[MUD-Dev] Advertising Thread

[Rayzam]

From: "Brandon J. Van Every" <vanevery at 3DProgrammer.com>
> Michael Tresca wrote:

>> Brandon J. Van Every posted on Sunday, August 04, 2002 7:31 AM

>> RetroMUD advertises.  Medievia advertises.  Achaea advertises.

> They certainly haven't reached me, a game designer who has
> downloaded plenty of demos the past 4 years, but hasn't been
> particularly interested in MUDs until recently.  I don't think
> you're appreciating how rarefied the MUD audience is.  You don't
> walk into EBX and see endcap displays for MUDs.  Not unless
> they're EQ, UO, or Baldur's Gate.

Advertising tends to be targetted. Someone walking into EBX is into
playing computer games. Someone checking out The Mudconnector, or
half a dozen other online game related sites are into playing those
types of games.  As you say, you haven't been interested in muds
until recently.

There's a difference between advertising to your targetted audience
and marketing to broaden the applicable audience. Of those who can
afford to advertise, a much smaller percentage can afford to expand
the target audience via marketing. And I'm not talking about MUDs in
specific...

>> and through banner advertising.

> I've never seen a banner ad for a MUD.

Then clearly you haven't been to the websites in question. I bet
much of the population of say Afghanistan has never heard of EQ, UO,
or Baldur's Gate. In fact, a large portion of the US population
hasn't either. I know that I get comments from people who aren't at
all into computer games going 'I just heard about Everquest from
readin an article <here>. You play games, what's it about?'. Just
got one today in fact.

So it's not a question of rarefied. Sure, there are less MUD players
than computer game players, than console game players. But the same
way you can say that the ads haven't reached a game designer of 4
years, you can say that game designers of 4 years should have been
interested in/following up on the breadth of the field for their own
edification.

Why do many with years of experience in the text mud worlds cringe
when they hear quotes by designers of MMORPGs that make claims
showing they've never played any of the text games? Example:
Horizons claimed 2/3 years ago when they were first explaining what
they were, that they were going to be 'The First Online Game with
Underwater Areas, Underwater Races, and Dragon playable
characters'. I know that's not true and they missed the boat on that
one by about another 3-5 years prior to the statement.

If you're a researcher getting into a new question, you always want
to read up on everything going on in that part of the field. Even
for your own line of research, you want to keep up with everything
available. Doesn't seem to be the case nowadays.

Take a look at the MMORPG releases. Were the more successful ones
developed by designers with experience in the text world? Were the
unsuccessful ones developed by designers without that experience? I
don't have hard facts on this, but my intuition is that it's true.

>> Dozens of other MUDs use the same approach.

> If mainstream game titles are the point of comparision - and I
> think that's fair if you're griping about how much the games
> industry does or doesn't know about MUD development and history -
> this advertizing is miniscule.  Nobody hears about X, and that's
> why nobody knows that X has been done before.

As per my researcher comments above, that's their fault. Referencing
a recent thread: VCs do their research and invest in/know how to
judge only those things they feel they understand the industry
of. In this case, it's like investing blindly.

I should add the caveat that experience with UO, EQ, AC, DAoC, and
AO may be more than adequate for designing new, and 'next
generation', MMORPGs.  I'd still have more faith in someone knowing
more of the past history.  <cliche> Or they're doomed to repeat it
</cliche>

So how does the concept get marketed to a larger audience? 
Franchises that have a large target audience moving into the field:
Star Wars & Warcraft.

One thing to be aware of when it comes to the big advertising
dollars for games: it's like Hollywood. A company can [hopefully]
afford to have some marginal movies [games], or movies [games] where
they lose money on, because a success is worth so much it can
support X number of failures.  Especially with sequels in movies,
and add-on packs along with sequels in games.  But you need to
afford making all those games. You need to have money to make money.

The last point is to relate it to the general software
business. When a larger player wants to move into some smaller
specialty realm, or fold it into their own offerings, they tend to
do their research into the field, and then buy out/work with a
smaller company that specialized and developed an appropriate
product. Are we seeing this? Should we be?

rayzam




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