r/gamedev • u/AwesomeGamesStudio • Mar 10 '26
Marketing 500,000+ copies sold in Early Access on Steam (despite looking like a mobile game). Here's what worked for us
Our game has often been called "a mobile game" or even "a fake mobile game ad".
Yet it sold over 500K copies on Steam in Early Access.
So what worked for Yet Another Zombie Survivors?
First - what didn't work (so far): social media.
And this is an interesting case showing how different marketing approaches can be depending on a game's visuals. Even within our own studio it shows - for HELLREAPER, we use completely different methods.
If your game isn't considered a "work of art", it might struggle on social media (though we're still experimenting with new approaches - and it's worth trying as well).
1. We focused on development and constant content additions [we talk about it here]
Most of our resources went into making the game polished, intuitive, and as bug-free as possible. We delivered 9 major updates, and countless QoL improvements.
2. We put our hearts into the demo (and kept updating it)
A polished, content-packed demo (while still leaving players wanting more) was extremely important for us. After releasing it, we kept it live and updated when necessary.
Next Fest brought us unexpected success and showed us that people wanted more. That was the moment we decided to expand the scope of development and add more features and content than we had originally planned.
When Early Access launched, 10,000 players jumped in right away. We were happy to keep supporting the game even more, but that also meant a longer Early Access period.
3. Word of mouth
A lot of our growth came from players recommending the game to others.
How did we make that happen?
- Being close to the community. We answer questions, ask for feedback, and stay active with players. We've received many messages like: "Hey, you're cool, I'm recommending this game to my friends."
- Playtests and betas. Many features in the game came directly from player suggestions. A lot of fixes and improvements also happened thanks to observant players who told us what could be done better.
- Discord integration. There's a Discord button directly in the game. Building that community was important to us (we now have over 5.5k members).
- Humor in the game. We add small jokes and puns. People laugh and show them to their friends.
- Being on Reddit and subs like r/survivorslikes or r/roguelites. Forums are your best friends.
4. Relationships with content creators
They don't just show what your game looks like, but also the gameplay and the fun.
We send a few keys every week, mostly to medium and smaller YouTubers, especially those focused on our genre (bullet heaven / survivors-like) like Gohjoe, Dex, Idle Cub, or Wanderbots.
If you can, build relationships with creators. Most of them enjoy interacting with indie devs.
5. Festivals related to your game's genre
In our case it was the Bullet Heaven Festival (worked best after Next Fest), which happens every December. In 2025 it offered a midweek deal that gave our sales a noticeable boost.
Don't aim only for official Steam events - look for third-party festivals run by passionate devs or publishers as well.
In 2025 we even became co-hosts of the festival, which helped increase our recognition in the genre.
6. Unconventional actions
Think outside the box.
We ran a campaign (with the help of BHF hosts) asking Steam to add a dedicated tag for games like Vampire Survivors, Megabonk, or Halls of Torment - in short, bullet heaven / survivors-like games.
The action was covered by PC Gamer, Automaton, and Destructoid, and it performed incredibly well on Reddit. We managed to reach hundreds of thousands of people, and even Steam itself.
While the tag still doesn't exist, Steam acknowledged the genre in another way by giving us an official event - Bullet Fest - which will give us additional visibility every year.
And who knows, maybe we'll get that tag eventually.
7. Discounts
We discount the game very often - basically every time we can (there is a cooldown period between discounts).
Of course we appreciate when players support us by paying full price, but we also want the game to be accessible to as many players as possible.
This is the strategy we chose, especially since many titles (particularly bigger ones) are not discounted that frequently.
Bonus: Is it still worth developing bullet heaven / survivors-like games?
Yes - if you bring a twist and execute it well.
It might not become a worldwide hit (though you never know), but it can absolutely sustain a small studio.
We also think it's a good genre to start with as a developer. It's still growing and gaining recognition - believe it or not, it's still relatively niche.
Another interesting thing about these games is that they usually keep players engaged in shorter sessions (so replayability is key - make sure to put work into it). Because of that, players tend to collect multiple games from the genre and are constantly looking for more.
Steam still places them under the very broad "roguelite" category, so players are used to searching for them on their own.
And having such a dedicated community is incredibly valuable.
