How Soon is Now?

I'm in a weird place right now, in game development. I'm in a sort of between-world that exists before a game is gold, but after it's been released to the public. I'm reluctant to put a lot of effort into another round of publicity just yet, as I feel the addition of upcoming features will make a better first impression.

On the other hand, I've already done some PR, and attracted players to a much older, buggier, incomplete version of what there is now. And by all accounts, most people loved it. That may sound like a good thing, and in some ways it is. However, I think a lot of people are enchanted by the "potential" NEO Scavenger promises: NEO Scavenger is a suggestion of a game many people have been waiting for. If I'm not careful, putting a lid on NEO Scavenger may disappoint many folks.

I suppose this is an issue many developers deal with, especially those who offer games for pre-order. How did they decide which features were required vs. optional? How did they decide when to wrap-up version 1.0, sell it, and begin work on 2.0? I have a gut feeling as to what I'd expect to be in 1.0, so I guess that's a start. It's more than what's there now, but probably less than I've outlined in my feature voting page (unless there was a financial windfall).

Why am I thinking about this? I guess it's largely influenced by the ever-shrinking tail of sales. The initial spike has paid for a couple of months of living costs, which is good. However, that money hardly dents the year's worth of living costs I've spent so far, and none of that addresses future development costs. I'm not quite in emergency finance mode yet, but with sales at 1-3 copies per day, it won't be enough to sustain development for long.



In retrospect, this isn't the first time I've been here. This sounds a lot like where I was just before NEO Scavenger's "soft" launch. I was burning up savings each day, and was starting to get antsy about whether I'd be able to recoup my costs. NEO Scavenger itself was a fun little game, in need of a plot resolution and several bug fixes. I didn't technically decide to launch then, as much as prepare for being mentioned in a few articles. And it was that accidental publicity which led to greater awareness, and a funding "shot in the arm" for new features.

Fast-forward two months, and the game has made significant leaps in stability and usability, and even has a few new tricks to show off. The plot is still as unfinished as before, but that appears to be the next thing on my agenda. Is this it? Do I put together a satisfying plot resolution and start preparing for final launch? Or do I wait and see where finances are once the plot is in, and consider a few features after that?

I feel like there's a good game here, so it's possible that a final launch could sell pretty well, with the right exposure. If I could get onto services like Steam, Desura, or Good Old Games, it could really take off. Possibly enough to recoup my costs and start funding the next game. But how much more NEO Scavenger do I need to cross that threshold?

I don't have a good answer, this is more a "thinking out loud" style post: a journal entry. My gut tells me that NEO Scavenger could show best if at least the plot were resolved somehow, and I addressed the randomness of combat. Resolution increase and downloadable versions would be good bonuses, as would a sprinkling of content variety (more items and creatures).

Fortunately, it appears my players agree. Looking at the feature voting page, plot and higher resolution are the two most popular features, respectively. And even though combat is fifth, it is the single most often talked about issue that players have. There's at least one good explanation for this discrepancy, so I've been thinking about what that might mean. It's possible I may need to make an executive decision to resuscitate the neglected feature.

I'll need some time to let that sink in. The plot work will take a while, so at least I'll have some time to consider it. (Read: hide from reality.)

On Public Relations

About a year ago, I made a PR blunder. I've probably made many in my life, but this one sticks in my mind especially because it helped inform my present strategy for dealing with the public.

Invited to do a guest post at Tales of the Rampant Coyote, I decided I would write about my job at BioWare. As an indie just starting out, I had little else to offer besides some insight into my former life at BioWare. I tried to pick a few topics that seemed interesting, such as where games came from, and why big developers don't experiment with smaller games more often.

Unfortunately, I also decided to speak up on the love/hate relationship fans had with BioWare. This was shortly after DA2 launched, so the topic was current for me. I had seen some pretty nasty things said about my teammates and friends. Some of it was quite frustrating, since it accused many of them of malice and/or idiocy, which I knew wasn't the case.

