Material packs - Want some feedback about distribution model

Distribution UE Marketplace
1

Hey guys! I’m planning to make a series of tilable materials(not casual photo-to-textures, but baked sculpts) and I’ve been thinking about different ways to distribute this stuff on market and I want your feedback on my model to understand is it okay for you guys or not.
I’m not sure about prices at all, but let’s assume that basic pack cost 5$ and advanced pack 10$

[Basic Material Pack]

  • Base color Texture + Hue parameter
  • Roughness/Specular Texture + Strength parameter(With Lerp node)
  • Normal map Texture
  • Height map Texture
  • Ambient Occlusion Texture
  • Masks texture(Additional roughness map(if used), different objects in texture highlighted by different colors and you can choose in your material editor particular “object” by this mask(if used), Emissive(If used))

[Advanced Material Pack]
All above, plus:

  • Different base color patterns(You have more colors to customize) using Mask texture
  • Advanced roughness control
  • More control of apperance with additional mask textures(Like dirt, grunge, scratches and etc)
  • Advanced support of vertex color painting using dirt & height mask
  • Normal map strength parameter + normal maps for additional mask textures(if used)
  • View distance dependent Displacement setup
  • Completed additional material instances as bonus

So, base pack is more about presenting to you textures with all masks you may need to create your own complex material + Ready-to-go basic material(s)
Advanced pack gives you more ready-to-go complex materials with a lot of control if you need to tweak something + additional masks for more customizing!

As I said, I want to release pack continiously, so if you’ve purchased advanced pack once, you already have complex version of shader and it make no sense for you to spend additional money for another advanced pack(It’s cheaper to buy next basic version and use advanced shader from previous purchase) and the way I want to add more weight to next pack - new grunge, dirt, scratches, weathering effects textures in each set and material presets for fast use. And of course you can purchase advanced version if you want to support me :smiley:

Does it look decent for you? What do YOU want to see in material pack?

2

My opinion materials should be meat and potatoes with as little complexity as possible. Think box of crayons.

Marketing 101 stuff though get the basics out first of what you think is needed and then put out later what people want based on the feedback as well weighted against what is already made available.

If you plan on being a first adopter you will want to see what the first rush to market is going to look like. Someone puts out a 101 materials package for free could put a monkey wrench into you plans.

3

Well, if people want a lot of simple and beuatiful materials without customization - so be it!

4

Well when it comes to common stock simple material packages will have a longer shelf life and personally I would avoid price points. Make the best product you can at a reasonable price point people will buy it even if free alternatives are made available.

The real trick here is just how big is the access base to the market place which is a real question.

If Epic had the market base say as a Daz 3d you could make a million bucks on a one dollar hat.

5

I think you should avoid tiered pricing and keep it simple.

As for the content, high quality maps are of course most important but to make your materials stand out I think you should provide plenty of customization as well as good documentation.