How I Earned €60,000 Making Video Games

[00:00] I have earned €60,000 making video games and in this video I am going to reveal to you how Hello, I am Tori and in this video I am going to tell you how I made €60,000 developing solely and exclusively video games

[00:12] in the last 3 years. And you may be wondering "But how can you make so much money making video games?" Well, I recommend that you stay until the end of the video if you want to find out, but first let's talk about what are the best ways to make

[00:26] money making video games and which option is lame. The clearest and most direct way to make money making video games is to develop an indie video game and sell it at a fixed price either on PC on platforms like Steam or Hio or on a console on platforms like Nintendo es or the

[00:41] PlayStation Store. If you have the knowledge and skills to develop a game from scratch on your own, in the end all the benefits from game sales They will go to you But this option is quite difficult and risky because you are completely alone and you must perform many

[00:57] different tasks such as programming the game, making the music for the game, making the art of the game, etc. Therefore, it is highly recommended that you hire an artist or a musician to delegate some tasks or even contact a publisher to help you promote the video game and

[01:12] ensure its success. However, and as we will see in the following ways to make money making video games, this is probably the safest and the one you should choose if you are starting to develop video games. Another option is to publish your game for free. But Tori, if I make my

[01:27] game free, how am I going to get money? Listen. Many developers start by publishing demos or complete games completely free. This serves mainly to make themselves known and build an audience for their next games. This way they ensure they have sales in their future

[01:43] paid games and therefore they can increase their profits in the long term. For example, I have several small games published on Ichio that are completely free, either because I was doing them when I was learning to develop video games or because they are experiments or demos

[01:58] that can later become bigger games. Also, putting your game free to play no. This means that you are not going to get any money for it. One option you have is to implement microtransactions for cosmetic elements or skins. This option works better on

[02:12] mobile devices but there are also successful games on PC or console that have microtransactions, such as Fortnite or LOL. You can also make your game free and sell DLCs or the soundtrack as

[02:24] additional add-ons. Another way to make money making video games is to publish a free to play game and put ads on it. There are some providers that bid to put their ad in your game and for each impression you get a commission. The problem with this option is that for

[02:39] each ad impression they pay very little. To give you an idea, the RPM or amount of money you get for every 1000 impressions is normally €1. This means that your ad must be viewed 1000 times to be paid a single euro. In addition, this option only makes sense

[02:54] if you are going to develop a game for mobile phones or for websites like minijuegos.com because in the end the ads work better in more casual games and it would not make sense, for example, if you were playing God of War on Play and just before the end you get an ad. Hi, I'm

[03:09] Antonio Lovato. Do you want to know how much your car is worth? In general, I don't recommend this option because you, who are watching this video, surely have no or little experience developing video games and very few people are going to play your game so that you have enough ad impressions. This option

[03:25] works best for large companies that release several games a year with millions of downloads, such as Bodu. Another option you have to make money making video games is to finance the development of your video game through an advertising campaign. Kickstarter This consists of publishing a

[03:40] trailer or a demo of your unfinished game and convincing people who are interested in the game to support you financially so that you can finish the development of your video game. This is an option that not many try because it generally requires having a community.

[03:54] that already knows the game previously or that the game is striking enough and that it goes viral so that it reaches enough people for the Kickstarter to be successful Even so, getting the development of your video game financed through a Kickstarter can be quite difficult

[04:08] Chard Tronic, a well-known video game development YouTuber, launched a Kickstarter for the development of his video game Kinikuneco, a game about a muscular cat that fights against aliens Despite having more than 20,000 subscribers and having a quite striking game,

[04:23] its Kickstarter failed with 40% funding Char said that he would cancel the project if the Kickstarter was not successful However, he never gave up and continued developing the game for 5co

[04:35] years until finishing it This option can also be somewhat dangerous as there are controversial cases in which things have been promised that were not true or the launch of a game has been postponed causing thousands of people who supported the project to have to wait up to 5 years

[04:49] to be able to try the game This normally happens because many Video game Kickstarters include a reward for obtaining access to the game, so most people who support the game are only pre-purchasing the game, which can lead to misunderstandings. This was the case of

[05:04] Omori, a game that began as a web comic and then became a game made in the RPG Maker engine. It had incredible success on the internet and in its Kickstarter they promised several rewards,

[05:16] such as a port to 3DS, which ultimately never came to fruition. This added to the fact that the game was delayed several times. times on launch day and that the development time went from one year to seven made people think it was a scam and asked for their money back. An option

[05:33] that many developers ignore and that can generate even more money than the sale of the video game itself is the creation of paid assets. If you are an artist or a good musician and you are making a model of a car for your game, believe it or not, there are people who would pay €5 for that car. This

[05:49] is because normally many video game developers are not artists. They are normally programmers who are not. They have artistic knowledge and instead of trying something that is going to look bad in their game and they could save a lot of time doing it, they prefer to buy a

[06:02] pack of assets on the internet. The opposite case can also happen in which you have no idea how to draw but you are quite smart and know how to program very well. So if you have programmed a dialogue system that works very well and is very well optimized, perhaps there is a

[06:16] video game developer like you who would pay €20 for that dialogue system. Another option to make money making video games is to create content about your video games. You can publish deblog on YouTube or create an account about the game on Instagram or you can also do live streams on

[06:32] Twitch while developing your video game. This option really serves to build an audience that is interested in your game and that will buy it when it comes out, but it also allows you to get money by directly monetizing the content you create either through ads

[06:46] or by running a promotion. In reality, this option is not highly recommended because it is really quite difficult to become well-known enough for you to make a living from it or that it affects the sales of your video games. I am trying and although I am still In the first

[07:00] phase of gradually creating an audience I have the hope that when I publish my first game on Steam everything will have been worth it. Furthermore, if Alba has achieved it, I can too But Tori , which of these ways have you chosen to get €60,000 because the truth is that none of them

[07:17] There is actually a way to make money making video games and that is to work in a video game studio This option is the safest because in the end you have a contract and a salary that will guarantee you money every month regardless of whether the game The one you are working on in the

[07:32] studio is going to be successful or not. It is also one of the most complicated options because in the end it requires you to be hired in a studio, which implies having enough experience and having studied something related to video games, such as a university degree, which is what

[07:46] I did. I will leave you a video above about whether you should study video game development, talking in more detail about the options you have to study and whether I recommend it. In my case, after finishing studying the degree in video game development, I was hired in

[08:00] a video game studio as a gameplay programmer and for the last 3 years I have been working on two different video games. This job helped me get a lot of experience in the industry and improve my skills in making video games in addition to having a salary that

[08:15] allowed me get a total of €60,000 In conclusion, there are many ways to make money making video games, whether working as a professional developer in a studio or as an indie developer. In the end you have to find the way that best suits your needs

[08:30] and the one that best suits you. For example, Ginchu lives from his YouTube videos that generate between €60,000 and €90,000 a year while he develops his video game Flatwork. On the other hand, Albamayo lives mainly from his games that generate €80,000 a year I aspire to one day become

[08:47] an indie video game developer like them Well that's all from me Remember that if you liked the video, like, subscribe and see you in the next video Ciao

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