Well now, here's a thing. We updated the demo, as you know, in time for the Cozy and Family Friendly Games Celebration and boy howdy did it go well!
Here's how we were thinking about it going in!
CONS
- it is a sales festival, so most people will be interested in finding games to buy & play
- we're a fair way from launch
- we're doing well getting the game out there, but I'm not sure we're as well known as Tiny Glade, Outbound, or our chums over at Tavern Talk (who have a demo out too!).
- there are a lot of games celebrated in the event, well over 150!
- we knew we weren't going to get a featured spot (that's all arranged ahead of time)
- we didn't know what kind of placement the event would get on Steam, if any
PROS
- the demo is polished & robust (thanks to all you Goblins out there making suggestions and reporting issues!)
- the demo update went live after the festival had started, so maybe Steam's algorithm might impact it positively in some way, being fresh?
- this is Trash Goblin for crying out loud, who doesn't love it?! 😅
- we've got the lovely folks at Plan of Attack helping with press and streamer outreach
Anyway, I'm sure there's more but you can see we felt that the odds were stacked against us having a brilliant event, but were keenly watching our wishlist numbers for whatever bump we might see.
But I don't want that to come off as defeatist by the way! We just tend to assess and settle on what we think are realistic expectations. So we thought perhaps we'd see a few days of a few hundred extra wishlists.
WHAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED
Er, we saw the second biggest spike in wishlists since we launched the Steam page, behind only the one-two punch of the Kickstarter & demo launch back in December, and that had the Wholesome Direct boost helping it out too!
Left: launch of the Steam page. Middle: Kickstarter & demo launch. Right: Cozy & Family Friendly Celebration
Ok so technically this was the 3rd biggest spike, but I reckon all those spikes around the Kickstarter count as one; they're certainly as a result of the same event.
Games usually chug along at a low-ish baseline, so we were doing just dandy and then BOOM! It is very exciting, let me tell you!
Seeing this huge uptick in wishlists made the team positively giddy with excitement. There might've even been tears. The past 6 days have seen 6,332 Goblins wishlist the game (compared to the perfectly healthy 221 for the previous 6 days) and now we're sat at an amazing 52,500 wishlists in total!
So it goes without saying we're a happy bunch, and we couldn't have done it without you. Literally as well as figuratively. This is your success, your moment to celebrate as much as it is ours, so at any point in the next few days that the opportunity presents itself please do raise a glass (of wine, or soda, or whatever!) to yourselves. Onwards and upwards!
Stay amazing,
The Spilt Milk Goblins