Disappointing Sales for Oozi: Earth Adventure Episode 1

Editor's note: Last night, I posted how incredibly low sales for the game Oozi are, based on an App Hub forums post by the developer. Outraged, I missed a little detail: the developer was supplying sales data for a single day and not for the entire period since release. The developer was so kind to email me, pointing to my mistake and supplying more accurate numbers and additional information. I therefore apologize for misquoting the developer and misinforming my readers. At least, Oozi's sales are not quite the catastrophe I announced yesterday, but my call for attention is still valid, so please read the revised post below.


Marcin Draszczuk, creator of recently released platformer Oozi: Earth Adventure Episode 1, is not quite satisfied with his title's sales, which he revealed last week in the XNA forums. Until April 8, only 223 people downloaded his game, of which a mere 62 purchased the title. Up until today, Oozi was downloaded about 12000 times, but only about 2500 people also bought the game. Considering its high quality, generally favorable reviews and the low price of 80 MSP, it remains a mystery why this excellent platformer doesn't sell much better. Draszczuk hopes a better trial experience for Episode 2 should result in higher sales numbers: "...the gamer will start with four special abilities, while in Episode 1 trial showcases only jumping on enemies and collecting stars." Also hoping that Oozi fares better when released on PC sometime later this year, Draszczuk is probably "...not going to make any more games for XBLIG that have no avatars, zombies, or hot chicks. It's just a waste of effort."

IndieWatch Episode Four presents another fine selection

Taking a look at the current german Top Downloads list reveals what a dashboard promotion like GamePro's IndieWatch can do for titles that are featured in it. Episode four went live on the german dashboard last Tuesday, and since then all of the games covered in the video have reappeared among the Top Downloads and on high positions on the best selling today list on Xbox.com. GamePro's selection in the new episode of IndieWatch presents some of the finest games available on XBLIG:

Review: Monsters (Probably) Stole My Princess

Recently featured on episode three of Gamepro's IndieWatch as an excellent pick for 240 MSP, platformer Monsters (Probably) Stole My Princess offers great cartoony visuals with lots of funny animations and fast-paced, vertical platforming action. You control a very narcissistic vampire called "The Duke" and have to hunt down monsters he suspects of having kidnapped "his" princess. The monsters try to flee from the Duke by climbing to the top of the levels, and you chase them down jumping upwards from platform to platform, impeding their escape by hitting them three times with a double jump before they reach the top.

Recent XBLIG dashboard promotions

While there is a lot of focus on some negative events around the XBLIG channel these days, I'd rather like to shed some light on more pleasant news now such as recent dashboard promotions. The german GamePro magazine continued their 'IndieWatch' video series started back in February on the Inside Xbox channel, covering the following titles in episode three:

XBLIG failure, sabotage & ratings war

The XBLIG Spring Uprising?

This past week has been a turbulent one for Xbox LIVE Indie Games with developer MStar Games - creator of titles such as Xenocide, Blazin' Balls and Space Pirates from Tomorrow - proclaiming the service to be a complete failure in an interview on www.dealspwn.com:
"XBLIG has totally, utterly failed. As an experiment in reaching out to independent devs it’s a disaster. As a marketplace it’s a joke."