It's a touchy subject to begin with, with many facets and where emotions run high. Any misstep can be miscontrued as an attack or dismissal. So when I tromped through the topic indelicately, some ire was raised. In particular, comments regarding the article elsewhere on the net were pretty scathing (some going so far as to call out my criminal incompetence as an artist on DA:O).

Fortunately, the article's own comments were largely constructive, apart from a few snarky comments. And in responding to these comments, I started developing what is now my PR policy.

The Blue Bottle Games PR Policy:

1. Keep my commentary constructive. Refrain from making snarky or sarcastic remarks.
2. Ignore personal attacks and rhetoric.
3. Respond to legitimate feedback, criticism, and inquiry as quickly and earnestly as possible.

Each of these serves an important purpose, so I'll talk briefly about them in turn.

Keep it Constructive

The first is probably the most important. As a business, everyone is a potential customer, and you treat your customers with respect. Acting like a jerk is bad for business. It doesn't matter who you're being a jerk to, or why. In the best case, people see you being a jerk and take their business elsewhere. In the worst cases, they take their business elsewhere, but not before jumping into the fray and/or spreading the word that you're a jerk.

Conversely, respect begets respect. Treat everyone with respect, and do your best to help. That person will be more loyal as a result, and may even spread the word. And better yet, when your customers see you being respectful, they're more inclined to follow your lead and be respectful to other customers.

Ignore Attacks

In some cases, people are going to be jerks to you no matter what. They're spoiling for a fight, or just believe so much that you are a jerk and/or an idiot, that they have nothing constructive to say.

Ignore them.

Seriously, there's no better way to deal with personal attacks than to just ignore them and move on. Acknowledging them works against you in three ways: it validates the attack, it encourages other jerks to attack you, and you use your considerable power of publicity to draw attention to negativity.

You're better off just sucking it up, biting your lip, and ignoring it. Those who want to fight want an audience, and they'll move to more fertile ground when you don't provide one. And those who want to believe you are a jerk aren't waiting to be convinced otherwise. Besides, you don't even have enough time and energy to address all of the constructive things that need doing when you run a business...

Respond to Legitimate Feedback ASAP

...such as interacting with interested customers. Running a business, and especially one which launches games to thousands of players, means there are going to be lots of questions, concerns, and other feedback. Plan on spending a significant portion of your time reading those comments, and in cases where they warrant it, reply to them.

You may not have to time to respond to everything, all the time, but you don't need to. Simply trying to engage makes it visible to your customers that you want to hear them, and want to help make your products better for them. Most will understand that you're busy, and can't hear everything.

This lesson was partially learned from observing Chewbot of Stoic Studios (also BioWare vets). A thread had appeared at RPGCodex talking about their new Banner Saga game. In it, there was a mixture of good feedback, dismissive comments, and legitimate questions. As a former BioWare dev, the 'Dex was a bit of a lion's den. He could have just lurked, mining the useful feedback and moved on.

Instead, he recognized them for what they are: customers who want a specific type of product, and have a hard time finding studios to make it. He created an account, introduced himself, and started addressing legitimate concerns and questions. The members of the forums were genuinely happy to have him visit and chat with them. He demonstrated the power of interacting with players, even in places where antagonism arises.

A week later, I got to try his approach for myself. And I was rewarded by valuable suggestions, words of encouragement, and even potential customers. It's definitely taught me that a developer's presence can really transform a discussion.

One month later, I'm proud to say that the NEO Scavenger community is a great one to be a part of. Both at Blue Bottle Games and elsewhere on the net, NEO Scavengers seem polite, helpful, and optimistic, and I'm thrilled. In the words of my high school chemistry teacher, "it's nice to be nice." Who could argue with that?

Of course, who would argue with a Greek guy in a suit with unlimited access to chemicals and a pistol-shaped butane lighter tucked into his belt? Maybe that had something to do with it too...

Sales, Metrics, and Doing the Right Thing

Later this week, I'll have hit the 1-month anniversary of NEO Scavenger's launch. The initial few weeks of heart palpitations have given way to a more calm work day, and the never ending stream of emails and forum posts have tapered off to a more manageable rate.

