MinoMonsters (YC W11) Hits 1.5M Players, Gets A Little More Funding | Hacker News Reader

MinoMonsters (YC W11) Hits 1.5M Players, Gets A Little More Funding

techcrunch.com

50 pointsearbitscom18 comments

Something doesn't make sense here. If they're profitable and making millions, why are they raising more bridge funding at the last round's valuation and taking on more dilution?

Because they're not profitable and not making millions.

1) 19 reviews in the App Store. 2) It's free

Money doesn't grow on trees unfortunately.

1) We have 9,516 Ratings in the US, 19 for a small bug fix we submitted yesterday. (http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/minomonsters/id477750637?mt=8)

2) We're a free-to-play iOS game, our revenue is through in-app purchases.

Hey, Josh (MinoMonsters CEO) here. Whilst I can't talk on the terms of this financing, we actually raised this round prior to our more successful launch. The money's now being used to accelerate our growth.

Because it looks like they have ~10 people and according to the top grossing charts on iOS they make a few hundred dollars a day. Gotta keep it going until better metrics and results, I presume.

I know it has nothing to do with the funding, but I found the new version of the game somewhat buggy (although the graphics are AMAZING). In 10 minutes, I stumbled upon two issues: first, trying to visit a friend always crashes the game. Second (and more disturbing): visiting the "team" tab and clicking the "i" icon levels up the monster automatically - I clicked it a dozen times, tried restarting the app and it still worked. As a result, I have a level 41 monster without even having fought anything...

I encourage anyone who's doubtful about MinoMonsters to download it and give the iPhone to their kid, niece/nephew, little sibling, etc.

It's one of the few truly great (and great-looking) iOS games.

Hey author, Pokemon had unique and interesting personalities too! Remember Cubones who wore the skulls of their dead mothers?

Tell me that wasn't interesting and unique. I don't see it in the wild, let me tell you that.

Is it just me, or has YC has become shit off-late? No offense, I think the game is great, but worth funding for? I doubt, I mean not from YC ofcourse. What happened to true innovation at YC? This is just plain embarrassing for YC, ofcourse. But really, great game guys, keep it going though..

Wait - you're saying it's embarrassing YC funded this project, but it's a great game? Adding "no offense" isn't some magic spell. Why wouldn't YC fund this? Do you even know the reputation of the developers?

It's you. You don't grasp that the combination of

(a) the fact that good startup ideas have to look like bad ideas initially and

(b) that the optimal way to grow a startup is to launch something as small as possible as fast as possible

together mean that most startups look bad initially.

I wouldn't say just you though, because there are a lot of people who don't grasp this.

> I wouldn't say just you though, because there are a lot of people who don't grasp this.

I think it comes down to a difference between those who see the now and those who see 3-10 years out. If they came to you and said "we've got this awesome game, and we plan to stop there", you wouldn't fund them; that's what most people see. I have no idea what trick they have up their sleeve or if they'll sink or swim, but if it's a YC company, you can assume they have a grand plan (even if it's wrong in the end) to be a Big Thing (TM). That most people don't see it is probably a good thing.

> (a) the fact that good startup ideas have to look like bad ideas initially and

I dont know if it's just me, but I have a question about that: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4563402

How do you suspect all the great game studios/media empires got started? Disney was just a few cartoons once...

That's a huge stretch. There are many profitable small game studios that will never be great nor media empires.

Great strawman. He didn't say that every small media company will grow into a large empire. He said that every large empire started as a small media company.

The point is that's a content-free statement, used in that direction. Every genius started as a single cell. So what? Doesn't really tell us anything about anything.

Yes it does. It tells us not to look for signs of greatness in how things start.

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