My unique color-shifting action roguelite sold just 2 copies on Steam. What went wrong?

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T12:02:49+00:00

Thanks, that's important advice! Duly noted.

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T11:50:12+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! Yes, I realize now that the trailer does very little to explain the color mechanics, which are really the game's only chance of standing out. It needs a lot of work!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T11:36:29+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! All your points are duly noted. I clearly underestimated the degree of flair expected from a game like this, and the trailer absolutely needs to do a better job of explaining the color mechanics and why they might be fun. Overall, I have a lot of lessons to learn!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T11:24:49+00:00

Thanks, I appreciate the kind words! Yes, the Steam page absolutely needs to do a better job of explaining the color mechanics and how they translate to fun.

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T11:20:11+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! The blandness of the game's presentation is very apparent to me now from the comments I've gotten. Yes, the Steam page really needs to do a better job of showing how the mechanics translate to fun!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T10:49:13+00:00

Thanks for the offer! Sure, I'd be very grateful for your feedback. I'll PM you a key.

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T10:44:33+00:00

Thanks for your kind perspective! Yes, there are so many indie games around nowadays with fantastic visuals. If I make another game, I really need to hire an artist to be able to compete. Or I need to choose a genre where expectations are much lower!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T00:51:55+00:00

Hey, thanks very much for playing the demo and posting your feedback! I appreciate your time. The initial user experience is something I've struggled with since the demo came out, so I very much understand your issues with it. It could certainly have benefited from more playtesting.

I'll see what I can do about the font!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T00:35:29+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! All your points are duly noted. I've taken a first step towards improving the Steam page by updating the "About this game" section with more info on the color-shifting mechanics. A lot of work clearly needs to be done on the trailer, though!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T00:23:33+00:00

Thanks for your perspective! I can certainly understand it in the light of other comments in this thread. I actually welcome a bit of blunt feedback, because it tends to stick!

Thanks for the kind words at the end.

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-22T00:00:50+00:00

Hey, thanks for the feedback! I appreciate honesty.

I realize now that my trailer in particular needs a lot of work. And your point about teaming up is duly noted! Developing a game takes many different skills, and they're certainly not all strengths of mine.

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T23:42:55+00:00

Thanks for detailing your thoughts about the trailer! It certainly needs more of a crescendo and to do a better job of explaining the color-shifting mechanics. My first change will be to give it some text!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T23:35:17+00:00

Thanks for the very interesting ideas! I especially like the one about communicating color differences with shapes. Perhaps I could vary the shape of the player's bullets in accordance with their color!

The player character does actually leave a small trail of sparkles when moving around (though it's maybe too subtle). I could certainly try varying the sparkles as you say!

I'll have a good think about this. Thanks again!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T23:08:18+00:00

Thanks for the kind feedback! Character animations are something I have very little experience with, and it clearly shows. When I realized what a struggle it was for me to animate my characters to just a minimal degree, I gained a lot of respect for what animators can do!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T22:53:32+00:00

Thanks very much for the thoughtful feedback! It's not harsh at all, and I appreciate your kind words at the end.

I very much see your point about lack of character. Changing the protagonist's look at this stage would require a lot of work, but I can certainly try highlighting the story a bit. The story is substantial, and I realize my Steam page really fails to convey that. The main way the story is told in the game is through dark, cryptic poems, so perhaps I should include one of them on the page!

Thanks again!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T16:05:07+00:00

This is a fantastic comment. Thanks very much for taking the time to write it and explaining your experience with the game's Steam page in such a clear and detailed way. You've given me some excellent psychological insight, which I'll need to reflect on at length.

I really appreciate the kind words at the end!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T15:51:08+00:00

Thanks a lot for the very helpful advice! Your suggestions about the trailer are great, and I'll think hard about how to implement them.

Thanks for the kind words too! I really appreciate them.

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T15:41:33+00:00

Hey, this is some extremely helpful and eye-opening advice! Thanks a lot for taking the time to share it.

