Tabletopia for Playtesting or Part of Kickstarter

I'm very interested in people's responses to this as well. I'm currently finalizing a game on Tabletopia that I plan to launch on Kickstarter next month. I think it could be nice to give potential backers an opportunity to sort of test out the game to get familiar with the game a bit before backing, and it is certainly less work on their part than a print and play.

Tabletopia seems to be ideal for this sort of thing because it doesn't require players to actually own Tabletopia, unlike Tabletop Simulator. The downside to Tabletopia is that there are a lot less players using it. For playtesting with as many people as possible or as an option to Kickstarter backers I think Tabletopia would be ideal.

Also if you go to steam TTS has a much better user rating, but I'm not really sure why...

Okay a couple of things...

We (my Publisher) decided that they would put "TradeWorlds" on Tabletopia provided the social goal was met. I can't remember what the social goal was (like thumb up an image on BGG or x Facebook friends, etc.) So they are going to put the game eventually once all the artwork is finished. We are still in the process of finishing artwork...

Learning about the "turf war" and the business models, there is ONE (1) clear thing that stands out: it COSTS game publisher to use Tabletopia.

That I don't like... And meanwhile you have TableTop Simulator which is the OPPOSITE: publishers can make money selling the DLCs.

But as I said before TableTopia is FREE for most gamers and publishers. Or until you want a 2nd game on their platform and then it's $9/mth.

So personally I would CHOOSE the platform that allows me to MAKE money rather than PAY money.

However the point that still remains is that Tabletopia for most gamers will be FREE... It's HARD to compete against "FREE".

Yeah, I wish the creators weren't the ones bearing the cost on Tabletopia, but that's the way it is unfortunately. In the future I will probably also use Tabletop Simulator and reserve Tabletopia to use for playtesting my most current game so that I don't have to pay the $9 fee every month.

Personally I see pros and cons to both. In the long run TTS is cheaper for a designer who has multiple games on the platform at once. Tabletopia is more accessible to ALL players.

And I certainly don't thing there is wrong for your motivation for using TTS is to make money. Though, I'd be curious to know how successful it has been for people.

Just a quick update on my Tabletopia experience. This evening I exceeded the limit of my free account, so that's something else to keep in mind. You get 1 free game, but you still have to keep it under the limit for your account.

I've just purchased TTS so now I can more accurately compare the two. :-)

agree with that - I tried both and honestly thought they were rubbish. Boardgames are not designed to be played on a computer and vice versa

in terms of setup - both reasonable to use from what I remember, I just wasn't that happy with the end product

so haven't used since - your mileage may vary of course

Going to disagree with Quest on this one – I think if you are trying to grow a fan base by putting up a digital version of the game, Tabletopia is the better option, due to it being free to play vs Tabletop Simulator requiring each player to have a copy.

Charging creators for the use of the platform makes tons of sense for Tabletop as a model.

Think of putting your game on Tabletopia as part of your marketing / promotion budget. In addition to your social media promotions, buying ad space, you're providing an easy way for people to try the game and hopefully convert into customers.

I think the goal of putting the game up on Tabletopia isn't to make money selling your DLC or premium content, but to drive people to your campaign / to buy a physical copy.

RE: Playtesting
That said, I don't like digital platforms for playtesting – as they make it significantly more difficult and sometimes impossible to capture experiential data like player reactions, offhand comments/ table talk / body language. They also provide extremely different interface and affordances to playing a physical copy of the game, so you can't test your learnability, total playing time, or usability at all either.

@John: I completely disagree with this. And I've personally experienced it first hand at a job I once held.

Let me explain... and then you can criticize.

I was working for a Large Bank. They had spawned the IDEA of hosting a B2B Platform for the Bank's business customers. But their model was totally flawed. Much like Tabletopia, their idea was to CHARGE people to sell product on their B2B site while the Bank would make money on each transaction. It was so flawed of an idea - not because people did not try. But because the basic principle of charge both Customers AND Supplier to use your "platform" is absurd.

Without Suppliers the B2B would have NOTHING TO SELL. It's the exact same deal with Tabletopia. Without US as designers uploading all our content to their "platform", they would have NOTHING to OFFER gamers except maybe outdated games like Chess or Checkers...

What makes Tabletopia interesting is that you can PLAY all of the NEW and more recent games (ergo the Suppliers are bringing GAMERS to the table).

And you still believe it is logical to CHARGE them???

Needless to say the B2B failed and I lost my job... Not because of me but because the Bank shifted the purpose of the B2B and decided to outsource all of the Technical work to a Third-Party in the USA.

But bottom line, that business failed because it was "burning the candle at both ends". Sure add a MARKUP to items sold and the consumer naturally pay based on his purchases... Or maybe allocate a "transaction" fee per order of $0.99 or something like that. The users are SAVING MONEY by using the B2B platform because prices were negotiated and the Bank was offering discounts to the BUYERS.

I'm sorry but I have lived through this ... and it was the death of their business. No way that a SUPPLIER should be both offering the OPTIONS to the consumer and that he should be charged for offering it.

To me (IMHO) it makes no sense...

But you are entitled to your opinion...!

Note: It was so stupid because they wanted even to CHARGE per Megabyte of "space" used by the SUPPLIERS to upload images for their catalog... So to recap: Transaction Fee, Consumer Markup, Supplier Fee and Per MB Images Fee... Talk about trying to suck the life out of everyone!