
Reverse Kickstarter – shows real sales stats - mrcharles
http://twolivesleft.com/Crabstarter/
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interpol_p
We set this site up for our new game Crabitron and decided to call it
Crabstarter. It is intended to be a light-hearted parody of Kickstarter, while
showing real sales.

One of the main reasons we set it up is because we wanted to have some hope of
recouping our investment in this game. In order to do that, we felt that we
couldn't go for rock-bottom pricing and hope for a mega-hit. That seemed crazy
and unrealistic.

Instead we gave our game the price we thought it deserved — $5. In order to
help App Store players get over the "sticker shock," we set up Crabstarter.
When you see that five dollar price in this context, it suddenly doesn't seem
so high.

We also wanted players to see that we were real human beings, and not a
faceless company. So we tried to make an honest video in the format of a
standard Kickstarter video.

~~~
Pxtl
It's good to educate the buying public about how much it really costs to make
something like this and how hard it is to recoup that. I hear people grousing
about $3 apps and it drives me nuts.

The new era of apps is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, we've got these
obscenely low prices... but on the other hand, people are actually _buying
software_. That's a bigger deal than most folks realize. Before the iOS era,
people basically just didn't buy software. I mean, geeks did if there was some
specific tool they needed, and gamers bought games of course... but the run-
of-the-mill normal person? At most they bought MS office and maybe got
hoodwinked into picking up Norton when the trial expired on their computer.

Now? Jane Q. Soccermom buys programs and games. That's a _huge_ shift.

~~~
peterkelly
_I hear people grousing about $3 apps and it drives me nuts._

The Oatmeal did a great parody of these people a while back:
<http://theoatmeal.com/blog/apps>

~~~
belorn
While funny, it completely fail in identifying the underlying causes of this
consumer behavior.

I do not consider it strange that people feel threaten by a $3 app purchase,
but not a $400 phone. To me, its consistent with consumers when they buy a
product they trust vs a product they don't. In psychology, economics, and
finance, its call Risk aversion and is the reluctance of a person to accept a
bargain with an uncertain payoff rather than another bargain with a more
certain, but possibly lower, expected payoff.

People expect software to fail. To a degree, Microsoft is to blame with blue
screen of death, but thats only part of the culture regarding software. If I
buy that $3 app, it might not solve the problem I got, it might be buggy, and
it might not even start. If it end up in either of those cases, the social
blame is normally put on the consumer for not knowing better on which software
to buy, adding additional feeling of uncertainty.

On products like phones or computer hardware, the risk feels less. If the
phone don't start, we expect to get it replaced and fixed. The blame will be
on the seller/producer, and not on the consumer. Add on top the positive
reinforcing through marketing in TV and movies, and a physical sale person,
and the $300 or even $1000 can feel much safer for the consumer than clicking
yes on a $3 app purchase.

~~~
Pxtl
Point. I've been dithering on purchases of a DNLA client for my iPod because
quite frankly everything I've demo'd and tried has _sucked_. Crashy, buggy,
poor format support, etc. Now, maybe these problems are also coming from my
servers, but the programs are terrible at explaining what I'm doing wrong.

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peterkelly
Brilliant concept IMHO. A lot of people don't realise the amount of work that
goes into creating this kind of stuff, and sadly the race to the bottom that's
happened with games on the app store has meant in a lot of cases it's hard to
for developers these days to justify the large development costs.

I also love that you've given it a price and not gone with a freemium model.
I'd much rather pay $5 for a (good) game up front than be constantly annoyed
with offers to "buy more coins" etc.

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smalter
The game looks really fun. I'm going to get it now.

One thing I looked for and didn't see was additional tiers of contribution a
la Kickstarter. The post-game credits tier, the t-shirt tier, the poster tier,
etc. The art and game looks so fun I would've tossed in an extra $20 to
support you guys and get a shirt.

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brandynwhite
How much do they have to unlock before it becomes a real kickstarter for an
android version of the game?

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EGreg
I don't get it. How is this a reverse kickstarter?

~~~
peterkelly
Normally with kickstarter they ask people to contribute to the development of
something before the development is done.

In this case, they've finished & released the game, and are encouraging people
to contribute to recovery of their development costs _after_ the development
has been done. Hence it's in "reverse".

