C3 + Instant Games SDK = Much Profit

[quote:3isqf0h9] I wonder if Scirra feels like they dont want to be responsible for the monetization features of the facebook plugin for similar reasons to what they cited re the original C2 Admob plugin? ie they think that keeping it maintained will require too much work to keep up with whatever frequent changes facebook makes?

Well, that is as much a part of any game development platform as physics or behaviors.

Yeah. I just remember Ashley posting something like, a reason why the admob and iap plugins werent maintained was because Google and Apple would make frequent changes on their side which broke the C2 plugins, and made it a lot of work for Scirra to keep up. I think im right in saying that.

Pure speculation on my part, but they might see the same challenge with monetisation options for the Facebook Instant Games plugin, in which case.. it might get left to third party devs again.

It can't be that challenging keeping up with all that. They spend 10000 times more time on things that make little or no difference to most Construct 2 users.

These things ( monetization ) make a big difference

I am not questioning whether your memory is correct, but whether they understand what really counts. I like Construct 2 quite a bit, but must say that I am pretty confused with their attitude towards this.

Monetisation plugins are a tricky area for me - whilst I can appreciate that the nuances of them make them tricky to develop for, as the developer has to account for updates and changes, their immense proximity to the financial success of an app makes using 3rd party plugins massively unattractive.

I can see why Scirra seemingly don't prioritize monetization - could you imagine the outcry every time it didn't work flawlessly? That said, Facebook seems to be moving away from their "move fast and break things" ethos that makes working with their products such a nightmare, and if there's one thing they've always been solid for, it's advertising (...) - so I hope a resolution can be found here.

Not really happy that we didn't get this for C2 as well, and the "not ready for primetime" state of the plug just echos why I'm not ready for C3.

Thats ok though, at least C2 has export for Tizen, and it looks to be just as profitable.

It can't be that challenging keeping up with all that. They spend 10000 times more time on things that make little or no difference to most Construct 2 users.

These things ( monetization ) make a big difference

I am not questioning whether your memory is correct, but whether they understand what really counts. I like Construct 2 quite a bit, but must say that I am pretty confused with their attitude towards this.

Yeah I agree with you! For me monetisation is pretty much the highest priority. I want to make a living as a game dev / digital creative so monetisation is fundamental.

I mean if the Instant Games plugin doesnt support monetisation I gotta ask, whats the point? Getting your game in front of a lot of people on Facebook is nice, its fun having a lot of people play your games, but if I cant make money from it then it's not something Ill spend time on. I have to focus on avenues that allow to me to generate income.

...proximity to the financial success of an app makes using 3rd party plugins massively unattractive...

I agree in part. I'm not against using third party plugins per se, because third party devs can actually be great. Ultimate Ads by TobyR is the best ads plugin Ive used for C2, its basically the ad plugin that C2 should have shipped with for all these years. So in that situation where you have a communicative dev maintaining the plugin and providing support I'm more than happy to pay a $ to buy a third party plugin.

But then it can go the other way too, like for a long time people had to rely on the plugins by bloody Cranberrygame for key functionaility (iap and ads) which could be buggy and came with zero support.

It always seemed crazy to me that Scirra would leave such core functionality in the hands of a sketchy, uncommunicative dev like that... It seems like a no brainer for Scirra to own that functionality and bring it under the umbrella of officially maintained plugins to ensure security and ease of use for their user base?

As far as Instant Games is concerned. I hope Scirra can make it clear whether they intend to provide monetisation options in their C3 plugin. Id also be interested to know if they plan to release version for C2, although I assume thats a no since they've previously said thered be no more major feature updates for C2? Maybe they'll share some more info with us soon?

I agree - and there's a solid market to be made for monetisation plugins; ad networks should logically try and make their platform as easy to integrate as humanly possible, so I'm hoping for an easy solution. 1st party would be massively preferred, but I'd happily go to 3rd party, as from what I've seen of TobyR his work seems well supported.

I'm really hoping we'll hear from Ashley / Tom on this, just so we know what the plans are.

Yes, we're planning on adding extra features for monetisation. This is literally the very first release that acts as a minimum viable product (MVP) so you can get going with it already. We have always taken an approach of release early, release often, rather than delaying things a long time in order to try to release a completely finished product in one go (which is often impossible anyway - you need some period to work out the bugs!). Features can often take several weeks to flesh out and get right. We'll be continuing to do so with Instant Games in the near future.

Hi Ashley that's really great news that you'll be including monetisation features!!

Is there any chance you'd be releasing a C2 version as well? Or this would be a C3 exclusive feature?

Ashley - Awesome to hear! Thank you for letting us know

I'm already using the plugin in my game and it seems to work nicely in development!!

It will be great to have an update for monetization indeed, but currently I'm focusing in getting my game to work great in development. and then to work great in production.

I'm new to fb instant games (as we all are) and still reading facebook's help articles while developing.

One thing I've noticed today is that in order to continue with my game to public production I'll have to send them Apple developer team id (because the game will be publish in Apple devices). Does any of you have experience with that? Does it mean that I'll have to pay the anual 99$ fee to Apple just to get the game published?

Is there any chance you'd be releasing a C2 version as well? Or this would be a C3 exclusive feature?

We've stated several times previously: only C3 will be getting new features from now on.

Yes I know I thought that would be the case. Just asking.

I upladed my game and i'm testing it on instant gaming platform, but I'm not managing to get the SDK features to work.

One thing I've noticed today is that in order to continue with my game to public production I'll have to send them Apple developer team id (because the game will be publish in Apple devices). Does any of you have experience with that? Does it mean that I'll have to pay the anual 99$ fee to Apple just to get the game published?

I would like to know too