Microsoft exec Marc Whitten says that Microsoft dropped the ball on its Xbox One product messaging, and that the company needs to be more proactive in selling its new console's features to consumers. ...
Film cameras are sadly a dying breed, but 3D printers are just starting their march to the mainstream consumer market. Thankfully for 35mm film devotees everywhere, the latter could ensure that analog cameras never disappear entirely. Specifically, thanks can be directed at Léo Marius, whose OpenReflex camera can be 3D printed with just over $30 worth of parts (minus the film). Marius says that all of the involved components can be printed in under 15 hours, and final assembly can be completed in about an hour. To make modifications and further iterations on his design easier, he's also made sure that all camera parts remain separate in his 3D design plans. Even better, he's promising compatibility with any glass you've got on hand...
Current Windows head Julie Larson-Green is poised to take on Microsoft's hardware division, a role previously being pushed toward former Xbox boss Don Mattrick prior to his decision to leave the company, Bloomberg reports.
The role will focus on both Xbox consoles and Surface tablets; however restructuring of the company's senior management has yet to be officially finalized. According to Bloomberg sources close to the matter, former Skype president Tony Bates may also be on the way to take charge of acquisitions and relationships with Microsoft software developers.
As for now there is no direct replacement for Mattrick since the announcement of his exit from Microsoft in order to fill a role as CEO of social games developer Zynga.
One regular complaint about Nintendo is its historic and ongoing commitment to region locking, making sure that consumers who buy hardware in one part of the world, can only play games officially released in that same region.
According to Nintendo president Satoru Iwata, the company has good reason to stick to its policy, which goes all the way back to the NES, released in the mid-1980s.
"I hope that game fans can understand that the industry isn't doing this solely out of business ego," Iwata said, in an interview with IGN. "There are some reasons behind it."
Companies like Nintendo region lock their consoles in order to protect international subsidiaries and core retail relationships, by cutting down on the import business. The...
Many game companies cut their staff numbers to save costs, or reassure investors, but Nintendo chief Satoru Iwata says that's a strategy he won't be using.
Participating in an investor Q&A, Iwata was asked why, given Nintendo's lackluster financial performance recently, he had not cut staff numbers. He replied that such moves might resolve short-term difficulties, but always proved counter-productive in the long-term.
"If we reduce the number of employees for better short-term financial results, employee morale will decrease," he said. "I sincerely doubt employees who fear that they may be laid off will be able to develop software titles that could impress people around the world."
Iwata pointed towards the value of the yen against...
I’ve been thinking about this for a while and I don’t think we’re going to have a difficulty in our next game that’s called “Normal.” Instead, I think we’ll do something like this:
Easy-going Difficulty – For the player who wants to focus on story & coast through the gameplay aspects as well as people who are brand new to RPGs. Would probably be somewhere between Easy & Normal in our previous games.
Challenging Difficulty – A modest challenge. Enough to keep the player’s attention and maybe have to rethink their strategies occasionally but they should still be able to finish the core story-path of the game without too much trouble if they keep at it (although optional content will probably prove more difficult). Somewhere between Normal & Hard in our previous games.
Maddening Difficulty – A strong challenge. For the players who really likes to min-max their strategies, dig deep into the game mechanics, and doesn’t mind learning from failure. Akin to Insane in our most recent games.
“But how is this be any different than just having three difficulties and calling them Easy, Normal, and Hard?” Glad you asked.
By including a difficulty called “Normal,” we allow players to abdicate responsibility for their own enjoyment. When presented with difficulty options, they don’t have to make a choice – they can just go with the default with the idea that “That’s how the developer meant the game to be played.” Except, that that’s not how we meant the game to be played – if we thought that there was one proper way to play through our games, we wouldn’t go to the bother of making & testing various difficulties. There is no one “right” way to play through our games; everyone’s experiences & expectations are different. For example, I personally find most of our games most enjoyable on the highest difficulty setting but if we made that the default, I think many people would be upset. And it’s especially frustrating to read people complain about one of our games when the nature of their complaints reveals that they would have had a much better experience if they had just bothered to raise or lowered the difficulty.
In short, I hope that by removing the label of “Normal” from the difficulty selection menu, we can force the player to really think about what kind of experience they want out of our games. And when they realize what they want, they’re more likely to get that.
