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Lyrical DejaVu
Agreed, this much i figured, and also that it was too much headache. But given that this was the 2nd time he had tried to make a game like this work, one would think this would make you extra determined to make it work, or at least not willing to let it go without a fight. Instead of the relaunch and advertising that should of happened but didn't, the game was closed, a ton of work putting this game together was lost, people lost there jobs, (and had no real warning) and the community may or may not, give you a chance again if you ever put out another game. To me that = not worth it. I'm not saying spend ALL of the money, but have a relaunch and a ton of advertising, at the very least, before you determine if it can't be saved. This game had virtually NO advertising, and trying to find it in a search engine was next to impossible. It really did need an actual relaunch, heck most of us didn't even know it had went to Open Beta. I know nothing is going to change, but its such a short sighted, bruised ego, don't want anyone to know there might be problems...type of reaction. Newsflash, there were a lot of ppl just as invested in this game. You, werent in this alone. If things like Small Worlds and Gaia can survive, Glitch at least had a fighting chance, don't know if it would of won the fight but...well weve said it all before.
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Lyrical DejaVu
Ok, that came across really harsh, some things are hard to say, what went wrong or how severe the stability issues were.....there are those factors, still it does strike me mostly as what i said above
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Shmoopie Kerfuffle
Agree! And I have seen and heard so many people say they didn't know about the game, they would have loved to have played it if they had known. Advertising was the key, but we were expected to do that ourselves, without knowing the possible closure hung in the balance.
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glum pudding
The problem with warning people was that they just shot the messenger and went back to playing. Even some of the staff kept their hands firmly over their ears when other staff tried to bring about positive change. I agree with you about the lack of advertising, and when that invitation feat showed up, all I could think was: why should I be expected to market a game which the staff hasn't bothered to market yet? (It would also have been weird to invite people to a game while there was such little content; it still felt like a virtual world desperately waiting for a game to happen in it.) Supposedly there were small ads placed over a period of months, but when staff analyzed the numbers, they found the return insufficient.
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Kukubee
We did spend some resources on advertising. But we had poor, poor, poor retention from new players. We had next to zero organic growth. It's not just about getting your name out there if the people who try the game don't even stick with it. Our dedicated players turned out to be a very very very small minority of the players that actually tried the game. And for this game to at least break even, we had to do something like 15-20x the player numbers we had. That's a huge jump. I really don't think anything could have helped outside of making some huge fundamental changes to the game itself. And THAT'S what would've cost us a more than we could afford.
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Benzyl
It seems weird that most people played for a few levels, said what's this and stopped. I played it for eight hours solid, said what's this and didn't stop walking for, oh, about 427 days. I'd be playing it now to be honest and the massively upgraded PC I bought all the bits to play it better with only got finished since it closed 'cos otherwise I never quite seemed to have the time.
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Kukubee
We did spend some resources on advertising. But we had poor, poor, poor retention from new players. We had next to zero organic growth. It's not just about getting your name out there if the people who try the game don't even stick with it. Our dedicated players turned out to be a very very very small minority of the players that actually tried the game. And for this game to at least break even, we had to do something like 15-20x the player numbers we had. That's a huge jump. I really don't think anything could have helped outside of making some huge fundamental changes to the game itself. And THAT'S what would've cost us a more than we could afford.
