I know the guys at Epic are working on the Marketplace and that it will be public for everyone to sell an buy content but I would like to write a few lines about what I would expect from the matketplace and maybe others can write their ideas.
I think this will be included by default but I am going to mention it anyway: a vote and rating system for the content, number of downloads.
I hope that the Marketplace will be available for all regions/countries where Unreal Engine 4 is available so anyone can Buy and Sell content.
All the material is reviewed by Epic before being posted on the Marketplace (to make sure it contains what is advertised). I believe Epic will take a percent from the transactions (as Apple or Google does) so reviewing the uploads shouldn’t be a problem.
What I would really like to see is a Request Page in the Marketplace. I will elaborate:
For example I would like a full tutorial for an Adventure Game (and I will make that request a separate thread). Now, one can make a suggestion to Epic and if it is voted and Epic has time (as I am sure they have a lot of things to work on) it may be or it may not be made. Another approach would be to request this to be made by someone with skills from the community and sold on the Marketplace. For example I would open the Request Page and I would say I will pay 50$ for such a tutorial. If there are other users interested they could log in and say if they would like such a tutorial and what they would pay - so someone gets interested enough to make the tutorial and the others get the tutorial.
An universal format provided by Epic: all content must have a description, screenshots, keywords, examples (for music) an so on.
Anyway these are some of my ideas I would love to see other ideas added to the thread.
It should be public for everyone to buy but very limited for people to sell.
I hope Epic have a extremely strict review process for all user created stuff even if it’s free.
I agree on points 1,2,3 and 5 for the most part.
For point 4 the paid for user tutorial example would be better suited to a forum post in “Got Skills? Looking for Talent?” in my opinion. For Epic made content I totally agree.
Voting/rating is ok but i’m not sure about download number. As a publisher, i don’t want to tell people how much i earned from marketplace. As a customer, i don’t care download number but positive votes and comments.
Must.
Must.
Great idea but i think it can be hard to moderate
Exactly. There must be a “fill-in-blanks” templates for publishers to make all asset packages on marketplace is understandable and accessible for each level of customers.
And my additions;
Detailed search and sorting system : Users can search for assets based on seller, price, category, containing text and votes. Also users can sort the search results by price, votes, creation date, update date
There must be special pages like “Top paid”, “Top free”, “Top grossing” and “Editors choices”
Asset videos along with the asset pictures would also be great addition.
Iconic informations for each marketplace item to tell user if this asset contains “sounds”,“blueprints”,“C++”,etc.
Ability to post multiple comments on bought Marketplace item. I’m saying “multiple” because Unity Asset Store limited this to “one”.
“Mark as helpful” option for user comments on Marketplace item.
Update notifications for downloaded Marketplace items.
I think it should be just as easy to buy AND SELL. Only in this way we will have a rich Marketplace.
If everything is reviewed by Epic it shouldn’t be a problem.
Also, in my opinion, Epic should not review the quality of the product only that it contains exactly what it advertises - maybe some want to buy less detailed meshes for less money?
I totally disagree BechD, mainly after reading damming reports on Unity’s version of the market place.
The trouble is, almost everyone adding stuff to Unity for example, aren’t professional programmers, developers or modellers, they’re kids trying to make a few pence to bolster up their pocket money. So the Unity store is awash with unusable rubbish and scripts that don’t work, (all being sold, not free).
I’d hate to see UE4 market place destroyed similarly, and if anyone can upload stuff, it’ll be filled with 15th rate junk in no time. It needs to be heavily moderated and the quality control ruthless for it to be of any use to the community.
You can download endless amounts of free models already online, so the Market place doesn’t need to offer sub-standard material.
I agree with you up to a point.
Please take as an example the Apple App Store: it has hundreds of thousands of apps, and yes, lost of them are bad, but you cannot say the store is “awash with unusable rubbish”.
It all depends of the rating/comments system - the good stuff stays on top, the bad sinks to the bottom and you are unlikely to find it.
That’s also incorrect, I make iOS apps and know exactly how it works
It’s all to do with marketing and how much money you have to spend on iTunes promotions, (in 99% of cases) and nothing to do with the quality of apps. the few apps that “ARE” good and deserve their top ranking are about 000000000000000.1% of the total apps on iTunes.
Apple actively encourages you to manipulate the ranking system by allowing app promoters to jump the scales by paying for promotion. The same kind of thing a lobby group does in politics…It’s legalised scamming!
Sadly, Apple are the worst company to use an analogy of the Market place best practices, being a global conglomerate and purporter of the most unethical working polices known to man. They’re akin to bubonic plague.
Well, I happen to be a iOS Developer too
While not all practices are ok on the App Store (you know there are also better ways to promote your app - like ads) I cannot say I ever felt the App Store as an unethical place.
Also, from experience, I can tell you that good apps get to the top without any iTunes promotions or ads.
However, speaking from a buyer point of view I can say I always found what I needed (yes, good apps are first) and I always find new and interesting things despite the 700 000 (or more) apps in the store.
With regards to Epic reviewing things, and to draw another example from Unity:
Unity’s asset store offers basic QA much in the same vein as Apple does for the iOS store. They open the package, they check out what content is there, and if what’s there isn’t what’s being advertised or is so broken that it doesn’t function when follow the instructions outlined in its manual then they’ll ask the developer to rectify the problem.
Things slip through the cracks of course, but there’s no bullet proof way to make sure that everyone’s offered only the best products that get submitted. The only solution to make sure everyone can obtain the best on the market is through different marketing tools like advertising what’s popular on the marketplace, having “Editor’s Picks” that highlight different gems in the marketplace, and so on. Items on the marketplace that just generally suck will fall to the bottom of the stack, will typically cease development, and can eventually be removed via version compliance policies (like requiring a package to work with at minimum the latest version of UE4 within x weeks of a version’s release, at maximum 3 major releases back). The market will dictate what gets to stay on the marketplace at that point, and Epic won’t have any need to intrusively review everything about a product outside of making sure it contains what’s being advertised on the tin.
i’d like to see it open to user submissions as soon as possible. For me i am not a developer or a coder or a model artist. I am mainly interested in the engine to do neat cinimatic videos for fun, but that means more content. interiors. props etc.
700,000 is being conservative, or is that an actual figure ? If so, that’s 699,000 piles of horse manure and about a thousand quality ones… What beggars belief there, is who approves half that nonsense …They should be sacked!
…They should be sacked!