One of the fundamental truths of writing single-player PC games now is that its so easy to pirate anything that people will only buy your game if they want to. Which means that being honest and forthright and likable is a key business strategy.
For the fifteen years weve been selling games, weve had a suite of generous, customer-friendly policies. However, we havent been clear and forthright about them. Some of them are only known to people who ask us for support privately. The others can only be found by hunting our web site. This is dumb. If youre going to the trouble to be nice, make sure everyone knows about it! So I wrote this little manifesto that will be prominently linked to on our site.
In youre an Indie developer and like one of our turns of phrase, please feel free to borrow it.
Our Spiderweb Software Promises To You
Spiderweb Software is a small company. We read all our e-mail, we love our customers, and if you are sad, we are sad. Were literally a Mom & Pop company, and we believe in the personal touch. So here are our three promises to you ...
1. No Obnoxious DRM!
Pirates exist. Sad, but true. But we wont let hatred of people who rip off our games drive us to annoy our paying customers.
When you order from us, you get a number you can enter into the demo to turn it into the full game. And thats it. No online authentication. No need to keep a disk in the drive.
If your computer dies and you need a new registration key? Were sorry to hear that, and your replacement is free. Register on the Mac and switch to Windows? A new key is free. Your child wants to play the game on his or her own machine? Thats awesome, and an additional key is free.
2. Money-Back Guarantee!
If you dont like our game, we dont want your money.
We have a no-questions-asked One Year Money-back Guarantee. Game stops working? You wake up one morning and realize that it sucks? You decide that you hate us personally, and our adorable children too? Money back within one year.
You might think, "Hmmm. I wonder if people ever buy the game, play it through, and demand a refund." The answer is: No. This has never happened. You know why? Because our customers are awesome people.
3. Big, Free Demos!
Spiderweb Software has the biggest demos in the business. Whats more, the demo is actually the full game. You just need to enter a key to unlock the whole story.
That means that you get a chance to play a bunch of game and make sure that 1. It works, 2. You are having fun, and 3. The retro graphics dont enrage you. If the demo works for you and is fun, you can buy the full game and be confident that it will still work and still be fun. And if it doesnt? Have we mentioned our Money-Back Guarantee?
We love that almost all of our customers played a demo first. It means were earning our pay honestly. Because, again, If you dont like our game, we dont want your money.
Hopefully, we will come across and friendly and honest when this goes up on our web site. And the truth is, we at Spiderweb are pretty friendly, honest people. But make no mistake. At the heart of it, the reason we are putting this up is pure self-interest. Since being nice is a core part of our business plan, when we are nice, we will do it in a loud way.