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Should I ship an Arcade Colony Sim?
Colony Sim + Arcade
Only 13 developers shipped an Arcade Colony Sim in the last 2 years, too few for firm odds: the middle one made est. revenue: est. copies × today's US list price; gross, before Steam's cut, taxes and refunds. See method.; the top game by est. revenue, Hole Is Mine, made about est. revenue: est. copies × today's US list price; gross, before Steam's cut, taxes and refunds. See method.. 19 more are announced.
Verdict: long shot, for a 6 / 10 build.
The middle developer here made $360, ×0.6 the market's $630 for a 6 / 10 build, but 1 in 20 cleared $170k, ×283 the market median. Revenue is up 214895% on the market; 19 games are announced against 10 developers who shipped in the last year.
| Bottom 30% | $179 (exactly $179) |
|---|---|
| Median | $359 (exactly $359) |
| Top 25% | $1.8k (exactly $1,796) |
| Top 5% | $178k (exactly $177,618) |
| Developers, 2 yr | 13 |
| Released games | 35 |
| Announced | 19 |
| Effort | 6 / 10 |
| AI-buildability | Medium |
| Typical price | $4.99 |
momentum: how a niche's revenue percentiles and developer count moved between two equal, adjacent periods, divided by the market's own move. See method., 12 months: revenue too few recent games to read momentum, supply 235% more developers than the period before.
Free games: 9%, excluded from money figures.
Can AI deliver it?
AI-buildability for this niche is medium: the lowest rating among its tags.
- Colony Sim
- effort 6 / 10 · medium · effort 6 sits in the medium band
- Arcade
- effort 3 / 10 · high · effort 3 sits in the high band
What it takes
- Effort
- 6 / 10 · full 3D single-player, physics sims, content-heavy RPG
- Systems
- Colony Sim, Arcade; 8 in 10 of the top 25% also carry Idler, Incremental, Management
- Price point
- $4.99 typical · top 25% priced $7.99 or above
- Art
- 8 in 10 of the top 25% ship with 2D, Pixel Graphics, Relaxing
Why players buy here
The top 25% priced at $7.99 or above; the middle game at $4.99.
The top 10 games average 89% positive over 964 reviews.
What kills games here
3 in 10 developers made under $180. 8 in 10 of the 6 games released 1 to 2 years ago have fewer than 100 reviews. 19 games are announced against 10 developers who shipped in the last year.
Adjacent niches
Colony Sim with a different second tag, ranked by verdict then median.
- + Female ProtagonistFair
- + 4XPoor odds
- + Open World Survival CraftPoor odds
- + Co-opPoor odds
- + Real-Time with PausePoor odds
- + HistoricalPoor odds
- + Alternate HistoryPoor odds
- + Open WorldPoor odds
- + Action RPGPoor odds
- + Post-apocalypticPoor odds
- + MarsPoor odds
- + Tactical RPGPoor odds
Comparable games
| Capsule | Game | Released | Price | Reviews | Est. copies | Est. revenue | Developer |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| | Hole Is Mine | $7.99 | 741 90% | 22k | $178k (exactly $177,618) | Incrementalist | |
| | Home Run High | older | $8.99 | 155 72% | 4.7k | $42k (exactly $41,804) | Kairosoft Co.,Ltd |
| | Simultree | $6.99 | 145 86% | 4.4k | $30k (exactly $30,406) | PIPAPOU | |
| | Idle Catfarmia | older | $7.65 | 63 74% | 1.9k | $14k (exactly $14,458) | RainbowStudio |
| | Steel Rain | older | $9.99 | 47 87% | 1.4k | $14k (exactly $14,086) | PolarityFlow, Adrian Zingg |
| | The Wratch's Den | older | $5.99 | 61 78% | 1.8k | $11k (exactly $10,962) | PUNKCAKE Delicieux |
| | Army To Army | older | $24.99 | 9 55% | 270 | $6.7k (exactly $6,747) | Piece Of Voxel |
| | Click to Civ | $3.99 | 42 78% | 1.3k | $5.0k (exactly $5,027) | Phantom Realm | |
| | Fungal Colony Simulator | older | $2.99 | 24 66% | 720 | $2.2k (exactly $2,153) | Skylor Beck |
| | Asymptote | $4.99 | 12 100% | 360 | $1.8k (exactly $1,796) | Crazish Games | |
| | Lunokhod | $4.99 | 8 87% | 240 | $1.2k (exactly $1,198) | Lunokhod Labs | |
| | Mine It Down | $3.99 | 8 75% | 240 | $958 (exactly $958) | Topito Games | |
| | Click-A-Duck | $2.99 | 4 75% | 120 | $359 (exactly $359) | Altered Games | |
| | GLITCHED MATRIX Prototype Lab | $9.99 | 1 100% | 30 | $300 (exactly $300) | GLITCHED MATRIX | |
| | Shades Of War | $5.99 | 1 100% | 30 | $180 (exactly $180) | Raven Knepp | |
| | Wild Harmony | $2.99 | 2 0% | 60 | $179 (exactly $179) | Blake Gocey |
Estimates: copies = reviews × 30, gross = copies × list price.
Five niches a week, one death, one deep dive.
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