Cash from Casual Games?

[spathi]

Is there any point these days in writing casual games for the portals, et cetera?  Does anyone make any money on that anymore?  If you release numerous games in a few styles, is it possible that it could be viable?

[Kirl]

Yes, I got two games with ads on several sites and they don't make much, but considering the play count versus some other games I know people are making a good buck out of their games. Casual games are an entirely new market that is still growing, especially considering handhelds are only just beginning to offer standard internet acces.

I think the best aproach is to focus on a few quality titles instead of quantity.

[benny!]

Yeah - I guess it is like everything in the world. Nothing is coming easy. But you can do some good bucks with casual games, I guess. There are several ways to monetize your games. Showing ads is just like one option. You could also sell licenses (exlusiv/non-exclusic), site-locks, premium features, sponsorships etc. to gain money.

In addition, you could also port your game to an mobile app (casual is big in mobile) and sell it through the app stores.

I only released one small casual game on the net and did not make much bucks with it - but I did a lot of research - and as I said in the beginning - there are ppl who make a good living out of casual games.

[combatking0]

I've been considering making my own casual game for a while. If only I could get my webcam barcode reader program working.

[spathi]

I'm definitely going to do mobile ports, which is why I picked up Blitz Monkey (easy porting to five compile targets or something like that...) 

In some of the statistics I've seen there is a really good long-tail effect going on, where they might only be making $10 per month per game but that $10 extends over a period of years.

[benny!]

Yeah, have a look at mochi games forums - there are several threads about how much users are earning by their games. It is really interesting. I also browse the android market for example. You can see a rough number of installation for a game/application. This is also interesting when multiplying it with the price...

As I said - there is definately a lot of money in the casual business. But making a good or even outstanding casual game can be as hard as making a normal game.