If I happen to win something that puts it straight to #1 or #2 on my queue of games to play.
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Let's say that I started battling my backlog almost an year ago, so far I think I'm not doing so good but I keep trying. Also I should really stop entering giveaways :D
My biggest problem is that I'm not only trying to just beat the game but also to 100% it. This adds a huge amount of time. If I have just beat all the games which I've won and did 100% I'm pretty sure I would have beaten all the games in my backlog.
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That sucks, sorry that people weren't playing your giveaways OP.
If anyone wants this Monsti key, they can have it:
VRPQ9-NHY5J-VHJ4D
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You've probably never heard of it.
Actually have it wishlisted since shortly after release (mid June 2016), and last saw it on 25% sale ;p
(Gives off a Construct 2 vibe.)
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Close, it's a GameMaker game =P
Well, maybe not that close. Construct looks like sophisticated level editor, not a game engine.
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I had actually heard about your game. It seemed pretty neat, but not really the kind of game I'd enjoy so I've never entered any GA for it. I personally play every game I win, but I've learned there aren't too many people that do that, still they do exist :) Try not to despair ^^
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Do you play games that you win?! [Vent]
Yes. I've currently played over half the games I've been given, though I've completed a fair amount less.
*I am one and only developer of Sector Six. You've probably never heard of it.
Of course I have. First in greenlight, then at least a dozen times since then.
gets drained of cards
That's terrible phrasing. You're not losing anything from the trading cards being activated. To the contrary, you're gaining money from users that- rather clearly- presumably wouldn't have enough interest to buy your game to begin with. Being a developer and playing any degree of victimization tends to be a straight course to self-sabotage, unless you can legitimately justify the perspective.
I mean, maybe my game is not good?
Well, it's not to my tastes- but then, I've never entered for it, either.
You can blame cg for the rampant rulebreaking in public giveaways without any options to address such, but even cg can't really be faulted for bots- they're so extensively used in low-level public giveaways that even if there was a way to consistently identify them, there just isn't the manpower available to weed them out.
If you make public giveaways, you will get good visibility- I think most of us at least glance at the high-quantity giveaways just to see if we're interested in them. Your odds of getting reputable winners, on the other hand, are rather low (though increasing minimum level- especially past 2- does noticeably help in that regard). More involved considerations toward SG certainly do best through the utilization of groups (play-oriented groups like Playing Appreciated aside, other groups [such as the group I personally co-admin, Positive Thoughts] do give consideration to GA creator desires, and will eject users if they're overly inconsiderate of others- and, of course, you can always just make your own group), or at the least, the utilization of SGTools, which at least filters out most basic bots, rulebreakers, and giveaway leakers from the start- and can be customized to further weed out users with higher-than-average odds of not matching your expectations (in your case, basing off a combination of site win ratio and existing library size may be the best options, perhaps with a Wishlist check for your game thrown in as well).
Rainbow Pony Deluxe
Well, I may not be interested in your current game, but do let me know if you ever release that one.
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You heard about it? Neat. Actually, quite a few of people claimed that they know about my game. That's pretty cool for a game to be known without marketing.
Ok, let me rephrase it.
Imagine me making a painting, not a game. For over 2 years. Spending thousands of hours perfecting it. I mean, it's nor finished, nor perfect, but I did so much. Now I try to show my painting for people. Instead of looking and it, they remove it from frames, roll it into a scroll and puts somewhere so that it won't get in a way. They then start to dismantling frames and enthusiastically trades pieces with each other.
That's how I see it.
These frame enthusiasts every once in a while give me 1$.
Because I get 1$ per 50 copies I should be happy.
These people don't care about paintings anyway, so I kind of scammed them by making them give me money for painting, even if they despise paintings =P
Now know that SteamGifts is not a good place to find players - there are awesome people here, but not enough - so either I'll find a way to use it better or I'll stop giving the game away here.
Money is not that important to me, I just want people to play it. I force myself to set a price on my game, to think about getting money, but if I could, I would make my game free so that everyone will be able to play it. And I guess I'll make it free once I'll start making enough money from my other games.
I can assure you, I will NEVER make a game called Rainbow Pony Deluxe XD
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Money is not that important to me, I just want people to play it. I force myself to set a price on my game, to think about getting money, but if I could, I would make my game free so that everyone will be able to play it.
Why isn't the price $1 or $3 then? You don't seem to discount it much, it hasn't been bundled, etc. Anything above $4 feels "really high".
Only makes sense to me when the store price is essentially a fake MSRP because the actual price is very very low, like for http://store.steampowered.com/app/421060/Age_of_Steel_Recharge/
The fact that you spent more time working on it than the average solo Game Maker dev makes me want to play the game more, but it doesn't really make me want to pay more.
