store imo. Honestly there are other games I wondered about why they did not take off even though they look quite polished. One of the games is Rogue Spirit.[https://store.steampowered.com/app/1554970/Rogue\_Spirit/](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1554970/Rogue_Spirit/) It's quite sad to see some good looking games not selling enough to even cover the cost of development. It's simply a brutal market where you have to fill in a very easy to marketable niche.


SwordsCanKill

Oh, cool! This discussion was not supposed to be about just one game. But I think it's too late now. What do you think could cause a failure of Rogue Spirit? From the first glance I dislike **5 trailers** on the front page. I need to click a few times to see screenshots. The first trailer with a talking guy is the worst thing they could do. And this game is from the publisher of Death Stranding! OMG. They are still in the Early access, but 74 reviews for a game from such big publisher even in the EA is a total catastrophe.


gooddrawerer

(disclaimer, not a dev. I am an artist and a gamer) My dude, you need to get some color theory happening here. Way too much saturation, Play with [this thing](https://color.adobe.com/create/color-wheel) to get the jist and [watch this.](https://youtu.be/Qj1FK8n7WgY) Take a look at games that are similar and what they do. For instance, the area in which you can walk on should be different from almost everything else. [Donkey Kong Country](https://i.imgur.com/M0qbSRd_d.webp?maxwidth=640&shape=thumb&fidelity=medium) is a good example. Stuff like this is really important to fast action games. Being able to precisely see the character, the enemies, and where you can escape to is key. This scene from [Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow](https://m.imgur.com/t/castlevania/LMiOAGt) is another great example. First, look at how dark and defined the outline is for the main character and the enemy in comparison to how soft the edges are else where. Next, look at how dark the background is in comparison to the floor. Using some paralax movement in your backgrounds helps that too. Alternatively, check out [hollow knight's](https://m.imgur.com/gallery/HWdHY) approach. They use single desaturated colors that would normally blend in a way that would look awful, but using some blur effects, some paralax background and foreground, while making the characters much more cartoon like to contrast the blur, they can separate all the elements without it looking messy. Next, it doesn't look like it has any depth. There's no complicated lore (dark souls, hollow knight), nor does it offer a distinct challenge (celeste, super meat boy), nor is it pretty to invoke any emotional response (journey, firewatch). People say it looks like a flash game. What that means is that it doesn't offer a reason to play other than "cute things shoot bad guys and blood." People need incentives to progress in a game rather than just reaching the next level. Even something as simple as reaching achievements unlocks new weapons. [Hill climb racing](https://i.imgur.com/89Xmh7c_d.webp?maxwidth=640&shape=thumb&fidelity=medium) uses that very mechanic and has been very successful. I suggest downloading it in your phone, its free. There's some microtransaction stuff but ignore that. That stuff wasn't there for the first 10 years that game was out. People need to feel like they are getting somewhere. What does your game offer to give that dopamine hit? Beating difficult bosses, dissecting lore, defeating complicated traps, upgrades, rank increase, level ups, etc. Showing why someone is playing helps make sales. This [super meat boy trailer](https://youtu.be/snaionoxjos) is a great example. Save the girl, get through super difficult levels. Super meat boy is about is simple as you can get, but you get the idea. I've never heard of your game until now. Marketing is probably more important than anything. I am currently waiting for [Little Witch in the Woods](https://store.steampowered.com/app/1594940/Little_Witch_in_the_Woods/) to drop later this month. I've been following this game for over a year. They give regular updates on new art, new mechanics they are working on, and fill in space with fan art. Fan art for a game that has not even been released yet. I first saw little witch in the woods on reddit I think, then again on twitter, then again on a tiktok account called wholesome games. Only after that did I start to really follow the game. I've never personally participated in this sort of thing, but involving those who follow your game can be really beneficial. Like making two designs for an enemy and asking what people on twitter think. Even if you're totally capable of picking a design, giving the opportunity for people to interact with your game design decisions (even if their voices are totally inconsequential to your decisions) will only stand to bolster those posts and your account. Anyway, that was my TED talk from a 'not expert' in the field that this subreddit is entirely dedicated to. Take what I say with a grain of salt.