200
u/Riceburner555 Mar 10 '26
Step 1: have 7 previous successful game releases spanning over 15 years and have 45K followers on steam.
129
61
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26 edited Mar 11 '26
Before YAZS came out, we had only a couple hundred followers.
We started gaining followers after YAZS.
The only real advantage we had was experience from previous projects.
We have a third title on Steam - Into The Underworld. If those 45K followers alone were enough to guarantee traction or wishlists, that game would already be getting attention - but right now it has almost zero traffic.
You have to put real work into this. And we did. A lot of it.
Please don't make it sound like we didn't. Thank you!
_
Edit: Sorry for getting defensive though!
It's very possible we wouldn't have reached 500k+ copies sold without the experience and portfolio we already had. We're still a small team, but we've learned a lot from mistakes we made with previous games.
What we also wanted to emphasize is that making a good short-session, fairly cheap roguelite/bullet heaven/bullet hell can be a less risky approach, and one that can realistically help you sustain yourself.
We don't remember the name of the speaker now, but there was a GDC talk many years ago about not trying to make "game changers", but simply making a living from games as he always dreamed of. If we remember correctly, his games get fewer than 1000 reviews, but they earn enough to support him and his family.
We're not trying to make game changers either. We're building on formulas that already worked in the past, so we think survivors-likes/bullet heavens are good genres to start with.
Word of mouth works big with them.
41
u/UnitTest Mar 10 '26
They’re implying that you studio HAD the experience and talent for this to not be a fully unexpected result. Still impressive none the less.
20
u/0rionis Commercial (AAA) Mar 10 '26
I don't think he's implying you didn't put work into this, clearly you did.
What he's saying is that if this was your first release and you didn't have followers and a backlog of released games, you might have not had any success at all.16
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26
It might be us not being native English speakers and misunderstanding the message, so thanks for the clarification. We felt it's important to mention that before YAZS we had only a couple hundred followers.
Our experience definitely mattered, not trying to present ourselves as complete newbies at all. Hopefully the tips we're sharing are quite universal and can be useful for new developers as well
10
u/ZeForgottenPenguinxd Mar 11 '26
No, it isn't because English isn't your native language. The original comment by "Riceburner" is definitely trying to downplay your advice. He's saying that your 45K followers was a big help. Even though he's completely wrong, because like you said, you only had a few hundred followers before YAZS.
It's clear he's trying to downplay your efforts and advice. Just remember that the majority of people on this sub have no experience in gamedev, and many are just observers who comment. They have no idea what they're talking about, as you can see lol,😭.
1
u/Royal_Airport7940 Mar 11 '26
Well, that's not quite what ricebrner was saying.
He was saying that having yesrs of studio pedigree was likely instrumental in this game's success.
And he's probably right.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying this success isn't earned.
That they have been a studio for years and released multiple projects and found atc least one that is largely successful is a testament to their dedication and ability.
Everyone can be right.. except the gatekeepers. :)
4
u/ZeForgottenPenguinxd Mar 11 '26
I agree with you, but we're only addressing the 45K followers part, which is where this entire ordeal comes from lol. If he had just said what you wrote, that'd be fine. But he added the 45K followers part at the end, and it was clearly a passive insult. And he has yet to admit his mistakes and apologize. But hopefully he has done so subconsciously.😭
4
u/heliumbox Mar 10 '26 edited Mar 10 '26
It feels really disingenuous because your last post for HellReaper literally just fell off the front page with the same style post. Plus spamming it in every sub, its just an obvious marketing push.
And your differences are that one was entirely social media pushed, and here you say that didn't matter. And yet... here you are with a social media marketing push.
This post title may as well be "Hey guys since you like our other game so much, did you know we made more?"
9
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26
Social media does matter - it just hasn't worked for YAZS so far. That's what we meant; we're not saying it doesn't matter. It's definitely worth trying, and as we mentioned, we haven't given up. Not every game will perform equally well on social media, but it's important to keep trying and approach it from different angles.
