Up Spell, my iOS word game, has now been out for two weeks, and if I had to do it over again, I would have made my app free with in-app purchase to keep playing. 1/
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The iOS App Store has moved software acquisition in this direction, and I don’t like it, but for me, and the kind of app that I made, and the future apps that I’m thinking of making, fighting the battle of charging up-front money for a quality app isn’t worth it. Too bad. 2/
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Maybe I made a bad app? Possible, but judging from rating/reviews/feedback, that isn’t so. People who have tried my game seem to like it. (Thank you Up Spellers!) Conversion rate in the store tells me that too few people are willing to try it. That’s the issue. 3/
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I think that free with in-app purchase is a worse experience for app consumers, but it would have been better to get my game in more people’s hands. Lesson learned. 4/4
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I’m sorry to hear this Ken! Alas, this does seem to be the growing consensus. You might enjoy this thoughtful piece making some related observations in a different niche. ia.net/topics/subscri
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Thanks Andy. I care most about doing quality work and creating the best possible experiences for people. So, I’m happy with how Up Spell turned out.
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I’m thinking now about what compromises I’m willing to make in a new game to get more reach. To be clear, it isn’t just about sales. I have the luxury to run Up Games as a hobby rather than as a business. It’s more about sharing my ability to make good apps with a wider audience.
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These changes will come in a new game, since my concept for Up Spell was to make it as simple and spare as I could. I won’t add a BUY button to it now. I didn’t design it for that.
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I also refuse to degrade the experience for people who already bought Up Spell to facilitate a change of the game to a Freemium model.
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There doesn’t seem to be an obvious way to grandfather in existing players into a “limited free/unlock all features through IAP” scheme. This seems odd, but as must be clear by now, there’s a lot about the App Store that isn’t slam-dunk-simple to me.
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Looks like you can check the “original application version” purchased by examining the receipt: developer.apple.com/library/archiv. But it’d be a hassle and you’d have to add an extra flow, as you say!