Took a BIG hit today, 4 games we AI coded in three.js went down with Hytopia today 😢 500k+ plays VoxFire + DM: Similar to Counter strike Arcade World: 5 arcade games in 3D world Hatch A Zoo: 70 day streaks on top players We will come back stronger,... looking to future! 🙏show more

Wowwww that’s so crazy and a story that needs to be heard and understood by game devs. Doesn’t mean there is not a place for platforms like Hytopia and others but just something devs should be aware of potentially happening. Tbh I don’t understand how companies like Hytopia, Spawn, Portals, and others actually make money (yet) especially with zero ads on their sites or forced to watch before playing a game on their sites and typically/historically if something is “free” it means “the consumer IS the product”. It’s also extremely common in startups to believe your own hype and over-extend the business into uncharted waters that are unsustainable and bad things start to happen - like what happened with Hytopia. So sorry for your troubles, happy to hear it hasn’t soiled your dreams

What happened to Hytopia?

We were devastated, 1 day we went to bed with our games online, the next day...gone. We still have the code, but would need to replicate our own servers, and some of the data layer... Sucks so bad, but nothing we can do. They will re-launch in 1-3 months once they get 500k+ back from a tax return which was delayed. They recently launched a new Neo engine, which honestly is pretty decent, had some good potential, and might still...but for now, gotta think about other ways to build! They were looking to allow the upload of more general three.js games, that would have been very nice, but let's see what happens in the end.

@threejs u dev roblox too?

@threejs Nice! Will try when it’s out

@AzFlin @threejs you should come try @spawn! would love to help you get setup and introduce you to the community

@AzFlin @threejs @spawn I checked out spawn a couple times, is there any monetisation rails built in? Any public user metrics? As you can imagine, we are pretty cautious after getting burnt hard here.

Did you earn anything off those

Unfortunately monetization was still 'soon'. We were paid a one off payment for the zoo game, but it didn't nearly cover dev cost/time. However, I can tell you, we learnt ALOT! We learnt what makes a fun game, juice, game design...so it's not a total loss at all, but a new beginning. We feel like this...we were on HARD mode! Fighting against various constraints and things out of our control...now we are free. Things that were possible in the Three.JS were not exposed in the v1 Hytopia SDK (their new NEO one would have allowed it)... But now we can do what we want, so all good!

The learning is a W still

Yep! We feel very good about what we can do going forward! 💪

+1 confident

🙏Thanks! Btw, I played your game other day, played a few games...was really good! Need to check it out again :D Was hoping it would be adding a bit more skill expression, item upgrade paths etc, but mindful ur also keeping it simple (I play LOL).

Check again, so much has been added. I can send you free skins if you connect an address. I am thinking of an item pathing / leveling xp system for persistence .

oh suck bro was trying to build something on Hytopia too

Thanks! yeah it sucks :( Have u tried three.js itself?

yeah but not really good at doing shader still trying to find an optimal work flow for threejs

oh thanks bro look sick. I will try

That’s crazy @AIOnlyDeveloper... do you have a GitHub? We can spin up a PF GitHub Sponsorship campaign to support you if you need it 🙏

What is a PF ?

Sucks :( just gotta keep building & cooking mate

Thanks, agree ^_^! We got this!

save the code! and import it into @tryAlmighty if they dont get back on .

Sorry to hear - Let’s see if we can get you on instead.

🥲 sorry to hear

that's unfortunate, had a look at their code template, it's probably doable to write a migration skill; but the fact of the matter is that the economics were never there

there's always spawn if you wanna try again

sucks, platform risk is real

Building with platform risk in mind is 👌 I’m down a “making an AI to make games” rabbit hole right now lol

💚🤞🤞🤞💚

wow that rough, but excited for what next

Thanks, yeah very brutal...but we will come back stronger !

You should check out @_portals_ they have sufficient funding and is a very similar platform, you will be glad you checked it out

@_portals_ Yep, I think I talked to you earlier? As I said, let me know once monetization is implemented. Unfortunately Hytopia never got there yet, so we are not taking any more risks till we know what is possible :)

@_portals_ Sorry didn’t realize you were the same person 😂

@_portals_ No problem at all, ty for reaching out! BTW, do u build or work for spawn?

@_portals_ Not sure what spawn is but I’m just a builder there

@_portals_ Sorry, I meant Portal xD I think Spawn is some other similar website, and I got my wires crossed. Can you link me any of your games btw?

@_portals_ I helped on this one, this was for a game jam. Game jams happen somewhat often if you are looking to get paid for building