Arcen Games: PR and Marketing

[Pepisolo]

But beyond that I'm at a bit of a loss, because Arcen can't go astroturfing other forums, and we also can't ask you guys to do it.  Or even imply that we want you to, because we really really don't.

The main thing that can be done -- only thing really -- is make any forums that you are already a part of, and which have a thread or subforum related to deals, aware of this deal.  If it's a place specifically for sharing deals, then great -- that's news, not astroturfing.  If it's unsolicited on some other random forum, then as you say that is "tricky."  I would actually go further than that and say it's an outright no-no, but that really depends on your standing in the forum and the type of forum itself.  If you're on there posting all the time and the news is relevant and so forth, then great.

Yeah, exactly. Nobody wants to or wants anyone else to go around spamming forums -- that kind of thing is not right -- which is kind of why I've exhausted all my limited outlets as I'm not a big forum guy. I'm a big lurker on the Tigsource forums and I know that they have an Indie Royale specific thread which this bundle should really be posted up on, but I'm even wary of posting something there as I don't have an actual forum account. For somebody who has been a member for a bit then there would be absolutely no problem in posting about the bundle -- indeed it is probably something that  would be interesting news.

I guess just try to spread the word to any of your communities that would absolutely be interested then guys. Every little helps. It doesn't seem like we can do much more than this.

Although, I was thinking that there might be some Let's Players who specialize or have segments about gaming deals that might be interested, as I recall TotalBiscuit used to do bundle segments (not any more) so there may be others around -- I just don't know of any. Sending these guys a heads up would be no problem... if they exist heh.

I would say that from a general press angle this bundle seems well covered, though, you've only got to google Arclight bundle and you see a lot of coverage. Bundle sales seem a little on the low side, though, although I'm no expert on how previous bundles have done.

[x4000]

Yep, all true.

In terms of the performance of this bundle... it's definitely lower than they or we expected, but it's kind of in the middle of the pack as far as their bundles go.  IIRC their bundles have topped out at 20k units sold, and that was only once.  While some other bundles with quite respectable games did like half what ours has.

I think that the fact that this was hitting during E3 may not have been to our advantage, but so it goes really.

[doctorfrog]

I think part of what may affect Indie Royale sales is that the juggernaut of bundles also dropped two or three tantalizing combos in the mix at about the same time. Humble Bundle #8 had several indie darlings I'd been waiting for (Hotline Miami, Dear Esther, Proteus, Tiny and Big), and just that week or the week before it was the Alan Wake series, and now they have this weekly bundle thing... so I think part of it is that they occupy a majority of the whole "indie bundle" heartshare, clearing millions in revenue each time.

I also suspect customers look at these huge wads of game, and go, "which bundle do I want?" "Which one has cuter graphics?" "Which one is has more titles?" In other words, viewing the bundles themselves as singular products, and picking only one, to the exclusion of others.

[x4000]

Oh, yeah -- that was right, the Humble stuff was badly timed, too.

[Azurian]

For The Last Federation you can do a Giveaway Contest, Preview or an Interview at Space Sector to gain publicity. That site has quite a bit of game developers providing interviews and stuff there. The Distant Worlds team announced their 4th expansion there today.

http://www.spacesector.com/

[cupogoodness]

For The Last Federation you can do a Giveaway Contest, Preview or an Interview at Space Sector to gain publicity. That site has quite a bit of game developers providing interviews and stuff there. The Distant Worlds team announced their 4th expansion there today.

http://www.spacesector.com/

Added a note to the marketing doc. Thanks!