I think this is an interesting development. While I have no coding experience at all, I will pledge to continue supporting the game. If some of the people here are talented enough to take on this project and committed to improving it, then it's time to make a serious offer and get to work saving this fun game. A few tweaks here and there would certainly get things going in the right direction.

Thank you for your support guys!

I'll give it another two days to see who wants to join this effort and then I'll take further steps. I'll keep you posted.

The following coaches have contacted me by PM and are on board:

Klomgo
SrednaD
Moran20
Belau23
Ruddy24
Buerco

Great to see so many of us willing to participate in the future of this game!

While I don't have any relevant management experience, I'm really interested in this development and happy that there seems to be at least some movement towards improving this flawed but fun game I'm a part of for almost ten years now.

I don't know simpathia privately, but all the in-game experience I had with him were first class. Just a genuinely fun person to virtually be around. I'm very happy you're taking charge here and I gladly help whichever way I can. That being said, I'm not exactly swimming in cash. Doesn't mean I won't contribute in a small way.

simpathia wrote: Under the assumption that there is nobody who will cough up the full asking price

In my opinion there was not any asking price mentioned yet, just the statement they expect 10k +

Yoinks wrote: a bit of due diligence regarding the asking price and revenue.

True.

For some transparency: My name is Pete, played this game intensively, but that was 13+ years ago. I started writing *** 2 games ***, still running both games. I do not consider these games to be a competitor of GI.

I was asking for some true negotiation about purchasing GI many years ago, but failed to step into it - mainly because Melderon refused somehow to have a real talk about the issue at that time - not blaming them.

I asked again for some more details when I read this announcement in the forum here.

Due Dilligence: I was asking for some counts, like userbase, paid supporter accounts, ads revenue.

In real life I am a pro software developer, responsible for a department of 30 coders. I was involved in mergers in the past, as well. I learned from that, that no-one pays for history, or source code written. You pay for an idea (aka risk investments), or for revenue related KPIs (unorganic growing). Since the GI idea is not unique, one would usually pay for revenue chances. So I wrote a small script counting the current status:

Humans playing GI: 489
Supporter (paid): 98
Ultimate (paid): 85

If my scripting did right ...

Taking this numbers, and under the assumption the new owner could maintain those numbers at least:

98 Supporter, roughly 17 EUR each (you have to deduct VAT): 1666 EUR / Year
85 Ultimates are no business value anymore, since they got promised lifetime contract length, and do not spend any money in this game again.
That leaves about 300 possible paying customers, if one could convince them. So a possible revenue between zero and 5,100 EUR. For myself, I do not buy the idea that a majority of those 300 users would become a supporter, in any way.

So 1666 + (something between 0 and 5100) EUR revenue.

Now deduct some server costs, maybe about 20 EUR per month if you go truly cheap and do not plan any consuming addons in the future, makes it 240 EUR / year.

That leaves the big question: how much ad revenue is the game generating roughly? Once the owner is ready to talk about this figure, it would be kind of a finished DD, and one could create an offer.

This goes under the assumption there are no third party things, like hidden consulting costs, license costs, stuff you have to take over and so on ...

For those not knowing about such mergers / acquisitions: usually you pay x-times the EBITDA the desired asset is generating per year ... in a non-business software you would expect that X to be 1-3, something like that.

That leaves me with an offer of 1,400 - 4,200 EUR, but it would be a bit higher after knowing the ads revenue. I consider this ads revenue of about 50-150 EUR / month. Let's use 100 EUR / month.

Possible offer is then: 2,600 - 7,800 EUR.

10 k is way off from what at least I know about Melderons numbers ... even I get the idea for the call. Of course you have to promote higher expecations before the bazar is starting, and of course the owner might as well bound mentally to the whole GI thing, which is very well understandable. But no-one pays for this ...

Don't get me wrong, this was not posted by me to run down your community efforts in any way. I just thought it could be somehow helpful to sort your thoughts and come up with your own strategy and idea what to do with Melderons call for an serious offer.

