[todfox]

After four years working on my retro game nearly full time, and several launches, I still don't understand marketing enough to understand what to do differently.

A lot of the advice out there is something like: "create a community" or "go join several communities" or "get to know other indie devs on Twitter". To me, this simply feels fake. I don't really participate in any online communities. I spend enough time in front of a computer for work and I prefer to socialize with my real life friends.

Besides, I simply have no idea how to get any kind of attention on social media. I created an eight-page booklet that recreates the first issue of Nintendo Power, except with my characters in place of Mario and Wart. It's an homage, because I developed a retro game. Somebody suggested that I post it on a retrogaming subreddit, where many others were posting fan art, and those people should recognize the magazine cover that I recreated. Well, I posted my PDF and it got about 4 upvotes. A simple photo, posted around the same time, of the very common TMNT NES cartridge got -- 800? 900? I stopped looking.

I understand that what I made is not going to be for everybody. I'm not expecting to be a millionaire. But damn if I can't figure out how to even get it in front of people. Everywhere I try just gets ignored.

The game is pretty substantial too. Mac, iOS, and Windows versions all done by me -- custom game engine -- 40+ hours of gameplay -- about a 5-6 hour minimum play time if you start from scratch and you know what you're doing (I was shooting for 3.5ish hours to equal Mario 3 or Mario World in "size" or "depth"). Lots of fun secrets. Nothing repeated. Challenging, but not as hard as Dwarf Fortress. Real life playtesters (not friends or family) asked me to reset the game so they could start all over again.

I just wish somebody else could do the social stuff. It all just makes me want to stop programming altogether. My brain just does not work along the lines of "how can I phrase this email to get this person's attention?" So I realize cold calling is a numbers game but I seem to be ignored no matter what I do.

I want to make great stuff, and I really don't care about attention/fame/money -- but what's the point of working so hard if nobody gets to enjoy it but me?

[aschearer]

Assuming the game is "Hazmat Hijinks: Total Meltdown" on Steam. Here's some tough love:

The video takes way too long to get to gameplay. Screenshots do a poor job explaining what the mechanic is. I've read the capsule image, watched some of the trailer, looked at several of the screenshots and still can't tell you what the gameplay loop is. Sort of a top down puzzle thing? With a "match the color" mechanic? The art is not good enough by a mile. OK I just read some of the "About This Game" -- no one cares how many hours of gameplay, if it's so novel why can't you explain that better than "always something new", which is redundant. Surprises also feels like it's just more novelty. The first point about various suits is not exciting, why should I care? Having a handful of people really love it isn't sufficient. I had a game on Dictionary.com that people played hours daily, still couldn't make money from it.

Stepping back, I think there are ways you could vastly improve your marketing, but is it worth it? Take the "L" and move on to your next project. Use what you've learned to improve and "make great stuff." It's better to move quickly, learn, and make better and better stuff until you've hit on something that works. At least I wish someone had given me similar advice back in the day.

PS All this is coming from respect and recognition of the incredible amount of hard work and sweat you've committed to the game. You're a bad ass for working so hard and completing a game!

[todfox]

Thanks for your feedback. I agree it needs visual improvements. I chose not to spend money on an artist -- just had too much in the project already. The trailer should have been done by a 3rd party. I don't grasp what is going to appeal to someone anyway.

You know what? I won't make any more. I think I'm done.

I'm not interested in learning what people like or adjusting to what's popular. Why on earth would I go through this again? Nothing I am interested in working on is ever going to be profitable. Simple as that.

This has nothing to do with your comment. I've had it with programming, I've had it with tech, I've had it with people. I will just scrape by doing the bare minimum to survive as a freelancer.

I wish I could throw my computer into a river.

[eloff]

Just going out on a limb here, but that's burnout. Take a break. Do things off the computer. Programming will call you back when you're ready. Or you'll find something new. Either way, take that break.

[bruce511]

I am writing this reply not to dissuade you, but rather to hopefully be helpful in your understanding of what is happening here. As they say, life is a game, learn the rules, and I will attempt to explain one of the rules here. It may sound harsh - that's not my intent. I did't make up the rules, I just play the game...

Firstly;

>> Nothing I am interested in working on is ever going to be profitable. Simple as that.

This is a critical understanding. Because it helps you to determine what _value_ you get from an activity.

