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I came across this link on the Mochi Ads forum over the weekend, and it gives a good, clear explanation of what it means to sponsor or license a game, the advantages and disadvantages of doing so, and tips on how to go about it.
Licensing/sponsorship is a topic that comes up regularly on here, so I hope this might be a useful resource for some members.
See here: http://www.flashgamesponsorship.com/
Cheers
Rich
Funny, all portals say they can make little changes on the games that makes them to be a lot more ppopular, it would be good if they give some examples of it
I like the ArcadeTown guys
Quote:
Hey, are we superficial? You bet! Hire a cheap artist at the very least. Programmer art is something we try to avoid
Some programmer art is better than most artist art I've seen so far.
i think "internet game sponsorship" will take it's place in history along side "junk bonds", "savings and loans" and "subprime mortgages"
Yeah but he is talking from the point of view of who runs a portal and knows what makes a game professional and popular.Every 'coder who draw' will love his coder art but it dont means the market will love it tooQuote:
Some programmer art is better than most artist art I've seen so far.
Very nice find. It wasn’t so valuable to me because it seemed that most of it was either common-sense or knowledge I already have, but I think this is definitely Knowledge base worthy (especially as a quick solution to those many sponsorship posts).
I only briefly glanced through most of the stuff, but I kept reading that sponsors only want to deal with 1 .swf file. That's understandable, but there must be an exception to separate .as files, isn’t there? I mean, how would you deal with classes (unless they're only referring to the amount of .swf files wanted)?
Viza
.as files are compiled into the swf mate.
It's only limiting if you want a stub preloader swf for whatever reason ( Checking which version of Flash is running and loading in a version targeted for that, although does anyone bother with that any more ? ), or if they don't allow external files at all ( Which sucks ).
Squize.
partly impossible imo. now with modern development. Recently I load all tiles/sprites dynamicly because it allows me to be much more flexible editing the graphics and reload them on the fly- no need to reimport and recompile the file.Quote:
or if they don't allow external files at all ( Which sucks ).
but most suck because they dont even try. It´s usually R-G or B colors mixed with some black-white gradients and usually Times New Roman.Quote:
Originally Posted by MikeMD
Yeah I totally agree, external files are essential in terms of workflow.
Squize.
Hmmm, interesting. An excellent resource - cheers.
Yep, sorry I know that, I just didn’t really express my question very well... I was a tad sleep-deprived last night.Quote:
Originally Posted by Squize
Doesn't really matter, I understand what they're referring to now :rolleyes:.
Viza
ha, just noticed I'm August's quote of the month :)
Squize.
OMG! You have seen my game! Wait, I use a Sans font... um... okay, there is some times as well. My god is this thing ugly, I need my wife back from vacation. I am addicted to gradients. They are so fantastically ugly! And then you can ANIMATE THEM! Moving ugly. IT LIVES!!!Quote:
Originally Posted by renderhjs
Then you have people like Render and Ever that do quite fine for themselves with nice looking 3d renders.
I contacted Crazy Monkey Games, Armor Games and a few other smaller sites about sponsorship a week ago. The other sites gave me pretty good offers almost immediately but Crazy Monkey and Armor Games still haven't replied. I'm wondering if I should wait or just take it that they're not interested.
Well from my experiences, they usually reply in less than a week (less than a day in most cases), but I wouldn't have thought they would just ignore you. If you are happy with the offers you have had already though and don't want to wait, then just go with the best offer you have.
With that said, I've had sites get back to me long after I sent the e-mail , by which point I had already sold the game. It just comes down to how patient you are, and how happy you are with the current offers really.
Ali
Crazy Monkey will likely get back to you. ArmorGames probably will, but they have been known to ignore some folks (they get a bucketload)
-CimmerianQuote:
Funny, all portals say they can make little changes on the games that makes them to be a lot more ppopular, it would be good if they give some examples of it
I like the ArcadeTown guys
Popular among players, portals, or developers?
High Scores
Multiplayer Function
Improved graphics/Sounds
Preloaders and 'more games' buttons (for sponsorship people).
-BlinkOkQuote:
i think "internet game sponsorship" will take it's place in history along side "junk bonds", "savings and loans" and "subprime mortgages"
I agree if you mean exclusive sponsorships. But you can make a decent living if you know how to market your games.
-SirCasticQuote:
I contacted Crazy Monkey Games, Armor Games and a few other smaller sites about sponsorship a week ago. The other sites gave me pretty good offers almost immediately but Crazy Monkey and Armor Games still haven't replied. I'm wondering if I should wait or just take it that they're not interested.
It took Crazy Monkey almost a month to reply to a question I had. Just wait.
But you will probly make more if you do non-exclusive. Get 20 sites * 100, if crazy monkey will match that, then my head asplode.
Just thought I would say, I don't know if I could even find 20 sites willing to do a non-exclusive licence these days, the market really seems to be moving towards an exclusive or nothing view point. Anyway, if you are talking 20 x $100, then your head might just have to 'asplode', but best not to get into money talk here.
Ali
Wow, what a great post! I read the entire article, and this was really educational for me.
