Plan for Jeff Tunnell

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Charlie Malbaurn   (Feb 06, 2005 at 07:30 GMT)

You,sir, are a blogging fool.

I have actually been doing a lot of research on low end advertising. One of the cooler, and surprisingly not so compicated, things being affiliate programs.

I'll put my findings up in a resource soon

Joshua Dallman   (Feb 06, 2005 at 08:38 GMT)

This is EXACTLY what Michael Robertson (CEO mp3.com, Lindows/Linspire, etc) was talking about at IGC. Someone stopped him on the street and gave him a business card with HIS domain name on it (mp3.com). Viral marketing, grassroots marketing, bottom-up marketing, call it what you will -- how do we accomplish it? That's the big question!

For starters, have some banners and image buttons of various sizes on your website, like Lore is doing:

http://www.darkhorizons-lore.com/download.php?view.45

Second, don't bury them four screens deep ;) Third, make sure people know you're "indy" and encourage them to support you by linking to your site if they like your game. People are often more motivated/encouraged by feeling like they did a good thing than by monetary gain. Fourth, I don't know. It's late and I'm going to bed now. But I saw "The Incredibles" tonight and it was great :)
Edited on Feb 06, 2005 08:50 GMT

Phil Carlisle   (Feb 06, 2005 at 11:24 GMT)

Way to go completely off topic Joshua.

Jeff: Yeah, thats nice to see. But there are far more things we need to do to promote our games. Its a huge battle and something Ive not seen done well very often.

Something to concern ourselves with for sure.

Prairie Games   (Feb 06, 2005 at 14:32 GMT)

@Joshua: Your enthusiasm is refreshing... keep it up.

Anthony Rosenbaum   (Feb 06, 2005 at 15:52 GMT)

Sweet, I love seeing ads for Lore

Stephen Zepp   (Feb 06, 2005 at 17:47 GMT)

@Phil: Heh, as far as I can tell, Jeff T.'s topic was various means and methods of indy's promoting their games. Joshua's post was all about ways for indy's to promote their games.

Unless you mean the reference to "The Incredibles"?

Jeremy Alessi   (Feb 06, 2005 at 19:01 GMT)

Very nice! If I were very confident in a game's selling ability then I'd have a large bag of tricks for stuff like this.

Joshua Dallman   (Feb 06, 2005 at 21:01 GMT)

As a result of this post, I'm going to have to add a section on my (in development) game's website for people to download or link to banners and buttons. And the Incredibles reference was just to note that I WAS doing "something better" on a Saturday night :)

Jeff Tunnell   (Feb 06, 2005 at 21:50 GMT)

Phil,

I don't think I was saying this was going to be the ultimate method of marketing. It was just a cool thing to be down in the depths of the blogsphere and see the Lore ad. Nothing more.

There will not be some "magic bullet" that automatically sells your game. I do see people that should be good at making games worrying a LOT more about marketing the game they have not even made than actually MAKING the game. I still submit that if you make a fun game, it WILL get sales. In addition, it will open up opportunities for your company. However, no game = no sales.

-Jeff Tunnell GG

Joshua Dallman   (Feb 06, 2005 at 22:08 GMT)

Another small comment from me is that there's also no one right way to market your game, because each game is going to have unique marketing needs.

One of the IGF finalists (Lux) draws heavily from the game Risk, and I was talking to the game's creator at IGC asking him how people find his game. He said the #1 way people find his game is by using the keyword "risk." I'm glad he told me that. My first game draws heavily from Scorched Earth, so I plan to be unabashed about that fact and try to get traffic by using that comparison.

However, my second game (actually my first, but on hold) has no such comparison, but it DOES have a very specific niche market, so that'll take a completely different marketing approach.

In both cases, I have the highest confidence that my games will find their audiences.

Matthew Langley   (Feb 06, 2005 at 23:32 GMT)

Your confidence and excitement is refreshing Joshua (liked your earlier post very much, thought it was right in with the topic of the plan - which was great too Jeff, I love seeing GG games at non GG sites... its a little rush of anticipation for when my team finally gets our first project done!)

Phil Carlisle   (Feb 07, 2005 at 14:59 GMT)

Jeff: I agree with you about MAKING :) (yeah, I AM PAYING ATTENTION) :))

But I think we cant ignore the fact that most indie games are making bugger all sales. Thats something that you cant live with for very long.

The fact is Jeff, GG sells games because of YOU :) and the dynamix link. I'm fully in agreement that making great games is the whole point of it.

But in order to turn a great game into a great bunch of sales takes a huge effort as well. For those of us without Jay and Ben that means we have to at least learn a bit of thier job as well :)

Stephen and Josh: I wasnt having a go at josh, It probably came over a bit like that, I just read the incredibles line and kinda read it strangely like josh was kind of rambling, much as I'm doing here :)

Phil.

Phil Carlisle   (Feb 07, 2005 at 14:59 GMT)

Oh, btw.. the lore ad was EXACTLY the kind of viral/underground marketing thing Ive been reading about. So I think its cool too.