For most of us, let's say 99%+, we have creative hobbies. Some play music, some write, some cook, some make pottery or art, some program. The value of a hobby is that the process itself brings us personal joy. The value gained is in the process, not the result.

I've started making pottery. Some of it comes out the way I like, some doesn't. Some doesn't survive the firing process. But there is joy in working the clay, joy in decorating the result, joy in the finished piece. But it's safe to assume I will never sell the results (as in, no-one will buy them) and in some ways selling them would rob me of the "hobby". Frankly, I'd rather give them away. Given how much I pay for the studio time etc it'll never be profitable.

So if i's not profitable, why do it? Because doing it brings me joy.

So it is with programming. Either you are doing it for profit (work) or for fun (hobby). If you are doing side-projects primarily for money then for starters, don't write a game. there are a zillion games in the world, and just like music, the number of them that make actual money are vanishingly small. Going from "I need money" to "I'll write a game" is not a good strategy.

Lots of Indies write games though because writing games can be as much fun as playing them. The joy is not in the selling, but in the process. As long as you end up with a game you like to play, well, you have your reward.

In many ways, most open-source projects can be thought of as "hobbies", not in a pejorative sense but because, for most of us, they are not income. The value has to lie elsewhere, in the creation process, in the community or whatever.

>> I wish I could throw my computer into a river.

Clearly the act of programming is not bringing you joy. For you the computer is work, and you should use it doing things that people are paying you to do. That's completely ok. I use my car to go to a place I want to be, I don't "go for a drive". For me a car is just a tool, for others it's a major part of their lives. That's ok, we're all different.

So, in conclusion, if you want to make money with your computer, then there are lots of ways to do that. (hint: it's not in writing games.) If you need suggestions in this space, then by all means ask.

But most of all I encourage you to find an outlet for your creative instincts. One where you get joy from the process, not profit from the result. Programming is not providing that. Tech is not providing that. People are not providing that. You need to find that for yourself.

Good luck!

[aschearer]

Isn't being an artist great? Hang in there.

[kleiba]

Go for it! If you have an opportunity to make a living outside tech, just do it.

[Shocka1]

The responding comment to your original post was a bit harsh. You are also being a little too hard on yourself. I can only imagine how hard you've worked on your game. You deserve a break, but don't throw your computer into the river. Go get recharged and rid yourself of the negative energy. Then ask yourself the hard question of why you originally wanted to create a game in the first place.

[antiatheist]

Looks like a Chip Challenge clone/upgrade, the surface mechanics aren't very obvious in the video on steam for someone who doesn't know it.

Perhaps some contrasting animations or visual guides would help with that.

[AnIdiotOnTheNet]

> I've read the capsule image, watched some of the trailer, looked at several of the screenshots and still can't tell you what the gameplay loop is.

Interesting. I think I sussed out the gameplay loop almost immediately because it resembles Chip's Challenge[0]. Maybe that's misleading, but to anyone who grew up in that era I'd think that's what would immediately come to mind.

> The art is not good enough by a mile.

Disagree. It could be a little better, but it is appropriate for what it is aping and plenty readable. Many many games have done well on art of about this quality or worse.

> no one cares how many hours of gameplay

I do, and so do a lot of people if How Long to Beat is anything to go by. In my case though 40hrs is too many and would be a negative.

[0] I later saw that it called this out in the video, during a part I skipped because, as you said, it takes too long to get to the gameplay.

[rasz]

>"Hazmat Hijinks: Total Meltdown" on Steam

Looks like 1990 Chip's Challenge on Windows 3, thats not a good look.

[Moru]

If that game is like Chip's challenge I know someone that would love it, it's her favourite game all times. Thanks :-)

[schemescape]

I don’t have any advice, but I will say the art in the screenshots didn’t grab my attention.

For what it’s worth, I had a similar experience. I launched a game on itch.io for fun, and got a ton of positive feedback (including “I love this game!” And “I can’t believe this is free!”), but when I launched on Steam (also for free, but now with music people said they liked and new features), it bombed.

The cherry on top was when I posted a Show HN here (it’s a zachlike programming game, using an esolang—-right up HN’s alley), and didn’t get a single upvote. I’ll admit: that hurt.

[sdenton4]

To be fair, hn submissions are a total crapshoot; don't take it too hard. The first upvote comes down to whether the right person looks at the new submissions queue at the right moment... And I often get the impression that very few people are looking at the queue and trying to separate good stuff from the giant piles of crap...

