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A few years ago, I watched a full playthrough of the first three Phoenix Wright games on Youtube. I enjoyed the story and characters a lot, hence why I pretty much binge-watched what is a series of very story-heavy games. I know it sounds stupid, but that's what happened.

As a consequence, I had no reason to buy and play any of those games. In hindsight, I realize I pretty much pirated the games without ever even playing them. It's not like I enjoyed the games because of their epic gameplay, I enjoyed them because of the story, and since I know what's going to happen, I don't have a reason to play them myself.

I still bought them in the end out of principle (even if it's Capcom...), but how many people are seriously going to do that? I doubt very many.

Now, I'm in the middle of creating my own story-heavy game, and I'm unsure because of how popular gaming channels have become on Youtube. I fear some big youtuber will play my game, a big portion of my potential playerbase will see the story and not be bothered to buy the game themselves. I mean, why should they if they've seen the story? Sure, I get some free publicity/marketing for my game, but what good is that if nobody's going to buy the game?

Is my concern valid? Or am I too pessimistic about people?

Philipp
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    I feel I should note that some games I am curious about so watch a lets play and then think "This looks like a cool game" and deliberately stop watching so I can play it myself without spoilers. So sometimes viewing a lets play might stop a sale but equally other times it might create a sale. – Chris Nov 21 '17 at 13:04
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    For me, Let's Plays have taken the place of demo versions. When I can't make up my mind if I would like to buy a game or not from just looking at screenshots (possibly manipulated), trailers (likely cut to make the game look more interesting than it actually is), media reviews (possibly bought) or user reviews (rarely objective), I watch some Let's Play footage to get an impression how the game actually plays. – Philipp Nov 21 '17 at 13:11
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    You may lose a sale from one person watching a video, but if they didn't like what they saw you lost nothing, if they did they may tell others and encourage them to buy. Additionally your next game will have a much larger audience if your first game was well received so you are building a future market for yourself – Lord Jebus VII Nov 21 '17 at 14:19
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    @Philipp, same. I find it frustrating that so many game trailers are just pre-rendered cutscenes, and show nothing about what the player can do and what it is actually like to play the game. Even in a more linear, story-focused game, I need to see a player walking around in-game before I'll consider spending money or filling up my hard drive. – tyjkenn Nov 21 '17 at 16:55
  • Just adding a comment here because so many others have already answered the question, but I've purchased more story driven games by watching Let's Plays than games that didn't have one of my favorite Youtubers playing it.

    Stanley Parable, Abzu, Beginner's Guide, etc. I've purchased all of these games after watching partial or full Let's Plays and have played through them myself and enjoyed them all immensely.

