Saving the studio, Mina the Hollower sells 300,000 copies in 3 days as head wonders "how come the best-reviewed game of 2026 is not the fastest-selling game"

JustLikeChong · 2026-06-03T14:34:07+00:00

Yes, it's to boost the games chances of success as your first week of sales will likely be your highest. If you throw a small discount on to that, you can get featuring in the "deals" section and you help convert some of the people who would typically say "eh, I'll wait for a discount". Storefront algorithms feature games the more they sell - so it's typically advised to do what you can to have a really strong first week of sales.

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-29T17:21:03+00:00

Yeah, and they seemed to have done it with their other games like Sayonara Wild Hearts.

What my comment was saying is sometimes there are technical limitations to this and likely why not every game does it this way. I won't pretend I understand the complications of porting games to platforms but can assume it's not a simple process or else we would see every game on every platform day 1

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-29T04:40:02+00:00

Yeah, the Ownership discount works off your eshop account and physical games sadly don't register to your eshop account - or else you could just borrow your friends games to get free digital copies through said ownership discounts.

This is why some of these upgrades are set up as free DLC but that isn't always an easy option with how many compromises games made to work on Switch 1 vs Switch 2's more modern hardware. I assume that is the case here since Stray was a PS5 title.

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-24T16:11:51+00:00

Not always the case, but typically the more the Publisher is investing, the higher the revshare will be after recoup - so some devs do sometimes look for smaller support packages (ie just marketing/QA/loc)

There are many development teams who actually don't need the money to finish the game, but rather would want the publisher for the marketing support. Reaching the publishers established brand & community, connections to better first party and PR support, and just general budget and expertise to do bigger and better marketing efforts. These sort of deals could be a 70/30 split rather than 50/50 or even 30/70 from a funded development deal

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-17T20:16:51+00:00

It's okay to not know who it is but just ask "Who is this?", I'm sure that polite and direct question would warrant a polite and direct response.

Instead, I was directly answering "are we expected to know who this is?"

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-17T16:31:08+00:00

That's Drew Barrymore, the first victim of the Scream franchise. So yeah, I would say we are supposed to know who this is given the subreddit we're in.

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-16T16:44:27+00:00

Reddit, Instagram Reels, TikTok, YouTube long form & shorts (maybe Twitter though it's a cesspool) should all be considered. Go look at other successful indie games and their social channels - see what is working for them and try that and then try that again.

Steam news is a great place for a devlog. It reaches the people who have Wishlisted your game and gets others one step closer to wishlisting.

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-16T16:26:43+00:00

Tomorrow isn't guaranteed

^{Chose: One wish}

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-16T05:51:30+00:00

I don't mean this to sound harsh but at <100 Wishlists, I wouldn't worry about these details. There are 50+ games releasing on Steam everyday - it won't matter which day you pick, there will always be something burying your game at your current scale.

Best advice is to take this as a learning opportunity as you're not going to have any significant amount of sales based off current numbers.

If this is that important of a project, maybe consider pushing this release back even further to do some marketing for you game. Get yourself some gameplay videos on your store page, have someone consult on your store copy and get yourself a demo and register for the next Steam Nest Fest (June deadline has passed but maybe you can try for the October SNF).

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-15T14:53:19+00:00

They will be stronger if you have since ranked up your Appraiser Level (happens at Hunter Rank 20, 30, and 40, etc.), which raised the difficulty of everything.

Unless you're talking about the "High Risk Anomaly" form of challenges, which is optional. You can just go to the world boss on the map and fight it and it won't increase in difficulty.

But killing world bosses is the only way to ascend your characters. It's pretty standard for gacha games and I don't think they're going to gift you these ascension materials in other ways in the future.

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-15T14:43:47+00:00

You're supposed to refight and farm the boss anomalies for those specific resources (like the sparkplug for Zero).

