How we spent $0 on marketing our game and sold thousands of copies

[@Visnii]

Congrats guys! you passed the 75% of developers that never release the second game, hopefully next year I will be part of this stat too

[@gameworkerty]

To be fair I think that's more like 75% of studios. A ton of developers just move on to a different job or different studio but keep going as a career.

[@alexanderkulaev541]

Great and very important video. Thank you for sharing your experience and knowledge, it's priceless. And kudos on your success with Unicycle Pizza Time! Amazing idea that totally broke through all the obstacles. You deserve this success!

[@TheRopiak]

This is super helpful thanks! I'm starting my first game journey after watching many videos of yours and others. I got a VFX guy, I'm a blueprints person, we're gonna make a game in 6 to 12 months for Steam, aiming less then 5 hours, single player, etc. Love all the advice and perspective you two give!

[@AlexGorskov]

Good luck, guys!

[@luotigames]

I'm soon releasing my second Steam game, but it took like a year to make cause I have so limited time ( without family, 9.-5 I could have made it in few months), but hey I still made it. Lately I've been just scrolling through my old projects and it's weird how I feel like many of them has potential, but trying to commit back into one is so hard, maybe I should do a video about my "dead projects" and people could spot which has potential.

[@tejaswithme3713]

Congrats

[@TimothyMiller-vo2un]

What is weird is that I cannot find the video where you and Thomas talk about people sending hate emails or hate comments. I certainly have benefitted enormously from this channels. Maranx and Thomas are very special people. Its unfortunate that people would say such hateful things. And this is such a great resource. I have re-thinked all of my approaches because of this. I must lay my hands down to how beneficial BiteMe games is to a solo dev. I am literally scaling my project down so that I can release it, and let it fly. Less hate and more encouragement. They are only trying to help. This is top-notch advice. Also many thanks from the USA for making these videos. Much love.

[@bitemegames]

Thanks for the kind words

[@SwitchbackCh]

Incredible video and resources condensed in a super concise package. Thanks for making this! It's super useful seeing a video actually getting into the weeds of what tools to use and where to look for promoting your game.

[@VSalgc]

Good job on the networking. 2 thumbs up. ❤. Good momentum created.

[@pyrouan8905]

congratulation for this victory !

[@AlexGorskov]

Good info, thank you!

[@SUPERitaa]

Hi marnix, fellow gamedev, big fan. wanted to ask you how did you get around the fact that when you send a lot of emails your emails start getting put in the spam folder of people and also how did you get around the daily limit of emails you can get from youtube?

[@ederluis123]

Thanks for your content. Wish you the best

[@mrsmith5114]

You are so lucky, that's why you did so well. Jokes :) Grats on your success, thanks for keeping us updated through out the process.

[@YawningCatGames]

I liked this one. Very helpful, thanks!

[@ReadingOcelotl]

You guys are going to become famous because of UPT, a successful game in 1 month is impressive! These insights are great.

[@KDmadness18]

I'm making a stream based game too, and I'm really hoping it'll perform well after I take your approach of sending it out to influencers. But, there's one big problem with that. As you said we should have these influencers playing our game like 2 weeks before launch, but what else should I do in the mean time? Like it's definitely a little scary if I have no marketing done at all until the final two weeks before launch. I might just try posting some clips on my own youtube and tiktok, but I have no fanbase already built up

[@goonba23344]

Congrats on the launch, guys!! I wanted to know what you mean when you say that making a 2D game is unmarketable? Obviously I'm saying this because I'm developing a 2D game to get started in video game development with the idea of ​​learning more about making video games and learning 3D in the future, but is it better to learn 2D and 3D now? Congrats again, I like the videos, keep up the hard work!!

[@LesJeuxDeMilen]

The 3D games are more "modern" and possible - will sell more copies.

[@AutumnPioneer]

@@LesJeuxDeMilen it's funny because this is the opposite to almost all indie success stories. 2D games are also more accessible on lower end devices, so the market is larger.

[@LesJeuxDeMilen]

@@AutumnPioneer If you are watching only few stories about indie success, without asking "why" (influencer with a lot of subscribers buying the game; dev with friends that are big influencers promoting the game; etc.), yes, you can think that. But when you see the number of releasead games on Steam each year then you will see the real 2D success rate (games with big sales / all games released in the current year) ... 2023 = 14 405 games ; 2022 = 12 416 games ; 2021 = 11 324 games ...

