Gaining presence, How to create the ideal conditions to release a game?

So guys, what do you think, is the best way to start getting presence and people to take the time to download, play and then comment back on your games? Do you just setup a webpage or a thread for it, and trust in the quality of your product to make publicity for itself? or do you think that a mere webpage is not enough and you must advertise it everywhere? What about commercial games? Do you build reputation towards your game with the usage of development blogs? Or do you hate the idea of showing an incomplete game and wait until near completion of the project to unveil it?

in other words... What is your approach to get your game known?

I'm sure it varies across people.

Step 1: Find Archeia.

Step 2: Let her do her thing.

That's pretty much my whole approach to getting anything I make known to more than 3 people.

What you have to do is be part of the community. Post on the forums, go into IRC, be out there so people know who you are. That helps to get people interested in your game because if they like what you post and say, they'll look at your project more. If you're just a ghost on a forum and post just your project thread and nothing else, unless that project is like godly, people may just pass it off because they don't know you very well.

There's a lot of ways to do this. First, DEFINITELY have a webpage. As well, once you've got the website set up, make sure the primary index.html page (the page that going to the website leads to, so basically the home page) has meta tags for things like RPG Game Roleplaying Roleplay (etc etc etc, just spam things into the meta tag that related to gaming). This'll make it a little more visible on search engines.

Most hosting companies give you a credit for official advertisement on Google or Facebook. Take advantage of these. That'll help advertise. But, make sure your advertisement is interesting and isn't something like "Yo, dawg, come playz meh gamz like duh BOZZ!". Commercially successful games require commercially successful advertisement meaning using real English, proper punctuation and capitalization, using spelled out numbers vs. 10, 12, 14 etc (unless space is restricted, then it's ok for numbers!).

After you've got your website and possibly some usage of free advertising credits (godaddy gives away 50 google advertisement credits for a domain name if I recall correctly, but that might be wrong), post on every RPG-gaming based you can find about it. Not only you yourself post, have friends who enjoyed the game post, have their friends who enjoyed the game post, get testimonials from these friends and their friends about how swell and BA Barabus your game really is.

These are just some basic ideas to get your game out there. There, of course, are more ways than just these.

What has been effective in getting me hyped for games, is Dev Diaries and viral Marketing.

Dev Diaries, as opposed to just trailers or gameplay, provide insight into the creation of the game. It shows what work has been put in. A good dev diary includes input from all persons on the Dev Team. Concept Art, writers, composers etc. A well made, informative Dev Diary provides immense value (in my opinion) to any given game.

Viral Marketing, or creative/interesting marketing as a whole, tend to garner my attention... and keep it. Making and using creative and engaging marketing tactics can mean the difference between a hit, and a flop. Think of all the great "sleeper hits" that would've been much bigger had they marketted/advertised better... you can't put enough stress on effective marketting and advertisement.

Can't say I know much from personal experience. But on a hobby level I wouldn't make a thread too early on. I'd make sure you get something playable ready before making a topic. Then once you have a demo make a topic about it and a week later post up the demo. Putting effort into the topic by making it look visually pleasing is a good idea and if you want to put the effort into it, a trailer never hurts. Advertise your game in your sig that connects to the topic and if you've been active in the community this sig will be seen by a lot more people. It helps to know the other rpg maker forums as well and do the same thing there.

I think the biggest issue is that a lot of people make a topic for their game too early. It's good if you want feed back right away but it causes problems if you just want hype. If you have something interesting and don't release something playable people will forget about your stuff and be less enthusiastic because it's been too long. Same goes between parts/chapters to a game. It's hard to release everything in a certain pace. I find it the most ideal to have the whole game complete and then release it with breaks between (or at least close to finished) but I don't think I'll do that personally. ^^ It's a bit hard to do that but if you want to bring up the most popularity you gotta strike while the iron is hot so to speak and in giving short breaks and releasing at a regular pace (giving dates and time frames) you'll get a much higher turn-out and higher chance of players continuing to play the game rather than forgetting about it or dropping it.

I don't formally announce my games until they are pretty much complete, as I don't want them to be vaporware. (I started working on a major game with RPGXP back in 2005 and it's still far from finished. :( ) I've only released freeware so far, though – not sure to what extend commercial games would profit from a bit of hype.

But when my games are finally complete I submit them to a large number of freeware sites. Many of them generate little traffic, but they still help increase my Google rank, I suppose.

Try to get hype going on your game. If you start a thread before the game is playable (a demo), then only release enough information to get them drawn in, but keep enough information to yourself to allow you to reveal a little bit at a time. Remember that releasing cool things to the public over time will get a better reaction than all at once. This is because, when people are looking forward to getting something, when they actually get it, it is more special. But if they get it all at once, then they dont care quite as much.

Also, I am a fan of both the Mystery Tactics and Shock-And-Awe Tactics.

Mystery: When you dont give the community much more than a few little things, making them wonder what the hell it is you are working on. For instance, my latest game (Dragon Warrior Monsters 2 {2012}) has been pretty much a complete secret. The only things I have told this community is essentially that I am making it. They have no clue how far I am into it, what it is going to look like, what the gameplay is going to be like, nothing. But I can tell you that it is driving a few members completely nuts right now waiting for the beta demo to get done in testing so that I can release the public demo. Which brings me to part two of my tactical plan...

Shock-And-Awe: This works well with the Mystery Tactic, as long as both are done right. This is the tactic of shocking the community and leaving them in awe. My personal plan is to keep my project under wraps until I have enough to 'Wow' the community. And then, when it is time, I will show it all off at once and give them a release date for the public demo. With this tactic, you want people to look at your project and go "Well , that looks cool. Can't wait for that demo."

Now, if you notice, I even through in what I talked about before... making them wait a bit. Once I reveal what I have been working on, I am going to hold them off for a week or so. However, once the initial reaction dies down and the demo is out, I then resort to normal means of advertising so that I can start the second wave. I will start advertising in my status on this site, get a thread ready on multiple sites, pay for Ads on a few sites, and even throw up a trailer or two on YouTube. Then, once everything starts dying down with the demo, I start back over at the Mystery stage and get them ready for either the second demo, or the full game.

MAKE SURE THAT THE GAME IS GOOD

and let it carry itself. no matter how much networking or advertising you do, your game will crumble if it can't support itself.

Well, I guess a short answer like that beats a long answer like mine any day, lol. Awesome point Frieza.

Be lucky.

Sometimes you'll release a game and one forum will eat it up but another won't bat an eyelid. I guess it just depends on the kind of people who are browsing your stuff and whether or not they're into it. That's why I usually post my stuff on the RM and general forums I'm a part of, my site and my YouTube channel. If nothing else, it gets the word out. XD