Edit: so yes, their best chance might be a community effort, since community effort means idealistic payments. Last edited on 2023-06-18 at 9:35

lefthandedjoe wrote: simpathia wrote: Under the assumption that there is nobody who will cough up the full asking price In my opinion there was not any asking price mentioned yet, just the statement they expect 10k + Yoinks wrote: a bit of due diligence regarding the asking price and revenue. True. For some transparency: My name is Pete, played this game intensively, but that was 13+ years ago. I started writing **2 games**, still running both games. I do not consider these games to be a competitor of GI. I was asking for some true negotiation about purchasing GI many years ago, but failed to step into it - mainly because Melderon refused somehow to have a real talk about the issue at that time - not blaming them. I asked again for some more details when I read this announcement in the forum here. Due Dilligence: I was asking for some counts, like userbase, paid supporter accounts, ads revenue. In real life I am a pro software developer, responsible for a department of 30 coders. I was involved in mergers in the past, as well. I learned from that, that no-one pays for history, or source code written. You pay for an idea (aka risk investments), or for revenue related KPIs (unorganic growing). Since the GI idea is not unique, one would usually pay for revenue chances. So I wrote a small script counting the current status: Humans playing GI: 489 Supporter (paid): 98 Ultimate (paid): 85 If my scripting did right ... Taking this numbers, and under the assumption the new owner could maintain those numbers at least: 98 Supporter, roughly 17 EUR each (you have to deduct VAT): 1666 EUR / Year 85 Ultimates are no business value anymore, since they got promised lifetime contract length, and do not spend any money in this game again. That leaves about 300 possible paying customers, if one could convince them. So a possible revenue between zero and 5,100 EUR. For myself, I do not buy the idea that a majority of those 300 users would become a supporter, in any way. So 1666 + (something between 0 and 5100) EUR revenue. Now deduct some server costs, maybe about 20 EUR per month if you go truly cheap and do not plan any consuming addons in the future, makes it 240 EUR / year. That leaves the big question: how much ad revenue is the game generating roughly? Once the owner is ready to talk about this figure, it would be kind of a finished DD, and one could create an offer. This goes under the assumption there are no third party things, like hidden consulting costs, license costs, stuff you have to take over and so on ... For those not knowing about such mergers / acquisitions: usually you pay x-times the EBITDA the desired asset is generating per year ... in a non-business software you would expect that X to be 1-3, something like that. That leaves me with an offer of 1,400 - 4,200 EUR, but it would be a bit higher after knowing the ads revenue. I consider this ads revenue of about 50-150 EUR / month. Let's use 100 EUR / month. Possible offer is then: 2,600 - 7,800 EUR. 10 k is way off from what at least I know about Melderons numbers ... even I get the idea for the call. Of course you have to promote higher expecations before the bazar is starting, and of course the owner might as well bound mentally to the whole GI thing, which is very well understandable. But no-one pays for this ... Don't get me wrong, this was not posted by me to run down your community efforts in any way. I just thought it could be somehow helpful to sort your thoughts and come up with your own strategy and idea what to do with Melderons call for an serious offer. Edit: so yes, their best chance might be a community effort, since community effort means idealistic payments.

I'm admin from the beginning of the game and if I remember correctly, and if you are who I think you are, you offered (if my mind doesn't play trick with me), around 2000 euros for everything. That was not what you call a "serious offer".
And that was at the time the owner refused a 24k offer buy-out attempt from another company.
Nice attempt on "hidden advertisement" for your games as well
Anyway.

About technology used in games.
GI was written about 15 years ago now and as far as I know uses HTML/PHP5 for web site and few scripts and C/C++ for engine, game processing, updates, etc... MySQL is the database. Server would need to be upgraded soon as it's old (and quite expensive for what it offers) so the game will need to be upgraded to support at least PHP7, but that's not a serious problem (we plan to move to a new server soon and will do it ourselves if no buy-out happens).

I do not know about finances.
I will ask the owner to give me few numbers for you guys and I will send them to simpathia when I get them.
We don't need to hide anything. It's a small company that deals with these web games and it's not something that is done for a living (owner is an IT pro as well).

And now, lefthandjoe, you forgot one more (vey important) thing.
There is a big difference if owner is forced to sell due to fund emergency or something similar and actively seeking buyer or if the owner doesn't really need to sell but someone would like to have the "item" and wants to buy it.
And if you are in the "inner IT circles" as you are claiming to be, then you also know that very well.

As I mentioned, owner rejected quite a few offers along those, what, almost 15 years now, and is now willing to consider selling this project due to him having quite serious health issues. But, operative word here is willing to CONSIDER. He does not NEED to sell.

Saying that. Give me some time to ask him about the numbers, and I'l get back to you.
But... if anyone intends to offer 7 grand, I would say that you should not bother - it won't be accepted. In another bit of "transparency", when I talked with him about this, it was clear the offer should be in the region of at least 14k-15k to be considered.
If you guys think he is expecting too much, then fair play, let's forget it, and let's go on with all our lives

OK this should be enough for now. I will contact simpathia when I get them numbers.