Many of the other big classic style roguelikes on Steam, like ADoM and ToME, also have free versions available. And those games also do excellently (though nowhere near as well as DF is doing).
Games are still such a refreshing change from the MBA driven coercion in much of other business, and especially tech. Make a good product, and people will buy it. And appealing to a micro-niche is still enough to make one a multi millionaire.
I've been thinking about this a great deal lately, but in other areas of content creation like YouTube.
I'm so tired of the YouTube thumbnail and clickbait headlines and predicable content on YouTube. Every once in a while I'll stumble on a niche that rejects this with very clear explanatory titles, super long play times, and informative or relaxing content. "walking through a city without narration" is one genre that features this, or the whole sleepy-time sounds genre. Unarrated full game playthroughs as well.
I'm dipping my toes into video content creation and I'm curious about taking a different approach than the one designed to play on the algorithm and get huge view numbers. I remember Tim Ferris writing that niche products is what people should target. Back in 2013 he was writing that indie entrepreneurs should never sell something for less than 100$ because you can't compete on economics of scale and thin margin. I wonder if that's what a lot of YouTube is doing, and whether a niche angle could be possible.
Basically, is it possible to make content that's very niche but wouldn't do well in the YouTube algo because it lacks clickbait headline and someone making the :O face in the thumbnail, and rather than try to monetize through huge view numbers and ads, instead using YouTube as a sort of side channel towards whatever other services or products you provide? I'm not interested in monetization but for me I make motorcycle videos, perhaps a shop I run or a tourist service I provide: what could possibly be more niche than "hire me if you're interested in a full service motorcycle tour in Taiwan" lol.
Coming back to games I have similar ideas about that, a lot of us are sick of AAA and refuse to touch phone games. I'm not interested in gambling or psychological head games. I used to be an avid battlefield fan and haven't touched the last two. I probably am done with Bethesda. Now I only play indie games. So is there a market for people like us that indie developers can target? I'd happily have paid a hundred dollars or even more for a game like dwarf fortress. Given the hours of enjoyment I get, compared to the cost of a vacation or something, by some algorithms DF to me could be worth thousands!
Games are still such a refreshing change from the MBA driven coercion in much of other business, and especially tech. Make a good product, and people will buy it. And appealing to a micro-niche is still enough to make one a multi millionaire.