[theduder99]

I wasn't even aware of the New button after years of casual browsing :) When I discovered it one day, I felt bad that I hadn't contributed to sorting through the crap.

[schemescape]

Ah, thanks to the person who looked at my submission history and gave me my sole upvote. I guess all I needed for marketing was a good sob story ;)

[fooqux]

>but what's the point of working so hard if nobody gets to enjoy it but me?

I have been struggling with this myself. Not just about programming but other creative pursuits as well. Recently it has been photography. I take pictures while knowing whatever I'm looking at has a far better picture on its wikipedia page.

I suppose we're supposed to take some sort of fulfillment in the process of creation itself? But that just goes back to the old koan of the tree falling in the woods. If I create something, but nobody ever sees it, did I create it at all? Doesn't feel like it.

[MrVandemar]

> If I create something, but nobody ever sees it, did I create it at all? Doesn't feel like it.

You have been trained to require external validation for your work. Maybe it's a modern thing with upvotes and twitter and likes and whatnot.

If you create a thing, then you have drawn on your skills, probably improving them. Whether the thing is seen by others is irrelvant. What is relevant is your experience in creating it, and the use of it (whether it has a use, or just has aesthetic value).

Maybe practice by creating something, then destroying it, as if it had never existed. What remains? Memory and skill, both of great value.

[wott]

> You have been trained to require external validation for your work. Maybe it's a modern thing with upvotes and twitter and likes and whatnot.

And simply the fact that, nowadays, you have access to the production of thousands of other people, with which you can compare yours. And in most cases it will compare unfavourably; to make it worse, almost all those people are unknown to the general public, they are often not even professionals, they are just very ordinary persons with a hobby, and yet you can see in a couple of clicks that they get (much) better results than you do.

On may call this a self-validation based on external elements.

Perhaps, as it devalues your creations in your own eyes, it reinforces the need for external validation.

[dotnet00]

I've thought about the same with regard to drawing (and previously with programming). While I agree that it's a tad bit disheartening to know that things better than what you are currently capable of are one search away, I like to consider the fact that prior to the internet those still existed and it was still somewhat easy to come across better photography by simply going to a library. Yet there wasn't such an easy way to get anyone outside of your own circle to acknowledge your work until you were already very good.

Thus you kind of do have to find at least enough fulfillment in the process of creation and of self-improvement to keep at the grind. Some amount of existential dread of that sort is also just part of the grind of any creative pursuit.

At the same time though, it also helps to keep some perspective and step back for some time if it becomes too consuming. I let this sort of dread get too far for programming, which had me shirking all other important things in life (family, food, sleep, work) just to keep coding. Once I stepped back from it I got a lot less stressed, managed to find other aspects of my skills I needed to work on and also managed to find a place to apply myself to which is sufficiently fulfilling.

[losteric]

> I have been struggling with this myself. Not just about programming but other creative pursuits as well. Recently it has been photography. I take pictures while knowing whatever I'm looking at has a far better picture on its wikipedia page.

> I suppose we're supposed to take some sort of fulfillment in the process of creation itself? But that just goes back to the old koan of the tree falling in the woods. If I create something, but nobody ever sees it, did I create it at all? Doesn't feel like it.

I think these questions come back to "what is the meaning of life?", no?

Among many things, I enjoy hiking. I also know for a fact that thousands of people have been to every place I go and none of my trips will ever be publicly notable. That's OK. When I hike, I enjoy the journey... exercise, clean air, calm views, quiet space, one with nature, and the ego-scratch of reaching a summit... my experience feels good, deep in the bones and belly. What more could one want? If no one knows about the trip, does that invalidate or lessen my experience?

I carry the same perspective to creative pursuits. The mental exercise, honing skill, going from nothing to something - some moments are frustrating, but in aggregate it feels good. At work, I do find capitalist realities corrupt the creative joy, but I accept that as part of where we are as a society.

[spaceman_2020]

Here's the harsh truth: unless you're well connected, the only way to get visibility on social media is to pay someone.

This can mean:

- Paying the platform (the easiest and most scalable, but also the most expensive and arguably least effective)

- Paying an influencer for an explicitly labeled sponsored content (effective, but depends a lot on your target demographic)

- Paying a popular account to share your content "organically", without any explicit sponsored labeling (the most effective, but also the hardest to scale)

You'll find that once you get a decent amount of following, it's easy to snowball into a much larger following - provided you have content worth sharing.

