Counterpoint: Chronology (http://store.steampowered.com/app/269330/). The guys who made it has been in the games business for about a decade, the game is pretty, interesting and has some novel mechanics.

It was part of the steam summer sales, at 50% of.

I don't think they have sold a thousand copies yet and the game has been up for months. Counter that with Goat Simulator - which saw a huge sale boost during the sale.

Unless you can point to a few games that fit your bill for being good games before they are released and then become successful after your prediction I doubt you are right.

And anyway the way to make money now seems to be to make the game fun and addictive (farmville wasn't either) then constantly charge users once they have gotten invested (think Clash of Clans - oh you are shielded from attack initially and can raid an easy AI and build up stuff, then you are no longer shielded and need to build so much more without getting raided and then you can't really do that without IAP).