Month 1 Sales

Even though I touched on sales last post, I thought it would be useful to follow-up on that with recent developments. Below, I included a graph of daily NEO Scavenger sales since launch.

Month 1 Sales, in Dollars Per Day

Blue Bottle Games officially announced on March 5th. Initially, I only announced the launch in my social circles: Facebook, G+, Twitter, and here. You can see a tiny blip that week, representing the 4 or so sales as a result. I've also overlaid a red line representing the number of dollars I need to earn each day to stay afloat. Basically, every day I hit that mark, I can afford to work another day.

As mentioned in last month's post, press coverage made a big difference in sales. You can see the major upswing in sales as a result of nearly concurrent interviews, preview/reviews, and forum threads surfacing about NEO Scavenger. In addition to traffic from the articles directly, I did my best to run around the internet, commenting in threads and on articles about the game, answering questions, and generally letting people know I'm trying to interact. The first uptick in sales after the initial peak was the result of posting in the Something Awful thread that appeared, and the second was a MetaFilter thread.

As expected, sales taper off over time, and are settling into a few copies sold per day. I expect this rate will remain pretty constant without outside influence. There are two upcoming website spots that I'll be watching closely, to see if they produce similar echoes to the first coverage period.

Has it been a success? Hard to say at this point. It's at least paid for March and most of April development costs. However, if one counts my unpaid wages between last May and today, that's a huge money pit yet unfilled. Business expenses are also missing here (licenses, registration fees, printing costs, etc.). Hardly a lucrative investment so far :)

However, I have put little effort into promoting NEO Scavenger. Most of the coverage of the game has been due to the press scooping the game before I contacted them. And most seem willing to talk about the game again in the future, as it develops.

Furthermore, I have yet to try the demo out on portals such as Kongregate and Newgrounds. I expect that putting it there will garner additional visitors to Blue Bottle Games, and potentially customers. I've been waiting for the right time to do so, mainly due to bug and feature development. I think there are a few extra things worth adding to NEO Scavenger, to make it more attractive, before announcing the game to additional audiences.

Finally, I've also decided I'd like to try and make a downloadable client for the game. A number of fans have asked, and I think it makes sense to do so. It'll also open up additional sales channels, such as Steam, gog.com, Desura, and other outlets. Indie games are gaining serious momentum in direct sales portals, so I may be well-timed to take advantage of the trend.

Metrics

I've been using Playtomic to track game play statistics, and so far, I've been pretty pleased with the service. It has some rough patches to sort out, but the service was a snap to integrate, is free, and has been quite valuable.

I currently have over 90,000 plays, and over 50,000 views of the NEO Scavenger Demo/Beta pair. The average play time is close to 90 minutes, which I'm thrilled about. It's not Kongregate or Newgrounds numbers, which can often be an order of magnitude more plays, but this is only from Blue Bottle Games traffic, a site which did not exist two months ago.

The site itself uses Google Analytics, which is a brilliant service, and I've hardly scratched the surface. For reference, Blue Bottle Games has had almost 30,000 unique visitors since launch, and almost 2500 registered users. (Registering is free, and provides the user a means to post in the forums, as well as a way to purchase the game.)

I've mainly been using Analytics's daily traffic dashboard and referrer logs. I use it to gauge relative traffic, and track incoming links to see if news has broken someplace. Google Alerts is also useful in this regard.

Doing the Right Thing

One other thing came up which I'd like to discuss. NEO Scavenger had its first major design decision made since launch, regarding saving and permadeath.

Initially, NEO Scavenger had no save feature. When a player died, that was it. Game over. Later, the save game feature grew in prominence on the feature voting page. I was admittedly nervous about making the wrong call on how to implement it, but I went to work on the feature.

A week later, the feature was in, and most of the bugs were sorted out. Players could save at any time, and load at any time. While there was only one load slot, the player could load as many times as they liked. That's when I stumbled across some interesting discussions (both at BBG and off-site) about the decision to add save games, and how that changed the feel of the game.

