Why All Spiderweb Games Are Now Cheaper Forever
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We released our first game in January, 1995. That is a long time ago, and much has changed. A few helpful comparisons.
Now: Huge distributors like Steam and iTunes sell massive numbers of copies for low prices, and Indie developers make good money on huge volume.
Then: The World Wide Web barely existed and we scraped by on a handful of sales from AOL.
Now: A quality Indie niche game sells on big portals for ten bucks at most. More than that and people think you're crazy and move on.
Then: Most good shareware games sold for $25. It took me a very long time just to realize that that price isn't normal anymore.
Now: Indie developers can make excellent livings selling lots of copies of cheap games.
Then: Indie game developers were called "shareware developers," and everyone thought they were losers and spat on them.
Now: Want to pirate a game? It just takes 3 seconds of searching on Pirate Bay.
Then: Took five minutes of searching instead of three seconds. This actually made a big difference.
Now: Many new games are given away for free and make their money on micro-transactions from a portion of their users.
Then: FREE games? With micro-WHAT? What are you? A SORCEROR?