How to choose a website tool for a game you intend to sell
Most comparisons of website builders compare page editors. If the site has to take money, the editor is the part that matters least — the differences that will cost you are in who is legally selling, what happens after payment, and what the thing costs in a quiet month. Here is a way to work through it, including the cases where we are the wrong answer.
Six questions to put to any option
- Can it take money, or only point at something that can?
- Many builders describe themselves as ecommerce-capable and mean they can embed somebody else's buy button. That is a fair answer, but the checkout, the delivery and the customer record then belong to that other product, and you are evaluating two tools rather than one.
- Who is the legal seller?
- This is the question with money attached. If you are the seller of record, VAT on a download bought in Ireland and sales tax on one bought in Texas are your registrations and your filings. A Merchant of Record moves that liability off your business; a website builder does not.
- Does it deliver what you sell?
- A game sells keys, files, in-game entitlements or a subscription, and each needs different handling. Ask specifically about key storage and release, whether purchases can carry a player identifier, and whether there is a webhook your server can act on.
- What does it cost in a month with no sales?
- A subscription-priced builder charges the same whether you sold nothing or ten thousand copies. A per-transaction platform charges nothing in a dead month and more in a good one. Which is cheaper depends entirely on the shape of your year, and games have very uneven years.
- Who ends up owning the audience?
- Your own domain, the buyers' email addresses and your analytics outlive one game. Some options hand all three to you and some keep the buyer and give you a payout report, and the difference only becomes visible when you announce the next title.
- How much of it will you be maintaining?
- Every plugin updates on somebody else's schedule and eventually breaks against something. Count the parts, then decide who at the studio patches them in the week before a launch.
The four kinds of tool, and when each one is right
- 01
General website builders — Wix, Squarespace, Webflow
Strong editors, hosting included, and a monthly subscription regardless of activity. Selling digital goods is an added module rather than the core, and none of them becomes your seller of record, so tax stays with you. The right pick when the site is a marketing page and the game is sold somewhere else entirely.
- 02
WordPress with plugins
The most flexible option and the most maintenance. A theme, a page builder, a gallery plugin, a commerce plugin and a host, each updating independently. You are the seller of record unless you add something on top — which is a real path, since our WooCommerce integration syncs products, uses our checkout and syncs orders back. Right when you already run WordPress and have somebody who tends it.
- 03
Marketplace and community pages — Steam, itch.io, Game Jolt
These are distribution, not websites. They bring an audience you would otherwise have to buy, and in exchange they take a commission, keep the customer relationship and set the terms of the page. Right when discovery matters more to you right now than margin does, which for a first title it often does.
- 04
A storefront that is also the seller of record
The site, the shop, the delivery and the tax filings as one product, priced per transaction. Right when the site's job is to sell — keys, in-game items, editions — and nobody at the studio wants to own a tax registration or a plugin stack. Weaker than a dedicated design tool if what you actually want is an unusual site.
Where each option tends to disappoint
A good editor does not file a return
The most common mistake is choosing on the editor and discovering the obligations afterwards. Selling a download to a buyer in another country can create a tax duty from the first sale, and no amount of layout control addresses that. Decide who is the legal seller first, then choose an editor you can live with.
Plugins are a maintenance contract nobody signed
The WordPress route is genuinely the most capable, and the cost is spread out where it is hard to see: an afternoon here for an update that broke the checkout, an evening there for a security patch. That is fine with a person whose job it is, and expensive without one.
Marketplace reach is real, and it is rented
A storefront page can send you players you would never have found, and a commission on a sale that would not otherwise exist is worth paying. What you cannot do is build on it — the buyer is theirs, the traffic is theirs, and the terms can change without you having any say in it.
A storefront is not a design tool
Ours builds pages from sections, and that suits most game sites. If you want bespoke layout, custom animation or hand-written front-end code, a dedicated design tool with our overlay or embedded checkout dropped into it is the better combination, and you should take that route rather than fight the builder.
What sellers say once they have switched
★★★★★ 4.8/5 from 10 reviews on G2 →
Vadim Finayev “We work with quite a few merchants of record, but none comes close to the support and speed of implementation of Fungies. If you want a payment partner that actually gives you the feeling they want to work with you — rather than leaving you on read for three days or randomly restricting your account — you are in the right place.”
David Elliott “I researched the options and Fungies was the best fit for functionality and customisation within a store builder you can connect to your own domain. Taking a small percentage of sales, instead of charging a subscription for every environment and plugin, is refreshing.”
Elnura Abdimanap Kyzy “The platform is user-friendly, integrates easily with APIs and webhooks, and simplifies managing digital products and subscriptions. We were up and running quickly and support has been responsive throughout. Fungies is clearly tailored to the needs of SaaS businesses.”
Francisco Magnone Rienzi “Fungies has been a great partner — fast setup, competitive pricing, and real humans providing quick answers. They are constantly rolling out new features, and I am excited to see what is next.”
Questions people bring to this comparison
Selling to players without a marketplace in the middle.
Work out who the seller is, then choose the editor
If the answer is that you would rather it were not you, open the builder without an account and see whether the pages it makes suit your game.