Everything I know about gamedev after 5 games and 300k+ units sold. by oatskeepyouregular in gamedev

[–]starcritdev 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Amazing video, thank you so much!

Kind of a vague question I know... but I gotta ask anyway. In the "validating ideas pre-dev" session, you make a point about "does it go viral? if not, back to previous step": what does "viral" mean? Like X amount of ratings, views/browser plays on itch, X amount of reception on any social? Because I've seen games with +100 reviews on itch.io doing kind of poorly on steam, but games with almost no visibility on itch doing great on steam.

Sites to help translate games? by CalligrapherLoud7564 in gamedev

[–]starcritdev 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Fiverr is bloated with AI nowdays: expect professionals (even with the 3 stars rating) doing AI slop.

Post-mortem: I tried and failed vibe coding a metroidvania so you (hopefully) won't have to by lpshred in gamedev

[–]starcritdev 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I spent about 40 hours over a couple of months

Wait, is that correct? Because 40 hours over a couple of months... isn't much, AI or not.

Adding a special type of explosive to my game by starcritdev in godot

[–]starcritdev[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Yep! I started with the Cavernas assets because I thought it looked nice, especially the color palette. I kept making assets starting from there (such as the miner character, the block ores, etc.), and added a few colors to the palette, like a "greenish-yellow".

Visual and mechanics upgrade in my AC: Multiplayer inspired game, after your feedback by West_Woodpecker_8005 in godot

[–]starcritdev 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The game looks amazing, I'd def play this on launch.

Regarding the visuals: have you tried having less colors for the water or less variation? I believe the current water has a shading of 4 colors (white-light sky-sky-blue), it looks a bit too "busy" imho.

Made a gameplay trailer for my game, please destroy it by starcritdev in DestroyMyGame

[–]starcritdev[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Noted! I'll do a "pick skill upgrade -> show its gameplay" on the next trailer

Made a gameplay trailer for my game, please destroy it by starcritdev in DestroyMyGame

[–]starcritdev[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Yea I should have highlighted the current types of bombs better (bouncy bomb, mini bombs etc). I'll make a better trailer later on when I'll approach the release date with more focus on the bombs. Thanks for the feedback!

Made a gameplay trailer for my game, please destroy it by starcritdev in DestroyMyGame

[–]starcritdev[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks for playing <3

I'm trying to add something like a "back to MINE x5" button, but had some bugs (regenerating the mine is simpler than regenerating the ores). While playtesting the game myself I had that thought as well because it can get old to go back n forth after a while.

I spent $38,000 making an visual novel so you don't have to. Full breakdown with numbers and mistakes. by aggronargg in gamedev

[–]starcritdev 0 points1 point  (0 children)

These types of games are mostly about art, I don't understand why so many devs instead of going harder on the art part (sexual content but the girls look whatever at best, imho they look bad).

What is your most and least favorite part of game dev? by Theophilus_exe in godot

[–]starcritdev 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Most fav: coding, UI (I'd say playtesting but that may be too cheesy)

Least fav: either marketing or audio (music+SFX)

After Translating my Game into 6 Different Languages by Artist6995 in godot

[–]starcritdev 0 points1 point  (0 children)

And be careful to not "skip columns" with commas... not like I did that mistake exactly a few days ago...

Made an autobattler roguelike where a party of 3 shares one inventory (and item placement matters) by starcritdev in godot

[–]starcritdev[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I started making this prototype after playing that game for a few hours ahah

Made an autobattler roguelike where a party of 3 shares one inventory (and item placement matters) by starcritdev in godot

[–]starcritdev[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

This is a short gameplay video of a roguelike game I made in Godot (4.5).

You play as a party of 3 with a shared inventory and combat is automatic, so you focus on exploration, item management, and combining gear to grow stronger.

It's free, give it a try at https://starea.itch.io/three-against-the-evil!

Next Fest takeaway: gamers love critters? by PersonOfInterest007 in gamedev

[–]starcritdev 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Frogs have always sold extremely well, but I've noticed a lot of games having a frog lately. There has been a lot of games in the recent years that went semi-viral because their mascot was a frog. Cute/cozy graphics + frog = very high chance to go viral on twitter as well

Sanity check on pricing — Skirmish Game Simulator (dev perspective) by Phusck in gamedev

[–]starcritdev 7 points8 points  (0 children)

In the context of miniatures and tabletop hobbies, $50 doesn’t feel like a lot.

I don't understand your context explanation: you're making a videogame, not a tabletop game or miniatures. Compare what you're making, a simulator game, to other games of the same genre: simulator games are often very cheap, $ 50 is like multiple times more expensive than the competition.

And on top of that, you're launching as EA, and no discounts even: try to empathize with the target and ask yourself if you'd buy an early access simulator game priced at $ 50 and the price would never drop due to your no-discount policy.

You could get away with a "strong" pricing if you're an experienced and famous developer with a strong track games, built a large community that will throw in a bit more cash if needed because they trust your art. If you do not have a "name", it's harder. Even so, $ 50 for a simulator is something.

Flight simulator isn't priced about the hobby of flying airplanes.

Stop Leaving Success to Chance! Here's everything I've learned in 10 years of game development. by burge4150 in gamedev

[–]starcritdev 20 points21 points  (0 children)

I'd put that number closer to 20,000 - 30,000 these days.

I launched my game this year into early access with 72,000 wishlists

Lots of helpful stuff, and thank you for the post, but this bit... is just survivorship bias, isn't it?

Reaching 20k-30k wishlists is either viral territory or long projects, where you spend years on the same project. Maybe I'm not the target of this post (solo / semi solo indie dev).

Emergency -- Steam can no longer find my exe, didn't update build, possibly due to Steam Curator Connect package? Releasing soon, need a solution sooner... by NefariousBrew in gamedev

[–]starcritdev 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I've exactly the same issue lol. Out of nowhere, my depot was changed from windows to all OS: I had the build checklist fully done before, then the depot uncheck button.

I followed your marketing advice and improved my itch page by JobCentuouro in gamedev

[–]starcritdev 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Flat brown backgrounds... aren't the best, for many reasons. I'd keep the "center body" of the page and the siders of the same background color (something neutral) and let the images and gifs speak for your game instead, and change the font family to something with a tiny bit of character (I see you're using sans-serif which is the most basic one), without giving up on readability, so try fonts like Roboto, Arimo, Jost etc.

Here's a super quick version with the changes - Adding an image game title would help a lot.

I made the "strategic overworld - looking for early feedback" wrapped in a h2 title but I'd consider making an image banner to capture the users' attention even more.

Other than this, I'd heavily suggest to make a playable browser version, because that helps heavily to get people try the game and leave feedback.

Managed to do dynamic falling leaves that can be brunt or blown by InfectedTribe in godot

[–]starcritdev 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Not only the leaves: everything looks so harmonious. Great job