a long time ago
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Hab
Dearest Brent/Kukubee, I just want to thank you - REALLY thank you - for taking the time that you have taken over these weeks to talk about this very difficult subject. It is getting touchy now even for those of us who have tried to stay upbeat about it, because, I think for me at least, the loss - the monumental loss - is finally becoming real. At first I was in denial - wouldn't talk about it, wouldn't go to the forums, would only go to my little house and play by myself, pretending like it wasn't going to happen. Then I started thinking about it. Went to the forums - posted sad but loving posts about our beautiful world and all the things I would miss. Then, when you and Dan (and others) started your efforts to save what you could of Glitch, somehow it didn't seem so bad again. I felt like it (and I) would be okay. And then (though please don't take this as any lack of appreciation for your efforts - I am still so totally stoked to have the book coming, and am ordering a CD & music box as soon as I have the cash this week, as well as being on the waiting list for the next go-round of pouches), I realized that NONE of this would bring it back. It could only ever be memories. From now on. Forever. I cried again when people started saying goodbye here on the update page, that they couldn't hang around anymore because there was no point. And then... I think that's when it happened. Things started getting quietly, understatedly angry with many of us who have never been that way. We started questioning the closing for the first time - wondering if it was purely a business deal - get what you can from it and get out. People brought up Flickr, and I (thank heaven) had my computer delete a reply I made that well, stoot was a businessman first and foremost, what did we expect. (Oh GOD - I can't believe I told on myself). I kicked myself for two days and didn't come back to the update page because I felt so bad about saying something like that when you ALL have obviously done everything and more so far above and beyond to give us everything you can of this game. Even to have left the site up for us to communicate - the forums - even (the closet of my dreams) the wardrobe?!!! It is just so clearly the action of people who care about other people and about doing the right thing as much as possible. There IS no other explanation. Stoot was even posting snaps a week after closing. Now tell me those are the actions of a cold-hearted business-only dude. So okay, I have rambled quite a bit here, forgive me, all of you, but it just means a GREAT DEAL to me coming from you, Kukubee - with all the craziness you have going right now with the projects - that you would take the time to look at these last few posts from us last few hangers-on, and actually be completely, truly honest. It helps readjust my attitude, because although anger IS a legitimate part of grief, it isn't healthy to stay there, and Glitch is something I want to always remember fondly - not have some niggling feeling that SOMEBODY could have done SOMETHING to save it and didn't. Let's face it - Glitch WAS really unusual - for me that was a great thing, but for mass marketing, yeah - I can see it might not be so good. It sucks, but its true. How many times, people out there, have you said - damn it! I loved that show - why did they cancel it and WHY is Keeping Up with the Kardashians still on the effing air?!!! (Sorry to all of you who love the K's) It's just a matter of - unusual not being enough of a draw to make a good living at. Anybody watch Firefly (the Sci Fi series)? Perfect example. Hilarious - unusual - great characters - rich with color... just a BIT too unusual to make it. And like Glitch, the people involved were really broke up about leaving it. Tried to save it. But in the end, it was numbers. I have always been an unusual person - creative, artistic, a bit poetic - didn't meet many people like that, EXCEPT HERE. So, it stands to reason really - now that I think of it. Yes it seems like there were quite a few of us, but realize, people that we were all over the world - from everywhere - and put that into perspective with any other big mass-market game, TV show, whatever, and you have to see that we just weren't enough. I can see it now. I couldn't before, and so for me, that's why your comment here meant so much. Thanks again. *sigh* (((Kukubee))) Love and hugs to my fellow hangers-on if you managed to hang with me through this post. :')
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Minkey
I could write an equally lengthy (gee, or five billion times lengthier) response to you or I could just say a few short things: A) OMG, you're so sweet and cute; B) glad you deleted and were honest about the stoot message but don't be so hard on yourself...seriously; C) Firefly, yes. K thing, no, never (I also mean no offense for those who do the K thing); D) yep, beyond unusual; E) Awww, I think I love you!!
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Shmoopie Kerfuffle
Oh, you are so right about the popularity of stupid and the lack of interest in anything with complexity or depth. The same thing can be said for serious music, art, liturature...most people today don't even know what they ARE. I can see it now too. Back when the game was relaunched, I wondered at the dumbing down and simplification of some things, like why are we able to have all types of trees, rocks, barnicles, fireflies, etc. in our yards? I didn't especially like it, and thought it made the game too easy. But now I realize that the devs thought that by simplifying things, they could attract and retain more players. This really saddens me, because it indicates what we have become in just a few decades. There was a time that much emphasis was placed on the Liberal Arts, and it was believed that one couldn't be truly educated without it. Now we are spoon fed pop culture and taught no appreciation for the arts, which is the category I would place Glitch in. It was art. It was complex, and clever, and special. Most people today don't get that.
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Shmoopie Kerfuffle
Oh, and, LOL, I deleted my earlier post about Stoot being a businessman first, too :)
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chilirlw
And this is precisely why many of us were so determined to try to find a new place to be together--we hadn't had the experience of meeting so many like-minded people in one place before!
