itch.io

[DividingByZero]

Does anyone use itch.io to distribute their games? I mean, I know people do - but anyone reading this thread? I am curious how good you think it is and what is your experience with premium games (do they sell?).

Ideally, a person puts their game on steam, but it is also harder to do. I am looking for places to distribute my small games, potentially free - but maybe premium if I get the quality to a point I am happy with.

 

[sharpie89]

Yeah I did, gets very little views, but it beats greenlight.

I decided to make my game free, even though I pretty much worked very hard at it.

If it doesn't sell, I at least want people to play my game though.

 

[DividingByZero]

Yeah I did, gets very little views, but it beats greenlight.

I decided to make my game free, even though I pretty much worked very hard at it.

If it doesn't sell, I at least want people to play my game though.

Thanks for the feedback. Mine will likely be free too, when I get there. I suppose it depends on how well you market it and get people to find it on itch.io, just putting it there won't ensure much.

 

[Ninety]

Itch.io is an excellent platform that can work well when combined with an effective marketing strategy. However it is uncommon to see higher-priced games and large projects there, for which you'd probably be better off going for Steam as well.

EDIT: I only have one jam entry on Itch.io myself, I was surprised to find a fair few people discovered it through the tags. So make sure you tag properly.

 

[sharpie89]

Itch.io is an excellent platform that can work well when combined with an effective marketing strategy. However it is uncommon to see higher-priced games and large projects there, for which you'd probably be better off going for Steam as well.

EDIT: I only have one jam entry on Itch.io myself, I was surprised to find a fair few people discovered it through the tags. So make sure you tag properly.

How long did it take to get some decent traffic? I don't know how else I can market my game, so I'm relying mostly on itch.io right now. I don't want to waste a lot of time marketing it, because I want to continue with my next project.

 

[DividingByZero]

I am guessing Twitter/Facebook are a good place to start online marketing too. Twitter include hashtags that would be searched by people you would expect would play your game (i.e. #rpg if you have a role playing game). Youtube can be effective too, people like to see gameplay. Especially effective would probably some "Let's Plays", by Youtubers with followers (or at a minimum by you). Youtube is another thing where tags can be important to help searches find your content. Busy forums that are related to your game (either just video game forums, or genre based, etc...) could potentially be good way to spread word, though many forums have advertising policies that you must navigate.

Unfortunately, all these things take some time - but I feel like you could setup a few of these things just to start building SEO juice, post updates as time permits. But, I think the Youtube videos are probably most important. If I am searching a new game to buy (or even free play) I watch videos to see what it is like first.

 

[sharpie89]

I agree, when I see people play a game on youtube, I know that game is gonna get traffic. How do you think developers contact the youtubers? Private message? Or a different way? Assuming you don't pay them, because the game is non-profit.

 

[DividingByZero]

Well, that can be the tricky part. But many of them give a contact email in the YouTube profile. Whether or not they respond is hard to say.

 

[Ninety]

How long did it take to get some decent traffic? I don't know how else I can market my game, so I'm relying mostly on itch.io right now. I don't want to waste a lot of time marketing it, because I want to continue with my next project.

If you're starting your marketing when the game's completed you're already too late. You need to build an audience so that when you release you have people waiting to play your game - marketing should start while the game is still in development. Pre-release, other developers are often your biggest audience.

Twitter is an excellent marketing platform for indie games, but it takes time and commitment. That's what I predominantly use (although I'm only lightly marketing right now) and I've seen it be very successful for a number of devs. Devlogs (not here: probably on TIGsource or similar) sometimes do well amongst the dev community. I've heard of people doing alright on Tumblr or Facebook, but that seems to be rarer. Twitter's definitely The Big One. Again, though, you won't get an audience overnight. It might take months of hard work.

Unless you were planning to make significant income on this game, I suggest chalking it up as a learning experience, and developing a strategy early on for your next project.

 

[sharpie89]

If you're starting your marketing when the game's completed you're already too late. You need to build an audience so that when you release you have people waiting to play your game - marketing should start while the game is still in development. Pre-release, other developers are often your biggest audience.

Twitter is an excellent marketing platform for indie games, but it takes time and commitment. That's what I predominantly use (although I'm only lightly marketing right now) and I've seen it be very successful for a number of devs. Devlogs (not here: probably on TIGsource or similar) sometimes do well amongst the dev community. I've heard of people doing alright on Tumblr or Facebook, but that seems to be rarer. Twitter's definitely The Big One. Again, though, you won't get an audience overnight. It might take months of hard work.

Unless you were planning to make significant income on this game, I suggest chalking it up as a learning experience, and developing a strategy early on for your next project.

I get your idea, but I feel like things aren't the same anymore.

I know that gamers feel this too. Every time I go on steam or itch.io, I get bombarded with pre-alpha-release, survival, open-world, zombie etc. games. And you just know deep down that the game is gonna suck, because you've played a million of those.
Same goes for the MMORPG tag. I get the feeling that gamers are on to this too, and I think we should not release pre-alpha games or build up hype like that, but just release a finished game (well almost), every time. This gives a bit of credibility to gamers when they play your game, made by you as a developer. If I've seen a glitchy crashy game from a developer, I don't even remember his name. But when I see a finished, polished game. His game resonates the next time I hear: From the creator of (x); Besides that, there's a huge lack of original content, games like factorio and minecraft are not supposed to be rare with so many people developing.

It's because people are going for the cash-grab and imitation lately. I say we should make original, finished games instead of building a huge library of glitchy unoriginal games.