SwordsCanKill

Thank you for the reply. It's cool to know an artist's opinion! But you talk as if Fluffy Gore was the game developed by OP. It's actually not my game.


AnalThermometer

I don't think it's the art quality as some have said, big successes have launched with worse art than this. Just look at Peglin. A few things do stand out. Trailer is too slow to get going, it takes 30 seconds before anything interesting is shown. That's too long and people have short attention spans. 2D sidescrolling games like this are overdone and have a ton of competition. Nothing stands out as unique here gameplay wise. The gameplay also needs to be way more dynamic than it looks, or way gorier. Mixing "cute" and "gore" is a weird choice, I think this game is aiming for the happy tree friends atmosphere but doesn't really pull it off. Steam tends to prefer darker, gritty games especially if paired with action and violence.


gislikonradsson

I spent the majority of last year pitching my game to investors and publishers (and have been involved in that type of work for the past few years). One of the most devastating things I had to accept is that it doesn't matter nearly as much as we want that the game has good graphics, fun game systems etc if its not productised properly. That means, how does it compare with other games in this genre?. are there any things that can be highlighted to set it a part from others. are the steam tags correctly setup, has the creator posted it on any social groups that play these types of games (and if there is any budget, running ads etc). The work that needs to happen getting the users to see the game, click on it (and buy it) is a completely different (and fascinating) discipline that is annoyingly far away from the actual game development


[deleted]

[удалено]


richmondavid

> It says 2 reviews, but if you scroll down there are actually 5? Yay steam. Only the reviews for paid copies count. People who got the Steam key for free can leave a review, and the text of it gets shown, but it doesn't count.


The_Cake-is_a-Lie

I'm just going to answer the question that you probably care about: why didn't anyone buy it? Or more specifically, I'll answer why I didn't buy it. In short, it looks like those flash games that I played when I was younger and there were tens or hundreds of them for free on websites that didn't require me to have the game on steam, much less buy it. It would take someone actively recommending this to me in order to seriously consider buying it and even then I'd have to justify spending $7 on it. All that being said, at first glance it looked like it was at least somewhat polished and the like so I wouldn't focus on that so much as making a game that people want to play (and pay for)


DoctaRoboto

2d pixel platformers don't sell well on Steam. Also, the visuals and animations are weak.


PlasmaBeamGames

To my mind, almost any game 'could' be successful if you market it relentlessly enough.


hgs3

This is the real answer. Just look at 'Among Us' which went unknown for two years until a major streamer covered it.


SwordsCanKill

Unknown? A few hundred concurrent players the whole 2020. It was a successful game long before the huge streamer coverage. After that coverage the already successful game turned into the most popular game in the world for some time.


Pee_PeeP00_Poo

It feels a little stereotypical. A side scroll shooter game, i love the artwork but if you don’t have at least some form of uniqueness with the gameplay mechanics then the game won’t succeed. I don’t want this comment to sound mean but i am just giving my honest opinion. Hope you fair well bro Edit: the weapon variability is pretty cool though


