Misleading title as I'm not talking about me :o)

It's actually the title of a thread on the gamedev reddit I just found out while taking a break and it's about GOG curation, I didn't put in in "too niche" thread or one of many Barry's thread because in the present case it's a bit hard to take the defense of the dev as it's a bit of compilation of everything you shouldn't do as a dev when submitting to GOG and dealing with it....

Here's the thread:
https://www.reddit.com/r/gamedev/comments/46o3fj/a_little_story_about_gogcom_and_my_experience/

Don't forget to click on the [+] sometimes to see some hidden responses.

PS: Here's the Greenlight trailer of the game submitted:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cA7_C1E2_O0

On one hand, this response is understandable as GOG's promises on the indie submission page to have a more personal, human relationship with indie dev submissions were not met by this dev. Then again, who could have expected so many indie games to be released so often? Just imagine how flooded the market is gonna be in another 15 years. GOG is probably bombarded with submissions.
But from what I can see from the dev's game, it looks like nothing more than a poor man's Race the Sun. Developers are going to have to have to reconsider their strategies going forward. There are so many indie devs who want to make a career making games, and many just pump out game after game, without realizing (or caring) what effect it will have on their own brand and the market (and by extension, their own sales). Too often I read devs only talking about monetization and marketing and visibility and trends. I guess it just feels disheartening when it seems developers care less about making something that truly stands out or that they actually want to play, instead of what they think will sell the best. My apologies for ranting.

Just watched the trailer of the game and it makes me want to buy 10 games from GOG.com right now for protecting me from having to see that indie shovelware eyesore on the front page of GOG.com. :)

GOG: Thanks for curating this stuff into oblivion! You probably should improve your communication with indie devs though. Maybe reject submissions like that within 24-48 hours instead of waiting 3 weeks. Alternatively give them an 8 page list of changes to improve their game that would take 100 developers 9 years to implement, or something like:

GOGtip#1:
- cd into root dir of source code.
- type "rm -rf *" and hit ENTER.

Just an idea. :)

3 weeks doesn't seem all THAT long to wait for a storefront to reply.
Seems like he was given no reason for rejection which is a bit weird.

Quote:
I personally don't even know how to react, part of me wants to reply saying "Thanks for judging us on what's now irrelevant information and for all that communication you promised" but I think I'm just going to ignore it and move on. We had no way of contacting them after sending the original submission to provide more screenshots/videos/information, there was no contact from them at all, overall it feels like we weren't even given a chance to try and make a case. Just a flat out rejection.

He says he wanted to reply but also states he had no way to provide more information.
I'm can't say this makes it clearer to me.

On this particular point, many devs think it can't get "bigger" simply because the market has already adjusted itself with the low-barrier entry of game engines and games website. so we're somehow already in the "peak" phase from a business POV. One other difference from years before when only Gamemaker & co existed for "non-coders" is that instead of putting their games for free (or with ads like Kongregate & co) is that they now put a price tag on it, thus shifting it into the paid market realm.

When I started watching the trailer my first thoughts were the same as yours... "It's like Race the Sun, but even worse if that's possible and with CGI graphics." Any developer of any game whether it is good or bad, awesome or pure crap is going to have an emotional connection with their hard work, and they're also going to not like being told bad things about it or being rejected. That's a natural human response. It's like listening to someone play guitar who can barely play but they're excited because they created a song and want you to hear it. You listen and it is pure crap, they're tone deaf and out of tune, not playing everything in the same key, etc.

If you are their parent or friend you might praise them for doing a good job and that they're coming along nicely to keep up the good work, but if they're submitting it to Sony Music well... don't expect a response, and if you do expect a dry "We're rejecting your submission, it is not what we're looking for, keep your day job." That will burn, but well... that's life really. Then go rant on the Internet about how nasty Sony is for rejecting your musical masterpiece. :)

3/4 or more of the Indie games being developed could fall into the Sun and the gaming world would not be particularly harmed, and that's being nice about it. :)

So it seems to be a Race the Sun clone, only maybe worse? An endless runner game?

I have a hard time faulting the guy for expecting some communication in return, even if just to say "Hi, I'm Pavel, the Submissions Coordinator, and we have received your game submission. We'll be in contact within x days, and please keep in mind that the process takes a few weeks. In the meantime, you may submit video, screenshots, alpha builds, etc., here."

That doesn't seem overly difficult. I know if I ignored customer requests for three weeks my customers would go elsewhere; at the least, I need to get back with them right away to determine how quickly they need action. It sucks to say "I'm working on it, please be patient", but that's what you have to do. No communication - if that's how it truly went down - isn't the way to do this.

And yes, in this case the developer is partly the customer. How is that? Simple: gOg are the ones making the offer of a service. That makes the developer the customer in this part of the relationship. At the same time they are a vendor of a specific product.

The expectations might have been a bit optimistic, but if the website says gOg are going to provide direct human communication then they damn well need to follow up on that promise, in a reasonable timeframe, even if just to say "Submission received, and we're looking into it."

