How much Money my Game made in 1 year - Indie Game Revenue
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- Опубліковано 22 тра 2024
- It's time to reveal how much money my game made in 1 year.
⚔️ Mortal Glory 2: store.steampowered.com/app/22...
⚔️ Chambers of Devious Design: store.steampowered.com/app/16...
⚔️ Mortal Glory: store.steampowered.com/app/10...
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In one year, my game #MortalGlory has sold 128884 dollars. That's not how much I got myself though. Not even close. Watch the video for more details!
0:00 Intro
1:20 Sales numbers
5:02 How much do I get to keep?
9:43 Bloopers
You might also be interested in checking out my last video, where I took a look at Steam video game revenue data to see if making a living as an indie game developer is possible - based on video game earning data.
Can I get rich with video games?: • Can I get RICH WITH VI...
Thank you for being so open about sharing your game making process! I'm sure it helps a lot of people. And congrats! :)
Thanks! I always love to hear detailed breakdowns like this from other people so only fair I do it myself also :)
Would be cool to see a post mortem of the game. What features were worth the time they took, what could the game have done without or anything different you would do in hindsight.
That actually sounds like a great idea! I'll put it on my list
@@AuroDev yes 😊
What's up?
I love how you were open to sharing every number and every small details.
Congrats for the great success on your game, +1 subscriber
Thanks! Welcome aboard :)
Very informative, thank you! I love the little bloopers in the end! :D
Imo,it's a huge hit without publisher
I'm taking inspiration from your every video thank you so much!!!
Waiting for next game devlogs ;-)
Thanks! It definitely was a big and happy surprise for me :)
Thank you once again for the in-depth information about your journey with Mortal Glory, especially about the financial aspects. I really like the way to convey your knowledge. Keep it up!
Thanks! Happy to share :)
Awesome video, really cleared things up!
Very interesting facts on the development costs and revenues. And hugely amazing for the first indie project of your company! Congrats, Auro, and thanks for sharing!
Thanks! Happy to hear it was interesting! :)
Awesome video! This is a great insight of how things work in Steam and game sales in general. Always good to see an indie dev succeeding. Also, if you have not and if you may, you should make a vid on why having a company is better, what type and when did you start one. That will also give more insights. Take care and Keep it up! :)
Thanks! :) Good idea about the company video! It will differ based on country, but I could talk about the basic principles why it's a good idea.
This is very informational and, as many people put it, inspirational. Thank you, I will definitely watch more of your videos on this topic.
Very happy to hear that! :)
Thanks for the video, it certainly helps my motivation to keep developing my game! Well done with your game and much deserved success.
Thanks! Happy to hear I was able to motivate you :)
thanks for sharing! really appreciate the insight
Thanks for the honest look at your finances. It's super helpful for other developers to get a sense of the ROI when you have a modest splash in the market.
No problem! Happy to be of help :)
Grats mate!
Love your suit, Keep up the suits ;)
Haha, thanks! I will have to consider my wardrobe for future videos :)
Thank you! It's interesting to know this information.
Great video and congrats on the success, must feel great!
Thanks! It definitely feels great :)
That is, I have to say, quite impressive and inspiring at the same time, good job and thanks.
Thanks! :)
thats very good. thats a fantastic sum. i'm from south america and and the tax rates in my country are rather similar ( in my country is around 27% for personal income taxes), in my case this amount of net profit is so much money i would be easily able to survive and fund games for the next 3 years.
Thanks for sharing the numbers and your story, it's so inspiring as a complete newbie to game dev. I am an artist and writer myself and thought it would be fun to make a visual novel 😊 will see when I can make bit and release it for fun 😊
Happy to share! :) Best of luck with the visual novel!
Wow! Great job, Auro! Happy to see you having success!
Thanks, Anders! :)
Really good, informative video. You're also pretty entertaining.
Oh, thank you! I can now start expanding the target audience of my bad jokes to this channel also instead of just targeting my wife :)
Great video and great job with your game! Subbed
Thanks! Welcome aboard :)
I got some insights from you. Thank you for video!
