Some creators disappointed with XNA Community Games sales

The community games I'm talking about, that sounded general >.

I think that's pretty common. I blame two factors here 1) No achievements. 2) No user reviews. The bigger issue I am betting is achievements though. Many people expect to get those points when they play a game and don't pay for titles without them. I bet if they allowed even 50 points in one of these games the sales would jump.

They can't put Gamerscore on XNA games because people like me would get rich of off a black screen that said "Press A!" and then you'd get that little bloop.

Don't get me wrong - I *love* achievements. But I really don't weigh how easy/hard the achievements are (or if they exist) into my purchase. Do people really do that?

It's just now that I've graduated college and living in "real" life, I don't have time to try out dozens of demos. And since there isn't a way to review XNA titles, I do want to bother sifting through the crap to find the gems. And since my friends don't either, I don't expect they'll ever tell me if they find a real winner.

I agree, I believe thats part and parcel of the reason I don't buy, with the added fact that you never know what is good and what is meh until you try, and you won't try all, they should have a star rating

@Duke

I think you nailed the issue completely. There really does need to be a user rating system. Some of the XNA games are really pretty bad, but there are some good games in there. The problem is that there aren't many, if any, reviews to be found. People don't review games like they review official releases. So without reviews many people simply aren't going to waste their time trying to figure out which ones are good.

And, yes, I agree that having even a small amount of achievements would result in a sales boost. People are more willing to try out games they are unfamiliar with if they can at least get a few point added to their gamescore.

Erluti, what about a single 10GS acheivement per community game? It'd be better than nothing but it wouldn't break the system.

Check out Groov. You won't be disappointed.

I just want a ratings system.

I doubt it. The App Store is a massive clusterfuck of crap at this point. At least there isn't much competition in the community games thing.

More lucrative? Maybe

But then again, there is the 90 days refund problem...

http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/r/iPhone/iPhone+news/news.asp?c=12333

No one is safe...

The Apple refund rumor is mostly bunk:

http://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/87k3h/apples_iphone_app_refund_policies_could_bankrupt/

Because 1 developer?

http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/03/25/apples-iphone-app-refund-policies-could-bankrupt-developers/

They have the full contract, and many other sources have confirmed it as well, the fact that it didn't happen to this 1 developer doesn't mean that it won't happen, and the fact that developers have already signed this is the scary part

So instead of competing against hundreds of titles, you go against thousands? How does that translate into more success? Plus you have to develop your iPhone apps on Macs. And do iPhone apps get peer tested and reviewed? or just thrown onto the system?

The iPhone has alot of influencers out there.

The Community games section just needs more publicity from Microsoft on the dashboard. There are alot of gems there. And good alternatives to XBLA titles. Namely Death Tank (1200pts) vs Battle Havok (400pts)

I'd say it's more lucrative because the install base is so much bigger - mobile apps are where people really can just impulse buy. iPhone users tend to get bored, want a quick fix, and don't mind paying 1-5 bucks for a game. They know what kind of quality they'll get with 1 dollar.

XNA downloaders are at least experienced gamers - I'd argue that they demand more quality compared to those looking for a fix on iPhone. Basically, you can make some money selling crappier games on an iPhone - if you're an indie developer, you may not have the time and money to spend on making a quality app - you might be able to polish it enough for release, but that might not be enough to satiate a 360 gamer.

The App store might be loaded with a lot of crapware at this point but it's hard to argue with the $ potential on iPhone if your game gets a bit of buzz around it. Make a good game on the iPhone and you will be successful. I hear a positive review of a game on iPhone that is in the $1-$3 range and I'll buy it without much hesitation. A large part of that is the ease of purchase and instant gratification factor. I need to hear a lot of buzz about an XNA title to get me to check it out.

HAHAHAHAHANO.

I would much rather release a Community Games title that gets almost no sales than deal with the abject cluster%$#$ that is Objective-C (the programming language you HAVE to use on the iPhone/Mac OS X). XNA is a much nicer API, and it's much easier to develop for than the iPhone-- in my experience. Other folks may be able to wrap their heads around Obj-C easier than I; more power to them.

@John Z

I never said anything about which was easier ;) I prefer C# to Objective C anyday.

Samfish, your argument makes little sense.

FUD, actually.

A typical Gamestop is still full of crap, used games, discounted HALO 2 action figures from McFarlaine, sales bins, but yet I still manage to go in and get the game I want.

The good apps on the AppStore are reviewed as such, there are several sites that cover iPhone apps, and friends tell each other about good finds - including the instant over-the-air purchase that helps push impulse buys by interested consumers, versus the 'write this down and check it out later on your 360 when you get home' thing the XNA system is hindered by because it's for the home.

You're suggesting that the nearly totally-ignored XNA system is better to stay with because it's less crowded, but by lacking any review system, and inherently not being able to benefit from a 'hear about it, open the app store on your phone and buy it' ecosystem, it's even WORSE for devs I would say, as they're likely even MORE doomed to stay in obscurity on the XNA Community - simply put, almost no one cares about that thing. I'd put better odds on quality being recognized in the crowded AppStore, because more people access it. Not to mention the XNA games are pretty expensive in comparison!

I would suggest a better gameplan might be to switch over to the iPhone, a platform that's just devouring quality games when they arrive right now, get some traction, and then develop the game to be sold like 'Geometry Wars' or 'Everyday Shooter' for the 360/PS3 if the game shows crossover potential.