EDIT: We might even go one step further and also offer a Custom difficulty option that would allow players to really fine-tune their experience if they wanted to. For example, such a system might allow you to adjust…
Enemy difficulty
Frequency of enemy encounters
Rate of gaining XP
Rate of gaining money
…and more. I’ve seen similar systems used in games like Silent Hill 2 (where you could adjust enemy & puzzle difficulty independently) and Persona 4 Golden (after beating the game, you can adjust various aspects of the difficulty) and it seemed to work out well.
I posted the following in response to a post by Mary Jo Foley, but figured I’d also put it here (especially since I got “Your comment contains words or phrases associated with spam and will not appear on the site until it has been checked by a moderator.” (is XNA now spam?) when I submitted it and don’t know when it’ll appear):
"But when chided for not announcing details of plans for supporting indie gamers on Xbox One this week, Guggenheimer deflected that criticsm."
We’re not looking for details, just a concrete answer. The E3 presentations showed Sony giving a lot of love to indies, while MS gave virtually none. With MS abandoning XNA this was tough to swallow. Then yesterday there was – http://youtu.be/qdpAM4GV6oU
A lot of us took this to mean that there would be some announcement that gave indies some love. When the @unity3d Twitter account tweeted "Anybody following #bldwin? Something interesting coming up soon.. #unity3d" a lot of thought there might finally be a resolution to the indie issue on Xbox. Unity3D is primarily an indie (both small and large) tool for game development. Imagine our surprise then when we see this (from here – http://news.xbox.com/2013/06/xbox-one-unity-announcement):
"Developers who build games published by Microsoft Studios now have access to Unity tools for Xbox 360 and Xbox One free of charge and can create interactive 3D and 2D experiences."
It’s not as if regular indies have a shot at getting Microsoft Studios to act as their publisher. But when we think we’ve been completely abandonded at the end of that page is:
"As we look ahead, we look forward to sharing more information on our plans to help empower everyone from the independent game developer looking to make publishing to the console easy to the app developer who wants to bring new experiences to the television."
The problem with this is that between the whole "no self-publishing on Xbox One" and the previous quote limiting the Unity tools to devs that have an association with Microsoft Studios, we’re still left wondering what MS is doing? Does "independent" mean "John Smith in his basement creating games in his free and is currently using XBLIG to publish on Xbox 360" or does it mean studios like Double Fine that can do a Kickstarter and raise millions of dollars on their name and background alone? If the former, why can MS just come out and say it and give us a break? I personally am fine with waiting if I know at the end I’ll be able to continue doing Xbox development without having to take a 2nd mortgage on my house to fund it. Just give us a concrete answer; don’t keep stringing us along.
The quick mention of a contest during the Keynote led some of us to believe that MS and Unity might be planning a new version of the DreamBuildPlay contest, just using Unity3D instead of XNA. That would have been awesome. Alas, it’s Windows and WP8, no Xbox – http://unity3d.com/contest/windows
I get the feeling MS is just flailing about, trying to do good, but only half-way succeeding. They had an awesome thing going with XBLIG. While there is a lot of junk that made it’s way on the service, there are also a lot of great games, some of which have generated huge amounts of money for both MS and the devs, letting some devs move into full-time game development for a living. This is probably the dream of a lot of indies and we were hoping MS would continue to give us a chance to realize that dream. Right now, though it’s like we’re dogs sitting under the table, hoping for some crumbs to drop and MS is teasing us by holding a big chunk of prime rib out and then yanking it back.
I’ve been supporting MS and helping the community ever since the XNA beta and would love to do so for years to come, but it’s hard to plan which way to go without definitive answers. That’s all we’re looking for.
You’ve poured hours of your life into your game, and it’s become everything you thought it could be. Well, I’m here to let you know that’s not true – there’s always more polish you can add to an experience. Let’s look at five ways to do that now…
Make More Noise
Audio contributes a lot to the video game experience, more so than you would think. Obviously if your game is complete you already have sound, but I urge you to take a step back and see where you could add more.
In real life, everything makes noise, and in most games this shouldn’t be any different. Don’t forget to include the simple sounds you wouldn’t be inclined to think about. Have a character that walks? Footsteps. The game takes place in a forest? Add some ambient noise. A minigun spits out bullet casings? Those should make sound when they hit the ground.
