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Postmortem - EF:Warfare 2
15/09/09
Postmortem - EF:Warfare 2
4 moths ago I released EF:Warfare 2. That was special experience for me - my first public multiplayer game, where I`m hosting my own server. So all traffic bills I`m paying from my own pocket.
Just to remind few stats about development: as2 game, server based on SFS, development took around 3 months, DB is MySQL.
Follow up:
After release I have been spending around 10-20 hours per week to support, fix, update this game. this support I have to run from release till game dies, otherwise nobody will able to play it. First of all I still cant fix bug - after few days SFS cant find users via getUserId properly, so I have to restart every 2 days server manually, witch is not cool at all =( So now server is stable, but I still have to spend time to restart it from time to time.
Good thing was that game is playable in singleplayer. Bad thing about it - difficulty =( To play singleplayer was very hard compared to multyplayer. Right now there is coefficient so Singleplayer is X2 times easier then Multy.
Multiplayer was advertise feature, so it can be played only on K, NG, EG.
That plays well in order to sent traffic to sponsor. But in release I used main version based on Gamejaket! that plays very terrible joke with me - once We submitted everywhere game version with GJ - it went bankrupt and version of game was not working anywhere. So beside average gameplay this event have shut down all our distribution work.
Stats:
Finally game have sent 56000 users to Kong, which was only 2800$ due to our deal with K.
By advertise there I earned on this game around 100$(Instead of dynamic ads i have used static with links to sponsor).
About multiplayer:
In order to play game user have to be logged in site first. There is no other option to be registered and play multy in game.
After 3 months there were registered 6k players in game, 1.5k of them played 1 map at least, till win(500 players) or lose(1000 players). In game shop they bought 400 items.
Overall:
Game was to hard - impossible to play. Distributions was shut down by GJ. Many hours we spend on distribution then to fixing and updating game. Total fail, in my opinion.
But there will be Warfare3 of course =). It will be waste to forget about engine that I already have after warfare2. there will be heroes for sure to add dynamic and fun to game.
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4 comments
Even if I am not a developper, I have a question for you.
Why didn't you try to use the multiplayer API of Nonoba. It works perfectly and will save you time ... I am sure you prefer to manage your site or create games than to keep an eye and manage your server.
just as example, right now i can add ef-warfare2 to http://www.jeux-internet.com as your own game! your users will be registered there, there will be no external links. if i had choose nonoba - that will be never possible.
(if you need it, just email me =))))
My visitors are mainly girls and teens. So, EF Warfare 2 was not a big success. But, if you use your techno for some other games, let me know if we can personalize it for Jeux Internet.
By the way, in the beginning of Feb 2010, do you expect to come in Hamburg ?
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