Publishing an Android Game: Android Market and SlideME

Where dreams get made and dreams get destroyed.

Let's first talk about the big fish:

Google's Android Market

So, if you've been following my guide and made a libGDX game, you could put it on the Android Market. If you're willing to pay 25 dollars. Yes, there's a fee involved, that can be a big turnoff for many people. I paid the fee .Sometimes I wish I didn't, because there are some alternatives to the Android Markets and they may even be more profitable than it.

Android Market. Pretty, huh?

Anyways, if you wanna pay the fee, you need a Google Merchant account. If you wanna to charge for stuff instead of giving away your games for free( I do that... ), you MAY need an AdSense account too. That depends on your country. My country, Brazil, totally required an AdSense account so I had to write a blog to get one. The one you're reading right now, actually.

I don't really have all that much to add about the Android Market. I always find it a pain to prepare all of the promotional images, banners and icons, so you should take care of that before hand. You also need to sign the app, which Eclipse makes it easy.

Some google information on getting ready to publish:
Preparing to Publish

Some images you need are a Icon of 512x512 and, optionally, a promotional banner of 1024x500 and a promotional image of 180x120. You can put up a video on youtube if you want to, so you can link it in your Android app page.

Try to really describe the best points of your application in the description, instead of just throwing around random key words. Try to use good key words but wrapped in a text that makes sense. Sorta.

Remember that if you set your app to paid in the Android Market, you can't change it to free. The opposite is also true. That can be bad.

So, let's talk about a friendlier alternative

SlideME

SlideME is free, fast to register and requires less images than Android Market. So it's much faster to upload your app there and less painful too.

SlideME is pretty too, huh?

 
It takes less than 5 minutes to upload your app there, seriously. But there is a screening process, I'm waiting on that right now, actually, for my new game, Dream Catcher.

I'll talk about how that goes later!

More markets out there?
Of course there are! But up so far I've explored only those two, I'll give my insight on more later!
Some more alternatives from the Trilena Blog!

Make a game, publish a game, do it now! Don't procrastinate!

EDIT: As soon as I uploaded my APP, I came here to write this post. As soon as I was done writing it, my APP got accepted. That's fast. Go SlideME!

Make a Game - Publishing

Make a Game Series!

Continuing the Make a Game series!
So your game is made, what are the publishing options?

My favorite Publishing spot

I think the best place to try and publish is Desura:

The Desura Logo

They kinda like Steam, but more Indie oriented. That doesn't mean it's easy to get in, though. I got turned down on my first attempt to get published there. It's still easier than getting in to Steam, I think.

In case you don't know, those are online stores where you pay to download games, they are a new trend in the industry.

The good thing about Desura is that it doesn't discriminate too much on how your game was made. Whether it's a LibGDX Java game or an Unity game for the browser, you can put it up in Desura, assuming they accept it, of course.

Desura doesn't want me, I wish they did!
If you wanna get in to Desura, go to ModDB first, it's Desura's sister site, in there you can put up demos, images and get feedback from the Indie Community, to make your better until it's accepted in Desura. You can even contact the higher ups for their feedback in to getting your game published! It's also good for getting some attention to your game!

My game is a silly Flash Actionscript game...

So go to Kongregate! They host flash games and a lot of people make a good amount of money there. You basically get money from number of plays, if I'm not mistaken. I have a nice, warm feeling about the flash game making community. There are a lot of others site to publish on flash, though, but Kongregate is my favorite.

What about Javascript and HTML?

A good place would be the Chrome Web Store, since I'm fond of Google. You could also put it on Facebook, same as flash games!

What about Mobile Games?
If you've been following our guide and made a game in libGDX, you would probably want to publish it for Android as well as Desktop. As far as Android goes, there are a lot of markets to publish in, but I think the most important one is the Android Market. We'll also visit other markets for Android later (like SlideME ) , since it's my current focus! We'll also talk about other ways to make moneys with a mobile game ;)

A deeper read on the Mobile Android Markets: Android Market & SlideME

Ok, what do I do?
If you made the game in libGDX, publish an Desktop version on Desura or ModDB and publish the Android version on a Android market!

Now!