~~~
EGreg
But what do the people get for the donation? If it's the game, then are they
selling it outside the app store? And if so, how?

~~~
peterkelly
It's sort of an ironic parody of kickstarter.

People "donate" by simply purchasing it on the app store, just like you would
with any other app, and thus they get the game (immediately). And they are
saying that they will add other features to the game if the revenue exceeds
the target.

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oneeyedpigeon
I like the idea of the top-up, in-app purchases. Makes me wonder how
successful a much-loved, popular app would do if it adopted a 'get free, pay
what you want via in-app' model, along the lines of Radiohead's In Rainbows
sale. Think something like ... Monkey Island 3. Unfortunately, if my maths is
correct, Crabitron has sold barely any (literally 1-3) top-ups :-(

~~~
fredleblanc
Keep in mind that some figures only will update once per day. It could be much
more by the time tomorrow hits.

~~~
oneeyedpigeon
(Bear in mind that I don't know whether you're anything to do with the
project, so I might be speaking out of turn!)

I'm assuming that the two figures in the top-right, being so closely related,
are 'cached' in tandem: 732 backers, $2,569.56. 732 * 5 = 3660. 3660 - apple
tax @ 30% = 2562. That gives $7.56 worth of 'top-ups' (no, I can't explain why
that's such an odd number, unless the apple tax for in-app purchases isn't
exactly 30%)

~~~
fredleblanc
I have nothing to do with the project, and I agree with you on the caching in
tandem. I think my point is that those numbers might shoot way up tomorrow
after a decent showing on HN (and presumably other places).

I really like the idea, the look of the game, and the execution of the site.
I'm in for the full $10.

~~~
interpol_p
Thank you!

I hope it does well, too. Our current chart position is #117 in paid iPad apps
(ranked by number of downloads). Our current _grossing_ chart position is #368
for iPad (i.e., Crabitron is the 368 highest earning app on iPad).

There is a massive discrepancy between these two charts because freemium games
(i.e., games that allow consumers to spend as much as they want) can sit
relatively low in the paid charts, but earn a lot more money from a stable
user base.

Our current popularity is mostly due to being featured by Apple in their New
and Noteworthy section. This will end in 5 or 6 days and sales will likely
drop down to $100/day (instead of $1000+ per day). Games are extremely hit-
driven, and have very unreliable sales curves.

With this trajectory in mind it is unlikely we will hit our development costs
of $100,000. More realistically, we will see $20,000 before the game drops off
completely in a few months.

It's still a pleasant amount to earn back for a side project, but it's
definitely why we still work full-time for someone else, building things for
clients.

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MicahWedemeyer
I'm going to guess that KS will be sending a C&D. It's a cute site, and I like
the idea, but the style is way too close to KS. They have to be concerned
about people stumbling onto this and not getting the joke.

On the other hand, if it gets popular to the point that KS sends a C&D, then
the site probably served its purpose. Overall, a neat marketing idea.

~~~
interpol_p
I tried to make it an obvious parody, but if it's too close for comfort I will
change it even more.

It's more about showing players our sales data and giving faces to the
developers of their games. The Kickstarter parody aspect of it is intended to
be humorous more than anything.

~~~
coffeecheque
I'm on my phone so couldn't see the URL. I thought it was a Kickstarter, for
what it is worth.

Great to see you're from Adelaide too! Keep up the great work, and best of
luck. Really imaginative campaign.

~~~
interpol_p
Thank you for letting me know. The last thing I want is for people to confuse
our page with a real Kickstarter page, so I've made a significant change to
the theming.

I hope it helps make it stand out as a parody.

~~~
brey
still too close :(

I love the concept, but I spent most of the time reading the page wondering
when kickstarter had started offering projects hosted on your own domain, a la
wordpress.

it's the layout of the right column that's sailing a little too close to the
wind, IMO

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morganwilde
I feel as though a much more exciting thing you guys are doing is Codea -
<http://twolivesleft.com/Codea/>. It looks so cool and something a lot of
people could relate to, given the major shift to tablets.

~~~
mrcharles
Codea rules and is pretty popular. As far as I know, Crabitron is just their
side project.

~~~
interpol_p
Actually both Codea and Crabitron are our side projects — we work full time on
iOS development... for clients :(

~~~
morganwilde
It's incredible to hear that since your work is really insightful (Codea
reminds me of <http://worrydream.com/#!/LearnableProgramming>) and is pointing
in an interesting direction. At the same time I do get that you need to put
bread on the table, so to speak. Still with startup culture booming one has to
wonder, why not commit? Have you guys tried that or is it something in the
works?

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ryan-allen
Incredible marketing!