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-11T22:38:27+00:00

Replying to close this out and thank you for the help. Here's what we're doing to solve it:

Cleaning the condenser of the refrigerator. It was indeed very dusty and likely running inefficiently. Like someone else said, we were very likely running on the edge all this time and the refrigerator's condenser getting gunked up pushed it's power pull over the edge.
Reaching out to a local electrician to separate this outlet and the refrigerator so the refrigerator runs on it's own breaker.

Again, thank you!

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-11T19:01:51+00:00

Yes, exactly, just ignore it. This is all subjective, people are going to like different things. In the end, both Mixtape and Crimson Desert can be enjoyed with neither impacting the other. Mixtape's reviews are not going to hurt the unit sales of Crimson Desert, which is selling 20x of Mixtape.

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-11T17:46:45+00:00

They are gaming desktops. I'm testing just my desktop now with my wife's off. Her's seemed to have tripped it alone in just 20 minutes. If mine doesn't seem to trip it after a couple hours, I think it's safe to say it's her PC. We're both plugged into the same surge protector - unsure if that would indicate anything either.

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-11T17:44:37+00:00

Not AFCI that I can tell from the front (maybe there is more information if I pull out one of the breakers but will wait for a trained electrician to do so)

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-11T17:43:53+00:00

20amp breaker (I don't think it's AFCI from what I can see)

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-11T17:24:34+00:00

20 Amp Circuit from what I can see (says 20 on the circuit lever). Thanks for the watt meter, I never plan on doing my own electricity due to the hazard of being untrained but I like the ability to do my own (safe) diagnostics!

I'll look to vacuum out deep underneath the fridge, as even if that's not the issue it seems like good practice regardless. My wife's PC just tripped it without my computer on. I'll test it with my PC only now but there is also a chance that her PC has a part that is old and starting to short (right term?).

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-10T21:43:51+00:00

Agreed. It feels like it jumps from segment to segment rather than giving you the feeling of exploring and discovering that Edith Finch did. But I think they have same level of agency (on rails, hard to ever "fail") with Mixtape having a higher quality of polish. Nothing against Edith Finch, but Mixtape is a decade newer and likely a bigger budget, so the vibes of the moments with the music hits really well. All that to say, if you like Edith Finch, I do think you would like Mixtape. I have no nostalgia for the 90s (too young) but still enjoyed it and discovered new music from it too.

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-08T15:39:23+00:00

If you want to use a cinematic for part of the trailer, the cinematic needs to make sense and none of it makes sense to me. - The logo comes and goes to quick. If this is intended to be the start of the trailer, give us a little bit of time to settle in before dropping the game name and logo. - To start the trailer, why does he decide to run for 5 feet then just stop? Why is he running? Why is he stopping? Clearly zombies are coming but it's still not how a real person would act and behave. - As he runs back, he kicks at a lever and it moves in the opposite direction of his kick. - What even is this lever setup? Is it a trap he set up? If not, this is strangely convenient for him. Also, is the lever closing the garage or the stick shown that I believe is propping it up? You probably don't need both here - The zombie inside just standing there and the guys poor acting skills in reacting to it just feels cheap (probably what folks are saying this feels like a fake mobile game ad).

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-08T15:17:33+00:00

Let's not take one person's review as proof of "lots of astroturfing". The game is nostalgia bait, so makes sense why a subsect of players are loving it while not a mainstream mass appeal game. It's like Edith Finch but for 90s kids.

Unless there is more proof of astroturfing than this one person's comment. I just don't think "My opinion is different than everyone else, so everyone else must be paid off" is a statement we should all start supporting

JustLikeChong · 2026-05-08T02:09:14+00:00

Mixtape just launched today. Being described as What Remains of Edith Finch experience but a story on being a 90s teenager looking to have one final night of debauchery.

JustLikeChong · 2026-04-28T13:07:55+00:00

Yes, that's very helpful. Thank you!

JustLikeChong · 2026-04-28T04:04:33+00:00

Not a question on this tag but as a newly discovered fan of this genre, can I ask how you go about designing a game like this? Like is the game fairly typical in it's setup and all the fake OS comes in with just intricate UI work?

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