In 2010 I didn't know about version control. I released an Android game and sold it. It did really well. I had released many updates, and hardware was changing fast.

I wanted to update the game with all new high res graphics for new devices, and support tablets too.

However, I started working on new functionality in the game, something that kind-of affected the core of every other thing that was happening in the game.

I never quite got that perfect, but I kept updating, making backups, etc. Still, no version control.

Then it turned out that the latest update I released about 4 weeks earlier had an issue with a wide range of devices that someone finally brought to my attention. This was a new Samsung device that everyone was getting.

Customers started writing in about the game not working on their new device.

I had a backup of the code before I released the last update (which had a ton of changes and new features), and then a backup AFTER the release but also AFTER I put in a lot of the broken core functionality.

Basically, I was in a situation of having an 8 week set back to redo all the changes I made before the last release from a backup. That would take about 4 weeks, then I'd have to release, and start again on the changes I've been spending 4 weeks on.

The game was doing well, but I definitely wasn't 2 months ahead in income, and this was a side project.

I ultimately couldn't do anything about it and had to just press on with the new changes that did go out, but in a less than stellar way about 4 weeks after that.

In the meantime, I had to make a ton of refunds for people with certain devices, and then block that device from the dev console and put notes in the description not to buy the game if you are using a device like X.

Doing this basically brought my sales to a halt.

I ended up putting out one more update with the small changes I had that weren't perfect, people didn't love the change, I did make it so people with the new devices could download and buy again, but my rank and sales hand tumbled miserably anyway. The game sold a few copies here and there for a few more months, and then within a year I stopped development completely and stopped selling the game.

So..... version control and proper backups are VERY important, especially if you have customers. This game was my ticket to being an independent game developer making a living selling games, and then it crashed because I couldn't work on an older version.