Ideally, every interaction between entities in your game should make a specific noise. Obviously this can’t actually be done in practice without making an unreasonable amount of sounds, but the closer you can get the better your game will feel.
It’s worth noting that there is one major worry that often holds back developers from following this type of all-in noise approach. Namely, developers often think they will over-saturate their game with noise, making the more important sounds and the music difficult to distinguish and appreciate.
This is a common thought that makes perfect logical sense, but is absolutely wrong. The human brain is surprisingly very good at highlighting sounds you are actively listening to. As an experiment, start the below gameplay video of Super Mario Galaxy 2 (a game widely known for its quality music), close your eyes, and just listen.
Your eyes should be closed right now.
You can hear that, without the context of the visuals, the game definitely doesn’t come off as particularly pleasant to listen to. In particular, it’s very difficult to appreciate the music, due to the cacophony created by the sound effects. However, as soon as you open your eyes and are capable of matching the various sound effects to their onscreen actions, you find that they don’t seem to be getting in the way of your appreciation of the music anymore, and audio tells for enemy actions are easily distinguished and heard.
Audio in games is far too often overlooked. It’s a real shame, because video games are at their core audio-visual experiences, and without a doubt the audio is integral to that. So before you tie the knot and release your project, make sure it’s making a lot of noise.
Animate Animations to Transition From Animation to Animation
I just mentioned that video games were an audio-visual experience, and we just covered audio, so obviously what follows next is visuals. Texture work is all nice and good, but the most important visual aspect in the vast majority of video games is the animation.
When creating animations for a game, most people tend to think of things in terms of singular unique animations for specific actions. These actions could be anything: a reload animation, a jumping animation, or a series of animations for a sword swinging combo.
But people often forget that these actions don’t take place in a vacuum. A typical breakdown of a basic animation sequence for a platformer game character might start with the character perform their running animation, then as they approach an obstacle they would jump into the air while performing their jumping animation, and then, once their feet again touch the ground, they would continue on with their running animation.
This is serviceable, but far from what you would actually see in a high quality gaming product. What’s missing is transitional animations: smaller, often simpler, animations used to smooth the transition between two other animations. In the breakdown above, for example, one would typically see some kind of short landing animation in between the character hitting the ground from their jump and continuing to run.
Notice that little animation every time Rayman lands from a jump.
Just to be clear, this isn’t restricted to two-dimensional animation or to platformers. Even in first person shooters, transitional animations can be seen. Have you ever noticed how when you play online in Call of Duty, everybody else looks kind of dumb? They always seem to be snapping in and out of prone mode, or turning uncomfortably while in full sprint – and every jump looks like it’s taking place on the moon.
Part of this weirdness can come from netcode lag, but the core of why this is happening is because players don’t have transitional animations. When you try and knife someone in Call of Duty it doesn’t matter whether you’re currently looking down the scope of a sniper or reloading your gun; you abandon the last animation you were performing and knife instantly, hence no transitional animation.
Now I want to note this isn’t a failure on the developers’ part; non-player characters are beautifully animated in Call of Duty. This was clearly a decision made in favor of responsiveness at the expense of visual fidelity. Third-person games facing this situation will often incorporate cancellable transitional animations, choosing a middle ground between responsiveness and animation cohesion.
This brings up something that affects this list in its entirety: there are no absolutes in game development. What worked for one game won’t necessarily work for yours. However, understanding how and why certain techniques worked for certain games goes a long way towards developing your own solutions, even if they aren’t directly applicable to your product.
Call the Exterminator
Your game can’t have bugs. Seriously, none. Clipping, freezing, texture pop-in, massive frame drops and scripting errors among other things simply cannot be a part of your game if you are aiming to create a polished experience.
Bugs can have a multitude of negative effects on the way people view your game. They can detract from player immersion, force players to repeat sections of gameplay, seriously hurt overall visual presentation and just be generally unpleasant. Nobody likes purchasing and using something that feels imperfect, and bugs are gaming’s number one sign of imperfection.
Here we can see what a game with an extreme level of polish looks like.
