would you trust mochi?

[Squize]

The issue with that for me was that more people would take notice of the article itself, rather than the comments at the bottom of the page, which could just be seen as developers being pissy.

I think it's better the article was taken down, and the ideal solution would have been someone writing an article ( For Mochi ) which deconstructed his more extreme advice and explained why.

The whole tone of his article was aimed at script kiddies, it was very much a "You can earn money from Flash, here's the quickest way to do so", rather than a "You can earn money from making great games in Flash" which is really what I think mochi should be pushing.
They're a quality company, they should be right behind quality work, not just scraping in the cash any old how.

I know we dug out the article on our blog, and it's been vilified a lot ( Lot ) worse elsewhere so people have been able to express their indifference to it without it sitting on the mochi site as possibly the worst "How to" guide ever.

Squize.

[gambrinous]

In fairness the article was fine apart from that one throw-away line. It's pretty bad Mochi didn't spot that it was out of line and ask him to change it before it went live. He could easily have said 'use free graphics' instead. I'm guessing they just missed it- they've certainly been very thorough on editing & feedback on the articles we've had published on MochiLand.

[Squize]

To be honest I don't think it was just that moment of crazyness half way through, the entire tone of the article was poor.

It was targeted as an introduction to being an indie dev, but at no point did it touch on things like talent, or joy or dare I say, soul ?

To me it reads like "Here's how to wring every cent out of what you do", like the little story of how he reskinned a game he did for a client and then sold it on ( Which in itself is borderline naughty, I've done 80+ client games and have never done that. If a client is paying for a game, then it's there's. It's not yours to do what the hell you want with once the invoice is paid ).

Every example is how to make money ( Which lead to the whole "Used ripped sprites, their free. If you must though, I guess you could pay an artist" ), not once is there mention of iterations, of beta testing, of user feedback, of the sheer joy of creation.

To me it sends out the message of "Make money, it doesn't really matter how, it's there to be made".
With the title of the article I would have expected it to be more game focused, the game itself is king after all, and a happy side effect is that you can make money from it.
In an ideal world the better the game the more money you can make, but there was no real mention of that, it was more the shotgun approach of put lots of poor games out, 20 poor games will still bring in money due to the sheer number of them.

It was targeted at the script kiddes who reskin tutorials and put them up on mochi, which floods the market with crap, who look to sell the game for $50, who bleat when it gets poor reviews "It's my first game, I'm only 13" and who never ever think to credit the author of the tutorial they've effectively stolen.

Nah, didn't like the article

Squize.

[tomsamson]

Ok, everyone made his points clear and i think, who made mistakes probably got it by now or will never do, can we stop pitying da fool on and on and get off from our i´m somewhat on moral highground stances again now please?
K, thanks.

[tonypa]

Squize, please write an article to MochiLand, there is not enough articles about passion and joy and soul of creating games.

[gambrinous]

I'd have to agree with you on all that. It's not exactly an article I have stuck up on my wall

Squize, please write an article to MochiLand, there is not enough articles about passion and joy and soul of creating games.

Good idea!

[tomsamson]

Don´t get my previous comment wrong, i appreciate posts about the passion, joy and soul of game creation way more than ones which make it sound as if its about the money alone and nothing else, too.
I just dislike it when one guy doesn´t just get reminded once gently about not ideal behaviour or views but instead gets punished over and over like by a medieval mob on a witch hunt.

It especially feels dishonest and arrogant to me when its clear that most game developers at one time or another (if not constantly) have mimicked or used the art, sound or gameplay concept of another game to a degree where one could name it a blatant copy.

I feel like nowadays many seem to have the weird notion that when one game is more unique than others everyone who mimics a particular part of it is a copycat.
At the same time while they themselves can make the 1000th space shooter or tower defense game clone and that´s totally cool. Once there are enough copies of something its an exemple of a genre instead of a blatant copycat, you know...
Regarding ripping art of another game its debatable whether its worse to grab or convert or mimic art assets or code or gameplay or other parts, what i do know though is that many artists who later on create wicked stuff on their own start out by mimicing or blatantly copying stuff by others they appreciate.
In either case maybe one should stop throwing one stone after the other when most are sitting in glas houses themselves.

[tomsamson]

Regarding the thread itself i think its problematic that several topics are mixed there.

Regarding fishy advertising offers i totally trust the mochi guys that they try to get the best advertising partners possible, unlike many other such system providers who have been recorded on tape while produly stating their fishy manners.
As discussed sure sometimes black sheep pass through in either case and in such cases i think its best to contact the mochi support right away to let them know of the problem.

Regarding articles on mochi or elsewhere, well, mochi is obviously mostly centered around making money with games so its understandable that there can (and should be) articles which are about how one can make money with games.
The mistake there was clearly that one should make clear that mimicing others´content too clearly can be seen as fair use when its done in non commercial manner but as soon as one does anything commercial with it (like adding ads into the content or on the page it sits on) the creator of the mimiced content has a good standing when suing you.
Therefore in such articles it should be made clear that it is a good idea to take a game one adores (ideally an as basic one as possible) and try to recreate it as learning experience, but at the same time as soon as one wants to make money with a game one better should not use any copyrighted assets to avoid any potential issues.
I think that could have been said in more moderate way though without constantly bashing the article´s author again and again in (to me) self righteous (sounding) way.