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Because Sector Six is worth 10€. Or at least will be.
It's rather big game and it keeps getting bigger =]
10€ is also a price of a full game. All future DLC's, updates, "Enchanted Editions", etc. will be free.
You bought it, you got it, no modern developer BS.
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You can blame cg for the rampant rulebreaking in public giveaways without any options to address such, but even cg can't really be faulted for bots- they're so extensively used in low-level public giveaways that even if there was a way to consistently identify them, there just isn't the manpower available to weed them out.
That is not entirely true. File hosters like MediaFire managed to do it a decade ago: you had to solve a simple captcha at every N number of files downloaded or after a certain amount of MB downloaded, whichever came sooner. The same captcha after X giveaways/Y points spent system would do the same here, and with the existence of the captcha that doesn't even require typing just mouse movement would mean like +1 second on average.
Sometimes I think he does not want to address this because it would drop back site traffic a lot, dropping its currently quite decent Alexa ranking.
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Oh, well, sure. At the time I wrote the above, I kinda was thinking of that element as a completely separate matter [ie, as a facet of autojoining rather than bot-use] for some reason- but yeah, you're right. We've been pushing for captcha/etc for so long that I just kinda pushed it into the realm of never-to-come-true fantasy and stopped thinking on it properly, I guess. :P
Sometimes I think he does not want to address this because it would drop back site traffic a lot, dropping its currently quite decent Alexa ranking.
Honestly, that matches to the impression I get of cg. He's been openly dismissive of both member and staff concerns, so it's easy to think of his perspective as being on something else [than user-friendly site functioning] entirely.
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He's been openly dismissive of both member and staff concerns, so it's easy to think of his perspective as being on something else [than user-friendly site functioning] entirely.
Sounds like Valve!
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I try to prioritize games that I won if I have space in my hdd, some games are often too big making me unable to download it. Oh and I forgot to mention that I have crap internet speed making the downloads slightly unbearable.
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i do play games that i win, but it takes me a long time to get to them because i'm also working on all the games i've purchased, traded for, or had directly gifted to me. there are a lot of them and i don't have a lot of time for playing. i entered a few 1000+ copy giveaways for games i wasn't all that interested in but basically everyone who entered would win but other than that i only enter for games i intend to play because it's kind of a jerk move to win something you're not even going to use when it could have gone to someone who would have.
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people give you a lot of understanding answers. and i am not surprised. not playing won games is generally something that people don't have a lot of respect for. i will still tell you why i think it's a very different case here.
you have a developer account. you only give away your own game. you use the site for promotional purposes. honestly, i don't think you have any right to ask for anything here. you didn't spend a single cent for any "real" giveaways. yet you enter other giveaways. that is something i never liked about certain developer accounts. they create CV by giving away their games (= no cost, even negative cost if you take into account that they do this for promotion), and then enter other giveaways anyway. i really don't see the difference to the typical leech who gives nothing, but takes what he can. people attack and blacklist leeches, but for some reason these developer accounts that do basically the same thing don't get the same treatment. i really don't get it. i guess it's simply because you played the "won games should be played" card, which is an ever ongoing topic here. but as i said, i don't think this applies to promotional giveaways like your's. you are not doing these giveaways because of your generosity. you are doing them because you want to push your game. raise awareness. get some visibility. there's nothing wrong with that. but at the same time i think you can't demand the same things like people who spend their personal money on giveaways, who are really doing it, because they want to make someone happy.
sorry, if that sounds harsh. but that's the way i see it. no offense. :)
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Well, you're seeing it wrong.
"you are not doing these giveaways because of your generosity. you are doing them because you want to push your game. raise awareness. get some visibility. there's nothing wrong with that. but at the same time i think you can't demand the same things like people who spend their personal money on giveaways, who are really doing it, because they want to make someone happy."
I can demand and I will. Making Sector Six cost me at least 10000 EUR, that's just living cost. I've did a lot of damage to my health to make this game by sitting by computer for days. And why? Because I wanted for there to be another good game in a world. My game only costs money because I need to survive to be able to continue making games. Because I love making games, because I love seeing other people play and enjoy my game. Not because I want to make money.
And besides, without hard work of developers, you wouldn't have these games to giveaway and make people happy.
It's really nice to know that developers don't get blacklisted and treated as "leeches".
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sorry, but nothing there changes my view on the situation.
I can demand and I will.
no, not for public giveaways. you can do group giveaways, as you are going to. but for the public giveaways you did here you can't demand anything.