Of course I’m being an idealist and a hypocrite here; few games in the history of gaming have been released without any bugs whatsoever. Back during the infancy of games, crazy bugs were the norm rather than the exception, and even today games with huge budgets and massive QA teams, like Fallout 3 and Assassin’s Creed 3, can be released riddled with creepy crawlies.
This can happen for a multitude of reasons, but these types of situations arise in large companies mostly due to budgeting and time constraint issues. As a hobbyist, pinpointing and squashing tricky bugs can be incredibly difficult, but it’s better to strive for perfection and come up short than to settle for mediocrity.
Realize Players Don’t Care About You or Your Game
After spending a huge amount of time toiling away on your game, it can sometimes be difficult to grasp the idea that gamers don’t particularly care about it or how much work went into it. This isn’t to say players are necessarily ungrateful, or oblivious to the work it takes to make a quality video game, they just don’t really care all that much.
This is important, because it means players aren’t necessarily going to do things the way most developers think they will. They aren’t going to go out of their way to play your game right. You might be really proud of the witty puns you have on the posters covering the wall in the bedroom scene of your adventure game, but chances are people won’t notice, or won’t take the time to read them. Yeah, that is a really cool skybox, but nobody’s going to look at it.
Now, people not noticing things in your game isn’t something you can change, and it definitely isn’t a negative to count against your game, but it does need to be considered in the way you present information to the player. Unless you are specifically going for a feeling of mystery and player discovery, à la Dark Souls, you need to make sure the player will actually absorb the information you need them to.
You must realize that tutorials and major plot points can and will be ignored by certain players unless you force them to pay attention. If you spend hours building up to a major plot twist you may want to make sure it’s not delivered through an audio log.
The counter argument to this is clear, however; players who would not be inclined to pay attention to some long exposition probably won’t be very happy when they are forced to sit through it. (With that said, when it comes to simpler and quicker things like explaining mechanics or introducing a key character or even just looking at a really cool explosion, this type of player resentment isn’t really that big a deal.)
More than any of these tips, this particular suggestion must be taken with extreme discretion. Directly forcing players to absorb information can have tremendous positive or negative effects on the pacing of your game depending on the type of experience you are creating. Importantly, though, a game developer who is aware of what information the player may or may not pay attention to will end up with a less confusing game and a happier player.
Make the Player’s Fingers Happy
Games are controlled by all types of inputs nowadays: traditional controllers, keyboard and mouse, motion controls, touch screens and even more are commonly used. Touch screens and motion controls in particular have brought to light the importance of a solid control scheme, with almost everyone these days having played a game absolutely destroyed by poor controls.
I encourage you to take a look at your game’s control scheme and make sure everything makes sense. You’ve been no doubt playing your game for quite a while so the controls will feel natural to you, but take a moment to step back and think about the players.
Gamers play many games, and it feels when the controls line up between them. There’s a reason most shooters use the square (or X on Xbox) button for reloading, and that’s because it’s the reload button in almost every shooter ever. It’s a chicken and egg scenario; I don’t know which game used that button first, but it’s what people are used to and feel comfortable with. There isn’t really any reason why you can’t use the right trigger for reloading and use the square button to throw grenades, but it will annoy your players every time they kill themselves with a grenade when they run out of ammo, so you might as well stick with the norm.
Another thing that needs to be looked at is ergonomics – always try to make your controls as comfortable on the hands as possible. Darksiders 2 is a notable game that really fumbled in this regard. The only control scheme available requires holding the L2 button for locking on and the L1 button for activating special abilities (left trigger and bumper respectively on Xbox). This practically requires using the middle finger to hold down L2 while keeping the index finger on L1.
However, for many people this grip is not at all comfortable. Since most games only use one shoulder button per side at a time, many players are accustomed to using their index finger for both the L2 and L1 buttons, something that can’t be done when they are required to be pressed at the same time. This brings up the most important point of all about controls. Notice how I mentioned the only control scheme was configured a certain way? Yeah, don’t do that.
This. This is good.
It’s easy to include multiple default control schemes as well as fully remappable controls and there is little reason not to include this feature. This is especially true for PC games where the different ways players are accustomed to placing their hands on the keyboard can vary drastically. It’s so easy to include this feature, and so many people will be upset if you don’t.
Hopefully with these five tips you’ll be able to take your finished game to the next level, creating an experience oozing with polish that players will look at with admiration.