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Gegnar
"At first I was in denial - wouldn't talk about it, wouldn't go to the forums, would only go to my little house and play by myself, pretending like it wasn't going to happen. Then I started thinking about it." Right there with you. I realized I was in denial about the whole thing when, 60 some minutes til the end, I still had all my stuff in my bags. I thought I had been handling it - I made quests for myself, "I must visit every street before the end" etc. and thought I was coping well...Until I noticed that I was still hanging on to everything as if it would be there for me later. That was when the THIS-IS-IT feeling began to hit and gather momentum until the very end. I cried for a while and it still gets me sometimes if I think about it much. However I will be eternally grateful for this shared experience, and for the confirmation that not everyone is a batshit violent self-obsessed lunatic, but in fact a lot of people are very kind and generous (& a little weird certainly doesn't hurt.) :)
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Brib Annie
I agree with most of what you said. I often wonder why "stupid" and "mindless" and "voyeurism" are all so popular and successful and Beauty and Creativity have to take a back seat and more often fail. TV is full of Reality shows. Why? They are much cheaper than shows that require scripts and actors and wardrobe, etc. Almost anyone just out of school could make a successful reality show but how many of them can make "Firefly" or "Downton Abbey" and make them pay? Here on the WEB, Zynga rules. Why? They make you PAY daily. If you want to move on, get ahead, have it all, then you can Dollar yourself to death at Zynga and it's like. People often pay more in a month for those games than I paid for a year at Glitch. I have tried several games now. All are very good and all cost more than Glitch and none are half as good or creative as Glitch but they are successful. I guess I would rather have nearly two years of Glitch or Faunasphere than 10 years of Zynga. It's just my preference and not meant as a particular dig at Zynga and it's like. They do what they do well. I am very happy to have all of the keepsakes that I have and that will come to me "soon". I appreciate the open Assets and everything the team has given us and I wish them much success in the future. Somehow I think that Stoot will find his "game" one way or another, something that will make a profit and can also be appreciated and loved for it's genius. I am staying "tuned"!
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Ann DramaDuh
Oh, what a shame. That Glitch didn't make it because most people "out there" haven't got a clue about what quality entertainment is. I agree with Hab about how new, interesting, quirky TV shows fold after one season because they don't pander to brain-dead viewers. For example: I loved the show "Life on Mars." I loved many shows like that .. but they all got pulled. The problems are (1) money, and (2) vacuous-brained people who only come alive when there is conflict of some kind to live vicariously through. The money part can be overcome, but the mindless, living zombies cannot.
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Dewa
Hi! Missing everybody and your comment both conspired to pull me out of lurking mode. The american version of 'Life on Mars' had a large amount of filming done where I work (Goldwater Hospital on Roosevelt Island in NYC) I remember ooooo-ing the old police car props in the parking lots, had no idea what the show would be about. I've bought the dvds but haven't watched them yet. I agree with you completely about how most folks do not want to think / be involved with their entertainment and just seem to let themselves be brain-washed with drek. Wow do I miss the wonderful, funny, brilliant people who played Glitch. Forums are not the same.
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Little Poundcake
To follow up on this, since I'm a numbers person and I know that some of you are, too: Think about how often you or anyone you know will click on an ad because it looks interesting. Not very often, right? We spent *well* over $10K (I don't remember how much) to get about 1,000 clicks on our ads. Those are expensive clicks. Okay, so we have 1,000 people who did not know about Glitch and then clicked the ad. They ended up on a version of the home page with a big shiny "Play Now!" button. Now what? Only 100 of those people decided to click the "Play Now" button, which took them into the brand new cloud and flamingoes tutorial. Boo: we just lost 90% of those expensive clicks. :( Anyway, bright side! 100 new players! They're playing! Except... oh, shit, we lost all but about 30 of them before they even registered for a real account. Fuuuuuck. When we stretched that trend out over more ad dollars and a longer period of time, it turned out that we would hang on to maaaaaybe 5 of those people for longer than a week. The rest just vanished, usually somewhere around level 3-5, never to return. Glitch was a wonderful, magical thing for those of us who loved it, but it was simply not loved by most people who encountered it in the wild. It sucks, but it's the truth. Tens of thousands of people saw Glitch and did not instantly love it! We don't know what's wrong with them, either. :( Ad conversion was a total shit sandwich. We tried! We put lots and lots of dollars into the ad machine after spending lots and lots of time making a new tutorial for all of those new people. We had smart people helping us target ads towards our most likely players. A few of them came, fewer of them saw, almost none of them stayed. As Kuke mentioned, we needed significantly more players. There was no indication in any of our data that we could get there — or even remotely close — with more advertising. In short, math: sometimes it's a bummer.
