I wasn't so fortunate with ads, but I didn't have much experience then, either. Still, ads sounded better than making people pay and risk missing having a less fortunate crowd try it.

With that being said, there is a nasty drawback: people will use adblockers to stop your ads. I used to swear by rewarded videos for this- it checked if the ad fully ran before rewarding. Other ads are either skipped or completely blocked using ad blockers or putting the phone on air plane mode.

Ads are phasing out right now, but I bet they will return as a valuable method for making money from games.

A friend gave me a tip recently. Anyone else hear of Rachel Pedersen? She has a podcast on marketing on Podbean. I checked it out and find her stuff kind of interesting. Might be worth looking into for beginners social networking.

I can't say I've ever touched a website in the past year without javascript and ads disabled. Ads definitely should not be relied on for any amount of money.

cybereality
I'm not sure if you're joking here or not. That would be a seriously dumb mistake that would be easy for them to avoid. 🙂

I just read the very interesting console article, and I have to say that if I were a young developer, looking to make money, godot would not be my first choice. There's less support for consoles (the source of "most of the revenue from independent developers"), even if you count third party companies. It's harder to insert advertising -- based on the many posts I've seen asking for help on the subject. There's just not much to recommend it.

Of course, mine is very much a layman's opinion, but new developers don't have much more knowledge on the subject than I do. They might reach the same conclusion.

      Okay, I'm not sure if this would help, but... Fahir Mehovic made a tutorial about setting up Admob in Unity- not Godot, but go with me. Could anyone possibly convert the code he uses to GDScript? Would that work?

      That feeling whether your tutorial is good enough or you still need to improve it.

      For context, I'm currently making a tutorial for Udemy. I have created the game for the tutorial, but I don't know whether they will like it or not.

      Functional speaking, it's ready. But there are some that still need to be improved, I think.

        For my own part, I will not install a game (or any software) that needs an internet connection, a registration, has some sort of DRM or does not run in user space alone. To be provocative, one either has the idea for a nice game that's worth spending money on (e.g. Factorio, KSP), or not. They are not that many. But if they must rely on ads to boost their income, they're not my cup of tea anyway.

        @KanataEXE , I would say that a game for a tutorial doesn't need golden handles, bells and whistles. Too much info might distract people from the underlying principles. It is not much that even a good teacher can transport in an hour lecture. People often tend to pack too much into it. That doesn't mean it should be repetitive, but just enough to give the listeners the feeling of achievement. It is an edge to walk, and you have no feedback like in a classroom.
        Disclaimer: I have heard for decades that I am a bad teacher :-/

        I really recommend everyone read this book if you want to be successful.
        GAMEDEV: 10 Steps to Making Your First Game Successful by Wlad Marhulets.

          To each their own. I sometimes like the stuff that has ads if it's not insanely packed with them. They're free, so I'm not out anything. If I don't like the privacy policy, I just move on.

          I also like offering the game to multitudes rather than only those who are willing to pay.

          Both ways to sell games have pros and cons, just like free to play stuff with IAPs.

          It's not necessarily about how you prefer to play games as a dev, it's what brings in the actual money.

          duane I have to say that if I were a young developer, looking to make money, godot would not be my first choice

          This is simply not true. Lots of games have made millions on Steam, and only ported to consoles after they were a success. For example, Slay the Spire, which launched on Steam in 2017 and made about $25 million in the first year (before porting to consoles). It's certainly possible if you make a hit game.

              I remember when it launched in 2017. I still play it hours on end which is rare for me to do in current year. Did it really make that much year one?

                Thanks, cybereality , book is queued but must wait until reconstruction of my bookshelves.

                Atm I must (besides constructing a new place to live in times of shortage and inflation) get behind C++ concurrency and at least the basics of the available semantics. Need it for my terrain renderer. Also need a tileable image format, or brew my own. I need to separate the data structures from the data to be really independent from size constraints. Need to bring my skills to the next level, so to say blah blah.

                    Pixophir get behind C++ concurrency and at least the basics of the available semantics

                    This is very tough. I've been programming in C++ probably like 15 years, and concurrency is still very confusing. I understand the basics now, and have done some small tests, but scaling that to a full app is difficult. Also, the bugs are madness and it's almost like programming with quantum physics, because it makes no sense. But you can learn it.

                    This is one of the only modern books that is decent on the topic. Much of the other material is super outdated compared to the current C++ standard. C++ Concurrency in Action by Anthony Williams.

                    However, I didn't fully understand things until I did the course at my school for Computer Science. So you may not get it, even after reading that book. But it's the best place to start.

                      Okay, the game that I'm working on is basically finish; I've even created additional levels and have 14 levels in total. Still, there is one little change that I need to make to the game; I need to find a way to change to logo and I don't know how. I'm reading about this issue in the documentation right now. If I'm able to get in done this week, I'll start putting on promotional information about next week. I'm feeling tired again but, I'm glad I'm close to the final stretch. 🥱

                      Yep, got the Williams on the table and I too find it confusing. It is not a didactic highlight.

                      There is a German book I find more on the point: R. Grimm, Modernes C++ Concurrency meistern, Hanser 2018. The first chapter introduces C++ memory models , atomic operations and data types, sequential consistency, acquire/release semantics, relaxed semantics, and so on with simple examples one can understand without too much abstraction. Will come to the multi-threading chapter in the coming days.

                      Edit: I see there's an English version apparently on packt pub:
                      https://www.packtpub.com/product/concurrency-with-modern-c/9781839211027

                      While quality on packt pub has a broad spread, this one I can recommend.

                      This was the book they had us read at school that allowed me to understand. It's about operating systems, but you kind of have to understand the full stack to understand how to use threads properly. You might want to check this one.

                      cybereality I really recommend everyone read this book if you want to be successful.
                      GAMEDEV: 10 Steps to Making Your First Game Successful by Wlad Marhulets.

                      Okay, I just checked out a digital copy from the local library. Only the audiobook edition was available.

                        KanataEXE Cool! I am just starting making a Udemy course! Would love to know more about how you're going about it

                        edit: in other news, crossing my fingers to see if unity crashes and burns. I'm happy just learning godot and unreal for now.

                            Erich_L

                            Currently making one for Shoot 'Em Up game.

                            I want to claim one since there's none on Udemy.