We feel like we’re at a turning point here at Zeboyd Games. We’ve released some fun RPGs over the past few years (and in fact, we just released a new RPG earlier this month which you should definitely play if you haven’t already) but now it’s time to take things up a notch. Now it’s time to get serious.
First up, we’re completely overhauling our RPG engine. XNA is a great set of tools that has served us well, but now that it’s no longer being actively supported by Microsoft and the Xbox 360 is on its way out, it’s time to move on. We looked into Monogame and though it has many strong points, in the end, we’ve decided to go with Unity for our next RPG. Unity is a very popular multi-platform development tool that is being used by more and more developers each year. In recent months, we’ve seen announcements for Unity support by both Sony (PS4 & Vita) & Nintendo (WiiU, though sadly no 3DS support yet) in addition to the platforms Unity already supports (PC, Mac, Linux, iOS, and Android). No promises yet on which platforms we’ll be supporting with our next game, but in addition to PC, we’d especially like to add Mac, PS4, and Vita to our list of systems that can play our games.
Creating a new RPG engine on Unity is a lot of work (which we started earlier this week) but won’t be nearly as hard as starting from scratch since we do have our old RPG engine to use as a reference point. However, we’re not going to stop with just replicating our old engine’s functionality in Unity. Some of the improvements we’re hoping to add include:
Larger, more animated sprites (think Chrono Trigger).
More interactive environments.
Improved User Interface.
A particle system for enhanced visual effects.
On-map battles (no separate battle screen) & enemy groups that detect & chase the player.
We also have some fun ideas for gameplay (picking and choosing some of the best elements from our past games while adding some new ideas as well) but we’ll save the details on those for later.
We will be doing a kickstarter later this year for our next game. We will, of course, be using our own funds from royalties of our past games to finance the game as much as possible, but a successful kickstarter will give us some extra freedom to make the game that much better (can afford more development time, an awesome huge soundtrack from Hyperduck, etc.) and generally relieve some of the “Are we going to be able to finish this before we run out of money?” stress. Details on the game & the kickstarter will come out over the following months but for now, I can tell you that the game is all-new (not connected to any of our past games or anyone else’s existing IP), the game’s acronym is CSH, it’s a distant future sci-fi spy RPG starring a female protagonist, and it’s not a parody. There will still be plenty of humor in the game but we’re going to focus on making the plot & characters deeper & more interesting than our past games. Basically, we’re shooting for a Lunar or Chronicles of Prydain vibe with the story.
These are exciting times here at Zeboyd Games. It still boggles my mind that in about 3 and a half years, we’ve gone from being casual hobbyists to a full-time 2-man indie studio that has released four full-fledged RPGs. Thank you to everyone who has supported us in the past; the best is yet to come!
There’s no worse feeling than creating a game you’re proud of, only to watch it drift off into obscurity. Unfortunately, it’s no longer enough to only create great content. In order to differentiate yourself from the masses, you must concoct a structured, coordinated marketing plan.
No one piece can fully cover such a broad topic, but in this checklist we will provide you with a bunch of useful tips designed to give your game the exposure it rightfully deserves.
To make your task even easier, we’ve created a number of versions of this checklist, including an HTML version, Markdown, PDF and Evernote. Download them all from the Tuts+ GitHub account.
Before even thinking about releasing a game, every modern indie game development team should have the following:
A Website – Ideally, you should have one site for your company and another for each game you create. This way, gamers will be able to identify you by both your brand name and products.
A Development Blog – Whether you incorporate it into your main site or not, having a blog is essential. It allows gamers to track the progress of your game, and lets them see that you are, in fact, real human beings.
Facebook Account – Use your team’s Facebook page to display media, share development stories and to connect with like-minded developers. When someone searches Google for your team, your Facebook page will be one of the top results, so keep it updated.
Twitter Account – Use Twitter as a secondary means of announcing news. You’ll find that most gamers would rather glance at their Twitter feed than scour a bunch of websites. Just don’t use Twitter to beg game journalists to review your game – that usually won’t go over well.
RSS Feed – Never a bad idea, and really simple to implement, an RSS feed will provide your fans with yet another way to view news regarding your company.