I just started Flash Programming and I have had offers for my game when it's complete, so I really needed to read something like this to fully comprehend the Flash Game Sponsorship system. Thanks a lot!
I sponsor flash games regularly. Please get in contact with me if you have games ready for sponsorship.
Hey guys! I'm the original author flash game sponsorship site. I'm very glad people are finding it useful!
I've just uploaded some additional content yesterday!
A great article from Flipline Studios (Papa Louie - when pizza's attack) on self publishing and marketing your game.
Another article from MochiAds explaining a bit how their system works and how they will help distribute your game.
Finally there is brief summary of Kongregate's new premium game offerings. This is a MUST read, they are are offering to fund the development of community based games (up to $100,000) and the developer keeps IP rights!
If you want people to take you seriously, at least have a link with more information about you, your company and your service.Quote:
Originally Posted by Max S.
-alillmQuote:
Just thought I would say, I don't know if I could even find 20 sites willing to do a non-exclusive licence these days, the market really seems to be moving towards an exclusive or nothing view point. Anyway, if you are talking 20 x $100, then your head might just have to 'asplode', but best not to get into money talk here.
Addictinggames.com
kongregate.com
Gamegecko.com
Arcadetown.com
Flashgames247.com
Newgrounds.com?
Armorgames.com?
Freeworldgroup.com
Hallpass.com
Bubblebox.com
Gamegarage.co.uk
2dplay.com
Freegamesjungle.com
www.startgames.ws
maxgames.com
hypegames.com
mousebreaker.com
jeuxnet.com
gamebrew.com
zapak.com
yogames.com
thorgaming.com
slingo.com
playaholics.com
shockwave.com
realarcade.com
shockarcade.com
jarkey.net
trekgames.com
freeonlinegames.com
gimme5games.com
xfgames.com
mygame.com
flowplay.com
www.pepere.org
Here is thirty.
someone did their homework.
You have listed thirty games sites, but out of that list I could probably count less than 15 that actually licence/sponsor games (for a decent price), and most of those will only do exclusive deals. I said that I doubted I could find 20 sites that do non-exclusive licensing (again, for a decent price, because I expect most of them would be happy to do it for $50).
Ali
Actually, I've given you 35, and if the game is good, they will happily pay much more. And even if they pay you crappy, 50 * 30 =? And there are few sites out there who will match that.
50*30 = I would much rather get an exclusive deal.
All I'm trying to say is that yes, selling many non-exclusive licences should work out better for the developer, and perhaps it sometimes does, but sadly from my experience its not the case any more simply because sites aren't willing to give up the cash for a game that’s going to be on other sites (and the more sites its going to be on, the less they want to pay, that is, if they would even consider buying a game that’s on other sites in the first place).
I've had sites cut their offer for a game to a ridiculous amount simply because the game is on one other site. The amount of effort it would take to get the same amount I could make from one exclusive deal really isn't worth it in most cases in my opinion. Maybe others have had different experiences, but that’s just what I’ve found.
Ali
I am curious to how much you can make from this game licensing / sponsorship malarkey as I currently just make games to order for people and am not making a great living as I tend to get paid between [sum commented out, no actual sums here, tomsamson] per game and this normally includes giving the source code to the client.
Here are some examples of the games I have made
http://www.mediakitchen.co.uk/portfo...mes_mbango.htm
http://www.mediakitchen.co.uk/portfolio_games_pizza.htm
http://www.mediakitchen.co.uk/portfo..._rugbygame.htm
If I could make a better living with this sponsorship / license thing, I would certainly be interested.
No actual cash amounts on the board please :rolleyes:
Squize.
yup.
luckily we live in a world of free trade and economy (well, in many countries anyway ;) ) and with web related biz more than in any other there is worldwide competition for any job.
At the same time in the flash game "biz" there´s a big portion of youngster upspring which will create games for fun and at most think of money making with it as an afterthought.
But yup, there are lots of people also making their living with it and yup, there are things like price dumping which aren´t seen as propper nice business manner by anyone (and not even by most of the western countries).
If you don´t know about what´s the typical value of something you better don´t state prices in public as if you did,otherwise you´ll probably dump the price for yourself and anyone else.
All i can say to statements like licence to 30 sites at once to gain 2000 as total sum is that´s ridiculous, sorry.
As Ali pointed out there´s a big possibility that the more sites you licencesd a game to,the less other sites will want the same game or be into paying a propper sum for the same game. You´d essentially have to licence the game to all sites at the same time to be released pretty much at the same time which gets more unrealistic logistics wise the more sites you tackle.
Next up pretty much each site will ask for certain changes/enhancments in your game,whether its just about including an intro/hs/tracking stuff for their site or if its about bigger changes and additinos is hard to guess beforehand.
Who wins if you licence your game around for 50 or 100 bucks and in return try to get it on 30 or more sites? Not you, cause you´ll have to rush from portal talk to portal talk and portal game adaption to portal game adaption, no fun work after the first novelty wears off and the payment in return is low.