Folks were concerned that the game had become something different: that fear no longer played into decisions, and the game was starting to feel less original and challenging. When permadeath was in place, many players admittedly chickened out when faced with the House at Seven Gables quest. They saw the house, read the spooky description, looked back over all the struggle they endured to stay alive thus far, and said "Nope, not happening."

It was a beautiful example of exactly the kind of role-playing I was hoping to provide.

Fast forward to a later game where saving was possible, and players would just save the game, and continue without fear. They'd explore each path with impunity, and then move on to the next encounter. The entire experience was robbed of its weight.

After reading through the many discussions, I had to ask myself: why was I adding save games? It was meant to be a tool for the player to solve problems outside the game world. Namely, players who needed to walk away from the browser and wanted to come back later. It was not, however, meant to be a tool for dealing with in-game issues.

Several proponents of save games argued (rightly) that the game was unfair at times, killing players with random dice rolls and no way to mitigate the disaster. To them, save games were a way to make these game balance failures easier to swallow. And while that is one way to address such game design failures, it wasn't in the spirit of NEO Scavenger.

Instead, I want to provide players with in-game tools to deal with in-game problems. I want them to have more operational discretion in combat, for example, and more ways to deal with wounds than just waiting to die. I want the player's choice to be what decides their fate, and relegate chance to a minor role.

So I updated the save game one more time: based on some good suggestions, and some follow-up research into how other rogue-likes handle it, I decided to make save games delete on player death. I briefly considered making save games delete on load, but quickly reconsidered when it occurred to me that browser crashing  might lead to total game loss. At least on player death, I can be sure the player got a full game in.

The result? Hard to say, empirically. I know a number of fans are relieved, and happy to see the game restored to it's original challenge. I think the solution is a nice compromise in player convenience and challenge. And it just "feels right" to me. It's the way I want to play NEO Scavenger. It's true to the vision I have for the game. It's one of the things that makes NEO Scavenger unique, and keeps players talking about it.

It may be a no-brainer for some out there, and maybe this doesn't seem like a big enough deal to blog about. But it was a big deal for me. It was one of my first public game design decisions, and forced me to identify what NEO Scavenger is, and who it's for. It forced me to admit this isn't a game for mainstream audiences. That this is a game for people like me, who want the challenge and role-playing opportunities with real consequences. For people who are more interested in the journey than the destination. It feels good to identify that goal, almost like a crisis of identity averted.

Speaking of, I should probably get back to work, so I can avoid the crisis of falling behind :)

Post-Launch Debriefing

It's been two weeks since NEO Scavenger launched, and things are going well. Truth be told, I'm a little surprised at the reception it's getting. I figured there were some folks out there like me, who revel in hardcore sim-ish RPGs, but the response was better than I expected. Fans and publications alike seem to really like it! I'm thrilled!

For today's post, I figured I'd speak a bit about the experience I had launching the game, as well as some of the sales performance I'm seeing. It's a pretty unique experience so far, and I wasn't entirely prepared.

The Stress of Succeeding

One of the biggest surprises to me was that stress doesn't just come from frustration and hardship. I've been pretty lucky in that I can recognize when stress is getting to me. There are certain things I do, and thoughts I have, when I'm stressed-out. However, until now, I've always associated those behaviors and feelings with negative situations.

Imagine my surprise when a successful studio and game launch was causing the same symptoms! I announced my studio, Blue Bottle Games, and NEO Scavenger on Monday, March 5th. For the next several days, every waking hour was consumed by anxiety. There was this tightness in my chest, and tension in my shoulders, not to mention gritting of teeth and constant shivering. Every thought I had was about player comments, articles about the launch, or what steps I had to take next. It felt like the entire world was focused on my every move, and I had to act both swiftly and cautiously not to let onlookers down.

Of course, by "the entire world" I'm exaggerating. It's more like "my entire world." Friends, family, colleagues, and the niche-within-a-niche that actually enjoys games like NEO Scavenger. (A niche which I'm still trying to define: turn-based, post-apocalyptic, choose-your-own-adventure-survival-RPG?) The positive attention is awesome, but it's also scary. There's a dark thought haunting me that this might just be a bubble, and that the swell of praise may suddenly turn to disappointment.

