Jools Watsham talks Chicken Wiggle's disappointing sales, future Switch support

A portion of a NintendoEnthusiast interview with Jools Watsham...

Nintendo Enthusiast: Totes the Goat seems like it was a hit. I can’t speak on sales, but people definitely liked the game. Your most recent game, Chicken Wiggle, didn’t receive the same positive feedback. It’s gotten some good reviews, but as you mentioned on Twitter, the sales weren’t there. As an independent developer, what is it like seeing your game underperform? How do you try to salvage the game and adjust its marketing strategy?

Watsham: It is extremely difficult when one of our games does not sell well – especially one like Chicken Wiggle, which we spent 16 months to create and poured a tremendous amount of passion into. I think it’s like any grieving process, you take some time off to reflect on everything and then you get back to it. I always try to learn from my mistakes or when unfortunate things happen to me. I chose to dive into bringing something to Nintendo Switch as soon as possible, which was Mutant Mudds Collection. The accomplishments we achieved with Mutant Mudds Collection helped me get back into the groove and feel energized about the development process again. I was also working on Treasurenauts in parallel to Mudds, which is a really fun project that I am still working on. Chicken Wiggle’s failure was primarily due to the choice of platform. Interest in the Nintendo 3DS sharply declined when the Nintendo Switch entered the scene. I firmly believe that if we had launched Chicken Wiggle on Nintendo Switch it would have sold very well. We may bring it to the Switch in the future, but unfortunately the timing will not be as sweet as it would have been if it had launched on Switch in August, 2017. The Switch market is quickly becoming saturated with titles, which is great for the players but makes it more challenging for developers.

Nintendo Enthusiast: Moving from the past, let’s look to the future, and specifically, the Mutant Mudds Collection. How excited are you about making games for Nintendo’s latest system? Do you see a future for Atooi on the platform?

Watsham: I am thrilled we’re bringing Mutant Mudds Collection to Nintendo Switch – and the fact that we managed to launch it before the end of 2017 is fantastic. Whether or not it is a success remains to be seen, but I am extremely proud of the game. It is an incredible collection of games, and a product that we took pride in executing properly and not rushing out, despite our desire to release it as soon as possible. We have a few titles lined up for Nintendo Switch, but beyond those, Atooi’s future on Nintendo Switch will depend on sales. Even though I love the process of developing games, it has to be profitable for it to be sustainable. That has to be a key component of Atooi’s future survival. We’ll go where the audience is.