Solo Dev Scores 4,000 Wishlists in 2 Months

A solo game developer has taken to Reddit to share their journey in accumulating 4,000 Steam wishlists for their upcoming game in a mere two months, all without the aid of a demo.

The developer's initial efforts included posting on Reddit, which brought in around 50 wishlists per post, and sending emails to gaming magazines. One of these emails led to a feature in GameStar, Germany's largest gaming magazine, resulting in about 1,000 wishlists.

Despite the challenges in replicating this success with other magazines, the developer perseveres, adopting alternative strategies such as contacting editors via Twitter and LinkedIn, which has yielded a better response rate. Additionally, they've found some success with YouTubers, with a couple of mentions leading to about 100 wishlists.

The developer also discusses their experiments with social media and Reddit ads, finding that the latter has been effective at a cost of around $1 per wishlist. Organic growth on Steam has been steady, increasing from about 10 wishlists per day initially to around 30 per day, with spikes during themed events.

The ultimate goal is to reach 40,000 wishlists before launching into early access, aiming to break even on development costs and continue game development. The developer hopes to achieve this through a combination of press coverage, YouTuber mentions, and the release of a demo, which some have already expressed interest in covering.

This experience offers valuable insights for other solo developers, highlighting the importance of persistence, diverse marketing strategies, and leveraging social media and direct outreach to media and influencers.