Rochelle is currently taking a counseling class, and we had a practice counseling session. In it, I spoke about these feelings, and tried to explain why despite the massive praise, I feel anxiety. I eventually came to start referring to a separate "Dan Fedor," the PR version of me that's "out there" on forums, in emails, and interacting with the world re: NEO Scavenger.

One of my biggest worries is that I'll somehow let fans down: I'll forget to respond to them, or fail to visit their forum of choice, or I'll make a design change to the game that's contrary to their tastes. I realize it's impossible to be everywhere and do everything right, but it's hard to walk away from my desk at the end of the day and accept that. So far, I've been pretty good at maintaining regular hours. I still sneak peeks at email, forums, sales numbers, and magazine reviews outside of regular business hours, but considering this is a company and product launch, it's probably far less than it could be.

Sales Figures

Speaking of sales, I should at least touch upon that point. It's too early to tell if NEO Scavenger is going to be a financial success. Having sunk almost a year's work with no salary into it, I have a long way to go before it recoups the cost.

Still, for the first 5-6 copies sold, I would excitedly tell Rochelle "we made $50 today!" or "we made $38 today!" when she got home from class. We'd both be genuinely excited that someone, out there, thought the game was worth their money. This was after announcing the launch to my various social circles, mainly friends and family.

I also had my new studio mentioned in two BioWare-related articles:

• The Escapist
• Video Gamer

Direct sales as a result of the above pieces were a bit slow to materialize, but I believe they were integral to this next development: just as I was getting ready to start sending emails to other game journals, I was scooped. Within a day of each other, I received coverage in 3 major games journals:

• Rock Paper Shotgun
• Indie Game Magazine
• Indie Games the Weblog

plus threads at Reddit, RPG Codex, Something Awful, Bay 12, 4Chan, and many more. I suspect the Escapist and VG pieces were what tipped off the magazines, which cascaded into other forum coverage. (FYI, RPS was the biggest contributor to traffic, by far, followed by Reddit, indiegames.com, and Something Awful.)

It literally transformed the sales performance. In the 48-hour period after those stories broke, I sold over 200 copies. Rochelle and I were floored. Sure, that's not Ferrari money or anything, but that was, like, rent and groceries money. We could afford food and shelter again!

The spike subsided, as most game launch spikes do, and has settled into a 20-40 sales per day range. I'm waiting to see if that is a plateau, or just the most recent slope in a long tail. Either way, it's a pretty good result for my first gig. I'm definitely glad I went the self-publishing route on this one, and not sponsorship. It's possible sponsors would've offered more than I've earned so far for the game, but there's a good chance I've crossed at least average sponsorship price tags already, and this is only week 2.

Of course, this was an unusual Flash game. 9-months in development means NEO Scavenger will take quite a few more sales to break even, and even the best sponsorship deals would've barely broken even, financially.

I'll have more to say on that topic once time passes.

There are other areas I'd like to talk about as well: the launch impact on hosting and bandwidth, feature voting, offers for volunteer help...a lot has come up in a short time.

However, I should really get cracking on NEO Scavenger's save game feature. It's been a big request, the leader on the voting boards, and I think I can have something working in the beta today. Only if I stay focused, though!

Blue Bottle Games, now launching!

Well folks, the day has finally come: it is my pleasure to present to you my new studio:

I'm nervous as hell, and I hope I haven't messed anything up, but I'm also proud to share what I've been working on, and excited to see what people think.

You can check out the new site at http://bluebottlegames.com, where I talk a bit about the studio, my plans for it, and of course:

My first game, NEO Scavenger! I've made the fruits of 9 months of labor free to the public. Yes, that's one human gestation period. No, I didn't plan it that way.

Go on over there and give it a try! I'm anxious to hear what folks think; what they think went right vs. wrong, and how they think I can improve.