Happy to hear that! :)
Thanks for this..this is inspiring 🙏😆
I thought I was already subbed to you but clearly not, awesome content and it's great to see what 1 man bands can do. I also guess you're Finnish so extra sub for that :)
Super cool mate, thanks
Great video. Awesome work
Thanks! :)
Thank you so much for these videos, they really do help! Would you be so kind to share how do you track your hours worked?
Happy to hear! :) For hour tracking I am using my own simple little python script. Basically when I open it, I only need to type in a letter and a number and then hit enter to save those into a csv file. I'm sure there are some free ready-made alternatives also. But I wanted to make my own so it's as fast and convenient to use as possible.
Thank you for the honest breakdown of the whole process.... maybe I should reconsider making a game....
Happy to share! I can also recommend making a game, but not for the money really. Based on data, most indie games sell very little if at all so on average it's not very attractive financially.
You made it in 9 months while having a full-time job? Respect!
Thanks a lot for sharing your experience
Happy to share!
@@AuroDev :))
Good job! This is amazing achievement :) It'll be awesome seeing you grow. What was your marketing strategy? :) Did you advertise your game on Reddit and if so in what stage of the game?
Thanks! I'm actually planning on doing a video (or several) about marketing next! But if I sum it up quickly, I had the most success with contacting youtubers and asking them to play my game. This was few weeks before I released the game. As for social media, I mostly posted gifs on Twitter and started that ~2 months into development when I had just put up a Steam page. I made an occasional post on Reddit and Imgur, but not so much. After release when I got on the new & trending tab on Steam, I made a post about it on Imgur in my excitement. That post ended up going viral and getting over 100k impressions there. That felt quite surreal :)
I'm not even 10s in and it's already a great video lmao congrats on the success bro
Hehe, thanks!
Congrats on the result! Also, more on marketing please, this is the most critical part IMO.
Thanks! This is good timing as I'm planning on making the next few videos about marketing :)
Nice! Would like to see a a vid on the release process! :)
I'll be sure to make a video about that at some point! A few next videos will be about marketing but maybe after that :)
@@AuroDev Ill be sure to watch the marketing ones too! :)
Thank you for making this video.
No problem! Happy to share :)
Auro, you have been doing wonderful work. Congratulations. Keep coming up with new videos about your experiences. I used to be an old school coder. I just got my hands dirty with Unity, and it seems to increase productivity. I am curious about one point. What is the scale of Mortal Glory? Say, in terms of thousands of lines of code.
Thanks! :) I haven't actually checked the lines of code before. I tried the automatic code metrics feature now in Visual Studio but it only gave me an error. If I estimate it roughly myself, I think it might be somewhere around 30k lines. But I'm sure I have done many things very inefficiently + there is a lot of old code there too that is not in use anymore.
I am so happy when game developer gets paid ! Thanks for making the video and sharing with us!
Happy to share! :)
Liked and subscribed! Thanks for sharing, i am also making game for android your video gave me inspiration.thank you!👍
Awesome, welcome aboard! :)
Well done mate!
Thanks! :)
Hey Auro,
you have mentioned a company foundation for tax optimization.
That's very interesting, because most always talk only about sales, but almost never about the costs or taxes.
You also mentioned that you left your revenue from Mortal Glory in your company(?) account to reinvest. Another wrote something about dividends.
Now I'm very curious how you're going to do it.
Maybe that topic would be good for a next video?
Thanks again for sharing your insights!
Hey Tobias! You have a very good point - planning your taxation is important and will save you money when you are running a business. But the problem is that the taxation laws are different in each country + there are many factors that can affect what is the best choice for each situation. So if I made a video about it, it would only be helpful for a very small portion of my audience. In my case it was smarter to leave the money in my company as I was also receiving paychecks from my normal 9-to-5 job. Since Finland has progressive income tax for individuals, I would have had to pay a lot more in taxes if I also received income from my own company.