[@Zethrax]

@@AutumnPioneer Bear in mind that indie success stories are usually outliers, and have some inherent biases in what you hear about them compared to the middling successes and failures. There are more 2D games made than 3D, too, so you tend to hear more about the 2D success stories. It's really a matter of what the best approach is with the average game, rather than the exceptions.

[@flymacseamus3474]

Useful info 👍

[@captainnoyaux]

Thanks for the video, very informative and useful ! What do you use for email collection ?

[@samgriff84]

I saw UPT! almost got featured on Vinesauce but lost out to 'Mommy Simulator' at the minute.

[@cristianbrici7074]

you should try to release the game for consoles

[@LesJeuxDeMilen]

I see more than 350 000 views. ~ 50 000 views from japanesse audience and ~ 300 000 views from western audience. In the same time you made 75% sales from japanesse audience and 25 % sales from from western audience. The ratio (japanesse sales / japanesse views) is way way higher. My advice : consider more japanesse oriented DLC-s for this game - I think you can make a lot more money with this game, than with your other game in development (the guild-game).

[@branidev]

do you have any experience with keymailer? as a Dev i mean is that worth it?

[@bitemegames]

I tried to use it, but it's just garbage spam requests of accounts with 18 subs that try to farm keys. This way where I looked up influencers myself was way better and time efficient if you ask me. -M

[@bellatorpoeta]

Did you also use AI to translate the game?

[@bitemegames]

We used a mix of our own language knowledge, crowdsourcing with our audience (Thai, Ukrainian, Spanish, Portuguese Brazilian), and the Polyglot Gamedev sheet docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/17f0dQawb-s_Fd7DHgmVvJoEGDMH_yoSd8EYigrb0zmM/edit#gid=2 -M

[@a6gittiworld]

🎉🎉

[@seamusoblainn]

Actually the reason they did well in Japan is the reason theyre in Japan -that's where their sugar daddy (ies?) reside 😂

[@LesJeuxDeMilen]

If I understand it correctly, you have a team of 4 devs, working a full time, and made a game covered by many streamers accumulating at least 350 000 views. From 350 000 views, you made 3 500 sales. Total ~ 3 600 $ net / 4 devs = 900 $ net monthly/dev. And this is a succesfull game.

[@vast634]

Thats why I say: better do it as a hobby or side activity next to a paying job. Its really about chasing crumbs - unless you get lucky.

[@bitemegames]

1) You're wrong, we're not 4 people, this game was made with 2 devs 2) You don't understand the bigger picture. This game will keep earning money from now until Steam shutting down, without us spending any more time on it. Stack that with making a few more games and over time you'll build more "passive income" that you can sustain yourself. -M

[@vast634]

@@bitemegames But when aiming for a "long term" income with many smaller games, I would rather concentrate on "non trend related" games like puzzle games, card games, variants of classic board games or similar casual gametypes that dont rely much on graphics, and would look very similar in 5 years. The type of product people would just add to their shopping basket because they are low cost and could be startet any time for a quick game session. The games could then point to each other (via the store page or ingame) for a bit more exposure.

[@ryuusaisai]

​@vast634 those genres usually don't sell as well tho

[@LesJeuxDeMilen]

@@vast634 I made a puzzle game (memory game with cards) and then I made my research - the average of this type of games made (estimation) 1000 $ in one year of sale = 400 $ net / year = 33 $ net / month. Also, some games (not all) make less sales with the time?

[@josiethompson5739]

Gonna have to disagree with you on your opinions on marketing to streamers. Many of the games I play are 2D and I almost never learn about games from watching streamers - I usually see them on a platform store, by watching/reading upcoming game listicles, or hear about them by word of mouth - and I play a _ton_ of indie games. I just watched this video that had a brief excerpt about how to market your game, made by the people who made Islanders - a game that by your standards "isn't very marketable," yet still was a very successful indie game. kzbin.info/www/bejne/rpbNkKqpd6doqrs

[@bitemegames]

howtomarketagame.com/2024/10/07/what-jonas-tyrollers-games-reveal-about-the-steam-algorithm/ Islanders' main marketing was done through content creators, and was in a highly marketable genre (crafty builder games). -M

[@TheMashedCouchPotato]

This guy did not just say JIFS 10:52

[@clayton_games]

Now I can't trust this guy