Interview at People Behind the Meeples

I got interviewed!

Pretty neat. Thanks to George for providing the neat series of interviews with designers.

https://gjjgames.blogspot.com/2020/02/people-behind-meeples-episode-211-dave.html

200 posts!

Rolled the odometer on the blog here again - I've been doing a post a day since March.

When I started, I expected to have my game, Diggity, in production, but what I've learned is that all of that stuff takes a lot longer than I thought.  I do have a number of quotes, a much better sense of what I'm doing, art in the works, and a brand shiny new LLC.

And a bunch of blog posts.  Thanks to everybody who's reading.

100th post

Looks like I've rolled the odometer here, so to speak - 100 posts - so maybe time to take stock.  The project (or quest) is to get Diggity published.  I designed the game while wandering around Munich and Bavaria last October, and tested it a bunch over there.  I did art for it in November. I got my first actual version from TheGameCrafter.com in December thanks to my mother-in-law.  I got my first production quotes in December. I looked at other print-on-demand options in January, and continued testing and development. I started blogging here about three months ago.  I've been interviewed, I've opined, I've done investigative journalism. Seems like this project is still moving along - I've got my art proposal out to my artist, I've got a good sense of what the game's going to cost to print up, and I'm learning about the marketplace.

Still no idea if I can actually make this work, but it's been a fun ride so far.

My two cents worth

Blogger reports that I've now officially earned . . . two cents. In two months of daily posting.  Hey, everybody, drinks are on me!

This makes me think that ads are not going to be a major source of revenue for the future.  I've considered releasing some flash games, like Scryptix (not officially released yet, but you should be able to check it out from the link if you're on Facebook), and trying to have them ad-supported, but this makes that look not so promising.

I'm not sure how this money gets delivered to me.  I'm sure they'll send a courier over soon with my two shiny Abe Lincolns.  I'll think I'll tip him 15%.

Blog stats

I've been writing this blog now for a couple of months, trying to average about a post a day. Google Analytics tells me I've got 1200 pageviews from 539 visits, 309 of them unique, mostly from the U.S. The stat-keeping is pretty amazing - for example, I know that somebody from Mid-Michigan Community College visits every few days, and that 18 visits have come from iPhones.

I signed up for AdSense ads here, mostly because I was curious about how they worked. The short answer is, they don't - I have had no clicks and generated no revenue from them. I didn't expect to, so that's not by any means a crushing disappointment, but it's interesting nonetheless - I know some blogs are major moneymakers through ad sales, but they likely have a far greater readership than do I.

I also publish the blog as a feed, and there are about 20 folks who follow the feed in various ways, either through Blogger.com or via FeedBurner.

I'm curious how many of my visits and clicks are from me - I think the Google Analytics algorithms make at least an attempt to filter me out of the stats, because the total number of visits from Greensboro, NC, are nowhere near the number of times I log in. But I'm not clear on exactly what's included - I may well be generating a significant fraction of my own traffic.

It's pretty interesting seeing how this all works as I cut my blogging teeth here. I hope the blog has been useful for those of you who stop by. Thanks for reading.