I’ve seen cases where a few developers don’t want to make a demo, for various reasons (some of which were cited in the article). Those might be legitimate concerns,but ultimately those reasons are trumped by consumers’ demand for demos, with the overwhelming feeling that the availability of a demo benefits them. I’ve seen people on forums like NeoGAF that have stated that they won’t even consider buying a game without a demo (particularly lesser-known games from smaller developers), no matter how good the reviews are.

Crafting a “good” demo should be part of the development process now. Developers need to make a demo that offers just enough fun gameplay to entice gamers to purchase the full game. They don’t want to give away so much game that gamers are content replaying the demo over and over again, but the demo shouldn’t be so skimpy that gamers felt like they wasted their time. If a developer cannot figure out how to make a compelling demo that’s not “too much” and not “too little”, then that might indicate a problem with the quality and/or structure of the game itself.

One other way that developers can make a demo more enticing would be to enable him to carry over his progress to the full game. It makes people feel like their time invested in the demo was “worth it” if it can be applied to the full game. It would also be nice if cumulative progress on the demo could be applied to ranking on leaderboards and/or trophy lists–which would only unlock after the full game is purchased, of course.

Sponge Bob Square Pants: The Movie

Really !?