It's not perfect, by far, but hopefully you have fun playing. And if you're really jazzed about it, maybe you'll decide to become a supporter, and help fund more features and content!

What Does This Mean for Game Dev Gone Rogue?

I plan to continue Game Dev Gone Rogue in a limited capacity, but NEO Scavenger-related talk will now be the domain of the newsfeed on Blue Bottle Games's website and @BlueBottleGames on twitter.

GDGR will continue to be a vehicle to talk about indie-hood, running a business, and other topics that I think might be interesting or useful to aspiring indies.

I'll try to keep at least the pace of before, though I'm sure Blue Bottle Games will occasionally steal more of my time than planned.

So once again, go check out the new site! Play the free demo! And have fun!

Toys in the Apocalypse

If you came here for apocalypse stuff, you might've found the last couple posts pretty boring. So to make up for it, I thought I'd break from the business speak for a post to share some previously unreleased goodies from NEO Scavenger. Yay, new toys!

Secret Stash of Toys

First up, say hello to the new face of suburbia!

I'll take the next bus, thanks.

One of the first things you'll see in NEO Scavenger, is that the world isn't what it used to be. Much of the landscape has been devastated and abandoned. Plus, there are these large, flying creatures way back there, that can't be good.

But if you're a scavenger (and you are!), every scene like this is an opportunity. A danger, sure, but think of all the useful stuff you can find. Like this:

iSlab: Guaranteed to make you look younger than the kids who assembled it! 

What do you do with an iSlab? Heck if I know. But they're everywhere! Also, these:

Corn-a-Cola: Made with real high-fructose corn syrup! 

You can drink these. They have calories. Yummy, empty calories. They even give you a shot of pep! Just beware the sugar/caffeine crash that inevitably follows. Still, sometimes you take whatever you can get.

Dan is not responsible for sudden increases in worldwide squirrel lynchings.

For those do-it-yourselfers, there are other ways to find food. Like this squirrel snare. You'll need some branches, some string, and some know-how. But damn, if a squirrel roast isn't tasty after days of eating gelli bears!

Also, remember that rifle I showed off a while back? Well, it turns out you can accessorize it!

It goes with my shoes.

If you're lucky, you may find a shoulder strap in an old shack. Find some small parts, and something to screw the lugs with, and you can sling that sucker over your shoulder. Look ma, no hands! And if you're really lucky, maybe you'll find yourself a telescopic sight too.

No rifle to attach the sight to? No problem. Even carrying just the sight in your hands still lends you extended visibility range! Which is handy for spotting these guys:

"Will kill you for stuff."

Creatures in NEO Scavenger have always dropped the equipment they use. Unlike some RPGs, where you dispatch a guard and are lucky if he drops an item, creatures in NEO Scavenger have, use, and drop their loadouts when killed. And different creatures carry different things (except dogmen, who only carry razor-sharp claws and an irrational hatred for guys in hoodies).

History buffs may be excited by this next one:

OX News: 100% Bull.

Littered throughout the wasteland, newspapers represent one of the few (albeit limited) glimpses into what led to the apocalypse. Each paper, though weathered to near illegibility, still contains a morsel of info. Here's a sneak peek:

End of the Road for I69
I69 becomes second interstate highway to be reduced to gravel in Michigan DoT's "Resurfacing Budget Reclaimation" initiative. With two of the three major traffic arteries to mainland America reduced to secondary road status, many are concerned that access to mainland USA will become severed.

A Native American Werewolf in New Mexico
The Pueblo Rock Casino has been plagued by controversy since its announcement last fall. First, a debate over possible uranium contamination in the soil, then reports that soil from an archeological native grave site was being used as landfill for the casino. Now, a week after its grand opening, casino operations are suspended indefinitely as mutilated bodies are found on the premises by guests. Several staff members quit shortly after the discovery, reporting having seen “skinwalkers” in the casino. New Mexico authorities are barring access to the casino as the investigation continues.

Doesn't sound like good news, but I'm sure they're just a few unrelated events...