A Trailer – The single best way to entice gamers to buy your game is through filming a captivating trailer. It doesn’t have to be overly flashy or dramatic, but it should leave viewers with a lasting impression of your game. Try to record a new trailer every time you reach a new milestone.
A Playable Demo – You’ll need to have one of these to send to journalists, show off at conventions, and to let potential players download from your site.
The Press Kit
Game journalists would rather click on one attachment than rummage through a series of links. They’ll also take teams much more seriously if they took the time to put together a package. For these reasons, consider putting together a press kit. Here’s what you’ll need:
Relevant Screenshots – Screenshots should showcase the very best your game has to offer. Avoid sending stills of your User Interface, Menus, and Game Over screens. Instead, try to capture your game’s most magnificent moments, like when you are fighting a colossal boss, or solving a complex puzzle.
Video – Most press kits include embedded YouTube videos, although some contain links to high-resolution downloads. As with screenshots, your videos should display critical gameplay sequences. Try to showcase the features that make your game special.
Press Coverage – This one is a bit of a Catch-22. The purpose of a press kit is to gain coverage, so how do you fill out this section if you don’t have any? The simple answer is that you don’t. Consider this section a work in progress. Every time someone writes a favorable blurb about your game, update your kit.
Game Info sheet – This is a one page – and only one page – summary of your team. Keep it concise, factual and casual. Talk a bit about the history of your team, what other games you’ve developed and your current project. Break it down into short sub-sections like “Description” and “History”.
Fact Sheet – Provide links to your website, dev blog, Twitter and Facebook accounts, as well as your email address. List your prior releases (if any) with links to each game’s homepage. This information should be presented as a sidebar, or near the beginning of your kit.
Logos and Awards – If you have a professional logo, there’s no reason not to show it off. Just don’t waste too much real estate showing off your awesome logo; most journalists won’t care how good it is. If your game was recognized for any awards, display them as a simple list near the end of your kit. No need to boast.
Use presskit() - presskit() is an excellent, free resource for indie game developers who want to assemble a press kit, but don’t know where to start. The program was created by indie developers for indie developers.
Contacting the Press Via Email
Now that you have your shiny new press kit, you have to give game journalists a reason to open it. The best way to do so is by writing them a short email. It sounds simple enough, but all too often game developers write emails that either end up in the trash or never read. Here’s how you can prevent that from happening:
The Subject Line – Don’t use just the name of your game as the subject line of an email. Unless your title is instantly recognizable, it will tell the journalist nothing. Instead, ask yourself what sets your game apart from others in the genre, and use the answer as your subject line.
Bad Titles – “Hiro Fodder: A Blue Hope,” “Hiro Fodder – A Game You Must Play,” “16-bit RPG about to drop.”
Better Titles – “Divergent Games releases first gameplay trailer for Hiro Fodder: A Blue Hope – a 16-bit, retro infused JRPG parody for the PC,” “Divergent Games’ latest RPG Hiro Fodder blends nostalgia with innovation; parody with hard-hitting drama. Demo enclosed.”
The Structure - Keep your email short and to the point. If you can’t prove that your game is newsworthy within a few sentences, the journalist will likely look for one that is. Focus on fun features of the game, interesting gameplay mechanics, and the ultimate objective, dedicating no more than a couple of sentences to each.
Use Bullet Points - The best way to relay the facts about your game is through short bullet points. They allow journalists to retrieve vital information about your game. Release dates, price points, platforms and distribution channels should all be highlighted as bullet points.
The Tone - Keep your emails super casual. You’re not applying for a job, so your email shouldn’t read like a cover letter. Starting your email with the line “Hi [first name]” is a perfectly suitable way of addressing a journalist.
The Conclusion - Don’t assume that the journalist knows you’ve attached a press kit, demo or other media to the email. Use both the subject line and the last sentence to remind them that if they’d like to learn more about their game, they can view the attachments. Conclude with a salutation such as “Sincerely,” “Best,” or even “Cheers.”
Who Should You Contact?
You want to spread the word about your game, but don’t know how. Listed below are small to mid-sized websites that have proven particularly friendly to indie developers. Please note that this is not a comprehensive list, and that you should never ask a site that only deals with PC games to review a mobile release, or vice-versa.
