Great low price! Fantastic value! Bonus exclamation marks!

The price of Time Flows, But Does Not Return has been dropped from 200 MS Points to 80 (approximately $2.50 to $1) in response to the recent pricing changes on the platform. I don't know if anyone would be reading this who hasn't purchased the game, but if the $2.50 price tag seemed a bit steep to you before, now you can buy the game for just 40% of the original price! What a bargain! What a steal! Act now, because supplies are (un)limited!

Why would anyone pay for this game?

I didn't want to raise this issue while the game was still new and relatively visible on the XBLCG service, but it's something I'll discuss now that the game has been out for a while and I've had a good chance to analyse the results.

One of the questions I've been asked about Time Flows, But Does Not Return is why anyone would pay for a game that could be completed in under 10 minutes, especially since there was no difference between the trial version and the purchased version. Part of it was simply that the game felt "done" in the form it's currently in. There was more content at one point while I was working on it, but ultimately it felt like anything beyond what's in the game now was superfluous. The game takes 6-8 minutes to play because the experience that I was going for took me 6-8 minutes to communicate. I was concerned with getting my ideas across as well as I could, and I wasn't really thinking about the trial time limit while I was creating it.

Towards the end of the process, though, I had to decide if I wanted to deliberately limit the demo in some way, knowing that I could release the full thing essentially as a free trial. I chose not to primarily because I never viewed this as a commercial product; it has always been about communication and experimentation for me.

So the question then becomes, why should anyone pay for it, since a paid version is available. The main reason is because I was hoping that players would question what exactly it is that they pay for when they buy a game. Why do you pay $2, $20, or $60 for a game? Is it because that's how you unlock "additional content", or is it because you gain something valuable out of someone else's work and you want to support what they do? This was my way of seeing if people were in fact willing to pay for something entirely to show their appreciation for it.

The result of this experiment was pretty positive - more than enough people have bought the game to cover the meagre costs I incurred making it. The conversion rate (how many people buy a game v.s. how many people download a trial) has also actually been pretty good - a bit below 2%. That might not sound very good, but 2% is considered to be pretty decent for most downloadable titles. I think it's even better given that - unlike other downloadable games - a purchase provided no additional content, and I made no attempt to "upsell" or advertise within the game, aside from providing a menu option to buy the game (the screen that appears after the 8-minute demo timer expires comes from Microsoft, not me).

As for people who didn't pay for the game, the most common thing I heard was that people didn't buy it precisely because they expected to get something extra in return for paying. That might not be so good for me and this particular game, but I think it bodes well for the service as a whole. Xbox Live is known primarily as a place where bigoted, immature young men gather, but I've learned that there's actually a pretty sizeable portion of the market made up of people who are looking for more risky, thoughtful works. And I think that's fantastic, even if I'm not the one who benefits from it.

Explaining the Name

I've seen a couple of comments now about the name that I release games under, which is The Shape of Games to Come. Some people seem to think that I'm trying to assert that I'm the future of the games industry or something equally pompous, but it's much simpler than that.

The short explanation is that it's an homage to one of my favourite albums, The Shape of Punk to Come by Swedish hardcore band Refused. If you've never heard them, head on over to their Myspace page, and listen to "Summerholidays vs Punkroutine".

The long explanation goes something like this: I originally wanted to release games under the name Curmudgeon Games, but a quick Google search turned up far too many similar names, meaning there would be no good way for people to determine what was and wasn't actually released by me. I came up with probably about a dozen other names that I thought sounded interesting, but they were all already taken.

At that point I stopped and thought to myself "What is an unusual but easily remembered combination of words that probably isn't in use?" You've probably had similar thoughts yourself if you've ever tried to sign up for an e-mail address with a well established service, since pretty much anything remotely common is already taken. Because I'm a huge music geek, I just started thinking about the names of albums that I really like, and trying to figure out if I could make any of them sound like a game development studio. The Shape of Punk to Come was the first one I hit on that I could find a way to "game-ify", so that's what I went with.

Time Flows - Your Response

This is part 2 of the previous post. I'd like the comments in that post to be about the game's themes. In the comments for this post, I'd like to hear anything else you have to say about the game. Was it interesting? Did it bore you? Is it dragging down the XBLCG channel? Do you want to see more 360 games trying to do things that are unusual and experimental?

Once again, a big thank you to anyone who took the time to play Time Flows, But Does Not Return, and an even bigger thank you to anyone who thought it was worth paying for.

Time Flows - Thematic Discussion

Time Flows, But Does Not Return is just about through peer review, so I thought I'd get a post up before it goes live in case I'm not around when it happens. I'd like to split this up into two parts, so I'll make two posts.

First, if you've taken the time to play my game, thanks! And if you thought it was good enough to warrant purchasing, thanks even more! If at all possible, I'd like comments in response to this post to be about the themes and ideas of the game. What have your experiences with these themes been? How does the game interact with those themes (if it does)? What did the game make you feel?

I'm really hoping that after people have played this game, they want to talk about it. That, more than sales figures, is what I would consider a success. So if you've played the game, and it's made you think about its themes in some way, please, share your thoughts here!

Exciting things are afoot!

Time Flows, But Does Not Return has now been submitted for formal peer review in Xbox Live Community Games. As long as no bugs/crashes are discovered and the game passes review, I'm guessing it should be available for purchase by the middle of next week. I'll update with a newer post for discussion of the game a little bit before it goes live.

Moving Along Nicely

The art game I mentioned in my last post is moving along nicely. I've got three out of the ten or so planned levels complete. I'm hoping to have the rest of the levels in the game and working by the end of next weekend. After that, I'll need to record and implement sound effects, add a menu, and write my creator's notes. Two weeks from today seems like a completely doable timeline to have the Xbox version complete. After that I think it shouldn't take more than another day to port it to Windows.

Changing Gears

I've decided to temporarily put Punk Rock Saved My Life on hold to work on a new idea I've come up with. I was starting to get a little frustrated with how long everything was taking, and the idea of the first game I've ever made taking nearly a year to finish and release seemed like not the best way to go about things. So "punk game" has been put on hold for a little bit while I work on something else. It's a little art game, which I'm hoping I can finish in two to three weeks. That way I'll have something concrete under my belt, and I'll feel a bit better about the massive time sink that Punk Rock . . . has become.