Launching a game feels a bit like teaching a child to ride a bike. We’re about to let go and hope it rides off happily into the sunset rather than immediately falling flat on its face. But what will it take for us to call it a success?
Launching the game
The fact that we’ve got the game through to completion and launch is pretty much a success in itself. For every indie game that gets released many have fallen by the wayside, whether it’s due to lack of time, funds or resources. We’ve overcome all the obstacles and come out the other end with something to show for it. That’s a pretty good place to be.
Our enjoyment
Yes, there have been tears amongst the laughter, but when it comes down to it, we’ve enjoyed the rollercoaster ride of making Lucy Dreaming and what is life for if it’s not to be enjoyed? This whole project happened because we needed a new challenge and a new creative outlet and it’s been just that. We can look back on the last 2 years proud of time well spent.
Your enjoyment
This is probably the thing we hope for most. We want you to enjoy the game. This would be our greatest success, if you play the game and enjoy it, even perhaps, love it, that will be our biggest achievement. We’ve done what we can, we’ve tested and tweaked and listened to feedback. Above all we’ve created something with love and we hope that comes through in the playing.
Positive reviews
This is probably the best way for us to see your enjoyment, shares and tweets and messages of support mean a huge amount, but positive reviews, on platforms like Steam, can make or break an indie game. So please, if you enjoy the game, leave a review, it will make us feel warm and fuzzy inside and it will help the game find more people and make them happy too.
Money
This is the hardest one of the lot. All the stats, everything, says that we won’t actually make any money. So far, all our time has been put into the game for free. That’s months of our time, late nights, early mornings, missed social events and time spent not earning money from our other jobs. We’re lucky we’ve been able to produce the game without investing our own money as well as time, thanks to our Kickstarter backers and the UK Games Fund, but this still doesn’t pay the bills. It’s a sad state of all creative industries that we have to create for the love of the thing and that money is a bonus. Every sale makes a difference, we’re not expecting to get rich, what we hope for is enough money to cover some of our time so we can carry on dedicating some of our time to doing what we love.
Making another game
If all the planets align, if you buy the game, and like the game and leave a good review then just maybe we’ll be able to do all this again. Now, that really would look like success.