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Little Poundcake
Shit, if only we'd preserved line breaks in status updates. That must be what did the game in.
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Dewa
Hi Little Poundcake, finally coming out of lurking mode, wow do I miss the entirety of Glitch......anyway, the numbers didn't work for me either when I tried to recruit friends to join and play. Did try though. And thank you for staying with us through the end times. It is comforting.
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Ayasta
For what it's worth, I was one of the ones who got invited from a friend when the game was out of beta. My friend says "Hey, you should play this, I think you'll like it!" Shortcut to a week later, I'm hooked and he's off playing a MUD. I got to level 60 twice and he never made it past level 11. Kinda sad, but that's how it goes. I figured there was more behind the scenes than most of us knew, but I'm glad you posted this to let everyone know! Thanks for trying, at any rate. You and the other staffers have all of my thanks for making something so wonderful!
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Miss Coco
Thanks for the numbers, you guys. It's easy to get lost in the shoulda-coulda-woulda without some hard data. While I would happily have given up my refund for one more day of Glitch (hell, five more minutes!), I totally respect that TS pulled the plug while they still had the resources to take care of their employees and give us players as gentle an exit as we could have hoped for (i.e, the fact that we can still be here on this website arguing about all of this two months after the game closed). I'm somewhat comforted, though also kind of depressed that I have to live on a planet with so many people who didn't instantly love Glitch. :-(
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Marla
I think another problem was the "instant gratification", "almost zero attention span" of many people in this world. Glitch took a bit of time and effort. If you expended those, you "got" the game and fell in love with it. Unfortunately so few people are able to, or want to, put forth the effort.
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Mocha Maid
Thanks very much for this. I feel a bit better about the game closing... and even more unique than I thought I was! Hugs to all devs and pl\ayers!
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Wynella
Thank you for sharing that info LP. I hope it will finally put some issues to bed. I feel marginally more relieved that I didn't spam every single friend I ever knew, twice, for the feat. And I feel every more special for having been one of the few, the proud, the Glitchen. :) <3
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Lyrical DejaVu
Thank you as well, yes i was getting a bit spiteful, but mostly it was because of pondering. Mind you it still couldnt of helped that it never came up in search engines if you were trying to find it that was, it was buried under how to fix, or take advantage, of such and such a glitch. Mind you knowing this helps alot. As for the inst-gratification crowd this wasnt for them, unfortuanatly thats MOST of gamers, so sad more people didnt "get" the game.
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Lelu
Thanks for this LP. Math is a bummer sometimes. I wanted other people that I knew to like Glitch, but too many of them just didn't get it, as you say.
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flask
i do not know what's wrong with those people. glitch was only like the most awesome thing ever.
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Macs
I wonder how many of the 1000 visitors got a message telling them that they need to upgrade their their Flash plugin to play Glitch, which caused them to just leave. The interesting thing is that Glitch still runs fine in Flash 10, but Tiny Speck insists that everyone should use version 11 or above.
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arizoo
I still think that a chill out game like this still have some potential. Like journey had. A place to chill out, hangout, discover yourself, open-less experiment, glitch had all of that in the beginning, it was a wonder world, then furniture and strange houses came, and it started to become something to not wonder about anymore. It was just work and busy people doing pointless mainstream virtual things. I don't blame anyone. I just want to say, you guys touched there, you were close, people will remember, will miss, something will come up after this experiment.
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Brib Annie
I understand but it is such a shame. It really was a great game. I did meet a number of new players who just had no idea what to do but, I have had that problem with every game I've tried. It takes something special to interest new players and "something" is wide and varied. I almost quit when I came in march 2011. I didn't like the side scrolling, I got stuck and could get no help for a while, etc. It was the Art that kept me here. The game grew on me a bit later.
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Genkicoll
I know that I didn't "get" Glitch when I first started, but then, I didn't "get" FaunaSphere at first, either. Both of them became beloved games, but most people nowadays are looking for instant gratification, and aren't willing to put any time into learning something new.
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