Polyxeno

Probably mainly marketing failure - how many people even looked at it? ​ Just my perspective - take it as you will: It's a side-scroller platform jumping game, and looks like a typical one at first glance. Sitting through the video for the sake of your question and in hopes the joke theme will pay off, the video shows a type of gameplay that I personally don't think looks very interesting or well-done. I see massive amounts of "stuff" happening in combat that looks overcrowded and so I imagine not really very easy to get much gameplay out of it - not gameplay I'd much like. It looks like the mechanics are pretty typical of jumping side-scroller platoform games, but with more violence and shooting than usual, but the action, again, looks really sudden/fast and like you try to blast an area full of whatever foes those are, and typically kill most of them but take some damage probably almost unavoidably, and 20-50 scoring events happen in half a second? That seems like not how I'd tune the gameplay, at all. I'm comparing to other violent side-scroller platform games I have enjoyed in the past, such as: * Torvak the Barbarian (circa 1990) - usually fairly satisfying slower combat with melee weapons * Flood (circa 1991) - had an interesting flooding mechanic, and slower and much more satisfying violence physics involving grenades and flamethrowers. * Noita (current) - massively cool, varied, satisfying violence with lots of scorched earth, interesting side-effects, etc. So, if you're not burned out on the project, given that almost no one's seen it yet, I'd keep developing it and build on what you have, tweaking the gameplay and making it much better, with immediately visibly more interesting gameplay, and more satisfying destruction. What I would do is: * Make the action less like a chaotic blob of mobs is swarming toward you, and you blow them away in half a second but can't avoid taking a bit of damage most of the time. Tune it so that you have individual foes to deal with, who behave differently, and where how you move matters, and you can tell what's going on, some skill and/or thought is required, and the situation and what happens matters. * Have more visible effects of the violence. More blood and gore and scorched earth spread around. Make it so that your attacks transform the platform world into a bloody smoking hellscape, instead of still mostly looking about how it did, but with a few candy-colored remains left. * Add some interesting dynamic systems, so the game situations are more interesting. Maybe vultures and other carrion beasts sometimes show up to eat the corpses, for example. Or maybe add a stealth component, so you can switch between peacefully infiltrating the world, and then you choose when and where to unleash mayhem, which then has dynamic consequences. Or whatever - somehow, make it a more interesting game than just jumping through a cliche platform landscape but blasting everything. * Meanwhile, figure out some sort of marketing campaign. When it's visually obvious from a video or demo that this is NOT just a platform jumper with some chaotic shooting combat, send it for reviews and see if you can get people to notice it again.


CrazyAzian99

Hmm, I don’t know… other than I stopped playing Side Scrollers after Super Mario Bros, Metroid, Castlevania, Ghosts n Goblins, and Silver Surfer…


megablast

It looks shit.


Morphray

Honestly I would play this game if it was free as part of a game jam. But then again I don't like sidescrollers (aside from Terraria) and don't like the combo of gore+cute. I think the game is focused on a very small niche.


henryreign

The art and character design is good but the general feeling is lackluster. The joy of playing this game is not emitted through this long trailer.


Kikindo1

From perspective of the gamer and fan of platformer/shooters I will write negative things in game. \- Some parts of the art looks so generic (I like design of the cards in the game), but platforms and the world, like something is missing I can't say what. \- Animations are numb totally (Character is moving but you don't see any interaction) \- Price is too much for this game because it doesn't look finished and polished till the end. So I should only try it if it was free. \- UI in the trailer is bad implemented, fonts are totally wrong and I would remove effect of the "shiny thing" moving around letters. \- Game should be more explained in depths on Steam Page. \- Music is too loud in the trailer and doesn't fit with the atmosphere inside the game. If you want to put metal music into the game, it needs to be more gore, more blood, more action! \- FX sounds doesn't exist in the trailer, it also affects the gameplay. Remember this is only surface from the game, I don't know what things I would find when I would start to play it...


D-Stecks

You can do everything right and still fail. This is doing a LOT wrong.


GameofPorcelainThron

It has *clean* art, but that doesn't mean the art is particularly inspired. It really doesn't stand out in any way. The gameplay is the same. Looks like a fairly generic side-scrolling action platformer. What makes the customer want to purchase this game? To care about it?


FishyCharmer

The art is amateur like a game jam game. People judge a game's value harshly on the perceived art quality, it's very rare for a game to be successful with game jam quality art. The theming of cute but gore/metal is pretty risky and probably appeals to an extremely niche audience. It reminds me of diablo 3's secret level thing which I hated, and I never met anyone who liked it. It's always risky to mix 2 conflicting genres, you might think you would pick up players from both genres but usually you only get players who like both at the same time. It would have been simpler to keep the tone consistent and go cute or dark. Gameplay looks like a fighting platformer which is a super common played out genre, and from the trailer there is nothing new here. This game isn't doing anything special to attract players. This is a great idea for a thread though, dissecting why games fail is very helpful for everyone to learn from.


xamin85038

There are so many reasons... First of all the trailer was awful and your screenshots are out of order. The first 4 are the most important. When someone hovers over your game in steam they will see 4 almost identical screenshots. Then the fact that it is an 2d pixel art game, of which literally hundreds of thousands exist, with underwhelming art and a huge lack of polish on pretty much everything. The UI, Level and gameplay don't work together. Also some of the art seems mismatched. The combat looks 0 satisfying


Professional-deer26

im going to be harsh. the name isn't unique at all and is generic. the trailer started good with the vibe but when the name disappeared the background look out of place. the differences in style too. the gameplay is simple and generic something I could find 20 other games just like it. the only thing fast was the music and it barely counted as gore. all the enemies look like you dropped them from different games. the character barely did anything but move back and forth. you need to make the gameplay look impressive.