I've did a lot of damage to my health to make this game by sitting by computer for days.
being a professional software developer for 15 years, i don't know what you're talking about. sitting in front of our computer every day is our job. that's not "a lot of damage to your health", unless you're completely overdoing it (which then really is your own fault, and you shouldn't do that). most people work hard. that doesn't mean anything. during the last 2 weeks, i worked 40 hours overtime. so what?
My game only costs money because I need to survive to be able to continue making games.
...which is the same for everyone out there who tries to make a living with his software, right?
Because I love making games, because I love seeing other people play and enjoy my game. Not because I want to make money.
that's nice, really. i appreciate your passion. i really do. but that doesn't change the fact, that you earn money with your game, and your promotional giveaways don't cost you anything. quite the opposite, they potentially generate sales because you gain visibility. so, i stand by what i said. i value someone who invests his private money on the site higher. is that not understandable?
And besides, without hard work of developers, you wouldn't have these games to giveaway and make people happy.
what is that supposed to mean? i pay for the games i give away here. those developers earn money from me doing that. it's not like i owe them anything. or what exactly do you want to say with that?
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Again, the giveaways I made are NOT free to me. I can generate thousands of keys for the game, but that is only possible because of what I've put into making the game. Which is money, time, health, etc.
I mean, sure, there are cases when a guy bought few assets, made a game in a week, somehow got through Greenlight, then flood SteamGifts with keys and earned 100$ from cards. That's minus Steam Greenlight fee. (Which, fun fact, goes to charity!)
But this is not the case.
Not many people will be able to invest more into giveaways than most developers do.
I'm not saying I invested that much, but I think I did invest more than you.
And I don't think you care if those games you giveaway gets played. You bought a game, gave it away, and your job is done, you can feel good about that. I mostly feel disappointed after making a giveaway.
I respect you for giving away so many games. That's very nice of you.
But please don't try to devalue my and other developer investments.
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I try playing most of the games I win. When I got depressed in the beginning, I entered some mass giveaways just in order to win something and I don't play any of these, because I did not really want them, I just wanted to win. So never make a mass give away, if you care that peole are playing your game :D. Putting it inside one of the groups you listed is the best thing you can do.
I had a glance at your game and it looks pretty cool, reminds me a bit of my childhood. However, the problem these days is that you can get way too much games you can play so I personally don't know, if I will ever enter one of your giveaways .
(Btw, that is an awesome logo you have there :D)
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One good SGTool solution I saw with giveaways of more copies than one was making a restriction that the game must be on the wishlist since yyyy-mm-dd. THat way no card farmer can simply go to steam, add it with current date and enter.
This way ppl who have it on their wishlist for a long time will enter and if they wishlisted it that should mean they want to play it.
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Man, im following your game since greenlight. How did i miss all those giveaways? :(
But with my backlog it for the best i guess...
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I might be just one of a few ppl, but I'm almost NEVER idling for cards! I only do that if I've beaten the game faster then I need to play it for getting the cards. So I idle AFTER playing!
I enter games because I want to play them, at one point or another.
I'm sorry to hear, your game was not played but idled. But I'm still sure there are ppl out there who play it in the first place :)
Heads up!
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What I would recommend is that you install Kelnage's script and do what LastM did https://www.steamgifts.com/discussion/UZiI0/do-you-play-your-sg-wins-dead-cells-ga-3-hours-remaining
Guaranteed that your game will be played. Easy and simple.
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Hey all!
EDIT: I am now going to run giveaways with help of Playing Appreciated, Actually Playing games and BLAEO groups. I will also make whitelist giveaways and specifically state that my giveaways are not just for getting some free cards. Thank you all for hundred of replies, now I have a clear understanding of what is going on SteamGifts.
I am slightly disappointed in running game giveaways on this site.
I've given away 50 keys of my game several times and usually my game* gets drained of cards through idling bots, with only a few people of those 50 trying to actually play it.
Maybe I'm doing it wrong? Maybe I should some sort of restrictions on my giveaways, so my keys wouldn't go to card farmers?
Or is this website just full of people who just want to sell my game's cards to buy some stupid Rainbow Pony Deluxe CS: GO Butter Knife skins and it's impossible to avoid them?
I don't want to give my game to people who don't plan to play it.
I get it, sometimes you just want to idle cards, because you know you'll never have time to play that game.
O the game is just not interesting to you.
But just idle the game without even trying it for 15 mins? C'mon.
I worked really hard on the game. Then I gave it away for free. Then I want to see people achieve achievements, take screenshots, maybe leave a review or comment, enter leaderboards, anything.
But nope!
After giveaway ends it's dead quiet, I get nothing out of it.
I mean, maybe my game is not good?
But then it doesn't seem like anyone would even try to see if it's bad or good.
So, what the hell?!
End of the vent.
*I am one and only developer of Sector Six. You've probably never heard of it.
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