Hi Everybody.
First off I'd like to thank everybody who has played The Flayed Man and left positive reviews. We've had over 1100 players in a week and The Flayed Man is also sitting in over 18,000 libraries waiting to be played. We've managed to hit Very Positive reviews in that time too, so we're very glad for all your support.
When adopting the free-to-play model, our aim was to get The Flayed Man in the hands of as many gamers as possible to show what kind of unique horror games Snoring Dog Games will make. The hope was always that gamers would respond to the free game with generosity to help us pay our artists and to make a new, full-length game unlike anything else on the market.
I will always be honest with players, and it pains me to say that as it stands, The Flayed Man will almost certainly be not only our first game, but our last game too.
The Supporter Pack has only sold 35 copies.
We need to sell 1000 copies to fund our next game, and 2000 to offer financial stability for the next two years. The 1000 copies is the real target.
We knew The Flayed Man would rely on word of mouth, but it was always our expectation to sell Supporter Packs numbering 10% of total players in a week and we're way below that.
Aside from not having enough money to pay artists to make another game, our current contract with our accountant ends in October and with it our first year discount. There simply isn't any financial viability with current low sales figures to continue to operate Snoring Dog Games past that date.
I am not making this or any game out of an aim of financial success but out of love for storytelling. Like most indie devs, I've worked day and night on the game, including on Christmas Day, so that you the gamers might be able to play something unlike anything else on the market. I won't see any personal income even with 2000 copies sold and will still be working my day job too.
The reason I make this post is to outline the future paths of Snoring Dog Games,
The first path (and the one we hope becomes reality) is that gamers read this message, are willing to support us, and we see an increase in the number of sales of the Supporter Pack. We don't expect to immediately hit our target but rather see a bump that shows there's some feasibility in long term future of The Flayed Man
The second path is that If we don't reach our 1000 copies sold goal by 1st July then we will have to delist The Flayed Man and shutter Snoring Dog Games.
We were hoping we would never have to make this post, but with such low sales, we wanted to be open with you all and let you know the situation at the moment.
We thanks you for all your support so far, and hope you will be able to enable us to keep Snoring Dog Games open to make more games in the future.