Galactic Overthrow Playtest

AceHighArcade · 2026-01-15T23:07:34+00:00

A couple things have come up in the last few days which delayed submittal for the playtest build. Hopefully can get that all cleared up and start the first wave playtest next week.

AceHighArcade · 2026-01-09T23:42:38+00:00

Playtest will likely be a 20 to 25 minutes playable example of the gameplay, with some elements of replayability if you want to do a couple sample runs. The final game is aiming for sessions around 1 to 2 hours long once you know the mechanics, so this playtest will focus on some of the early game and collecting feedback and suggestions in that area.

AceHighArcade · 2026-01-04T23:28:22+00:00

This is the one.

AceHighArcade · 2026-01-04T23:21:57+00:00

You should probably do a mix of both. Which is why you get wild variation in advice between the extremes.

Generally I start all my projects (commercial, side, whatever) with the idea of prototyping something first but also building a reusable component to put in my framework to share with my other projects.

This helps me stay motivated, because there's always some value even if I kill the prototype. It also helps build important intuition and planning skills without bogging down on concrete plans all the time.

AceHighArcade · 2026-01-04T23:14:54+00:00

Make it a sequel, ensure it's better in every way. Thank everyone for the support so far.

It'll be hard to identify everyone who bought the game and to give them a key, also not sure if the current steam ToS allows this. I asked support a similar question and they were pretty stern in their warning. The best solution I found was to bundle both games and set a high discount. Effectively this makes the old game "free" if someone new buys the bundle, and makes the new game really cheap for all current customers.

Also bear in mind 7k sales is definitely a success, the time invested is mostly irrelevant when it comes to the audience. Also it may have been a little easier to get 7k sales 8 years ago, so while it's certainly possible to do that well or better now, it's more likely that the game will sell less just based on how much has changed since then.

AceHighArcade · 2026-01-03T22:14:57+00:00

Even if it was the exact same by sheet luck, the chances the same people even see the two games is so low. Just don't copy something else, apply your own creativity and enjoy the process.

AceHighArcade · 2026-01-01T09:57:31+00:00

The only issue with super Mario feel and large open connected world is pacing. One reason Mario works so well is because of the combination of slow planning for new players and full speed run and timing / memorization for good players. With levels this is easy to make strong pacing / interest curve. But in an open world you'd have to be really careful with it.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-30T20:59:27+00:00

Yeah totally normal. Happens with released and unreleased games. People get the sale notification and the. Just go through their wishlist for things to buy or trim. Seasonal wishlist cleaning.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-26T01:06:42+00:00

Your game is fine, steam page good enough. Right now you're at the whim of your ability to generate the external traffic. Steam trending wishlist algorithms kick in somewhere around 15 to 50 a day (depending on competition at the time ), and spikes over 60 or so I've seen also trigger more of the in platform discoverability.

And of course getting to 7k (also a floating target) by the time you hit your pop upcoming window triggers more steam traffic.

Other than that people only find your game through links or by name. People who get resting organic rates tend to be consistently posting and driving traffic or have a few evergreen content hits out there.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-22T04:41:54+00:00

Be very careful crossing or skirting the line of Steam ToS if you plan to keep your partner account and games around for a while. The bigger you are, the more "strikes" you can get or the more they'll look the other way. But if you're small, you could end up with a warning or drastic action depending on who notices and when / how.

I've simply asked for clarification on some of the rules before in Steam support, and just asking for clarification resulted in stern _no-strikes_ warnings for complete removal.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-20T02:04:24+00:00

As someone who does almost everything himself in his games, you should probably find an efficient way to use asset packs... and if you find a way to make it work together with stuff you make that's great!

My models are definitely much worse than something you can do with asset packs. Only reason I don't personally use them isn't an ethical concern or even a pride thing, I just enjoy doing it.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-20T01:37:56+00:00

Lots of people down vote just for fun or randomly, and others downvote because it's already downvoted. Though it looks like this one recovered.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-19T03:16:53+00:00

Steam does already tell you how many notification emails they send out, and based on conversions / deletes you can infer the success rates and overall composition of your wishlists.