Indie Business Administrivia: The Pre-Flight Checklist

The saying goes, the last 10% of a game takes 90% of the effort. And if one is self-publishing, that is doubly true. (Which, I guess, means the last 20% of the game launch takes 180% of the effort. So invest in a time machine.)

Each week, I think to myself "this'll be the week I announce my new company." And each time, there are a few (crucial) things yet to nail down before I flip on the "Open" sign in the window. Forget about polishing the game design. That's a problem I wished I could be solving right now. No, I'm talking about business administrivia. You know, the stuff you never had to worry about before becoming a sole proprietor.

The list seems to grow as fast as I can check things off: finding a host, finding a payment provider, defining product delivery and pricing...things that seem simple, but bog down progress at every step. Part of it is that I feel the need to research each before making a call. I want to bring at least a minimal amount of expertise to each decision, which means research. Which means time invested. Which means another week goes by and I'm still not prepared to receive traffic.

The Pre-Flight Checklist

So what are these things? What makes them so important that I can't launch without them in place? I'll do my best to get them down in a list here. Perhaps they'll be useful to others self-publishing their first game. And at the very least, it'll help me to itemize them in one place.

• Business Development - As covered in a previous post, setting up a business is its own project. There are quite a few considerations to be made in doing so, and I don't think one could do it in any less than a week. And even then, there are some additional items I forgot to cover, such as:
• deciding on a bank account for expenses/revenue
• deciding on a filing and accounting system
• implementing the above decisions
• Website - Your website will probably be your storefront if self-publishing, so this should receive significant attention. Depending on your aptitude with web technologies, this probably means at least another week of planning, development time, and testing. Probably double that. Considerations include:
• What info will your website present? The game, of course. But what else? Is there any background info on your game? What about company info? Will it have a newsfeed, or just pre-planned pages?
• What social media tools will the website have? Will users be able to follow your accounts from your site? Will you have upvote/like/retweet functionality? How can users contact you? Email? Phone? Post? Twitter? Facebook? Google+? Will you have company pages on any of those social sites?
• Where will users go to discuss your games and company? Assuming your game grows an audience, where are they going to go when they have questions or comments, or just want to share stories? Are you going to host your own forum, or rely on other community sites out there (or fans)? How will your forum work? What sections will it have? Who can post, read, upload, flag as abuse? Who is going to moderate your forum?
• Is your website going to have user accounts? How many types? What does an account grant to the user? How will you handle logins? Lost passwords?
• Is your webhost/server up to the task? How much traffic are you anticipating? How much does your webhost allow? What if you go over the limit? Does your server have any processing or memory limits, and how might that affect traffic limits?
• How are you going to handle website security? SQL injections, DDoS attacks, rainbow and brute force login attempts, etc.
• Are you going to backup the site anywhere? Where? How frequently?
• How will you handle developing on your site when it is live? Will there be more than one instance of the site, for development purposes? What is your migration strategy to make dev changes go live?
• Payment Provider - How will you receive payments from your customers? If you want to sell your game, customers have to get money to you somehow. You are almost certainly going to need a payment provider. Pixel Prospector has an awesome list. In fact, they have many awesome lists for indies on their site.
• PayPal - There are many providers, but this one comes up a lot. And it has some considerations that make it worth mentioning. PayPal is not a full-service payment processor, unlike FastSpring and BMT Micro. With PayPal, you are on the hook for figuring out local sales taxes for all your customers, and paying them to local governments. You are also on the hook for any product fulfillment actions (hosting the game files, sending links). Furthermore, PayPal has had made rather dubious decisions regarding frozen accounts and destroyed violins. They're a cheap service, to be sure, but make sure you know what you're getting into. The extra money per transaction may be worth it to avoid the hassle.
• Whomever you choose, you'll want to accept PayPal as a payment type. In fact, aim for many types of accepted payments. There is such a thing as too many types here, but consider who your customers are. Many may be too young for credit cards, so PayPal and mobile payments may be their only (non-gift) purchase option. Fortunately, most processors accept PayPal as readily as credit cards.
