SO i released my game Fehu. And it's not BAD. Its ok. Ive played worse with much more downloads. HOW?!

I read some articles did everything I can think of.

I posted on forums, posted to facebook pages that review apps, made a boosted facebook post(i can't afford an ad), made an adwords campaign(again small budget) and im sure some more stuff that i cant remember right now. Anywho I got like 14 downloads 7 of wihich are my friends. So HOW TF do people get users? Whats the mystery. This is the only thing i dont understand AT ALL!

I got a good store listing i think:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.RedFox.Fehu&hl=en

And i got a barren facebook dev page:

https://www.facebook.com/RedFox-919263971510895/

So ideas? Help?

And it's not BAD. Its ok.

That pretty much sums it up right there. Second best is first loser.

To be competitive in a worldwide market you need to be best-in-class, only-in-class, or somehow provide a better value to the player than the competition does.

Yes I get that. But I am ok with not being the best. Not with this game. Im looking for a minimal success. Like 1000 downloads. DO i have to be the best for that?

Moving this to Business. You're not asking a development question but a marketing question. Marketing is business.

I feelz for ya. It's frustrating when you've put a lot of hard work into a game only for it to be relatively unnoticed. I think the answer was your budget. You did everything within your budget, but as you said you could have done more with a greater budget. Enterprise gaming companies have the advantage of a high budget for maximum advertising exposure.

Edit: I think your best bet (if you haven't already done so) is to do some heavy google searching for all ways on how to get your game noticed. I don't think you ever have to completely give up on getting a game noticed.

14 downloads 7 of wihich are my friends. So HOW TF do people get users?

Advertise on places where you know mobile users like to gather.

Facebook and forums like gamedev.net is a bad place to look for mobile users. The people browsing the site on mobile is just quickly checking things and have no intent on downloading apps.

The people typing and responding on PC are charging their phones, or just don't want to stand up and look for them.

Places like Imgur that sees a large mobile user base for long periods of time will be better places for advertising.

HOWEVER, don't scheme or dance around the point, doing something foolish like asking them for advice when you only intend to advertise will only irritate people. As humans we understand that people are trying to sell us stuff(or get us to play there games), we hate being mislead or lied to.

It's also important not to force something or to sound desperate. "The more you want, the less you get."-some smart person or such.

It's like how in freemium games the more something is advertised and pushed into a players face the less they want it.

- There's no video on the app store page explaining how to play it which doesn't help converting people from the app store page into a download. Even after reading the page description, I have no idea what the game is about.

- The screen shots look blurry? Is that intentional?

- Can users share their high scores on social media like Twitter/Facebook from the app?

As the others mentioned, it's a small casual game and it's almost impossible to get noticed without some sort of marketing budget and plan on these types of games. If it had/has a unique selling point (e.g art, game style, innovative gameplay mechanic) then standing out becomes that much easier.

Anywho I got like 14 downloads 7 of wihich are my friends.
..
Im looking for a minimal success. Like 1000 downloads.

How much did you spend yo get those 7 users?

Off the top of my head, the cost to acquire a mobile user is about $1 (and $5 for a PC user), so you'll probably need to spend a few thousand dollars on advertising to reach the level of success that you want.

I won't disagree it's an absolute slog getting downloads .. some of it is pure marketing, which is quite different from developing, and I personally find a bit morally distasteful. <_< But there you go it's a large part of the battle, unless you happen to go viral.

That said, on first look at your game, my thoughts would be:

1) Where's the graphics?

2) What makes it different from umpteen million similar games?

Yeah, and as said, lack of video was a thing too.

Programmer art is great for development, but realistically it is not likely to get you downloads. On 2, if it is in fact similar to umpteen million games (let's face it for most games, a lot of mechanics are non-original), what about putting a slant on it, like making it trump and clinton or something topical.

Like 1000 downloads. DO i have to be the best for that?

When I started, to sell 1000 units at a $20 price point with a 2% download-to-sales conversion rate required about 50,000 downloads. I got 10,000+ downloads the first week just off of AOL (this was before the web).

1% conversion rate is considered average. so 1000 downloads would typically get you about 10 sales. and 1000 sales usually requires about 100,000 downloads.

but the numbers may differ for very low priced games. lower prices would tend to increase conversion rate, but additional competition will tend to lower it.

The secret of course, is marketing, marketing, marketing - and then some more marketing. Building a game is only half the work. Marketing and sale fulfillment it is the other half.

If you build a better mousetrap, the world will beat a path to your door, but only if you tell them about it! So first you have to build a better mouse trap - not just yet another mousetrap - a better mouse trap. And then you have to tell the world about it. But until you build a better mousetrap, you have nothing worth telling them.

You only get one chance to make a good first impression. Make sure you make the best impression you can by making the best game you can.

The mobile market is so flooded with "me too!" titles, that average just ain't gonna cut it. Not if you really want to succeed.