In other words people, email Marty and tell him what you want, but make sure
you put it all in one email so he can get a good database of what it is
we're looking for.
----- Original Message -----
From: <ma...@kidfriendlysoftware.com>
To: "Gamers Discussion list" <gamers@audyssey.org>
Sent: Wednesday, April 13, 2016 9:50 AM
Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Why I build the games as I do
I didn't say they didn't like it; I just said that from the email I've
received, I get far fewer requests for RPGs than other games (about 1 in 30
is a RPG request). Sports games abound, but when I push back and ask how
the game would be played, I usually don't get a response. A classic
suggestion is a basketball shooting game; I think it sounds pretty boring,
after playing it for a few minutes.
Building out an RPG would take months, and I can't see how to do any
return on that investment. Assume that the game would sell for $20, of
which apple keeps $7. Assume a programmer earns $40/hour. A game that
takes a month to build (and I think an RPG would take far more than that)
would need to generate 6,400 after apple's cut, or about $9100. At $20
per game, 500 people would have to purchase it just to break even. Given
that 80% of the people never purchase, I would need 2,500 downloads to
break even.
I am working with the programmer who built park boss, and I will probably
port that over to the iPhone. I've built a framework to mix my
infrastructure with C++ code, so it might not be overly complex. Since
park boss is in the direction of an RPG, or at least closer to a SIMS
environment, I can see how that game goes to try to project how any RPG
would go. Do you think this market could handle an RPG game for $40 to
$50?
--------- Original Message --------- Subject: Re: [Audyssey] Why I build
the games as I do
From: "dark" <d...@xgam.org>
Date: 4/13/16 7:34 am
To: "Gamers Discussion list" <gamers@audyssey.org>
@Marty, Blind people don't like rpgs? not true.
Go and check audiogames.net and observe the amount of people who reply to
rpg related topics, or indeed post a topic and ask. I suspect the
information you got from that statement was from a local focus group, ie,
society or association for the blind. Unfortunately, such places tend to
have a generally older population who are primarily interested in
traditional type games, however for younger gamers (and indeed those more
likely to own Ios devices), something a little more modern and complex
would
appeal more, indeed part of the problem with audiogames development is
that
there is a large amount of traditional games available and not so much
that
is none traditional, ie, I can think of about 8 versions of blackjack over
the years, but not one single version of a modern fantasy board game like
Talisman, much less a ccg, collectable card game.
I'll also add that rpgs don't need to be as complex as the games produced
by
companies like namco and squaresoft. dungeons and dragons do very well
with
basic mechanics, indeed most of what an rpg does mechanically can be
represented by dice rolls and risk assessments, the one difference is that
you have story and atmosphere added to that, as well as player progression
over time.
You might begin therefore by adapting some of the multiplayer fantasy
themed
card and board games for Ios, games like heroes of the multiverse or
talisman, or creating your own along similar lines if copywrite is an
issue.
These would be mechanically similar to games like roadtrip, hearts or dice
poker, just with more text involved, eg, a player would encounter a
monster
with a description of it's stats and be required to roll dice for combat,
or
a player would encounter a magical object card and decide whether to take
it
with them or not.
While I do enjoy the games in the collection thus far, I am a little sorry
none are games intended for longer or more complex play. There's nothing
wrong with a game of hearts, blackjack etc or a quick arcade game, however
unfortunately there has already been a lot of that sort of thing produced,
indeed I do wonder if some people are taking the attitude "well there are
several versions of hearts for pc, why should I pay to have one on my
Iphone?"
this isn't meant as an attack, as I said I enjoy the games for what they
are, it just saddens me to see developers now producing exactly the same
sorts of games we were seeing in the community 10 years ago, especially
with
the greater distribution and easier development inherent on Ios, indeed
it's
a little ironic that with one exception all of the more complex games
we've
seen recently for Pc or Ios have been games produced by sighted developers
who have accidently created accessible games, or have included access
requests in games that are %80 accessible such as adventure to fate, where
as games produced with the express intention of writing games for blind
people have intended to be simpler.
This isn't to say "where's audio final fantasy", only that some change and
advancement would be nice, especially if kidfriendly software are doing so
well as a company.
All the best,
Dark.
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