Nice 😂. I am wondering about the wishlist before rekease.
I had around 1700 wishlists before release.
@@AuroDev
Thank you
great vid- more puppy plz!
Thanks! The puppy, Luna, always seems to want to join the recording so I'll have to see if I could give her a bit more screen time here and there :D
Well done man, inspirational.
Thanks, happy to hear that! :)
Thank you for sharing a real numbers, I have a question what is your opinion on creating steam page as soon as possible to "snowball" audience. Everybody says it's important to do it early, but I think really early it could look unpolished and many things may change, but if you do it too late you won't be able to build channel people into your community through steam. In which stage did you create steam page and would you do it near the release (like 3 - 6 months) or as soon as you have vertical slice (6 or more months before release let's say). Well good luck with company and another projects.
That's a good question! I 100% agree that you should create your steam page asap. It doesn't matter that it won't fully reflect what your game will end up looking like. I believe I made my steam page around 2 months into development. By then I had some of the basic graphics in place but a lot of the features weren't still implemented. So what I did was that I "faked" the screenshots and trailer by manually placing objects and texts in Unity to give an idea what the end product would be. It looked very unpolished, but I also put "Work in progress" text in the screenshots in the hopes that people would understand that it's not the final look. If you want to get an idea what my game looked like back then, here's my old trailer that I created at the same time as I made the steam page: ua-cam.com/video/xsigVaMBhmg/v-deo.html
By creating the steam page asap, you can start generating wishlists early on, which will increase your chances of having a successful release. So the earlier the better is what I would advice.
I'm glad that I'm in Poland so I can pay 12% revenue tax.
very good
very clear and honest!
have you ever considered the option to release your game even on mobile stores? You could increase drastically your sales
Thanks! I have considered a mobile port, but I haven't had enough time to look into it yet. The game would require some adjustments at least on the UI side to play well on mobile. Maybe at some point I will do it!
That's something very motivated video . Can you make some tutorial step by step about submit game on steam :-) .
Thanks! :) It's a good video idea! I am currently working on my second game and I was thinking I could make videos about what do on Steam's side (making a page, uploading builds) at the same time when I do them myself again.
@@AuroDev Thanks a lot dear . I also make small games but never try to submit games on steam because of very complicated processes and if I make something wrong may be my 100$ forfeited. Anyways your video is very good 👍 love you from me and my country INDIA . 🇮🇳
I AM SOOOO GLAD FOR YOU!!!!
WOOHOO!!! 🙌🙏
would love to see a year 2 update!
I'm actually planning on doing that :) Shouldn't be too long now!
thank you so much for this great video. Is it ok to buy a computer or hardware you need to work with a company account?
Yep! That is actually one great perk of having a company as you can buy any necessary equipment, software etc with the company's money instead of with your own personal money. Due to taxation, buying with the company's money is always cheaper than buying with your own money.
@@AuroDev thank you so much. I hope we see more games from you.
Thank you for the info!
How is your new game going?
Happy to share! :) The development on the new game is going very well! I make devlog every 2 weeks in case you are interested in seeing the progress. But I should be able to release the game on first quarter of 2022.
@@AuroDev cool, going to check!
good luck with your games
Thanks! Looking forward to start working on the next one soon :)
Hi there, I am not so far from you based in Sweden and family on my mothers side live in Espoo. I am working on my first game. I done everything and all assets myself so far but would like to speed things up. Most time consuming activity is music and sometimes the coding when it does not do what you hoped for. But I struggle to find free music. What websites did you use to find this?
Ah, cool! I found all of my music from Unity Asset Store. You can find plenty of free ones there + a lot more for a low price. I'm sure google could offer a lot hits also if you search for royalty free music, but that will require a bit more digging. I recommend checking out the asset stores first! Best of luck with your game! :)
Thanks you for shareit
Wow man. I was so excited to make money, and then I was so let down at how little money you get, and then I am so excited again because you said it's still a lot of money for the time that was put into it. Very very cool video. (I was gonna wear a suit in my first "appearance" video ... Looks like I had the right idea)
Yeah, unfortunately a big chunk of the money will always flow elsewhere, but that's just the reality of this business. I have learned to live with it by thinking "Ok, I'll just go sell more copies then" :D
How did you keep track of your hours? 1681 is nearly another full time job in one year that's amazing commitment!