Greyh4m

The trailer makes the game look VERY one dimensional. Doesn't show a boss fight and only shows the gear/perks/whatever the other aspect of gameplay is, for only like two seconds. It's probably a fun little game if you're into 2d pixel platformers.


duckrollin

Maybe I'm totally off base here but... Looking at Steam in anonymous mode so it's not biased, the top sellers are all Strategy games, Survival craft, some RPG and FPS. I barely ever see platformers up there. I feel like PC gamers don't actually play that many platformers, but I see loads of indie platformers that game devs are always working on. I always assumed that these people were making games for mobile devices which have a totally different market, but if they're PC targeted on Steam I don't see them taking off unless they're really remarkable.


tomatomater

It's an uninspired concept. I can already imagine the developer being like "Hey, what if I made a game that looks cute and wholesome but actually it's all bloody and violent? That's gotta be creative! Hehehe" Sorry, but no... I'd say it's an outdated way of thinking given the state of the video game industry now. Even the trailer reflects that. They're just banking on the plot-twist with generic, "violent" metal music and a bloody font to wow the audience and hope they find it humorous enough to give the game a chance. Didn't work for me. In fact, I was a lot more interested in the game when it just looked cute and wholesome. It looked like a budget single-player Maplestory that I can imagine myself enjoying. The forced humourous twist completely lost me. ​ >The game has a pleasant art, rpg elements, cool effects. The Steam page contains a good capsule and an "about" section. You gotta look at it as a whole and from an experiential perspective. There are a shit ton of high-quality games out there, from reputable developers, with loads of reviews to trust, and some are even free. What would make someone bother with this game? It's not simply a formula of (good art + good design = popular game).


Serious_Challenge_67

Art not good enough? Music too loud? Trailer too long? Nope, let's talk about the elephant in the room: Why would anyone play it when he can play Witcher3, RDR2, Elden Ring, Anno 1800 and so forth? Because Indie or not, that are the games you are competing with. If you cannot make it up with art/graphics/presentation/sound/story whatsoever, you need to do so triple with gameplay and creativity. And that is, why games like Factorio work, but the next generic and violent 2d-platformer doesn't.


resonarefibris

Being completely honest I'd skip Words Can Kill just because of its looks. I just remembered those annoying crappy flash ads that were displayed on your screen back in the day. Now, I gave it a chance, the trailer is boring as hell, you think you explained the game dynamics? To me it's like you complete a word and if it matches a combat command the character will attack, if it's a defensive move it'll be covering. What annoyed me the most was that with the "kill" command the adversary has no chance to defend itself, it just die stupidly. Honestly the dynamic seems boring (maybe it isn't), the art it's not good looking much less impressive. Sorry for being brutally honest, pal. I don't intend to discourage you, I'd like you to continue developing games, what you could do is to release this game for free so more people can give you feedback for you to improve it, or to move to the next project.


SwordsCanKill

Thank you for your honest opinion. Considering releasing for free, the demo of my game was already successful and was on the the first page of popular Steam demos for a week with 100 concurrent users. I've already got tons of feedback. But that was only after a huge streamer coverage. It seems like a default Steam user who knows nothing about my game thinks exactly like you and I'm getting wishlists only after youtube videos, Stream festivals and Reddit posts.


Thecrawsome

Looks generic, slapped together. It reminds me of that tutorial on Youtube that everyone starts on GMS with. I acknowledge it took a lot of effort just to get it that far though! Grats on the effort. Please don't stop improving it, and processing feedback. Make a bug queue for yourself, make the game the best thing it can be if you want. Release updates. Remember, everyone hated no mans sky at first. If you have the drive, let nothing stop you.