Go where the interested consumers are, devs.

Pretty much, for me at least. Especially because there are so many of them. And especially since I came across one that simply let you control the rumble in the controller. Wheee

"Of the 7595 downloads his game DUOtrix had received, only 157 were converted into full purchases" I don't really have a good frame of reference to make a comparison, but I'm sure the conversion rate on every XBLA & XNA game is pretty abysmal. I'd venture that most people, upwards of 90% I'd guess, downloading demos never have any sort of intention on making a purchase.

"I'd venture that most people, upwards of 90% I'd guess, downloading demos never have any sort of intention on making a purchase."

Haha, that's definitely true for all my 360 owning friends. One of them filled up the majority of his 20 gigabyte hard drive with demos, but the only full game he had was Geometry Wars, and that's because I bought it. Freaking cheapskate.

The only game I've ever bought based on the demo was World of Goo. There are other games I've rented, but none I've bought. (Well, except for games I was planning to buy anyway before playing the demo, but those don't count.)

I've done some XNA programming but haven't published anything yet. I view it as a hobby for me, and nothing more.

I want to help support these guys, I just don't have the time to d/l many games. The games I have played have been excellent.

From my point of view they should be looking for the exposure and experience. This is a good way to help you get a job, but to make it big just by making an indie game? Doubt it.

I think tenor nailed it right on the head. I've looked at XNA and have been debating putting in some hours to do a little toying around on the 360 Console, but it'd be for little more than 1) experience with coding on a console, and 2) something to put into my portfolio of things I've done. You're really not gonna make it big doing XNA. You'd probably have a better chance getting noticed doing modifications for big games with big modding communities.

Groov is pretty cool too.

"but iPhone gaming is getting it's own dedicated media coverage."

and?... the fact that it is getting dedicated media coverage means squat, hell, even the N-gage had dedicated media coverage...

And also this statement isn't true

"the iPhone is a hot bed of indie development"

Most of the best products on it are not from indie studios

"the agument about it being all crap is ignorant nonsense."

The argument isn't "everything is crap" but rather "most game available on the App store are crap"

i dont think you got his point.
personally, i hate almost every game on the platform
and have bought community games for my 360...

but, im not a retard or blind
anyone can tell that media coverage means a lot
maybe it doesnt make the app better, which it doesnt
but it gives it a bigger user base, higher profits
and thus motive to make better apps.

if Microsoft can market and implement community games well
it might just be the next big thing it promised to be
but right now, they still need to move up a few levels
much higher than iphone yes, but at upto that first.

a big thing for XNA games is that they are running against XBLA.
and even more, running agaisnt all those retail games.
with i phone, you read about a game you buy, you get bored
with XNA, you think, you check out, you download free..
you get bored, you never buy..

so i think a little better implementation with small changes
and XNA will be on it's way.
it may not be an iphone killer in popularity
but in quality, it is the iphone killer allready.

250 Gamer score 400 ms points!

I wouldn't say XNE is a failure but I think we've reached the points where some of those issues should be addressed in a spring update.

There are some things that run pretty slow. However, on the whole, I'm a pretty happy cat about how the NXE has turned out. Like it a lot. Old dash was pretty damn easy to cruise through and get what you wanted, though, can't argue that.

I completely agree. The XNA games take forever to get to. I don't think they're even advertised on the main pages.

NXE caching sounds like a good idea.

NXE is a "complete and utter failure?"

No. Not even close. I think it's far, far easier to navigate content in NXE than it was in the previous dashboard. The UI is much easier on the eyes with NXE, and though there are still a few moments where it pauses to do stuff, I think it's faster on the whole.

It's not perfect, but labeling it as a "complete and utter failure" is just stupid. There is a gray area between bad and good (or fail and win if you're an internet junkie), and that's where NXE falls.

so maybe 'complete and utter failure' is a bit harsh but my point stands that the interface is difficult to navigate and honestly when you have to navigate several menus to get to the place to find new games, its cluttered, and not clean and like I say, irritating to have to wait on things to populate. It's a triple core 3ghz processor and it has a hard drive, it shouldn't be taking minutes to populate a dang list.

I wouldn't say it's a complete failure, but I agree that it's sort of clunky and slow. I find it easier to just hit the guide button and bring up the miniblades than to navigate the main dash. For example, the damned 3D friend list takes too long to appear. I can see right away that X number of friends are online, but my list will be empty for a few seconds. I actually end up scrolling down the list so their names pop-up before the graphics actually appear. IMO, NXE is all flash and no substance. Everything is the same or worse than before.

All that said, you do realize this article is about XNA games and not the NXE dash, right?

Right, but I believe part of the problem with the XNA community games is that the NXE is difficult to navigate, was my point.

There is a lot more to lists and how fast they populate than processor speed.

But I disagree with you about NXE being hard to navigate. With the old dashboard, I spent a lot of time wondering where certain things would be located, and which direction to press to get to which area of content. There were a lot of text-based lists, and you had to navigate very deep into an item just to see what the heck it actually was.

With NXE, you can see everything from the start. Some of the online content is organized a bit oddly, but after one or two browsing sessions, it's easy to find stuff. And it's very easy to jump into content and see what related items are available, what actions can be performed on said content, etc.

The only thing I wish NXE had was a text search for online content.