Happened upon an interesting post this morning about making art and making money.

Warning, this does contain strong language: “Why I am not afraid to take your money”

One of the interesting things about the App Store, which ties a little bit back into the post about Halo 3: ODST, is that the concept of “value” in the new mobile space is highly unusual. With ODST, the issue was that there was an expectation of what ODST was - the total value it brought to the table, and what it was worth.

In a single dimension - the length of the single player campaign - regardless of quality, ODST was perceived as a budget game. When it was revealed to be a $60 product, people felt slighted - and Bungie was unable to convey that the combined value of the campaign, a brand new multiplayer online mode, and a “complete” Halo 3 multiplayer package was worth the $60.

With the current crop of mobile games, it’s a similar situation. People expect to pay $1. In extraordinary circumstances, people may pay $5, even $10 - but absolutely not one penny more than that. The interesting thing is that these games, in many cases, are as complicated, and as fully-featured - in some cases even better than - PSP or DS games, which people are used to paying anywhere from $20-40 for.

Somewhere along the way, $1 became the default price. So now, selling a $5 game is like trying to sell a console game for $200. There will be some people willing to make the investment if the game is extraordinary, but not many. And the expectation is that for $1, you’ll get a fully featured game you can sink hours into.

So, with Word Ace, our goal was to try something different. As I’ve said in other posts, the basic goal is to let the player decide what they want to pay for the game - to let them establish the value of the experience. In many ways, it’s very similar to putting your hat out there, and hoping that someone will value the experience enough to put some change in.

We’ve had a number of people buy chips already (either buying Word Ace Pro, or the associated chip packages) in values from $1 to $20. We’re grateful for every single purchase. Every single one. We’re hoping to roll out the “hat” to Palm Pre and Facebook users soon, and then making the experience even more rewarding - showing others that you were one of the awesome users who helps keep the game growing.

As Amanda says,

“i believe in the future of cheap art, creative enterprise, and an honorable public who will put their money where there mouth is, or rather, their spare change where their heart is.

can i get a f***ing amen?”

Amen.