To give you an idea in the normal work world basic adoption of a game to a site would have more work/money value than what you´re asking for for the whole game (and adding up adoption of the game to the site for free).
Sure, you can do games for fun and see the money you make as pure bonus for a hobby or you could just be trying to get into the biz and starting selling your first few games with the thought to make any propper money with em. But yeah,consider how long you worked on the game, how much your living would cost for that timespan if you have to pay your living on your own.
Also think of how much money some of these sites make with the game you ask 50 $ for, you´d probably go crazy if you knew the difference.
I´m not saying don´t offer a good price/value deal to a portal. Of course you should.
Just don´t sell yourself and at the same time everyone else so low that the portal owner laughs his b... off ;)
Oops sorry!! Didn't realise mentioning amounts was a no no...
np, my post was more of a general reply to several posts i saw here rather than just yours :)
can someone give me a good explanation why people can't discuss money here again, I still don't get it
surely the only people to benefit from the knee-jerk censorship here are the site owners that will continue to offer piddling amounts for hard work because the developer wasn't aware what his work was worth?
can we say 600 - 1000 jellybeans?
erm, did you read my post or some of the others before? There were good reasons and examples given for why its no good idea to have public price statements here.
While someone working in the biz for some years might give a fairly reasonable sounding quote, someone not so experienced yet will probably state a sum which is ridiculously low regarding the amount of work that goes into games (and the amount of money that is often made with em by some clients).
Prices vary heavily depending on your country/client/project scale and many more points; whos the one to say hes found the sweet spot for each and everything?
if you´re so curious to know what´s a good value talk with other developers in private or inform yourself how much jellybeans miniclip is earning per year, that should give you an idea.
exactly, so why not discuss them and get the varying types of work and pay in the open? If prices vary heavily then they'll hardly be fixed. I'm sure I'm not the only one that would find it usefulQuote:
Prices vary heavily depending on your country/client/project scale and many more points
I disagree - for sure, they are valid arguments, but not a reason to quash all discussion unless it's against the flashkit Ts&Cs (is it?)Quote:
There were good reasons and examples given for why its no good idea to have public price statements here.
if there's a thread about a subject I'm not interested in or disagree with I just ignore it, can you not do the same with threads discussing costs if you don't want to get involved?
who benefits from the lack of openness?
Miniclip earns more jellybeans than I think most people would imagine :)
mentuat I kinda see your point of view, in that if we were all open about what we charge then people would realise that 500 jellybeans is actually an insult, but then people would just under cut each other and the prices would tumble anyway. Pre freelance forum people would post here asking for games for $100 and after about 8 posts ( At most ) someone would be offering to do that for free.
I know we can all argue that it's market forces so we have to compete, and someone doing a game for free isn't going to be any good, but it still causes bad blood on here, and that defeats the object of this board imho.
Squize.
to mentat: i already tried to explain it to you before.
I think (and i guess Squize and some others would agree) that public price statements, especially as not experienced fellas often state way dumped prices are more good for portals than any developer.
Whom does it help if kid a states hes made a great deal by licensing his game around for 50 or 100 $ ?
For once i´ve heard people selling flash games for anything between 20 and 300 k euros (and that´s for a single player game, not something multiplayer like club penguin which can go in the hundreds of millions), so there you see how much price statements here would vary, how should that be any good for anyone here?
Next up: you´re a member, i´m a moderator, i don´t say this to sound bold but yes, my task is not to just ignore threads silently i have a serious issue with. If i have an issue with a thread i feel like its in the benefit for the members of this forum i should do something about it.
I´m sorry that you see my motivation to help all here as knee-jerk whatever.
From my experience here talking prices is often done by people who don´t earn their living with flash games and therefore are generally way lower than what´s a reasonable sum and therefore just lead to further dumping prices for all.
I´m open for suggestions on and corrections of my view though, so jump in people and let me know if you agree or disagree with having public price discussions here.
squize beat me to it :)
for sure, that's a valid opinion, but how do you know? we're not allowed to talk about costs!Quote:
I know we can all argue that it's market forces so we have to compete, and someone doing a game for free isn't going to be any good, but it still causes bad blood on here, and that defeats the object of this board imho.
Quite how it would defeat the object of this board when the majority of users are trying to make money from developing flash games is beyond me...
understanding the worth and costs involved is an important part of development, why immediately stop any discussion on it?
again, no-one is demanding to know how much everyone earns, like any discussion you can choose to get involved or not, but I don't see how you can justify censoring it?
it's all information that would be out there for people to make their own judgment from, knowledge is power etc!Quote:
Whom does it help if kid a states hes made a great deal by licensing his game around for 50 or 100 $ ?
For once i´ve heard people selling flash games for anything between 20 and 300 k euros (and that´s for a single player game, not something multiplayer like club penguin which can go in the hundreds of millions), so there you see how much price statements here would vary, how should that be any good for anyone here?
you're right, I'm a user and you're a moderator and you do a wonderful job of moderating this forum but I think censoring posts about costs is out of your jurisdiction and detrimental to the forum :)
discussing pricing in a forum such as this could be considered an attempt at price fixing which is illegal