We are proud to be our own publishers for Rivengard and Legend of Solgard, as well as our upcoming third title codenamed “Project Loki” (a tactical game set in the Warhammer:40,000 universe). Getting to this point as a company has taught us a lot, and we’re like to share what we’ve learned so far:
Partnerships matter. Self-publishing sounds so independent, but in reality, it’s only possible with the right connections and relationships. There are so many moving parts with game publishing, with many areas of expertise. No individual and no small team like ours could possibly know everything — but we know a lot of experts who’ve been generous with their time and advice, and that’s made all the difference.
Know what you want. At Snowprint, we have clear goals and objectives for ourselves to help guide our decision making. Not just the big picture, “masters of our own destiny” level of thinking, but concrete stuff like what technology we want to develop in house, where we want to grow our own expertise vs. what we want to outsource.
Speaking of outsourcing:
Know what you don’t know. Localization comes immediately to mind. Our audiences are global, and even if we had infinite time, we would not be able to translate our games into all of the languages in which we want to publish. Games like ours are filled with sly wit and cultural references and other things that are difficult to translate, let alone with the cultural sensitivity we want to demonstrate. This is where we need to depend on the expertise of others.
Not everything should be outsourced, though.
Community is an inside, full time job. We want to talk directly to our customers, and even more importantly, we want to hear directly from our customers. Building those relationships directly is something that makes a big difference to our products.
UA is the same. User acquisition is a big, data-driven part of game development. It just makes sense to have someone who can put all their focus on this element of development, someone who is an integral part of the development team.
Customer service — know before you go. While it’s possible to just wing it, our customers deserve better than that! Before the first ticket arrives, it’s important to have guidelines in place, and the agents need to be empowered to solve problems (reimbursements, investigation, account restoration) without taking time away from game development. You may not need as many agents as you think you do — if the agents really know the game well. Outsourcing won’t save you money in the long run; agents who don’t know the game and are heavily reliant on scripts will result in service that’s slow, awkward, and ends up disrupting developers anyway.
A company is a living thing, always evolving, and needs and resources can change over time. For Snowprint, self-publishing is perfect for where we are and where we want to go.
Recent Comments