[Squize]

"instead gets punished over and over like by a medieval mob on a witch hunt."

If that is directed at me specifically, then I was just airing my views in response to the posts here about it.
I highlighted issues I had with the article on the blog when it was first posted, as well as in the comments on the page on mochi.
I've also spoken briefly to Badim about it, and made it clear that my distaste at the article isn't a dislike of either him personally or his work.

Unlike some other blogs, I've made a point of saying we admire his contribution to the community at large, and we've linked to his blog previously. We never slipped ( At least knowingly ) into personal slander or a witch hunt against him or Mochi over the article.

"Squize, please write an article to MochiLand, there is not enough articles about passion and joy and soul of creating games. "

Ha, T two good reasons why I can't mate,
* You read the blog, you know I can't go more than 400 words without swearing. I'd spend more time editing it than writing it.
* If you need to explain to someone the buzz that comes with creating something, then you're already falling on deaf ears. Some people finish a game and sit there with a big grin on their face once it's done, others finish a game and wonder how much it'll go for on FGL.
The former gets it already and doesn't need a stranger telling them what they already know, the latter will never get it no matter what you say.

Squize.

[Incrue]

Regarding ripping art of another game its debatable whether its worse to grab or convert or mimic art assets or code or gameplay or other parts, what i do know though is that many artists who later on create wicked stuff on their own start out by mimicing or blatantly copying stuff by others they appreciate.

But they only do that for learning, not for profit.And even those who start with a style that looks like another guy's style, they have the work to create the stuff, they dont simply get and get credit of the work of others.

[tomsamson]

I wrote a lengthy first reply draft and then erased it
Let´s try again

I´m not into blaming everyone around, so to make it shorter this time:
yeah, i don´t think its a good idea to rip someone´s graphics, it can lead to legal trouble and even if it doesn´t and even if there´s always one group who totally loves it for what it is there will also always also be one group who thinks its blatant copycat work and not worth a crap.
At the same time everyone is getting in some cases heavy inspiration by other games like space shooter x, platformer y or tower defense z and in my eyes there´s no huge difference in that so why should i blame script kiddy p who makes the 1000th monster trucks copy (for example).
Regarding making money with it i myself create iPhone games for a while now for example.
All projects i made for big clients have brought a good bunch of money while games i made on my own in my spare time have brought close to no money in comparison. I think the games i made on my own or with friends for fun spare time projects were actually much better games, so i blame the high piracy rate and not spending any effort on marketing on the for fun games post release.
Still i make iPhone games for fun in my spare time, too next to the client work.
Why? Cause i find it very enjoyable.
We also started stimunation as free time coop and most initial games were made without any monetary intent at all behind them.
That was back when i first still had education and then fulltime 10 hours+ work at an agency going on next to our SN stuff.
So noone needs to tell me about passion =)

The thing is later on more and more people have to move on to some degree once they have to pay bills and who am i to blame people having to worry about paying bills?

I see many ways for making money and its clear that some are more fishy than others and one shouldn´t do the fishy ones but again, i think people should stop acting as the moral preacher when they themselves surely get *inspired* to do something heavily based on what they saw/played somewhere else and surely most grown ups here also do indeed think about what they can work on next at least to some degree based on whether they can make any money at all with it or whether they have enough money saved up to pay next months´s bills.
I know from myself i always do some client work for a while and once that´s done i can thanks to the earned money focus on some spare time for fun stuff for a while where it then matters less whether it brings in any money.

[alillm]

There is a vast difference between being inspired by something/someone and flat out taking content which doesn't belong to you (or that you haven't had permission to use) and making profit from it. The first is an essential part of developing a genre, the second is legally and morally wrong.

Ali

[tomsamson]

Yeah, i agree, still i think its better to have a view of sharing and inspiring each other is better than blaming each other while still being more than just inspired by others´work in many cases anyway.

[Incrue]

https://www.mochimedia.com/community...pic/mario-ad#0

https://www.mochimedia.com/community...ame-featured#0

[rumblesushi]

I heard about those scam ads before, ie taking a quiz and beign tricked into a subscription, but I don't understand how they work - how do they trick you into giving card details etc?

[Alluvian]

I heard about those scam ads before, ie taking a quiz and beign tricked into a subscription, but I don't understand how they work - how do they trick you into giving card details etc?

Maybe they are charging you through your mobile carrier? The text seemed out of place in the process, and it might work like the haiti thing where if you text them they can bill you through your cell?

[Squize]

There's an interesting thread on the mochi forums explaining their stance on copyright infringement ( When it comes to submitted games ) which has been hot on the forums for a couple of weeks now.

Oh, and before you click, it's not good news.

https://www.mochimedia.com/community...ng-me-thirsty_

Squize.

[Incrue]

Chris is right, those excuses are bs.Apple refuses any game they want, and if you want to sell your game for i phone you will have to agree on that

[dandylion13]

I have absolutely no idea what Mochi is, but form an outsider's point of view, they should change their name. "mooch" means to beg or scrounge. It doesn't inspire confidence, whatever it is they're selling..!!

[Son of Bryce]

Mochi is Japanese rice cake.