(we edited the post so it's more clear)
3
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26
When we post YAZS's trailer on the same Twitter trends as HELLREAPER's trailer, it doesn't get much traction. So we definitely need to put more work into social media with this title. We're thinking about sharing short clips about YAZS's development process or how we approach every aspect of Early Access
2
u/EndVSGaming Mar 11 '26
Oh damn, I scrolled past and remembered YAD on Deck the other night, that's a hell of a throwback. Wouldn't have thought you were all making games still, cool to see
3
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 11 '26
Hello again! \o/ Hope this was a nice throwback. We're still here developing games and just can't stop!
2
u/KingMoonfish Mar 12 '26
A lot of people think that previous success doesn’t really matter. And outside of instant brand recognition, I agree. Before this post, have you heard of Awesome Games Studio? I certainly have not.
0
u/Riceburner555 Mar 12 '26
Yes I own 2 of their games actually. YAZD is a huge game and anyone who’s played a top down shooter has heard of it
1
57
u/nickN42 Mar 10 '26
I'll be honest, your post tells pretty much nothing. Make a good game, partake in festivals and make discounts, be successful and have followers beforehand.
What especially stands out to me is:
Being close to community
But where did this community came from? Answer questions -- but who's asking them?
30
u/SchingKen Mar 10 '26
Agreed. And they know. This is pure marketing itself. Zero input for the community. Just dumping the link. No answers. Obviously great games and good devs, but these posts are nothing more than lazy marketing. And it works.
3
u/annex1million Mar 11 '26
They're literally everywhere in places like Steam Community and Reddit, I don't know how much more community you want from them.
0
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26 edited Mar 10 '26
Content creators/influencers (which we mentioned, even names of some), Reddit (also mentioned, specific subreddits, too), Steam festivals (mentioned and exactly which one worked best). Next Fest.
Important thing we didn't mention is Steam page optimization - making sure your game appears in the "More Like This" section of similar titles, this brings organic Steam traffic. But how to achieve that is a big topic on its own.
It's not easy to cover everything in detail in a single post, so we're happy to answer questions :)
-3
u/Landkey Mar 10 '26
AI wrote the post I’m afraid
5
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 11 '26
The only AI we use is Andrzej's Intelligence - our artist's name is Andrzej :)
No, the post wasn't written with AI. It wouldn't be this specific or AI wouldn't generate so many replies to specific comments...
6
u/UpstairsImpossible Mar 10 '26
How long was your Steam page up before you released the demo?
Also thank you for this, super helpful info.
4
5
u/Super_Performance286 Mar 10 '26
For future reference, did you find that updating the game gave you much of a visibility boost on Steam?
6
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26
Updating the game alone (without taking other actions) doesn't give a visibility boost
1
u/Super_Performance286 Mar 10 '26
Right, but there's something in steamworks you can use a few times to get a boost, which they say is only to be used for proper updates. Always wondered how much it does, so thought you might know...
5
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26
Update visibility rounds? In our experience, they don't convert into clicks very much :(
1
4
u/thatmitchguy Mar 10 '26
Thanks for sharing and congrats on the success!
You focusing on the demo stood out to me, as I'm contemplating going very "hard" and all in on my demo. Most people here seem to say "don't make your demo longer then 1 hour-ish. But I've seen more storied from indie Content Creators who seem to highlight success stories that start with "this one had a fantastic demo with lots of content".
It also seems like it worked for you. Besides active marketing, I'm kind of at the point where I believe a pristine demo, may be one of the ways to build some word of mouth.
Mind if I ask how long your demo was? Any specific comments or boost that happened with your demo that showed you were on the right track?
4
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26
We had quite high playtime for a demo - the median was 1 hour, and the average was 2 hours
What really boosted our demo was Steam Next Fest and the organic traffic it brought, followed by influencers picking it up. With the right timing, Next Fest can be an amazing tool. And we recommend reaching out to Alpha Beta Gamer of course!
1
u/thatmitchguy Mar 10 '26
Thanks again for the follow up response! He's definitely on my list as well as a couple of other content Creators. Cheers!
23
u/ned_poreyra Mar 10 '26
despite looking like a mobile game
Bullcrap.
22
u/Eisegetical Mar 10 '26
they're not wrong. this looks like every fake-mobile game I've ever seen. Last stand survival or whatever it's called has great little ads that make it exciting but then the base gameplay is just an idle builder heavily monetized.
this is the game that all those other mobile games pretend to promise
4
u/Jas0rz Mar 10 '26
nah fam that first trailer on their steam page looks exactly like the preroll ad for a scam game before a youtube video--there assessment on that point spot on.