Thanks! That's one of the things I am most proud about, that I managed to put all that time in :) I created a custom python script that makes it very easy for me to input my hours into a csv file. I showcase it briefly here: ua-cam.com/video/m3A_4xffspo/v-deo.html
Your game is really cool! Tho its not my type, my sister played it and loved it!
Thanks! I understand, we all have our favorite genres :) Happy to hear your sister enjoyed it!
Did you owe any money to Unity, or are they royalty free? That seems to be the answer from their FAQ, but just curious for an actual released product that made a fair amount of sales. Thank you for all the work you do for these videos!
I haven't had to pay anything to Unity yet. They have a free tier that you can stay on as long as your revenue is under $100k from the last 12 months. Even though my game has sold quite well, my company's revenue is still well below that threshold (due to Steam's cut & other stuff).
But I do hope I will have to pay Unity something in the future (since it means my sales are doing even better) :)
@@AuroDev Awesome! Was wondering how they get their piece of the pie. Best of luck on your next games and having to pay Unity! :0)
@@torempilor Thanks! Best of luck to you too :)
Hail, fellow water enjoyer
How many wishlist you have? GL on your gamedev journey
Thanks! Before release I had around 1700 wishlists and now over a year later it's up at 13k wishlists.
@@AuroDev Thanks great Auro ;)
First of all I just want to say congrats. It looks like your game has done very well for all the hard work you put into it.
One thing I'm curious about is while developing your game how was your social life? Did you feel pressure to work on your game and learn all the time or were you still able to enjoy other aspects of life? I apologize if its kind of a personal question. I ask because I'm wanting to get into game development but also wondering if there is a way to balance everything.
Thanks! And hey, no problem, that's a very good and relevant question. I had to balance time between work, my game, my wife and still find some time for relaxing. It definitely was stressful at times and I put pressure on myself to keep putting hours into the game, even if I didn't feel like it at all times. Luckily, a lot of the process was fun and more like a hobby. My wife was also very understanding! I'm sure there's a way to balance everything, but if I'm honest, I still have lots to improve in that regard.
How many sold got Mortal Glory the base game the first year? Just curiosity... I really loved your game, was really interesting to play even with such graphics LUL congrats
Happy to hear you enjoyed the game! :) Do you mean how many copies the base game sold? In first year it was 17525 (17486 Steam + 39 Chrono.gg)
@@AuroDev Thanks you, you are very kind. :3 sorry my english is not the best and something I made those upsies I forgot its called "copies" Hahahaha I love to see how indie devs progress, so you have my follow (I have to say I played so much Mortal Glory, I think my longest gameplay was literally infinite and I just stop around round 100 or 200 I can't remember) I was too OP that got boring Hahahaha but yes, was the base game not the DLC. Great job, you made a really enjoyable game.
@@bso1538 Oh wow! Yea I can understand getting bored at 100 (much more so at 200) wins - that's very high! :D
So let me get this straight. You made and released this game, while working a job in 9 months and made that much? If so then holy cow that is really inspiring wow
I have to say I was a bit surprised myself too how well it turned out! :)
Can u make city building war game ?i have ideas about that and u have knowledge how to make that ,can we work on new game project?
Sorry, already got my hands full!
Thanks for sharing, might sound discouraging that you only keep 43 cents but on the other hand everyone keep in mind without Steam the sales would be much lower. Congratulations anyway!
Thanks! Selling games without Steam would be much tougher so I don't feel too bad about their cut. That said, I also wouldn't mind some more competition between Steam & other storefronts. Competition is always good for the customers!
