[PIGMI] Square Off Released to Windows Phone 7 Marketplace

Mon May 23 08:18:54 PDT 2011

Hey nice work on getting it out guys!

I had a preview of an early version and it was already looking good and
playing solidly.  I wouldn't get too disheartened about sales at this early
stage.  It sounds like you've been doing a lot of hacking but are just
starting on the marketing.  And the platform's pretty young, so if you can
maintain a good position on the chart it could pay off as the userbase
grows.  I'm curious to see what the impact of Nokia's hardware will have on
WP7 sales in a few months time.

Anyway, congrats on the release and I'm looking forward to the new stuff
too!

Cheers,

Dan.

On Sat, May 21, 2011 at 11:25 PM, Aranda Morrison <
aranda_morrison at yahoo.com.au> wrote:

> Regretfully, I have to correct that last email from Josh. Those numbers
> were based on a short skype message I wrote in which I accidentally said
> "sales" instead of "downloads"! The actual numbers for the first 11 days
> after release are:
>
> Downloads: 4992
> Sales: 150
> Conversion rate: 3.0%
>
> This is pretty depressing. It also doesn't bode well for the WP7 platform
> that a game can sit at #32 in the "Top" games list, be rated 4.5 stars and
> still sell less than 10 copies a day. We're still holding out a small amount
> of hope that the numbers from Microsoft are bogus, or based on partial
> data!. I'm not certain whether the "Top" list is based on downloads or
> sales, but I suspect downloads as our position on the list is too static to
> reflect the much smaller and more fluctuating sales numbers.
>
> Here's a couple of brighter points:
>
>    1. Our Mogade stats indicate that up to yesterday we're still seeing
>    over 130 new users every day with over 700 game starts per day. This
>    indicates an advertisement supported version is definitely worth
>    considering.
>    2. Square Off on Xbox Live Indie Games is still selling almost 1000
>    copies a month at $1 with a conversion rate of about 45%. It also looks like
>    the WP7 version has improved this as the month of May looks to be heading
>    for well over 1000 copies at 60% conversion.
>    3. We're finally going to bite the bullet and target iOS for our next
>    game. I really had high hopes for WP7, but this project has reminded me that
>    Microsoft has a LOT of catching up to do.
>
> Cheers,
> Aranda
> Gnomic Studios
> ------------------------------
> *From:* Josh Stewart <aek at wn.com.au>
> *To:* pigmi at pigmi.org
> *Sent:* Sat, 21 May, 2011 8:52:52 PM
> *Subject:* Re: [PIGMI] Square Off Released to Windows Phone 7 Marketplace
>
> Some other facts (if you like numbers)...
> We have been tracking time on the project using Kimai, to help determine
> what everyone in the team will get from the profits.
> Kimai reports that we have spent 544 man hours to port our existing xbox
> live game to Windows Phone 7 and ship it.
>
> Aranda reports that initial sales for the last 18 odd days is around 5000
> units. It sells for $3 in the US and $4 in Australia (MS decide what the
> regional prices are based on a selected US price). Microsoft takes a 30% cut
> of sales I believe.
>
> He also said the conversion rate of trial users to was currently 3% which
> is pretty bad. We will do a post mortem of the project soon and hopefully
> release more detailed sales information.
>
> cheers,
> Josh
>
> On 21/05/2011 10:38 AM, Josh Stewart wrote:
> > Good morning,
> > I thought you might be interested to know that Gnomic Studios <
> http://www.gnomicstudios.com/> released Square Off on the Windows Phone 7
> Marketplace in the first week of May.
> > The response from reviewers and also marketplace reviews has been
> phenomenal.
> >
> >    * We released the game in 4 languages (with the help of some crowd
> >      sourced translations)
> >    * We are the 3rd most popular non-xbox live enabled game (the xbox
> >      live enabled titles get a lot more exposure on the marketplace).
> >    * We are ranked as 32nd on the top games list on the platform and
> >      have stayed there.
> >
> > *Here is a summary of our marketplace reviews by users*..
> >
> http://wp7reviews.tomverhoeff.com/AppReviews.aspx?id=3a3e5ed5-6570-e011-81d2-78e7d1fa76f8&mp=en-US<
> http://wp7reviews.tomverhoeff.com/AppReviews.aspx?id=3a3e5ed5-6570-e011-81d2-78e7d1fa76f8&mp=en-US
> >
> >
> > My favourite is: "Outstanding!!! I was considering taking my life this
> morning but this game made me change my mind."
> > *
> > Here are some website reviews*:
> > http://www.wpcentral.com/square-review
> >
> http://www.bestwp7games.com/square-off-a-fun-dual-stick-shooter-for-windows-phone-7.html
> >
> http://www.mobiletechworld.com/2011/05/04/square-off-for-windows-phone-7-hands-on-review/
> > http://www.wp7connect.com/2011/05/05/game-review-square-off/
> > http://dotconn.de/main/news/square-off-review/
> >
> > Sales data is trickling in, but the conversion rate is exceptionally low,
> but apparently some of this data takes over 2 months before it is full
> reconciled from different mobile carriers, so we are holding out hope. We
> will post some sales data in a month or two once we have more confidence in
> the results.
> >
> > Happy to answer any questions about its development or marketing. Gnomic
> Studios is now starting work on a new unnamed title for mobile devices,
> likely to primarily target iPhone.
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