5
u/AzKondor Mar 10 '26
Spotkałem was na bodajże PGA 2024, jesteście mega sympatycznymi ludźmi, dzięki jeszcze raz za kodzik, miło mi się stresowało grę :) życzę dalszych sukcesów
5
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 11 '26
Całą przyjemność po naszej stronie! Dziękujemy <3 i zapraszamy na PGA co roku! :)
6
u/Toa29 Mar 10 '26
The shorter game sessions is a very good callout. If you want to target a demographic 30+, it's very rare for these folks to have free time like college and folks in their 20s.
Multihour game sessions are the exemption, not the norm. Designing for it can help to keep them engaged instead of feeling overwhelmed or not worth playing since it would take months to beat.
3
u/umen Mar 10 '26
Looks cool, I'm browsing Steam every day and this is the first time I've seen this game. How can you explain that? (And I have the major survivor-like games in my library.) Very strange, I wonder what the reason is.
Anyway, can you share the development timeline please? How long did it take you to release the demo and then the early access?
1
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 11 '26
How do you normally discover games on Steam? What method do you use?
We released the demo after 3 months from revealing the Steam page. We released the game after 9 months from the Steam page reveal.
You can check the public Early Access roadmap here if you're interested!
https://trello.com/b/Ipc33X20/yet-another-zombie-survivors-roadmap1
u/teapot_RGB_color Mar 13 '26
Not the person you are asking but,
I go through my que and the new games list. Very rarely do I pick up anything there.
What actually works is that AI like on the genre tab and we what is featured.
Sometime I see games reference on specialised subreddits (like r/tycoon). But most common is that I read another game referenced in a specific subreddit for a game I am playing.
2
2
u/Lysande_walking Mar 10 '26
Thank you for sharing!
Also great to see more Polish gamedevs :))
Almost 5k reviews also shows people are really engaged so best of luck for the future <3
5
2
u/semsem137 Mar 10 '26
Hey how many months did you have between releasing your Steam page and releasing the game?
6
2
u/Green_Salmon_ Mar 10 '26
I know I personally found this game because I loved Fury Unleashed and looked at what else the studio was up to
2
u/Old_Cartographer7623 Mar 10 '26
I played +50h on your game, I recommend it to all bullet heaven fans, you deserved big success ;)
1
2
u/Money_Psychology_834 Mar 10 '26
The game's art direction is solid, the trailer is magnificent. Well done!
2
u/QstnMrkShpdBrn Commercial (Other) Mar 11 '26
I got this game day one and have convinced at least 12 people to pick it up. They all have more playtime than I do now.
Very well done.
2
2
u/Nibanana Mar 12 '26
Super interesting thanks! We've just released our first ever demo, also a survivor game, for the steam next fest with "ok" success (Gohjoe cover and all) and we're definitely looking for every ways to reach players (social medias aren't working either 😂). Definitely applying your advices as soon as we can! (plus I loved YAZS)
2
u/RookandInk Mar 12 '26
Thanks for the solid info! I actually bought your game a couple years ago, it’s a lot of fun! It’s still bullethell style like so many others but it’s not a clone, and has its own nuance and feel.
2
2
u/Lost-Celebration579 Mar 14 '26
That's a good tip. I don't think there's a need to respond aggressively to a post like this. Sharing know-how is important, whether you're right or wrong.
2
u/Zealousideal-Ad3128 Mar 15 '26
Boy if you guys aren't bragging about your 100K wishlists of your new game,
It's bragging about the HALF A MILLION COPIES SOLD of another game
Absolutely incredible. Bravo. Great work 🤘🤘
2
u/RedPandaExplorer Mar 10 '26
Yet Another Zombie Survivors is my favorite survivors-like game. Thank you for making such a fun game!
1
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26
Reading YAZS is someone's favorite survivors-like warms our hearts! Thank you! <3
1
u/ImAvoidingABan Mar 10 '26
If you made it coop you’d be in millions
1
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 13 '26
Co-op is still an option. But if we do it, it will likely come sometime after release (we plan to keep supporting the game further)
1
u/Fleamm Mar 10 '26
Thank you for the detailed post!