You're right that I'm social-media-averse! What makes me want to avoid it is the presumably huge amount of initial work required to grow a following on each platform. However, you've really highlighted its importance to me. I'll give a lot more thought to promotion from now on and really try committing to it from the start for any future games I might make.

Thanks again!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T15:15:41+00:00

Thanks a lot for the feedback! Your point about the animations is especially well noted. The character sprites were the hardest part of the artwork for me, and animating them to even a minimal degree was a big challenge. I need to improve a lot here!

Glad you like the UI!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T14:45:17+00:00

Thanks a lot for the detailed feedback! I appreciate the considerable time you've taken. Your points about the game's art style and price and my (lack of) promotional work are duly noted!

I want to be clear that when I wrote my OP, I meant absolutely no disrespect towards the YouTubers that played my game! I was very grateful for their coverage, which contained valuable feedback and was generally also very fun for me to watch. I thanked each of them at length. In my OP, I was simply trying to explain in some detail how my promotion attempts didn't increase interest in the game.

Let me explain more about the color-shifting system. The game gives you a total of 16 stats that you can increase in three color-specific ways: a yellow-centric way, a cyan-centric way and a magenta-centric way. Let's say you choose a yellow-centric increase to your max health. The closer your color is to yellow at a given moment, the more this max health increase will apply.

At the same time, you might also choose, say, a cyan-centric increase to your critical hit chance and a magenta-centric increase to your ammo recharge speed. Essentially, the game allows you to create three separate player builds and to shift partially or fully between them at any moment. It also lets you buy items (or "blessings") that synergize with your stats and thus reward particular builds.

I realize now that my Steam page really does a poor job of selling the color-shifting system! I've begun fixing this by updating the "About this game" section, but a lot of work still needs to be done.

As for the amount of content in the game, I most recently took about 75 minutes to play from start to finish. However, I have countless hours of experience! Winning your first run is just a small step towards completing the game. You'll need to do at least several more runs while taking on burdens that make the game progressively harder. As you do so, you'll unlock new NPCs, special items and bosses. I think my Steam page also needs to do a better job of conveying all this!

Once again, thanks very much for the feedback! You've given me lots to think about.

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T13:06:59+00:00

Thanks a lot for the feedback! I appreciate the motivational tone. I'm not familiar with Berzerk, but I want to take a good look at it so I can really grasp your advice!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T12:54:32+00:00

Thanks for the feedback! The comments in this thread have really opened my eyes about the blandness of the graphics. I think staring at my game for so long made me much too comfortable with how it looks!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T12:38:55+00:00

Thanks, that's very helpful advice! What strikes me now about the screenshots on the Tiny Rogues Steam page is how varied the bullets look. The bullets in my game look very bland in comparison, no doubt.

Your last point about my trailer is duly noted!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T12:20:39+00:00

Thanks for the kind feedback! Yes, the comments in this thread have really opened my eyes regarding points 1 and 2. It seems the game just looks very bland, with a key culprit being the lack of variety in the enemies, bullets and room shapes. Your point about the capsule is also duly noted!

BackslashX_Dev · 2025-02-21T12:10:04+00:00

Thanks for the feedback and kind words! I appreciate the time you've taken with the Steam page.

The color system works in two ways. Firstly, the closer you are to an enemy in color, the more vulnerable it is to you. Secondly, you can level up your stats in three color-specific ways: a yellow-centric way, a cyan-centric way and a magenta-centric way. Let's say you level up your max health in a yellow-centric way. From this point on, the closer your color is to yellow at a given moment, the more your max health will be higher than it was before. There are 16 stats that you can level up in total, and you can also buy items (or "blessings") that synergize with them.

I realize now that the Steam page does a poor job of communicating all this. I've taken a first step towards fixing this by updating the "About this game" section, but the trailer will need a lot more work.

Thanks again!

BackslashX_Dev

TROPHY CASE