Rock, Paper, Shotgun – These guys run one of the biggest and more reputable gaming sites on the planet. But, unlike other big name sites, they’ll actually take the time to preview indie games. They’re especially friendly towards games that are featured on Kickstarter. Do note that they’re a PC-only site.
Kotaku – Another behemoth, Kotaku is great because they’re willing to take on delicate and controversial subject matter. For example, our tongue-in-cheek game Red Ring of Death was featured on their site, without us even asking. If you’re creating an JRPG, be sure to contact the author of the weekly column, Random Encounters.
Indie Games – The Weblog – Not as big as Rock, Paper, Shotgun or Kotaku, but even more indie friendly, Indie Games will cover just about anything. From the most obscure XBLIG game to a casual mobile one, anyone interested in having a feature piece written on their title should contact these guys right away.
Gaming Blend – A sub-site of Cinema Blend, Gaming Blend covered our game Hiro Fodder: A Blue Hope, without us even asking. The site is still finding its bearings, but has shown signs of steady growth. Definitely worth a shot.
TIGSource - I was shocked to see a myriad of very low budget indie games featured on this site. They also seem to cater towards games entered in the Independent Games Festival. If your game is quirky, unusual, or just downright strange, shoot them an email.
The Indie Game Magazine – Not to be mistaken with Indie Games, IGM requires that you submit a playable version of your game (demos are okay) to the site before being considered for a preview or review. They’re a bit particular over which games to review, but considering their popularity, that’s understandable.
Trendy Gamers – This mid-sized site must have 100 journalists working for them, because they’ll review just about any decent game. From Triple-A console titles to casual iPhone titles, they do it all. That’s good news for you. Just be warned that they aren’t afraid to give a game a 2.0 out of 10 if it sucks.
Indie N - Another prospering indie site that primarily focuses on PC releases, Indie N loves to feature games that are currently on Steam’s Greenlight.
The Indie Mine – A smallish site that is particularly friendly towards indies of all walks. Reviews and features PC, mobile and XBLIG games.
Indie Gamer Chick - She seems to shy away from PC games, but she’s such a thoughtful, insightful writer that landing a feature on her site would be well worth your efforts. Just don’t submit a crappy game, or you’ll be at her mercy.
Alternative Marketing Strategies
Contacting game journalists and setting up multiple ways to relay important news about your game is the bare minimum you can do to market your game. If you want to really go all out, consider these alternative strategies:
Crowdsourcing - Sites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo are not only great places to procure funding for your title; they’re also fantastic means of raising awareness. Placing a campaign on these heavily visited sites is a virtual guarantee that thousands of gamers will, at the very least, know you exist.
Alphafunding - Distribution portals like Desura now offer Alphafunding. This allows you to get your game out into the public eye before its released, and maybe make a few bucks in the process.
Steam Greenlight - If your game is not of the casual variety, I would recommend placing it on Steam Greenlight. It only costs 100 bucks, and even if you aren’t selected, you’ll get plenty of exposure. Recommended for feature-rich, nearly complete PC games only (mobile ports will get eaten alive).
Indie Databases - Indie databases like TIGdb tend to be flooded with titles, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t at least consider placing your game on one. Remember, anything that nudges public awareness up even a little bit is still worth doing.
Reddit - Reddit has a subreddit called Indie Games. Perfect. Use it to link to your YouTube trailer, website, or press release. The only downside is that the channel tends to be flooded, so make sure your description stands out from the crowd.
Gaming Conventions - If your budget and time permits, secure a booth at an event like PAX. You’ll meet dozens of other developers, and potentially thousands of gamers, all looking for the next big thing. Entice people to visit your booth by doing free giveaways, and make sure to have a playable demo ready to roll.
Contests and Game Jams - Submit your nearly finished game or demo to a variety of contests that recognize outstanding indie games. The IGF and Dream, Build, Play come to mind as some of the biggest, but there are plenty of online, just for fun, competitions as well. Also, try to participate in a local game jam. It’s fun, and is another opportunity to tell like-minded individuals about your game.
Conclusion
Believe it or not, once you’ve completed your first demo, approximately 25-30% of your time should be dedicated solely to marketing. Sounds like a lot, and it is, but without it your sales (and subsequently your revenue) will suffer.
The aforementioned strategies are just a few ways to market your game. If you have any of your own, please feel free to post them in the comments section. Happy marketing!
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