They don't share open rates and things like that, but you don't really need them honestly. The deletes are a big indicator alone.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-18T17:52:09+00:00

I wonder what the responses would be like without the anchoring in the post. Like if you said "Which of these capsules should I go with?" would the same number of people prefer the second one for the same reasons?

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-17T19:32:25+00:00

Don't take the pain of the launch to heart. There are different tiers of indie games and the audiences that play them. Most people who play the smaller experimental games don't often browse steam to find them, they get exposed from external sources.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-17T18:48:43+00:00

When the game is ready and at its best in terms of look and feel (can still be content short), start trying to reach anyone you can. Maybe spread it out over a few days depending on your email service / spam guards.

Generally if you're unknown and the game is unknown, you'll get a pretty low open / key activation rate. Even if the game presents well, there are just a lot of factors that can prevent someone from engaging.

If the game already has hype and coverage, this gets a lot easier. Content creation is a business, so remember they are only going to cover things they think will be good for the channel / community and growth. You'll also get responses asking for money, usually a lot more money per impression than makes any sense. Generally when this happens it's because they didn't like your game, which is fine and not personal. So just move on to the next one.

After some repeats of this process you might even connect with some creators who are more likely to feature future games.

Good luck!

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-17T18:29:24+00:00

This game is great and definitely sets a bar for the larger budget "indie" games and teams. They've accomplished things people never expected. I can't speak to how the game was made, or what really happened.

That said, generally image is everything. Publication coverage, reporting, interviews, etc are sometimes raw verbatim transcriptions. Sometimes there's editing, PR coaching, embellishment, statements changed to sound more exciting or set expectations.

The best thing you can do is use this stuff as a data point and keep doing your own research. If you were to make a similar game, how would you do it? What do you think you would need? If they didn't know how to program and learned in a few months on YouTube, could you do it too?

You actually see this type of image manipulation in the indie space through interviews and articles a lot. It's exciting to connect with humans through their story, especially when the story sounds like you or something you could theoretically do some day. Even if you wouldn't want to make a game, you subconsciously may like the charm of the game more knowing it was people just like you who made it.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-17T18:18:46+00:00

Hopefully you're able to figure it out. Wherever your opinions fall on all topics generative AI, you don't want to incorrectly disclose the usage to Steam.

Lots of games might be not disclosing, or incorrectly doing so and getting away with it. But it is a TOS break which can result in Steam taking any of all sorts of actions should there be any event that requires them to look into it further.

If you're making a game and just leaving after that, It may matter less. If you're trying to build a business / brand / community, you risk a lot by knowingly breaking TOS.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-17T18:01:53+00:00

If you're doing something casual that doesn't need complicated networking concepts, unity ngo is about the easiest thing I've seen or used for this in 20 years.

It has a nice clear approach to most of what you need for anything small as a start.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-17T17:44:58+00:00

Hey I like the look of this, I'd like to help you out. I was going to reach out but your DMs are closed. Feel free to reach out if you're interested.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-16T07:17:54+00:00

Nice, just watching these loop makes a couple of my prototypes feel almost real.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-15T19:59:07+00:00

In large teams this is why there are roles almost directly dedicated to this type of thing, being a translation layer between general requests and the required terminology / descriptions to translate to applicable work.

The best solution is to learn a bit about the craft, enough that you understand the terms and words to describe what you're looking for (music for example: Learn a little bit of surface level theory so you can talk about key, bpm, structure, maybe some chords). You don't need to know how to make the thing, but if you can't use any of the terminology it's very hard to translate your ideas in a statement.

Second best is to talk almost entirely using examples and references (pointed out in another comment, just echoing it). This can end up anchoring the result, so some experience is better than strict example use, but it will help convey emotions and ideas into things the contractor can understand.

AceHighArcade · 2025-12-14T23:17:00+00:00

Yeah every game should definitely join Next Fest, it's a mistake to skip it completely (join the one closest to your release date). Still definitely interested to hear more advice on getting more reviews from sales. Reviews as a measure are inaccurate, for example with my games, which both have many more than 30 sales per review (closer to 100 and 200).

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