How much do super-simple games earn?
Flappy Bird made thousands daily, Wordle sold to NYT, 2048 earned nothing. We explore how simple games make money, why hits are a lottery, and who plays them.
In the last lesson, we found out that simple games attract the widest audience. Today, an uncomfortable question you're probably already thinking about: what about money? The three stories below are honestly chosen to show you the full picture: one about a windfall, one about a good deal, and one about a hit that brought in almost nothing. You'll need all three.
The game its own creator deleted
Dong Nguyen, a programmer from Hanoi, created a game about a bird flying between pipes in a few evenings in 2013. One tap, one flap of wings – that was all the control. Flappy Bird sat in app stores for months almost unnoticed, but in early 2014, it suddenly exploded and topped charts worldwide. In an interview with The Verge, Nguyen said that in-app ads brought him tens of thousands of dollars a day – he stated the amount himself, so take it as the author's word. Then came a twist nobody expected: in February 2014, at its peak, Nguyen removed the game from stores. The sudden fame, journalists at his home, accusations and threats online – he wrote that the game had ruined his simple life. This story shows both sides of the coin: yes, a simple game can bring a fortune, and no, a winning ticket isn't always a happy one.
Wordle: the word game bought by a newspaper
Josh Wardle, an engineer from New York, created a game during the pandemic as a gift for his partner, who loved word puzzles. Six tries to guess a five-letter word, one puzzle a day – all on a simple browser page, no app, no ads, no registration. In autumn 2021, he opened Wordle to everyone, and within a couple of months, the game became a global morning ritual with little colored squares all over social media. In January 2022, The New York Times bought it – according to the newspaper itself, for a sum in the low seven figures, in dollars. A game with no graphics, made by one person for one person.
2048: a hit with no profit
Now for the promised third story – an antidote to the first two. In 2014, nineteen-year-old Italian Gabriele Cirulli put together the 2048 puzzle over a weekend: slide tiles, combine numbers. He released it for free and open-source – anyone could copy it. The world played it obsessively, but almost anyone but the author profited from its popularity: app stores were filled with other people's copies featuring ads, while the original remained a free web page. Cirulli publicly stated he didn't want to profit from a game he'd made over a weekend based on someone else's idea – a respectable stance, but the takeaway for us is different: a game's success and the author's income are two separate things. There needs to be a conscious decision to monetize, and we'll have a separate lesson on such decisions in the money module.
Honest talk: lottery and craft
From these stories, it's easy to take away the wrong idea: 'I'll make a bird game and get rich.' The reality is a bit more grounded. Hits are a lottery: for every Flappy Bird that takes off, there are thousands of bird games nobody noticed, and nobody, including big publishers, can tell them apart beforehand. But the lottery has a reliable neighbor – craftsmanship: small games that don't make headlines but simply find their audience and gradually pay back the author's time. Craftsmanship, unlike a lottery, consists of learnable steps: clear mechanics, careful assembly, publishing, attention to players. Our course teaches exactly these steps – and let the lottery ticket remain a nice bonus you get for free with every game you release.
Who plays casual games
Since we're talking money, we need to understand whose attention it comes from. The profile of a casual game player from the last lesson is worth repeating in close-up: this is an adult with a regular phone. They play in line, on public transport, in the evening after work, during breaks – in short sessions of a few minutes. They don't read gaming news and wouldn't call themselves a gamer, even if they spend an hour a day playing games. There are more such people than owners of gaming PCs and consoles combined – which is why ads in free casual games can support creators. Remember this person: they are your future audience; they forgive modest graphics but don't forgive confusion.
Why did a newspaper with a century and a half of history buy a game with no graphics and no app? What exactly was it buying? Think about it before reading the answer.
A habit. Wordle was played exactly once a day and, within a couple of months, became a morning ritual for a huge audience – and newspapers thrive on daily rituals and subscriptions. The New York Times wasn't buying code that any student could replicate in an evening, but millions of people accustomed to checking in every morning. A lesson for creators: the value of a simple game is almost never in its code.
Do this now
Think of three simple games you've spent the most time on in your life, and for each one, honestly write down two answers: did you ever pay in it, and did you see ads in it? This will give you your personal answer to how casual games make money – based on real experience, not external statistics. In the next lesson, we'll move from talking to doing: we'll get acquainted with the tool you'll use to build your first game, and we'll honestly discuss its price.
Short questions on the lesson — with an explanation for every answer.