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The design and business of gaming from the perspective of an experienced developer

Category: Marketing Sucks (Page 2 of 4)

Second Life Hits Bogus Milestone!

October 25, 2006 /

I’ve got to hand it to Second Life. They know how to keep the buzz going. Even despite their recent problems with grey goo and credit card problems, they manage to keep their presence up. Second Life recently announced their millionth login. Of course, that stat isn’t all too meaningful, given that SL is free to play, and has little relation to how popular the game is on a given night. According to their front page, they have 11,ooo people playing right now, giving them a concurrency of about 1%. That would be pretty awful for a standard subscription-based game, but again, the free model changes all the rules.

What’s more intriguing are the number of other corporations that have bought into the idea that Second Life is the place to be: Coolzor has the rundown of companies that have bought in. The list includes Reuters, CNet, Adidas, Reebok, American Apparel, and some advertising agencies. Again, that’s to reach 10K users. People over on Terranova seem interested mostly in talking about Second Life as a creative genesis, but to be honest, Coolzor’s tour of Second Life makes me really happy with the men in tights games – at least in WoW, no one’s going to try to sell me shoes.

Original comments thread is here.

Dungeon Siege Discovers How Far Is Too Far

August 22, 2006 /

Ars Technica is all agog over this bit of in-game product placement in the new “Dungeon Siege” game. (I strongly recommend going there to see the screenshots)

In Dungeon Siege 2: Broken World, our forum goer Scero found an NPC that told him about the Dungeon Siege PSP game and offered him a code for it, as well as saying the PSP game had a code for items in the game he was playing. Way to help us suspend disbelief. Even worse, this “ad” was voiced by the character.

Really, it’s the Voice Over that turns this from a bad idea to a stupendously bad one.

There are any number of ways that they could have presented this opportunity to the player. Heck, they even could have had a window show up while playing the game. But by tying it to an in-game NPC, they destroyed the sense of immersion that the game was trying to create.

More Thoughts on E3

August 2, 2006 /

So E3 isn’t dead, just ’stripped down’ and moved to July. That’s cause for elation and depression. Elation because, hey, two more months to make that kickin’ demo. Also elation because there’s more separation between it and GDC.

What’s depressing is that, in the new stripped-down, all-behind-closed-doors format, being sent to E3 to pitch your game is going to suck. Continue reading

Vote Me For Most Successful Game Blog!

April 8, 2006 /

I’m hoping to get into Guinness. Seems that they no longer need any sort of actual metric, just someone to throw some cash their way to put an ad in their good book. From GameSpot.

Lara Croft has today been awarded a Guinness World Record that recognises her as the “most successful human video game heroine.” The Tomb Raider star won the prize for “transcending the boundaries of video games and becoming a recognisable figure in mainstream society”.

Continue reading

In-Game Advertising Goes Too Far

February 25, 2006 /

A new entry into the gaming advertising space advertises their services thusly:

How can I increase revenues from my game investment? You (and us) have been there more than once. DoubleFusion provides the service that allows you to manage your in game advertising real estate, expose it to a large network of advertisers and maximize on in game advertising revenues.

This pitch is accompanied by a screenshot of a KFC ad on, I shit you not, a cow.

Original comments thread is here.

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