Note: This is old content from GarrettMickley.com. I am no longer pursuing a game design career, but I didn’t want the content to go to waste, so I...
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Hello, I am a Games Developer and i found this post very interesting and just wanted to contribute my opinion.
It is specificly the first part refering to Demos in games and how many games now seem as if the developers behind them are just looking to make money instead of share their art and work in the world.
Demos have certainly fallen out of fashion since the later 2000s and I believe this is due to the contributing changing video game market as they have become less effective as online stores like the play store become more competitive and diluted.
That said I do believe they can work a dream in markets such as Roblox inwhich the player has already purchased ingame currency with real cash, I have found in such markets players are more open to spending cash as they dont see it as spending real money, even though they are.
While these markets are stll competitve and players tend to not buy games outright if there is a free alternatve, if you offer a demo for free and they enjoy it they tend to be more open to spending currency on it. This can not be said, at least to such a degree in my opinion for other online markets like the play store where its straight from cash to game.
For years I worked in the "shareware" industry and this worked extremely well (this was from 2000-2011). We didn't sell games, but rather time-limited software. In our case, we let the user have all of the features, but it only worked for a month. After the month, you either needed to uninstall the software or pay for it.
When I ventured off to do my own Play Store software I did what you suggested. I had a "lite" version and the full version. The tricky part was finding a way to migrate data between the two versions without using a server in the middle.
While this doesn't apply to games, it can still be done using in-app purchases. Supply a feature- or time-locked version, allowing the user to purchase the full app if they want more power.
Now, if only we could find a way to properly implement upgrade pricing...
To be honest, I wouldn't be so negative about it. You're right about ads being one of the best ways to generate substantial revenue, and it's not surprising that ad monetization is becoming so widespread. I believe that with a proper approach, it's possible to make good money, so there's no need to give up on that right away.
Advertising in games, otherwise known as Advergaming, can do a lot of good. That is why it is worth getting interested in the topic. I can recommend a post on this topic if you are interested in the topic: gamerseo.com/blog/advergaming-exam...
Love to see some more content like this! Great article.