• What is your payment flow? Will you have a shopping cart, or just an order info page? How does the customer receive their game when finished?
• How will you protect against hacking? Most payment processors have a mechanism for guarding against spoofed orders, but be sure you understand and are comfortable with the tools before using them.
• How will you handle lost orders? Customers who lost their copy of the game (or login info)?
• Pricing Structure - What are you selling, and how much does it cost? Are you selling an executable file? Access to a website? Virtual items in a free game? Much of this should've been answered long ago during the game design phase. But, as I discovered, these answers can still change very late in the project. Sometimes as a result of internal changes, other times as a result of market changes. Still, you'll need to consider this topic at least once.
• What is the cost of goods sold? (a.k.a. "cogs") This is more than your development costs. It must also consider hosting costs. Your payment processor is another cost. And what about marketing? In digital goods, this may vary as the number of sold goods changes. But at least make sure you're not losing money on each sale (e.g. a flat "per transaction" fee of $0.75 means you shouldn't sell for under $0.75. Maybe not even under $1.00.
• Will you have a fixed price for your product? A variable price? Choose your own price? What is your price range? Ideally, this is informed by your business plan's target market. Do you sell 1000 copies at $20, or 4000 copies at $6? 
• Will you have sales or other promotions?
• Are you giving away bonus items?
• Will you sell non-game items, such as t-shirts, soundtracks, or posters?
• Public Relations - How are you going to get the word out about your game? This, like pricing above, depends a lot on your game design. Your business plan should've explored this as well. It'll depend a lot on your product, and the people it's intended for. It'll help with the following considerations:
• What channels will you use to talk about your game? Magazines? Websites? Which ones?
• Are you planning on having a presence on Twitter? Google+? Facebook?
• How will you handle demo copies of your games, for reviewers at magazines or websites?
• Where does your target audience hang out? Where do they get their info on games?
• How do you plan to talk to your fans? Are you going to write a press release and blitz spam it to every news outlet? Are you going to tweet about what you had for breakfast before starting your day? Do you cross-promote with other game developers? Will you blog about fan-knit mittens when they send them to you? They sound like silly questions, but I think it's worth at least imagining how you'd handle such situations. What kind of voice will you have with your audience?
• Piracy and DRM - It's a dreaded topic, but you should at least give it a good amount of consideration. We're assuming here that as a self-publisher, you're charging for something. So what happens when someone gets the "something" without paying the charge? There are as many ways to approach piracy as there are developers, so there's a lot of freedom here. And truthfully, I think most methods (including no DRM) result in enough success to warrant people using them. So it becomes a matter of choosing the method that suits your style and product.
• How can your game be pirated? Can the file be copied and distributed? Can user accounts be shared on the web? Can other portals include it in an iframe? Whether you choose to have DRM or not, it's worth examining how the game could be obtained by those you didn't give it to.
• Do you care if it's pirated by players? Some people invest in DRM to deny players access until money is provided. Others view any player as platform growth and a potential source of PR, and are happy to have their game played by as many people as possible. I'm probably closer to the latter than the former. I'd rather 5% of 1000000 players paying for the game than 100% of 50.
• Do you care if it's pirated by businesses? What if a someone sells copies of your game without giving you a cut? Or what if they host your game on their site without your permission? This is what I do care about. It'd bug me if someone took my work without asking, and started selling it on his terms. Or worse, rebranded it as his own and sold it. By definition, that's money out of my pocket. And if a stranger approaches you and starts fishing around in your pocket, you do the sensible thing: you gut punch 'em. Putting one boot on his chest and shouting "Victory!" is optional.

Ok, I think this is where I'll wind-down my latest list-based post. I really seem to rely on bullet lists a lot. Must be my short stint as a producer still wearing off.

The above list is pretty substantial, but I'm sure I've forgotten something. That was kinda the inspiration for this post, after all. Things like the above just keep popping up, and I wouldn't go forward without first thinking seriously about each of the above.

I may never have it all covered, but at least I'll have enough covered that the stuff I missed is manageable.

I think.