MAJOR CHANGE

all right guys it's honesty honesty time uh kind of got an update for you and wanted to sort of give you a heartfelt thought wellth thought out um brain dump for those of you who follow my channel and for those of you who don't I make video games for a living but I also do YouTube Right Where I do game development videos for YouTube and over the weekend it was kind of a a big weekend um and it was something I've been aiming for for the last couple years and I just want to give you sort of an honest honest thought process here um so a lot of you know this um I I have online courses where I teach game development I I teach the business of game development that's primarily what I focus on is the bus business of game development um but I also have released two commercial games but it's been a while since I've released a commercial product and I think it's been like two two maybe three years and I'll be honest with you guys I I was talking to my wife

in January earlier this year and I said to her I said if I don't do something with another game soon I'm not going to feel I'm not going to feel okay about selling online courses about the business of game devb because it's been a while right um and I feel like I maybe have the credibility would be slipping um so I just never really felt I sort of had a deadline for myself if I didn't do something by like April or May of 2023 three um and it's September or it's October right now um I wouldn't feel good I wouldn't feel I I would probably I told her I was going to probably at least pause or close down the courses um so so here's the news Okay um the news over the weekend was let's see here there we go um my game Twisted Tower and it's I say my I'm the art director um but it's it it's a group

effort guys uh Felipe caravelli AJ venat um Chris pesos um we've got Hector Rodriguez we've got who else um who did the artwork here oh Santiago Lor amazing artist doing the the artwork for the cover art so a lot of people I'm just the art director um that said um we signed with 3D Realms and we actually signed with them a while ago um earlier this year but I couldn't announce it this is a big deal for me personally because the things that I teach in my courses and I know I I have over three I think I have almost 4,000 students the things that I teach in my courses I I I was hoping that I could prove them to you and I want to be honest I I I was kind of panicked about this whole thing because I thought man I've got 4,000 students you know people have invested in this course um I hope that what I'm teaching is actually working right and it is guys it does work um

this is my third published game this will be my third commercial release this is the biggest budget game um and also some some credibility when it comes to Publishers because I I teach about Publishers a lot and a lot of my YouTube My Game Dev YouTuber friends um they don't want to work with Publishers and that's fine and they're they're really successful at it for example Jonas Ty roller who released recently released early access for his game Throne fall fall that game is blowing up he's doing so good and I'm so proud of him and that was purely self-published for me though I like to work with Publishers cuz they handle a lot of the marketing stuff like this beautiful website here right um and also let me just show you guys what a publisher can do um this is IGN right uh the trailer dropped on IGN over the weekend I had no idea about this but 3D Realms made it happen Okay um so 35,000 views so far pretty good um they got a article from Bloody Disgusting right um I made the tra

so a lot of times a publisher will will hire out or contract out or even do it in house and make a trailer I like to have my fingers in all the details because I'm a marketing guy I'm also a Salesman if it's not obvious um excuse me um I'm willing to admit that I am a Salesman uh and I like sales I like marketing but I also like making games um but the the steam page dropped and by the way click the link below if you want a wish list Twisted Tower um so all of this you click follow and also wish list um but also you know is it Realms deep um it was at Realms deep over the weekend um featured at Realms deep um so really really excited tons of Articles came out over the weekend about Twisted Tower and you know I I think that this is something that I I want to clear I want to clear the air about several misnomers okay there's a lot of things where the game community

and this isn't a slight against the game Community I think it's just a slight against human beings uh human beings they tend to gravitate towards one thing right and they're they focus on one thing and then they they throw out everything else they sort of get religious about things so for example um they'll say Publishers are all evil and they'll just write off Publishers or they'll say I'm an unreal guy or I'm a gdau guy or I'm a Unity guy right and unity in particular that one's difficult to swallow but the point is you don't have to be a certain tribe okay and I understand the unity side being well you just don't want to get screwed over in the future by their pricing but the point is is even between unreal and gdau right you don't have to be one or the other when it comes to Publishers you could self-publish sometimes you can get a publisher sometimes you can do Kickstarter sometimes you don't want to do Kickstarter you want to do let's say investment right find an investor or sometimes you don't want to do any of it uh sometimes you want to be a a a YouTuber right and sometimes you don't

