Author Topic: Pondering something...  (Read 5065 times)

ArenMook

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Pondering something...
« on: May 16, 2013, 02:43:23 PM »
I'm thinking of releasing full source code for Windward and possibly even Starlink, but not quite certain what to price it on, and if a full-out game would be of interest to many people. Starter kits tend to do fairly well on their own, but this would be a lot more than that. Way more code, and as well-commented as it may be, it's still a lot. What do you guys think?

Nicki

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Re: Pondering something...
« Reply #1 on: May 16, 2013, 04:44:39 PM »
I think it would be great. There's a lot to learn from practical implementations like those, so a fully functional game would give people insight into how it's done.

I have no clue as to how to price it though. :D

sabba2u

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Re: Pondering something...
« Reply #2 on: May 16, 2013, 11:54:07 PM »
It would be interesting to see how you laid out your menus and such.  Always nice to have something more advanced to learn off of.

marasto

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Re: Pondering something...
« Reply #3 on: May 17, 2013, 05:21:42 AM »
It is a great idea!
As Nicki said, there is a lot of things to learn from a full game implementation and not last about NGUI usage too.

The price ... Depend on how much code is there (I think a lot considering the games), the presence of comments, not everywhere but at least in the critical part, and also how much things could be "reusable", not in coding term but instead on what you are really learning from that full games. Also depend if all the assets are there or not.

Even if it is a full game I think you can't use an high target price, but something in the middle of certain Starter Kits could be be fine. Don't know... something like 59$ - 79$ should be enough but as I don't know the details and how much work there is behind :)


ArenMook

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Re: Pondering something...
« Reply #4 on: May 17, 2013, 05:37:40 AM »
Commenting wise, what I tend to do is write the logic, then go through it and comment it in plain English. This double-checks my own workflow and often finds issues that I've overlooked. So comment-wise, both projects are what you would expect after working with NGUI.

Do you guys think it would be better to split up the games into certain usable components instead, such as the entire UI workflow, since that's likely what the majority will be interested in?

$60 for a full-out game with all assets wouldn't be a good idea. Starter kits have 1% of the code of the games in question.

Majicpanda

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Re: Pondering something...
« Reply #5 on: May 22, 2013, 11:16:13 PM »
It's really hard for me to invest money in ideas or examples for a product I've purchased.  I think you may be able to sell me on something that had a bunch of example scenes that set up some cool things you did in each game, but a full project is too much code to jump right into.  I've bought frameworks in the past and they ended up being dumped in the trash because at the end of the day the code is just way to different than your own and a huge waste of time to reverse engineer.

With that said, I did study all your examples because it's 100x easier to break examples apart.  Problem is... how far out is Unity GUI? :)  You could sell me on a bunch of examples on it when it comes out... hint, haha.

Trithilon

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Re: Pondering something...
« Reply #6 on: May 23, 2013, 03:29:52 PM »
I remember seeing A* Pathfinding project (Normally $100) bundled with an FPS kit which essentially costed 125$ on the asset store somewhere, wonder how well it worked for them (Maybe you could ask them?).

So I think, you could sell them as Package deals :
Like Selling NGUI + WindWard/Starlink OR TNet + Windward/Starlink to give real world examples of those systems running in action.
$125-150 would be a decent price to ask for such bundles.

If you throw-in everything + Tutorials exploring the project (refer to Mecanim Animation Tutorial for a format of what I am trying to suggest), you could essentially sell these packages as a Noob-to-Pro learner package which will teach you most of the things you will need to make a game. Not only do you ensure that people will buy it with much less hesitation, but also you bring them into the Tasharen Ecosystem from the very beginning.
Say, you introduce  the package in the form of chapters, (AI, Networking, UI, Pathfinding, GameLogic etc.) at a frictionless price point ranging from 15-25$, they are much likely to learn and buy more to build upon when they like it.

Your target should be to replace that Bootcamp project as the top learner project series.
It will be a fair amount of work, but with the new - larger than ever - wave of Fresh Unity developers coming in (after Unity 4 Free for Mobile announcement), it makes sense to make this bet. Remember, these are newbies who want to jump-in and get ready made code along with video tutorials to back them up. It would be a wise idea to try your hand at a new product : Especially for a company whose Cash-cow Flagship product which will now be competing with the Free GUI solution to be offered by Unity 4.2.

You could also strip off the assets and textures and merely sell the game logic along with a few scenes covering most use cases.
Unfortunately, if you are targeting people who are new and willing to learn - what would sell the kits is how beautiful the screenshots look. Your call on that. The assets would be just laying around on your machines anyway if you don't.

As for me, as a warmed up nerd getting a hang of C# and interested in Multiplayer, I would be personally interested in buying the projects just to be able to learn from it and would gladly pick them up for 75-80$ a pop without a thought and if they were priced at say $150, I would think a few times, but I guess I would eventually buy them.

Alternatively, you could sell the entire source code and assets for a big huge price tag of $300-500 depending upon the project and see how it works (another experiment). Even if it sells 1 unit every 2 months, does it amount to similar profits with reduced support costs? Wonder how many units The substance database or Mixamo plugin sells in a month. Not many I bet.

Just random thoughts.

ArenMook

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Re: Pondering something...
« Reply #7 on: May 23, 2013, 08:33:02 PM »
The new GUI won't be in 4.2, I can safely tell you that much. I am working on it, and it is pretty cool and has a better design than NGUI, but for the time being it's nowhere near the point where I would be happy with it enough to let anyone use it.

Splitting the full game into compartmentalized tutorials that tie into each other is a good idea. I might just do that.

Trithilon

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Re: Pondering something...
« Reply #8 on: May 24, 2013, 01:29:52 AM »
Awesome! :)
And wow... great to know they hired you. I guess as on an assignment basis rather than a Full time Employee. :)