I put significantly more effort into Block Merchant than I did into the last game. The programming logic was more difficult; I didn't get it working properly until after thinking of a way of making a grid system. There was actual artwork, however simple involved. I also made made a shiny title screen composed of multiple alpha layers. I definitely learned a decent amount making it, but it wasn't well liked at all by the few people who played it on Kongregate. I got some feedback from them at least, but it is still a bit of a bummer. I think it's possible that the bar for free flash games is higher than it was six months ago. There are so many others such as myself who have followed various tutorials and started making games that the casual gamer's patience for familiar concepts is much less than it used to be.
I see two ways to go from here.
- Make improvements. It still won't make much of any revenue since it's not that novel. It will be much better liked after getting some polish, though. Also, it might be good for me to try to actually make something a bit higher quality.
- Make a new game. I'm thinking of programmable robots that you fight against each other. It would probably have more of a chance of gaining some traction. I'd also learn more from a new project than continued work on an old one.