@@AuroDev Have you tried to bring it to Epic or GOG or itch.io? Would be interesting how it performs there in comparison. My experience with a free to play game of me between Steam and itch is Steam downloads have the factor 1000.
@@BitbeastGames I haven't tried those, but I have heard of similar numbers with itch vs steam. I would be open to having the game on other stores, but I'm not willing to put much effort into it as it's much less hassle for me to have the game only on one storefront. Especially if my sales would only increase by less than 1% by having it on other stores.
@@AuroDev I agree. Would be interested myself to try Epic just to see how their process is. But setting up the game on Steam was quite time consuming (well at least it felt that way because going through those checklists, preparing images etc. was not my favorite type of work :D)
Hyvää työtä :)
Kiitos! :)
@@AuroDev toi steam cutti + verot kyl sattuu :D tämmösiin platform kauppoihin vois olla kyl joku oma verotuksensa joka ottaa huomion ton revenue sharen
@@pixboi Joo, kyllä siellä kummasti aina löytyy käsiä ruokakupilta :) Noh, ei voi toisaalta liikaa valittaa kun peli on menestyt paljon paremmin kuin osasin odottaa!
@@AuroDev Juu hieno saavutus, ei kun uutta vaan tekeille ja postilaatikko Gibraltariin ;)
How you marketed your game? this youtube is quite small. Or steam naturally pushed your game? how many wishlists you had on release?
The most important method of marketing for me was getting UA-camrs to play my game. I have a few videos on marketing, f.ex. this one: ua-cam.com/video/fvsI4BHSTHw/v-deo.html. I had 1700 WLs on release
How did u market u game? Did you sign up with a marketing company?
I did it all myself! I have detailed my marketing efforts here: ua-cam.com/video/fvsI4BHSTHw/v-deo.html
@@AuroDev thanks going to check it out
How many wishlists did you have on release day?
I had around 1700 before clicking the release button.
Aivan mahtavaa! Miten marketoit sun peliä?
Kiitos! Ajattelin itseasiassa juuri seuraavassa videossa käydä läpi kaikki eri markkinoinnin muodot mitä kokeilin ja kommentoida mitkä toimi parhaiten. Mutta jos tähän lyhyesti summaan niin parhaiten toimi peliavainten lähettäminen tubettajille siinä toivossa, että kokeilevat ja tekevät videon siitä. Giffien postaus someen on myös hyvä tapa markkinoida, mitä itekkin harrastin, mutta toisaalta en voi sanoa että sillä olisi hurjan suurta vaikutusta ollut mun pelin menestykseen.
@@AuroDev Mahtavaa. Näin tän videon redditissä ja kiinnostuin. Subasin heti videon katottua. Kiinnostavaa kontenttia
@@supooze4352 Hienoa, tervetuloa messiin! :)
The payment for Unity, where was it included?
Congratulations, by the way!
Thanks! Unity is free if your company's revenue is under $100k within the last 12 months. So far I haven't had to pay anything for Unity.
@@AuroDev Oh great news haha suppose your total of 122k were pocketed within the first year, Unity's cut would have been calculated on the total amount, or after Steam's cut?
My curiosity stems from how a game continues to be self sustainable
Once again, congratulations, my friend! I wish you great success!
@@phillipgallas If my company had gotten over $100k in one year (so this is the sum after Steam's cut), I would have been liable to pay for Unity's higher tier license. That sum I would have needed to pay from my company's bank account so that's after Steam's cut. Paying for Unity wouldn't be a big issue though. At this point in time, the next highest tier costs $400 per year so in the worst case scenario it would be just 0.4% of the revenue.
Makes game
Steam 30
Govt 30
Publisher 30
The person who made gets 10.
Not too far from reality :'D
15 seconds in the video: this is either a big-money game or this man is very ironic
If I make $100K with my game in one year, I can retire from my freelance jobs and go full-time in games, in a third-world country of course (jokes aside... Nah, it's not a joke. I'd really do that). Even if you ended up with 43% of that after cuts, taxes, etc. For me, you are a model to follow!