[lairv]

Is the third one legal ? I thought influencers had to make it clear whether they are sponsored or not

[spaceman_2020]

Nope, that's why you won't see anyone online talk about it (at least not on public blogs and magazine articles). But it's also the most effective since it feels less like marketing and more like organic sharing.

[kiawe_fire]

First I’ve heard of your game is via this comment, and as a fan of old Windows 95 / DOS games, this looks great! I’m eager to buy it once I’m able to load up some Steam credits.

I’ve been down your road before, and it sucks, but ultimately it’s why you need to make sure you enjoy doing what you’re doing above all else, with the hopes that others will enjoy it.

Sometimes you just gotta make something because you want it to exist in the world, and because YOU want to be the one to bring it into existence.

Personally, I love that you’re keeping a concept like this alive.

That said, because it’s the internet, I can’t help but add my $0.02 on your marketing efforts.

So, from your brief description of your attempt at Reddit marketing, I can’t help but notice that your game is very much going for the Chip’s Challenge / MS DOS / Windows 95 vibe.

Yet your marketing efforts and description of game length is trying to make a Nintendo Power / Super Mario connection. On a subreddit in which people were upvoting NES cartridges.

I’d say that’s the wrong audience. While there’s plenty of overlap between early PC gamers and early Nintendo gamers, most people tend to focus their nostalgia on one over the other.

You’ve found a cool niche, but I would expect far more resonance with the vintage PC / DOS gaming crowd, and maybe even the Amiga / Atari PC crowd.

But like I said, I’m not any better at this than you, and I also acknowledge that your Reddit story may be just one of many attempts you’ve made at marketing.

I hope you keep at it, and find enjoyment in the process, but don’t be afraid to take breaks, or try something wildly different. Best of luck!

[kirse]

what's the point of working so hard if nobody gets to enjoy it but me?

Life starts posing those existential questions at the extremes of sacrifice, especially when you're working for something your brain subconsciously knows could potentially turn out to be vaporware.

If you're going to play the game of wanting users, then 1) immediate and regular program-shaping user feedback is king and 2) many overnight successes take longer than expected [1]. At 4 years in you're really just getting started with learning. Obviously you're in the phase now where you recognize you need help and can't do it all yourself, so how badly do you want your Everest? It always takes teams to reach any great summit.

[1] https://dondodge.typepad.com/the_next_big_thing/2008/05/guit...

[squokko]

I don't think you can make yourself want to be good at game marketing - you need to partner with someone who lives and breathes that life and recognize, by ownership/compensation, that they are just as important as you to the business, and work on it together from the start (that person will have a better pulse on the audience and what they want to see and how to get it to them).

[eps]

You have a Catch 22.

Your game looks super basic and through that unappealing. You would've gotten a feedback IF you would've not mentioned the 4 years sunk into the game. Virtually all that feedback would've been negative or critical, but people are just not assholes enough to tear into a massive amount of effort when it seemingly yielded so little. Hence the silence when you try and engage.

[codexon]

Marketing is a zero sum game to get people's attention. Attention is finite resource and you are competing with others for it.

It isn't a trivial task that anyone can do, at least efficiently (paying the minimum amount for the maximum number of conversions). It is just like programming where some people never seem to get it, except you are also competing against others.

If marketing is not something you are talented at or something you want to spend time and effort on, try paying for it. Even the biggest studios are buying ads and paying influencers.

[fuzzzerd]

I don't have the answer, but have been seeking it for a long time myself. Heard the same advise you got, make a community, join communities, post on twitter/reddit. As you said it just feels like fake advise.

As best I can tell, success in those efdorts is equal parts luck, wit, and having something unique yet relatable.

[adventured]

> Heard the same advise you got, make a community, join communities, post on twitter/reddit. As you said it just feels like fake advise.

It feels fake to let people know what you're working on by writing about it? That's what you and the parent are de facto saying.

How else do you expect them to find you?

There is no possible way around it. You have to tell people what you're doing. Repeatedly. You have to cultivate an interest in your thing. If one can't be bothered with that bare minimum building block, well, there obviously will be no successful outcome. It's definitely not build it and they will come (they don't know it exists until you show them). Give them a reason to care, cultivate interest, and they'll show up.