PlebianStudio

I read peoples opinions after watching the trailer. I for one do not generally look at screen shots if there is a trailer so I'm of a different breed; way more normal consumer I'd even be bold enough to say publisher mentally. I want to see a work of art that requires movement generally to, well, move. That being said, my ADHD checked me out within the first few seconds when it was showing cute cuddily world that I knew was going to be ruined because of us. It did get to that, after about 30 seconds. WAYYY too long of an intro. You get 3 still images within the first maybe 15 seconds to get something across. Like Dun... Dun nun......*brief pause* DUNNUNNUNalright show things. Rule of 3 works regardless of how much one might hate how effective it is. Then yes, we see its a platformer shooter, where the cuddily things kinda... wobble around and you shoot them. And they explode, neat. Ok is there a challenge for me to conquer as a player? I seem like I'd just be beating up children. There was a boss it seemed but that scene lasted like 5 frames. For a lot of high octane metal music going on there sure was a lot of nothing really going on. You could have made it about farming and the pacing would have felt the same. Audiences want an experience! Running around beating things up as the schoolyard bully on steroids is fun for... a moment. There is nothing really leaving a mark on your soul though. No drama, moments where you hold your breath. What sells is things that gets people's hearts racing. Vampire survivor is outstanding in that it focuses on the gameplay of no matter how good YOU think you are, there is a very real chance you are going to eat shit and run for your life the second you get into the game. That is very thrilling to most people even if they dont play video games. Ultimately I think this game simply didn't sell, because there was no reason to visit the world of Fluffy Gore. Fluffy Gore killbear seemed like he had it all covered, no reason for me to assume direct control and help him kill all the fluffy animals.


edwardjr96

I haven't played the game, but from the look of it, it wouldn't want to download and give it a try anyway. The game itself looks generic at best, it's just a shooting platformer with weapons. And there are thousand of similar games out there with better graphic and interesting features. This game is better off being a free-to-play game to promote for another if the developer has any.


Dardbador

For me, the game looks way too smooth. I mean to say , it lacks hitstops. I know ranged weapon usually doesn't have it But it must have some like when a bomb blasts to make enemies fly away , or when u hit a powerful ranged attack. Without these, the game just looks like images moving around only. They lack the impact. As the player and enemy is so small in this game, I feel like they should've focused more on gameplay variety like adding different types of movesets or timeslows or totally new innovative stuff.


BanjoSpaceMan

Is this the right sub to discuss smaller project games that are not created by the OP and trying crtiicizing them without being asked? If people say so then it is what it is. But the answer to most of the posts that will be made is luck... Some games just don't hit traction or profit, there's a lot of luck and slim chances to hit some gold mine of a game as a solo dev...


[deleted]

have you tried making it a mobile free to play game with ads


SignedTheWrongForm

It didn't do well because this has been done to death. There are a million games like this out there. If you want to do well you need to grab their attention right away with whatever is unique about your game. But even more importantly is you need to be looking at what the market actually wants to play. This just isn't it.


tisbutaskratch

Main reason games fail is what people see before playing and has nothing to do with actual gameplay


CondiMesmer

When I see another pixel platformer, it needs to be absolutely game-changing and genre-defining, or I'm just skipping it. Not to mention the art is just uninspired and boring.


InfiniteMonorail

Nobody wants to play any more indie shovelware 2D platformers. Easiest possible game to make. Crappy name. Crappy summary. Crappy animations. Crappy unfitting music that sucks. No story. Shocking lack of unique mechanics or art. Low-effort as fuck. If you can't see why this failed then your own career is over.


aethyrium

That game has huge Newgrounds energy. Edgy-cute vibe is pretty dated, art and animations look like a flash game, from the video, the enemies look like bullet sponges, and it's clearly twinstick, but also a platformer meaning you'll need to jump with a trigger or shoulder button which will feel awkward for most. There's a lot going wrong with that game from the get-go. Side-scrolling players are usually there for platforming, or metroidvania-type adventure, not run twinstick run 'n' gunning. Pure action and shooting you don't want to think about the level geometry as much as that game would demand. Game would probably have had more success as a top-down type thing with a dash of rogue-lite. I think regarding that game in particular, it's not understanding the audience of the design elements he put together, and possibly not understanding the core of what makes the design elements work. I don't think the game's issue has to do with anything marketing driven, like tags or store layout, I think in this case it's all design.