     – Mkalafut Nov 21 '17 at 17:41
  • You mean like that crappy borderlands story game? Protip: don't make a game like that unless your IP is awesome. People either play because your IP is cool or the game is actually fun to play, or if you get really lucky, both. – Mazura Nov 21 '17 at 17:43
  • If you think about let's plays, you might want to think about age rating. there are countries where you need a broadcast license to do let's plays, which includes adherence to age ratings – PlasmaHH Nov 21 '17 at 19:26
  • Something you should maybe be considering is why you want to make this game. Regardless of what that reason is, ask yourself if this is a deal-breaker for you. If you're not passionate about getting this game made, honestly, I'm pessimistic about your success, especially if reduced sales due to Let's Players is causing you concern. – Daevin Nov 21 '17 at 19:36
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    Repeat after me: watching game content is not stupid. Watching game content is not stupid. Twitch streamed almost 5 billion hours of gaming content in 2016. It's not stupid. – corsiKa Nov 21 '17 at 20:41
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    Maybe this is a controversial opinion so I'll make it a comment and not an answer: If your game only stands as a story, then it's likely better off being some other kind of narrative experience (i.e. book, movie, comic, anime, etc). If you really want your work to be a game, then there should be some compelling interactivity involved in it. Even if it's just (meaningful) branched story paths, or if it's a full game with interesting mechanics, a game should justify itself being a game -- otherwise it might actually be meant to be something else. – Alex Jones Nov 22 '17 at 00:16
  • Saying that watching game content is stupid is like saying watching football/soccer is stupid. Don't fret we all do i (that shouldn't be justification for anything, but I hope you feel better). – Kitanga Nday Nov 22 '17 at 12:46
  • If i liked your game, I'd buy it just because I liked watching it. Also if it's story driven then there's definitely something the let's player might have missed – Kitanga Nday Nov 22 '17 at 12:48
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    It may be worth considering the potential consequences of attempting to stop people from making videos about your game. As a consumer, my knee-jerk reaction to companies like that is 'they're trying to hide how awful their game is, no buy'. I doubt I'm alone in this. – Jack Of All Trades 234 Nov 22 '17 at 13:12
  • I have personally bought the following games (among others) I otherwise may not have because of watching other people play it or discuss it: Minecraft, Assassin's Creed: Syndicate, Prey, Civilization V, WoW Legion expansion, Terraria, Bastion, Firewatch,.... And I can probably find many more games in my library that I wouldn't have bought without watching my favorite youtubers/twitchers play them. And there are ALSO a ton of games I have watched them play that made me go "hmm, I was going to buy that, but I reconsidered". – Nzall Nov 22 '17 at 15:00
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    Your concern is about what people in the game industry call "a nice problem to have". – Russell Borogove Nov 22 '17 at 16:19
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    You do have the legal right to issue copyright takedowns on LPers. But that is not advisable for the reasons other people have mentioned. – Rob Rose Nov 24 '17 at 03:28
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    That Dragon, Cancer is a short, story-heavy game that had trouble reaching profitability because of Let's Plays. So yes, this is a valid concern depending on how short and linear your game is. – Josh Townzen Nov 26 '17 at 03:39
  • Here's a random tip: if you're worried about spoilers in thumbnails, provide a (easily visible) asset pack for people to make thumbnails out of that doesn't contain spoilers. Lazy and courteous people will then not be putting obvious spoilers in thumbnails and it'll be easier for the people who care to avoid them. You won't be able to stop those that will make their own spoilerific thumbnails. Just make sure you provide room for individual to brand their content or nobody will want to use cookie cutter premade thumbnails. – CAD97 Nov 26 '17 at 05:51

3 Answers3

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Yes, you should care about Let's Players. In fact, you should make your game as appealing to them as possible. Reach out to them and encourage them to play your game.

Let's Players have become one of the most important marketing channels for independent game developers. They are a great way to expose your game to a large and interested audience and most of the time they don't even want any money for it. And exposure is everything in a market as crowded as today's game market. Only those people who know your game exists will consider buying it. I am sure some games like Surgeon Simulator or Octodad would have never been as successful if they weren't played into the ground on Youtube and Twitch.

Regarding your fear that "a big portion of your potential playerbase will see the story and not be bothered to buy the game": Have you calculated how large your "potential playerbase" actually is? There are hundreds of millions of people in the world who regularly buy and play video games. Your "potential playerbase" is practically endless, even if your game only targets a niche demographic. But just as countless as your customer pool is your competition. That's why exposure is so crucial for games.

However, if you are afraid that watching your game is just as good as playing your game, make sure it is not. Add multiple major branches to your story and lots of minor decisions which affect later events in the game. You want the audience to constantly wonder what would have happened if the player had done something different. And do not neglect your actual gameplay. The unique strength of games as a medium is that they are interactive. If you just want to tell your story and don't want any audience interaction to interfere with it, you can just as well write a novel.