Thanks, I feel honored! :) The cost of living is an interesting thing when it comes to being an indie dev. You can make games anywhere you want (as long as you have a pc and an internet connection) and aside from different taxation status, you will get paid the same amount no matter where you are from. So in relation to the cost of living, there is definitely a bigger earning potential for devs from not-so-wealthy countries. I wish you the best of luck with your gamedev journey!
@@AuroDev Thanks! I've just started to follow your channel and couldn't recommend enough your videos. They're great and I'll adapt and apply the tips you gave us.
(yeah! I'm based in a poor country and it allowed me to work in the entertainment industry via remote, because of the dollar exchange rate. It's not a glamorous life, but it gave me a chance to try out this industry, at least. I don't need to work every day for clients/publishers and it allows me a better schedule to develop. I'm slowly shifting industries, but I'm sure if I was in a place like LA, my game dev goal would be doomed XD).
@@Amelia_PC That's nice that you can dedicate some days for gamedev between your main job! I'm sure it will still be tough juggling the responsibilities but that's already a very nice plus. Keep up the good work! :)
@@AuroDev Thank you! :)
Man I wish my first game had made that. Instead I lost tens of thousands of dollars after counting the art I bought, marketing I made. And it doesn't count my hours, but I worked for several years. 9 months? I'm super envious.
I'm sorry to hear about your experience. I am definitely very lucky to have gotten such good results with my first game.
That's an insane revenue for someone's first commercial game, congratulations! The thing that triggers me at the end is how much money is taken away by Steam, taxes and other commissions, which removes a big chunk of earning.
Thanks! My expectations were low up until the point of release so it definitely felt surreal to see the numbers after a few days. But yeah, a lot of the pot ends up flowing elsewhere... Wouldn't mind seeing some more competition with Steam (even though I really like the platform) and their cut dropping thanks to that competition.
I would literally feel happy if a game of mine would reach 50k, that would make me happy
I hope you get there! Everything is possible with diligent work :)
@@AuroDev I'll do my best!
"1000 hours before release" means that you work 25 hours every week (you said you had worked 9 months to create the game; 9 months = 39 weeks). 25 hours a week, is a long time considering you also have another full time job. Congratulation!
Thanks! :) The journey definitely wasn't effortless.
What game engine did you build the game on?
Unity!
@@AuroDev Damn, do you think unity is hard to learn?
@@AuroDev how to use
@@esdeath1236 I think Unity itself is fairly easy to learn how to use and there are a lot of tutorials available to help with that. But the hardest part is learning how to code, if you are new to that. But even that is not an obstacle, if you really put your mind into it.
@@AuroDev What game engine do you think is the best to start with? I know multiple languages so I think it should be okay (what game engines that aren't unity btw)?
so why would anybody need a publisher? 30% is a big cut wow
I guess localization / porting, right?
Different publishers can offer different things. Usually the main reasons to get a publisher are to get a paycheck up-front to fund the development and to get help with marketing. On top of this they can also help with various things like porting, testing, game feedback etc.
But as you said, 30% is a big cut (the cut also varies though) and getting a publisher doesn't guarantee the game will be any more successful than if you published it yourself. I don't think getting a publisher is necessary a bad deal, but I would say that generally new indies are better off self-publishing than getting some relatively unknown publisher (big publishers probably won't be interested in your first game after all).
sniff sniff sniff lol
Are you Andrey Lebrov's Son?
Shh! Andrey wants to keep it a secret.
he looks like a tiny elon musk.
30% for Steam!!! this is enslavement , put your game on other stores like itch with cheaper price, even though it's will not sale as steam but you have to contribute for steam competition which is good for all indiedevs.
Sorry for what I did.
What did you do? :)
Is it me or does he resemble Elon Musk?
See what other game devs achieve in nine months of developement: www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/mggkq6/releasing_a_game_in_9_months_a_postmortem_by_the/
Makes Auro's accomplishment even more impressive.