Indie Game Developer, How Can I Make Something People Want?

[Slamduncan747]

I'm 16 and had about 2 years of game development experience. I've been looking into business and fastlane entrepreneurship for a while now and originally ruled out game development, but decided I want to give releasing a game a shot. My concern is that I don't want to spend months developing a game that no one will want to play. While there are some game developers in here I know that most people aren't although I'd assume there are traditional business principles that will relate to this. Unfortunately, solving the problem of entertaining people can be more vague than say solving a more specific clearly defined problems. Any ideas or strategies that may help?
PS. I am working on improving my game art development, if any artists see this and are interested in partnering lmk.

 

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[SEBASTlAN]

Look at games in the app store that get a lot of downloads but have 3-3.5 star reviews and learn from the feedback to make a better game.

 

[MRiabov]

Just remember that the advice from YCombinator is trash, covered in survivor bias and pills.

Tbh, you need to solve problems. Do videogames solve problems? If so, how can you solve problems as a video game developer?

 

[Trait]

Am a Solo Developer who is now making a Published game in UE5.

It might seem like Video Games do not follow the CENTS rule, but in reality, they are the same as any other product. Need is the most important factor.

How to find a need for a Video Game?
- The method that worked for me is a competition model - Improving something that already exists. You might want to be PlayerUnknown (PUBG Creator) and spawn a whole new genre but that is similar to reinventing the wheel and the odds are stacked all the way against you.
So basically what you do in this method is to take an existing game and solve most of its problems and then market it to the existing playerbase.

The more severe problems you fix the greater the chances of success/profits. So I am making a game in UE5 that will compete with a game with 2000s graphics. Very easy to notice this improvement and the existing playerbase of the game with 2000s graphics has welcomed my game with open arms and are cheering me on in development. I also struck a deal with a publisher. I have also a list of 8-10 improvements over my competitor's game which serve as value skews.
Start building up a value skew list over your competitor game, and you will start getting attention. YouTube, Reddit, Twitter are your marketing powerhouses. Fair warning - If you are doing it solo it will be really hard and it will take a lot of time.

Don't make the mistake of thinking of Game Development as an Art - It is just another business that follows CENTS fundamentals. But you do need some experience playing games to spot improvements. Anyone who doesn't play games will really struggle to find problems/solutions. Personally have 12 years of experience playing Video Games so it doesn't take much effort to see problems with genres I am familiar with. YouTube video essays are also an underrated source of problem-solution finding.

You might find my progress thread useful -

EXECUTION - Bootstrapping a Video Game business from a third-world country

Intro For the past ~1.2 years I have been building a game solo for which I found the market had a strong need for. It's been around 9 months since I revealed the game to the market and the feedback received confirmed the existence of the need for my game. So my game is actually competing with a...

www.thefastlaneforum.com

 

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[ocricci]

So basically what you do in this method is to take an existing game and solve most of its problems and then market it to the existing playerbase.

Start building up a value skew list over your competitor game, and you will start getting attention. YouTube, Reddit, Twitter are your marketing powerhouses.

Don't make the mistake of thinking of Game Development as an Art - It is just another business that follows CENTS fundamentals

Gold advice ! @Trait really knows how the "game" works
--
I suggest you to read the book "Reality is Broken" by "Jane McGonigal" where she breaks the psychology of players and why those players solve real life needs in a virtual environment ( loneliness, boredom, etc.. )

Good luck friend !