[todfox]

It's a chicken and egg problem. If you post, nobody will see it because nobody knows who you are. So you have to spend a long time "engaging" or "networking" with a community you didn't really want to join in the first place just to make enough of a name for yourself so that someday when you have something to say, a few people will listen.

I'm too busy making stuff and hanging out with my real friends to go be fake with people just to market to them in the future.

I guess you could try to make as many games as possible, quickly, and hope that one hits just right, and then focus on it and make it better fast.

[bee_rider]

I think this is why most people work in companies; there are tasks that need to be done to sell a product that we don’t want to do.

I mean, Dwarf Fortress was like the ultimate “good game, tiny community” example and even they had two dudes working on it, IIRC one of whom seemed to spend quite a bit of time dealing with the community. And despite making every game designer’s favorite game, they still had to hire a publisher in the end…

[stcroixx]

It is 'fake' in a way - you don't truly want to make/join these communities or post about this on twitter/reddit. If these communities really interested you, you'd already be a part of them. There are communities where the people have known each other for years and you're going to step into their forum, make your one post, annoy them, and move on. I personally wouldn't want to be that guy, but this is just what marketing is.

[will5421]

Have you thought about making a demo? That would give you something you might feel good about sharing on social media, and would be passed around on if the game is good. And it’s something you could make with your existing skill set (no crafting of emails necessary).

[antiatheist]

Why don't you recruit those playtesters as beta users to promote your game?

[hoseja]

Get Splattercatgaming or somebody in that space to play it somehow.

[shaftoe]

Sounds interesting.

What's the game?

[todfox]

Hazmat Hijinks.

If you happen to visit the website and see the Nintendo Power-esque PDF, tell me, shouldn't that grab the attention of the right person? I know I don't have the best social understanding but I thought I nailed that one.

Marketing is just so opaque. I would rather write an OS from scratch. At least I know that can be solved given enough time.

[safety1st]

I think the best insight I've ever come across about marketing was in The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss. He had a strategy of building marketing campaigns before he built products.

He would go as far as to develop the website and marketing assets, all the way up to and including an order form, spending money on advertising, etc. and see how it performed. And when people hit the order button they'd just get a message which said "currently out of stock - check back soon."

If the numbers coming back from a marketing campaign were good he'd then go on to develop the product.

Now you could debate the ethics of this but the key point is that the best way to figure out the sales and marketing side of a business is trial, error, and measurement of the outcomes. You get a marketing message of some kind out there, and you see if where and how you did it is a winner. You get your message/funnel/whatever as close as possible to an actual sales process. You get as close as you can to measuring specifically buying intent. You defer as much investment in actual product development as you can. Your time and money instead goes into looking for a technique and message that work.

Eventually you get enough info about your market this way that marketing looks much much less opaque. You will come to understand who would buy your shit and why. If you are a creator/maker/artist/developer/etc. and you achieve that understanding you've basically written yourself a golden ticket for many many years at that point, because for you, making the thing which fulfills that demand is really the easy part.

It's understanding what the demand is and who has it that needs your time and attention at the start. Understanding the shape of the hole in the universe which you are going to fill. Once you achieve that everything else falls into place.

[linuxftw]

I watched the video on the site. I didn't care for the music, very jarring. Most of the graphics were bland such as all the gray blocks.

When I think of the fun NES games I played, they were not puzzle games. They were TMNT 2, Mario (obviously), TLOZ, Contra, Metroid, Megaman. Those are more action games, not puzzle games.

While watching the video, I couldn't really understand what was happening. You showed gameplay, but what was going on was indecipherable.

Anyway, maybe the game doesn't appeal to me, and it does to others, IDK, I don't spend much money on games. From time to time, I'll spend a couple dollars on a mobile game if I enjoy it. Maybe you should change your marketing to make it F2P and users can purchase the full game after 4 or 5 levels via in-app purchase.

[bavila]

> If you happen to visit the website and see the Nintendo Power-esque PDF, tell me, shouldn't that grab the attention of the right person?

Maybe 30 years ago, but we're all (mostly) grown up now. Even for those old school gamers, I don't think it's enough to just give them something retro -- there's still got to be something new brought to the table, and I'm just not seeing it here. I'm sure it's clever and all, but when it comes down to it, most people need (not want -- need) novelty.

[astrange]

Isn't the usual advice to never make a game and a game engine at the same time, because you'll only finish one of them?