I’ve been looking at the Flash ecosystem today! It’s pretty tough, but there are options. From what I can tell, OK games can make a few thousand dollars with some effort, and decent games – in a popular genre, in an established Flash game franchise, making use of multiple revenue streams – can make $50,000 or more for a few months’ work (according to Boxhead developer Sean Cooper in this awesome Gamasutra article on the topic). However, getting there can take several games, and there are hits as well as misses.
Bear with me now – I don’t have experience in this market yet, this is just what I’ve read, and I’m noting it down for myself as much as anything 😀 But… what I’ve read suggests multiple revenue streams are key.
1. Web advertising, or a share of advertising as with Kongregate etc. This sucks. Games can pull in millions of plays and only make a few thousand dollars via adverts. However, it’s useful supplemental income to the rest.
2. Primary sponsorships! This appears to be one of the best sources of revenue. Sponsors will pick up games via sites like FlashGameLicense.com and pay anything from a few hundred dollars for a random game up to tens of thousands of dollars for an appropriate game that’s likely to be super popular (see: established brand). You add their logo to the front of your game, that redirects to their site, and they’re happy.
3. Site sponsorships: A few sites won’t carry any Flash games if they mention other sites. You need to provide a specific, site-locked version of your game that mentions their site, and they’ll pay a bit for that. Apparently primary sponsors are usually OK with this.
4. Up-front advertising: Stuff like MochiAds. This puts a very high visibility advert in front of the player, meaning it’s worth relatively more than site ads, and as the developer you get a high cut of the revenue.
5. Upsell. Virtual goods sales, subscriptions, premium content, premium versions – the goal here is to segment your market and let the people who are willing and able to pay for your game do so, giving them something in return. This probably has the strongest influence on game design, as you need some way to slot in the paid-for content or service you’re offering. Fantastic Contraptions offered a level editor and the ability to check out other people’s puzzles for money; Dino Run offered hats for your dinosaur.
6. Merchandising! OK, I guess this comes under upsell… but games with decent characterisation can hope to sell tshirts, mugs and plushies just like webcomics.
7. Donations. Nobody makes much from donations – it might be 1/1000th of what other revenue streams make – but a donation button costs an hour to set up, max, and it’s a great morale boost knowing that people just like your stuff that much!
8. Running your own portal. Establishing a developer brand and getting traffic to your own site is a lot of extra work, but for Nitrome, etc. I have no doubt it’s paid for itself. Even if you give them a site exclusive, Kongregate will only give you 50% of ad revenue. Run your own site and you can get the whole lot.
9. iPhone/iPad ports. There’s huge crossover between Flash games and iPhone/iPad games in terms of how people engage with them, interface complexity, graphical complexity… so most games transfer over fairly well, and that’s another revenue stream.
10. Commissions. Sites like Kongregate and Adult Swim (and no doubt others) are happy to give money to capable, experienced Flash developers to make games on commission. This does mean you don’t get to do your own thing, but it pays the bills.
The big problem for me with all of this stuff is that the Flash ecosystem is very much a casual space. Almost everything’s geared towards games which get millions of plays, and people will close a game in seconds if they’re not having fun. That means the games have to be fairly shallow and be accessible to a broad audience, most of whom won’t be particularly game literate. Even if you can pay the bills that way, it means partly giving up the chance to do something challenging and interesting for an audience that’ll appreciate it!
Maybe there’s a way to make niche Flash games for an enthusiast audience work, but I suspect the limitations of Flash would outweigh its instant accessibility in that market.
I’m still definitely going to stick with Flash for a game or two – I’ve got a few ideas that would work best as Flash games. 🙂 I’m not sure this would work for me as a main source of income long term though.