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Philipp
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    "If you don't want to make any use of audience interaction, you can just as well write a book." I suggest you emphasize this sentence. – starikcetin Nov 21 '17 at 12:12
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    There is a certain recent game that has some extra dialog for Streamers. Having one of the "villains" of the game suddenly stop talking to say "Oh, you're recording?" and then proceed to say hi to your audience is extremely creepy and one of the must fun aspects of it. – T. Sar Nov 21 '17 at 13:39
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    @T.Sar: What game is that? – BlueRaja - Danny Pflughoeft Nov 21 '17 at 15:24
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    @T.Sar I would like to recommend this game to some LPers I know who might enjoy it. What is it? (Wish I could just subscribe to an answer.) – trlkly Nov 21 '17 at 15:34
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    @trlkly That would be Doki-Doki Literature Club. It is a visual novel that was recently covered by a varied group of streamers (Including GTLive!) - it starts off as a very pink, lovey-dovey romance but then takes an abrupt left turn into absolute creepiness and meta-horror halfway through it. It is not a game for the faint of heart, by no means. – T. Sar Nov 21 '17 at 16:14
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    There's another consideration: a person who watched your game on YouTube may or may not buy your game, but (if he likes it) he's going to spread the word to his friends. At the expense of one person who watched the game, you've expanded your audience, bringing zero, one or more paying customers. – svavil Nov 21 '17 at 16:27
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    Essentially while a Let's play might satisfy a few people, the potential for increased sales from exposure puts it something like this: 50% of 500 people (That you could maybe reach without Let's play's) VS 25% of 50.000. The numbers are pulled out of the thin air, but that's essentially the core "pro-Let's Play" argument that many of them(Youtubers and Streamers) argue for. And I believe they are correct in this, even in a story heavy game. Even minor interactions in a video game can pull people in, making it much more personal, creating a need to play themselves. – MartinArrJay Nov 22 '17 at 09:58
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    @MartinArrJay You are probably correct. Personally, I've purchased several games after seeing their Let's Play's or game reviews. That includes Fallout 4, Skyrim, Azura's Wrath, Dragon's Dogma, Terraria, Starbound... Even my SO's Switch was purchased after seeing a few of its games' Let's Play's. They are advertisement, and all advertisement is positive in the end. – T. Sar Nov 22 '17 at 15:50
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    To this I will say: I am a LPer on one of my channels, and I try my best not to spoil things, but I find that people will skip a channel if they get spoilers unless they are like my wife. She watches because she enjoys watching the games while others play them. She'll watch me play all day, and never touch the game herself (she does game, don't get me wrong). In this case, you're not losing anything. You're still getting the sale of the game to the person and just exposure to the game by the second person. – SliderBlackrose Nov 22 '17 at 17:53
  • @S.TarıkÇetin I totally disagree. Visual Novel are huge (in Japan) and many popular/highly acclaimed ones have linear stories. Muv Luv Alternative and Higurashi come to mind, as both are on Steam. – Euphoric Nov 23 '17 at 06:13
  • @Euphoric Visual novels where the player doesn't make any decisions, or at least none which matter (aka Kinetic Novels) do not really fulfill the definition of "game" in my opinion. I am not claiming that it's a medium without merit. Just that it isn't really the same thing as a game. So different rules apply to making and selling them. Streaming a kinetic novel from start to finish is definitely piracy. – Philipp Nov 23 '17 at 10:38
  • @Philipp It doesn't matter if it is game or not. What matters is that people are just as willing to "lets play" them as they are "normal" games. Often without any additional value like commentary. – Euphoric Nov 23 '17 at 11:00
  • @Philipp Also. The point is that "just writing a book" is quite rude to say if you want to make a story with audio-visual elements of Visual Novel. Its same as saying "just write a book" to movie screen-writer. – Euphoric Nov 23 '17 at 11:11
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    @Euphoric If you look at the edit history of this answer, you might notice that I edited "book" to "novel" shortly after posting it. I did this specifically to also include visual novels and kinetic novels as an alternative medium to games. – Philipp Nov 23 '17 at 11:31
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I had a similar experience to the one you describe with some other game I will not mention, and ended up thinking about it in similar terms as you do.

As Bálint says, it is a double edged sword. Yet that does not mean you cannot get ahead.

What happens when they play the game for an online audience, then that audience gets to know the game. If this were people who would not have known about the game otherwise, they are people who would not have bought the game anyway. Thus, you should not think about this as a loss, but as a missed opportunity.

To exploit that opportunity, you need to sell replay value during the gameplay. After all, most "let's players" (for lack of a better name) will rarely replay a game (most of them have to move on to something else to keep their audience interested), thus having multiple endings or stuff locked behind a complete play through will make it harder for them to present the entirety of the game.

Now, replay value is usually achieved with some variation of choice and consequence, yet that could be harder in a story heavy game as those tend to be very linear. In that case, I would suggest catering to theories. How? You avoid heavy exposition in the game. Let the explanations, backstory, setting, lore, mythology and the rest of the world building to those who want to look for it, and make it as deep as it need be.