I feel like I agree with SCPM. There are plenty of stores selling games, be it an indie or a big title. So one should not be too upset if some store(s) decline an offer. Asking for a company to include the game in their store always comes with two possible answers - either yes or no. Simple as that. GOG is still growing in my eyes and not flooding a store with all the games proposed is completely understandable. If GOG did accept everyone, it would just be another Desura/itch thing.

And I am already repeating myself and I have lost my train of ideas...

mmm, that's where we have to agree to disagree because for me it's a pure B2B relationship where both parties have to sell "their" stuff. Not different than a farmer trying to get distribution deals with retail stores but hey, maybe it's just my twisted capitalist mind speaking :o)

I sometimes had to wait three weeks before support requests to developers or sellers were answered with general questions, so yeah, that doesn't seem like a scandalously long time for a company to make a business decision about whether they can fit in your game or not (and I doubt you'd get a quicker answer if you sent your novel manuscript to a publishing company). Of course, it's not ideal either. We all know communication isn't really GOG's forte, even though at least they try a bit harder than others, but I get the feeling their ambitions are often greater than their capacities ... (And I don't want to know how many indie submissions they (still) get on a regular basis.)

I like this one...

[–]davidmaletz@DavidMaletz 17 points 14 hours ago
I've submitted two games to GOG and had a similar experience. Both were rejected after 3 weeks with a one liner saying they took a look at the game and it seemed interesting because (insert random detail that is obvious at a glance), and then following with this paragraph:

Unfortunately, however, we feel that the game would not be a good fit for GOG, as we think that it appears to be too niche and a bit too small in scale in terms of production value for our core users, which means that we aren’t confident in its sales potential on our site.

They didn't ask for a copy of either game, nor communicate aside from the rejection. I'm not sure what their criteria are, but both games had websites, videos and screenshots at the time of submission - so the fact that your game didn't have a website was probably not a big factor. One of the two games has even been doing well on Steam, so their loss I guess.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/374950/ - With 910 owners according to SteamSpy - just bundled on Groupees (1st)

http://store.steampowered.com/app/340330/ - His "doing well" game - with 7,424 owners - bundled 3 times already

http://store.steampowered.com/app/346090/ - 1,172 owners - not bundled yet

Seems GoG's responce was spot on. Not selling on Steam and the only one "doing well" is because it sold in bundles 3 times. Not sure what this guy was complaining about...

Honestly, if I owned an online store and did any sort of indie game submission thingy,
- Website (even a free blog or facebook page)
- Youtube trailer
- Playable demo
would be the bare minimum for me to even start considering such game

He seems pretty adamant that GoG is "losing" to Steam, because they don't take the time to communicate personnally to the dev and because they're not fast enough in responding... He also believes it doesn't help him practice his craft and doesn't give him the monetary help he needs in learning/perfecting game development (and paying his rent). He seems to be missing some perspective though. Things that have been said here by us, for some times, concerning their curation.

Steam doesn't need to communicate personnally with hundreds of devs since their systems seem automated. There seems to be little communication going on in regards to submissions of a game, acceptance or refusal of a game, updates to the games, current advancement of the game, price of the game and any other things that needs to be communicated between business partners. From what I understand Steam is very hands-off with a majority of the games that get on their platform.

What he doesn't seem to get is that the day he'll make a game he's going to be proud of, and wants it to be recognized and get the attention it deserves... Steam might not look as wonderful as it does now.

He seems more hurried to release his game (in whatever state) and make money, than he is offering a product to the consumer, learning his craft (so iterating on his game) and learning the business side of the industry (which you have to do if you are indie). Seems like he needs to wise up, ask for feedback on his game (not the platform that did not accept his half-made opus, having feedback about GoG's lack of personnal communication with devs won't help him make a better game) and also learn the business of submitting a game to a distributor that doesn't accept everything without looking at it. Also the fact that GoG inccurs costs for curation in joining their store and curation in keeping games playable on new exploitation systems is not something that seems to be known by this dev.

It would not even be a good idea for GoG to give an email for devs to ask about where their submission is at, since if they don't have time to answer every submission in a timely enough fashion for this dev they'll certainly have less time if they have to answer about where a submission is at... Anyway, I rambled enough (and probably made enough typos to give an headache to most of you). :)

He says GOG is losing to Steam, but are they? They're losing something they don't want to begin with. Selling a few hundred copies of a game is meaningless. Maybe it buys the developer a few cases of Redbull and pays his car insurance but bringing games that sell such low copies to GOG wouldn't likely even pay for the overhead costs of GOG.

I've yet to see any game that anyone has mentioned anywhere on the forums as being rejected by GOG for being "not a good fit" or similar even look worthy of being sold here. The evidence of Steam accepting it being suggested by devs as an indication Steam knows better is pretty silly. Steam more or less would sell just about anything that compiles and doesn't get massive customer returns even if it only sells a few hundred copies. Steam just doesn't care and doesn't want to be in the curation game.

Almost every game I see mentioned that GOG rejected, I think (usually silently to myself) "holy crap, give GOG a gold metal for shitcanning that pile of crap!". I mean really, the Atari 2600 game "E.T." is an epic masterpiece compared to most of the stuff GOG rejects. Seriously. :)