Nick Zafiris   (Feb 07, 2005 at 15:19 GMT)

Picked up a copy of PC Master magazine (in Greece) last month and in the enclosed DVD there was a demo of Dark Horizons:Lore! I'm curious, does a game developer pursue a demo inclusion in a magazine or does the magazine add it themself? I would think the first one.

Nick

Edward Gardner   (Feb 07, 2005 at 16:29 GMT)

Heh, Jim was a player in our Beta. We like Jim :)

At least I think that's Jimbo :)
Edited on Feb 07, 2005 16:32 GMT

Edward Gardner   (Feb 07, 2005 at 17:58 GMT)

We've been on the cover disks of a couple euro mags, and had some mention in print in PC Zone and a couple others (I have some cover scans from our fans).

Some of this has been official, some hasn't. Expect some more print press as IGF approaches and as we release the next version of Lore :)

Jeff Tunnell   (Feb 07, 2005 at 18:12 GMT)

I think there are numerous examples of developers that charged forward, made great gmes, and had those games be very successful just because they were great games. The Chronic Logic products, Bridge Construction Set and Gish are both prime examples of games that spread virally and sold well just because they were nice, fun games. None of those guys had Tribes or Dynamix experience. Now CL is building up a reputation that will help them sell their next games. In addition, they are getting to port those games to other platforms and they are being approached by a lot of other companies with opportunities. This would not have happened if they didin't have games completed.

Phil Carlisle   (Feb 07, 2005 at 18:18 GMT)

Jeff, I'm sure there are plenty of contrary examples of great games that DIDNT make that leap.

I'm not suggesting in any way that making great games isnt the core of it. What I'm suggesting is that we could all do well to learn the principles of marketing and selling the games too. Because the marketing (positioning etc) feeds into the design decisions. Some people (like yourself) make those decisions intuitively. Others have to learn it by example (like me I guess).

But I dont think anyone would disagree that the key to it all is the core "make great games" :)

Paul Dana   (Feb 07, 2005 at 19:33 GMT)

@Phil I remember my first conversation with Jeff Tunnel. He took the time to call me on the phone and discuss my plans to "go indie".

So much advice he gave me essentially went wizzing over my head that it took me a few years to even fully understand the advice he gave me in that one phone call.

On the other hand...how else can you learn this stuff but by doing it?

That being said I do agree with your advice Phil and I feel I've been on that same journey with you.

Jeff Tunnell   (Feb 08, 2005 at 07:16 GMT)

Yep, there are a LOT of failures. I think that getting caught up in all the marketing is a big mistake. I have never, ever read a marketing book. Seems to me that a lot of the marketing books look backward, not forward. You know things about making games that the marketing guys could never know. I think you instinctively know what makes a good game, too. I just don't think you are trusting yourself enough.

Edward Gardner   (Feb 08, 2005 at 12:18 GMT)

Timely note unrelated to Phil's discussion:

That website, complete with Lore ad, was on Screensavers last night, and in talking with Jim, he mentioned some 27 thousand new hits on the site since that article went up :)

Fun stuff :)

Joe Maruschak   (Feb 08, 2005 at 16:53 GMT)

Wanted to add my comments to Jeffs. At Dynamix, near the end, a lot of the decisions (or indecision as the case may be) up at corportate seemed to be driven by marketing analysis. The one that stuck out in my head is when in a meeting the VP of marketing told us that their research indicated that players did not want to buy games where the lead character was an animal. (anyone ever hear of Sonic the Hedgehog?)..

marketing research can be valuable about giving you additional insight into your audience, but it is my feeling that this is useful only after you have your idea, and then can be useful in deciding when and where to spend the marketing time/money in trying to reach your audience. If you make a game to cater specifically to a marketing study, it will probably fall flat.. as it won't be a work of passion.. it is just a bland tradeoff of half formed impressions.. that nobody really gets or can get behind (in the development sense) and leads to design mud.

marketing is a tool.. and I see (and have seen) it used at the wrong time for the wrong reasons (my opinion)..

The best (or worst) example of marketing as of late is the move Catwoman.. proof positive that no matter how hard you try, you can't shove crap down people's throats.

Make the game first, and then, if it shows promise to sell well, start looking in to ways to intelligently get the word out to as many people as possible. For ThinkTanks, we did not do a ton of marketing, and we are doing ok, using pretty much positive word of mouth... and we are looking for smart, low cost ways to get 'out there' more.

Phil Carlisle   (Feb 08, 2005 at 19:04 GMT)

Guys, Ive got permission to reprint a post by a guy who did some of these things "right" in terms of promotion, but unfortunately I have to rewrite it somewhat to protect the innocent.

I'll post the full version in our associates forum, but I'll try and re-write the version later tonight or tommorow, because it kind of leads to what I was trying to get across.

Jay   (Feb 16, 2005 at 21:43 GMT)

Jeff,

Please let me know if you got my email okay ;^)

Best,

Jay

jaytando@hotmail

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