right sometimes you want to make Game Dev videos sometimes you don't you don't have to pick one thing and stick with that one thing there's a variety of ways in when it comes to game getting getting funding for your game there's so many ways to make money for your game before you launch your game and in my case I actually I did it in a variety of ways for Twisted Tower Twisted tower has been a very expensive game what I did is that I just continually released content that helped bring in funding for my team excuse me so that I could pay my team and so I had a full-time uh artist I still have a full-time artist his name is felipy and he's a good friend and he's really smart and he's really really talented brilliant artist takes takes uh offer offers up incredible ideas but also takes critique well and he just really humble he's just a really well well-rounded guy and also AJ who's the who's the C developer incredible guy

takes takes feedback well but also offers incredible ideas for me where I have to take feedback well is as well um but those two team members I was able to pay uh the bills and pay those guys because I had a YouTube channel does that make sense so you have a YouTube channel you secure sponsorships or maybe you offer a digital product or an online course or you um sell your other games or sell small games there's a ton of different ways to bring in income and then once you've got this prototype and that this prototype took a long time for us because frankly I've never made a 3D game before and so we spent over six figures on just the Prototype and I I swear I'll never do that again because I know how to make 3D games now it's kind of like with 2D games I kind of understand 2D games it would it would it would not cost me over six figures to make a 2d prototype I could probably do it in a month with 3D games I could probably create a prototype in two months now just because I know how to do it and I know how to

direct a team and I know how to direct a c developer and an artist to create that demo but it took us a while because it was kind of like a massive R&D project you guys without knowing it did support that obviously you supported yourselves by enrolling in my courses or or you know buying my games I hope those were valuable to you and and they were I believe it because I get great reviews but point being you did support the channel and that means so much to me because we were able to create this prototype and we sold this prototype to 3D Realms the question is how do you sell a prototype right well you you you obviously need money or or at least time and and skill and talent and a good idea to create a prototype then what you do is you take that prototype excuse me let me find it here you take that prototype oh man I need to find it in my email you take that prototype while I find this you take that prototype and you sell it to a publisher

okay so here's how the process worked for us um I sent this website that I'm about to pull up I sent this website to a billion not a billion maybe like 30 40 Publishers may I think maybe it was it might have been 25 let's be honest I think it might have been 25 and the reason why it was 25 is because um well there just noted a lot of Publishers out there who want to make a a sort of creepy nasty gross horrifying game like Twisted Tower right there especially a first- person shooter a lot of Publishers steer clear of that and then they also don't want to they focus on more familyfriendly games or artsy games or something something like that because I I I pitched it to Serenity Forge I I pitched it to armor games and those are my previous Publishers and that's just not part of their portfolio they're not going to make a game like this right so this is what I sent to a bunch of Publishers okay and I had a lot of different Publishers you know take the bait right and that sounds nasty

what I mean is the pitch deck is the bait and then they find out what the actual value in it is right and so you throw it out to 25 Publishers maybe 100 Publishers if your game is more family friendly and then they determine if it's going to fit within their portfolio and after I think it guys it might have been seven months eight months of back and forth with Publishers that's how long it took for me and it shouldn't have taken this long but because this game is more Niche not Niche but like it's a first- person shooter and there's there's there's not a lot of Publishers out there who want a game like this that's you know you're mulching enemies with with machine guns right so this is what I sent to them okay I sent the trailer you need a trailer I sent some other videos just sort of showing what the game is I even sent sent a let's play uh to two Publishers because I wanted them um to be able to play the

demo without playing the demo if that makes sense because they don't have a lot of time in their hands um and then also just what makes the game sellable you you would call this a USP a unique selling point in the games industry you call it a a hook so these are the hooks these are the things that help the game Market itself um I I Incorporated those as well and we're talking about twitch integration and streamability and the plot all of this stuff right weapons screenshot I sent this Le link to a bunch of different Publishers and then the negotiations just happen on Zoom calls right it's it's really that simple okay so how you get your your demo created is one thing right sometimes you have to spend money on it like I did or sometimes you could do it all by yourself and just do it in the evenings in the mornings for those of you who are curious for my previous games I didn't do this right I didn't spend money on my my prototypes I would instead just work early in the mornings and through the

lunch and through the evenings that's what you can be doing right now especially if you're you're young and in your 20s and you don't really have any social obligations I'm not saying that if you're in your 20s you don't have social obligations I just know that I didn't uh if that's the case then you know work your butt off work your butt off no more Netflix and chill right work your butt off make a prototype and start sending it to Publishers and get funding you don't have to work with Publishers but Publishers really really do help with this okay getting published by in this case I think they're 30 years old 30y old brand which is a dream come true and I'm just super super thankful number one to you guys for supporting the channel and supporting the team while we pitched this but also obviously huge thank you to 3D Realms uh for for for publishing this and believing in the game