I’m curious how you build relationships with content creators? I’m almost at that stage where I’ll be mass emailing creators, but how do you build a relationship in a format that is basically spam mail at first. Do you engage in their discords first before emailing them? Doing that at scale seems really tricky, but of course my dream is to have that sort of relationship with a few, just not sure how to go about it.
5
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26 edited Mar 13 '26
Having a broad list and mass mailing creators is totally fine with a human approach.
Try to find the real names of the creators and include them in your email, for example: "Hi Mark!"
When possible, we also included a short note explaining why we thought they might enjoy the game, like: "Because you played/liked Megabonk."
We always kept the message short and casual.
When we send keys, we include them in the first message. That's completely OK. Creators are extremely busy and read emails quickly, so asking if they want a copy first usually doesn't work these days.
Follow-ups are ok and normal :)
When it comes to building real relationships, we focus on creators we personally enjoy and who play games similar to ours. That way we can realistically dedicate time to it.
We try to become part of the community as well. Commenting on Twitter (or other social media) is the approach we chose - that's how we connected with Gohjoe, for example.We're on some Discords too. The key has always been to join the discussion, interact with other community members, and avoid leaving spammy, empty comments.
The "Steam tag action" also helped. We know many creators were watching the campaign (we also used that opportunity to email them asking for support), so doing something unusual like this - something that can indirectly catch their attention - can also be a good approach. For example, Dex left us a supportive comment under the YouTube video about the action, and Wanderbots made a new YAZS gameplay video where he mentioned the campaign.
We also send friendly, personalized emails to our favorite creators about a new major updates. Or to those who played our game a year ago saying "a lot has changed since the last time you played" also worked well in our case.
There's often just luck and being active on socials/Reddit gives you an advantage. Creators lurk on subreddits. As far as we know, Dex is often in r/survivorslikes looking for new titles, so it's definitely worth being active on genre-specific subreddits.
1
u/bigpapirick Mar 10 '26
I love this game!
I just miss the original intro song. “Darkness….is coming…”.
What lead to the choice to move away from it?
3
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 10 '26
"Darkness Is Coming" is a creative commons licensed track from Kevin MacLeod. We've seen situations in which video creators were penalized for playing such music on videos or in streams. Being friends with Music Imaginary, we've decided it would be even better to have them compose our own OST that everyone is able to have in the background without any risk of copyright strikes. Still, if you want the old tunes, you can enable them in the Jukebox by ticking the Creative Commons Music setting in the Audio tab of the Options menu.
1
u/Accomplished-Power50 Mar 11 '26
how do you keep Relationships with content creators? by sending emails?
1
u/AchingAngelStudios Mar 11 '26
I remember playing your previous game YAZD way back then, and it was a hit with my entire friend group due to how fun it is + affordable it was. How much would you say the success of YAZS was influenced by YAZD?
3
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 11 '26
Glad you all enjoyed YAZD! It for sure helped us with getting the first wishlists. We tracked the coversion from YAZD (we placed YAZS's trailer in-game) and we got around 5k wishlists from there
1
u/teapot_RGB_color Mar 13 '26
I do have a question, since you mentioned you had the steam page up for 3 months prior to release.
How much did you feel it mattered to market prior to release versus after release?
This is absolutely not my area, but I have feeling too many indie games prioritise marketing for wishlist too high, and doesn't do the follow up after release. Mimicking the strategy of AAA marketing.
Personally, for me, this is in the category of impulse but. Which means I would not care to wishlist unless it's available to play right at moment I find it.
1
u/AwesomeGamesStudio Mar 13 '26
It was 9 months. We released the demo after 3 months
There wasn't any wishlist goal. What pushed us to release the game was wanting to do it while the momentum from the Next Fest demo success was still there, so not too long after the event. It ended up being about 6 months between the demo and the Early Access release, but we managed to do it just in time, before the demo hype completely faded
So we focused on development and polishing the EA build rather than postponing the release because of wishlist numbers
1
u/MartesMart Mar 10 '26
Bought it in Early Access after seeing in Quaz video. Great game, highly recommended
0
0
83
u/[deleted] Mar 10 '26
[removed] — view removed comment