Udder Talk

This is Part 1 of my 5 part mini series that will show you how you can make money in the world of video games. With that, it’s on to money maker 1.

It used to be that the only way one could make a decent living by making video games was to endure 4 years in a private college, make it out unscathed, and end up as some console game maker’s 5 letter word that rhymes with itch :shiftyeyes: . These days, we have the internet and thus many doors can be opened for the every day game developer. If you consider your options for making video games on the internet then you quickly realize that the difficulty bar can be significantly lower. But don’t let me fool you into believing that this is an easy task by any means.

The games you will be making are flash games. Thanks to the decreasing cost of bandwidth, increases in online advertising budgets, and an overall increase in support for the internet flash game development has made huge strides in the past 6 years. Flash games are a great way for any website owner to increase traffic back to his/her website by advertising within the game itself but they are great source of income for the creator. So how does one earn money here? Well, there is the obvious way of selling the game to a webmaster or company but don’t stop there. Thanks to websites like Armor Games, Addicting Games, and Crazy Monkey Games a flash game designer can submit a game for sponsorship. This way you do not lose credibility as the game creator and you still get paid for making it. If that ain’t a win win then I don’t know what it is.

Upside: Once you learn to make flash games, and make them well, the sky really is the limit to the income you can make. These games are going places, and going fast!

Downside: The learning curve can be extremely difficult. It also may take some time to establish a client network who is even interested in your games.

For more information about game development you can check out the following websites:

JayIsGames – Go here and see what a real flash game should look like.
Gamasutra – Game News for the every day Game Developer
Game Producer – This guy knows his stuff!
Jamie Fristrom’s Blog – Get into the mind of Jamie Fristom, technical director and developer for Torpex Games.