I just don't feel like finishing an unpolished game, just for the sake of giving these goddamn gamers the same feeling I got when I played OOT or any rareware game.
Sure it aint glitchless, but it's obviously done.

 

[Ninety]

I think you've misinterpreted my post. I'm not suggesting you should release unfinished games, I don't know where you even got that from. I'm saying that unless you start building interest prior to release, you will not have an audience when you do.

 

[DividingByZero]

Right, sort of treat it like Kickstarter (even though you aren't funding). You are releasing concepts, story elements, art, gameplay footage, timeline, etc... to get people interested in it. Make a developer blog - showing your progress periodically.

Then - when the time is right (and only then), you could consider an alpha release - if you wanted to go that route. You could even build that up, so the followers you have built can start trying it out, spreading the word. But, I only recommend if your game is really good, even in it's 'alpha' state. If it is broken, people will get a bad taste, probably not come back and very likely spread the word.

 

[Yal]

I can definitely recommend itch.io... even if you won't get a lot of traffic or anything, it has lots of convenient controls that makes uploading and managing your stuff easy, it's MUCH easier to upload stuff to than GameJolt. There's also a bunch of non-game categories, so you could upload scrapped resources and such that someone else might use, or try to sell an art book separately if your game gets popular, and such. Just don't be too spammy, they actually moderate the site

(To name one pretty major incident, Digital Homicide uploaded their stuff there, including those cloned shmup games, and were suspended. Those were some interesting days. Soon after, a feature was changed that you're now forced to preview a game page before you can publish it. )

 

[ajan-ko]

I can definitely recommend itch.io... even if you won't get a lot of traffic or anything, it has lots of convenient controls that makes uploading and managing your stuff easy, it's MUCH easier to upload stuff to than GameJolt. There's also a bunch of non-game categories, so you could upload scrapped resources and such that someone else might use, or try to sell an art book separately if your game gets popular, and such. Just don't be too spammy, they actually moderate the site

(To name one pretty major incident, Digital Homicide uploaded their stuff there, including those cloned shmup games, and were suspended. Those were some interesting days. Soon after, a feature was changed that you're now forced to preview a game page before you can publish it. )

Ah, the infamous slaughtering grounds.
Edit: by the way what is he doing on itch.io?

By the way, can you change the price once it published in itch.io?

 

[Yal]

Ah, the infamous slaughtering grounds.
Edit: by the way what is he doing on itch.io?

By the way, can you change the price once it published in itch.io?

That's the one
I'm pretty sure they didn't upload Slaughtering Grounds itself, but a lot of other asset flips / fake games / recycled shovelware. In either case, they're banned from the site now and all their "games" were taken down.

And yeah, you can change the price at any time, and even arrange sales and bundles (with limited duration). Their latest addition is a "limited extras" thing (forget what it's called) that lets you do things like the first 100 customers getting a discount, or set up open-but-limited-slots beta testing etc.

 

[NazGhuL]

I get bombarded with pre-alpha-release, survival, open-world, zombie etc.

Oh God i'm with you with this. It kills the genre.

 

[Sam (Deleted User)]

Am I the only person who hates the website's url/title? It's so random and has nothing to do with games, yet that is what the website is meant for. A little dumb for a title, but other than that, I do prefer it over Game Jolt a little. I have mixed feelings. I'm not sure if anyone outside of the indie dev community actually knows it exists (i.e. real players, not fellow devs looking for inspiration to drool on)...

 

[Thylacine Studios]

For a little perspective: I've sold about 20,000 copies of my games on Steam, and 13 copies of my games on itch.io. Can't say it's exactly worth the effort.

 

[Geoff Jones]

Which game?

 

[Caique Assis]

I have the same feeling towards it - overall, I find it easier and more enjoyable to setup than Game Jolt - the pages are more customizable without much effort, but the biggest problem, like others have pointed out, is visibility. You can have way more visibility on Game Jolt than on itch.io.

I released my game Free for Fall on both platforms, and started pushing the itch.io page more with my marketing efforts because it was better looking than the Game Jolt one. What happened is that my game was featured on Game Jolt, and so I have way more access there than on itch.io. That made me sorta stop referring to the itch.io page and start using more the Game Jolt one.

But both services are free to use, so it doesn't hurt having your game on both of them - after all, the more places you put your game on, the more visibility it will get, and also affects search results on search engines.

 

[NazGhuL]

Released game, released game. X quantiy sold...I didn't see any quick links to your stuff in your signature guys?!

 

[zbox]

I use it to sell assets, somewhat similar. Itch.io is such a fantastic service.
great little treat for me to get money that is not 3 months behind and missing 30% off the top (im looking at you marketplace)

 

[Yal]

I use it to sell assets, somewhat similar. Itch.io is such a fantastic service.
great little treat for me to get money that is not 3 months behind and missing 30% off the top (im looking at you marketplace)

Yeah, the good thing with Itchio's fanbase mostly being indie devs from various different fields is that unlike the Marketplace, you can sell assets to devs using everything between GM, Unity and RPG Maker. I mostly make assets, so I can't say I'm hurt visibility-wise... lots of people visiting the site are after the kind of stuff I'm offering even if it's kinda niche

 

[sitebender]

I have tested itch.io and GameJolt with exclusive games for both to see which gathers the most attention. In my experience, GameJolt by far gave me a wider audience. itch.io its a struggle. Even with traffic and focus being put into the itch.io there are just no visitors for my games except for 2 keywords "rogue" and "MetroidVania." I had to pull out the rogue keyword as the game changed and the game felt the impact.

Over on Reddit the itch.io owner / maker has chimed in saying there are a lot of players to developers.