Do that correctly and “Let's players” will complete the game and only scratch the surface of what the game has to offer. If people watching them find mysteries in the game, if you inspire curiosity, and if people would like to take the control of the game and go explore more by themselves, then most of the work to sell the game has been done.

In abstract, you want to provide joy of discovery, and if you put a lot to discover, “let’s players” will not discover it all.

I fear some big youtuber will play my game, a big portion of my potential playerbase will see the story and not be bothered to buy the game themselves. I mean, why should they if they've seen the story?

Well, it is not that they "should". Yet, they can be interested in playing the game by themselves if:

  • They have not seen the whole story because that is not necessary to complete the game. Perhaps you can replay the game with a different character and get a different point of view.
  • The story is not the only interesting thing of the game. There is a lot of world building beside the story. Then there are the game mechanics that could (and arguably should) be fun and interesting by themselves.

You might be interested in Shandification. The act of telling a story is also the act of picking what is relevant and what is not... there are multiple way to tell the same story by merely changing the point of view. If you can accommodate that in the game and let the player choose on what to focus on instead of dictating it, then you have the potential to make every play through different.

You may even make that literally. For example, the game "Revolution 1979" lets you take the role of a reporter during the eponymous 1979 Iranian Revolution. Although this means that the player is not the protagonist of the history, it allows the player to explore different parts of the history as it unfolds. This allows circumventing the problem of placing the player in command having player action result in something different that the actual history (by being a glorified spectator, you are not in position to change historical events).

See also How a Japanese Indie Studio Kicks Bethesda's Butt at World-Building

Consider also that the experience of playing the game is not the same as watching it. Of course, this is more relevant for an action games (platforming, first person shooting, etc.) - You need to know what you are making, is it a graphic novel or a video game? Consider games like Chrono Trigger, Fallout or your pick of the Final Fantasy series... they do a great job in storytelling and world building, yet they have game mechanics that are (most of them) fun to play regardless of the story.

On the other hand, if you are making something like a detective game, I suggest to find ways to mix things up, so that it does not play the same every time. Crime mystery really suffer in replay value once you know who the criminal is.

Should I look for other ways to monetize my game, just to be sure?

Yes and no.

Not all games fit all monetization schemes. Some games work best in a pay upfront model. In addition, monetization is better when you considered an integral part of the game design (because it can make or break the game).

On the other hand, thinking of ways to monetize the game (even if you end up not doing it) would be a good exercise to find aspect of the design that you could change. For example, if there is a part of the game that could be different thanks to DLS or micro-transaction, that part of the game that could be different, period. If you can make it so that it plays different every time, you have added replay value to the game.

Secespitus
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Theraot
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    This is very insightful. I learned about some very plot-heavy games such as Sorcery! from Twitch, yet I felt compelled to buy and play them myself due to the copious amount of choices those games provided, despite their generally very linear structure. The more interactivity your game would have, the more likely Youtube exposure would be beneficial to its sales. – undercat Nov 21 '17 at 13:55
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Youtube let's plays are double edged swords. On one hand there's the probability, that you'll lose potential players, but there's also the probability, that you'll gain new ones, especially if you're an indie dev.

Most popular indie games become popular in the first place because of them. You can probably name a few from the top of your head; Stardew Valley, Shower with your dad, Flappy Bird, etc.

There were cases of video game companies being afraid of let's players spoiling the majority of story based games. The most recent I know of was Atlus not allowing youtubers to upload let's plays of Persona 5 after a certain point in the game.

Bálint
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    And there was a lot of backlash with Atlus's policy on Persona 5. People were intentionally spoiling the story on the Persona 5 Twitter account, and someone even wrote a Persona 5 spoiler bot that posted spoilers for any tweet tagged #Persona5. So there is a potential PR issue, and bad PR for a small dev can be fatal. – Chris Schneider Nov 21 '17 at 17:20
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    Streisand strikes again. – Mazura Nov 21 '17 at 17:40
  • Well, AFAIK, Atlus has been doing this since Catherine. I don't have any idea whether it backlashed at that time though (in the end, I bought and played until the end). – Andrew T. Nov 22 '17 at 03:59