Subject: Re: [stella] Money matters... From: "Andrew Davie" <adavie@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Date: Sat, 19 May 2001 14:27:04 +1000 |
> This is an open call to anyone listening. If you have an opinion, voice it. As a recent developer of a completed/released, and dare I say fun, 2600 game, I thought I'd throw my experience into the ring. I expect I spent about two months on my game, all-up, on a part-time basis. Probably total hours were in the order of 300 or so - certainly nothing like full-time. Obviously my experience helped me out considerably - I knew what I wanted, and how to do it. I expect most would take significantly more time to do similar work. Now, from my 300 hours of work, I have so far released 50 cartridges (the PhillyClassic version). My production costs per cartridge were $10 to Hozer Video, $1 for labels, and another $2 or so for sundries (manual, postage, organisation). I was left with an in-pocket profit of US$850. That's for just 50 cartridges. The coming special-edition is essentially sold out (just a few places left), and the anticipated buy-price of that will be US$35/unit. The extra cost is justified by the colour box, CD/floppy with in-production versions, hardcopy listing, numbered/signed specially printed glossy label, and anything else I can think of to throw in. My production costs on these will probably be closer to US$20/unit, but that will still leave me with a paper profit of something like US$1500. I don't think I can expect many incoming $ after that. So my total for the production of one game is in the order of US$2300. For two months' hobby work, this is reasonable - but not enough to live on. I have outsorced the production of the cartridges, and the box, and will make the manual and label myself (but printed externally). I pay for all of these extras, commercial rates. But still, I can make a tidy profit on the cartridges. So, for me, a proposed figure like US$200/game is simply not even in the ballpark. I can't see ANY attraction of developing this way. Any future 2600 game I might write would probably be done exactly the way I've done it now. Sure, it's a bit more work - but also, it's a bit more fun. And, at 10x the profit... it pays a lot more! Having said that, I don't mind the idea of publishing under a common banner. I do see some advantages to brand-recognition by a single entity being responsible for the release of several '2600 games. But although this is attractive to me, I couldn't see myself doing it when I can achieve the rewards as outlined above, by doing it myself. Cheers A -- _ _ _| _ _ _| _ * _ _ , (_|| )(_|( (/_\/\/ (_|(_|\/(_(/_ ,~' L_|\ ,-' \ see my Museum of Soviet Calculators at ( \ http://www.taswegian.com/MOSCOW/soviet.html \ __ / Qb: the latest retro video game! L,~' "\__/ http://www.atari2600.org/qb.html @--> v - Archives (includes files) at http://www.biglist.com/lists/stella/archives/ Unsub & more at http://www.biglist.com/lists/stella/
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