I haven't been in college for quite some time now, so I can only paraphrase the idea as opposed to providing direct reference. Essentially, there were several test cases and real life examples in which someone brought a new twist on a new product to market and publicized it. Say Ben and Jerry's created a hamburger flavored ice cream that they marketed heavily. People as a whole tasted it and hated it. Now say you're a regional ice cream company that made hot dog flavored ice cream and, in taste tests, people love it. The problem is since Ben and Jerry's already popularized the failed fast food ice cream, and ruined mass public opinion of the idea, it makes your ice cream much harder to sell, and people that partnered with Ben and Jerry's would be wary to partner with you and your similar idea.
Right, so you have no examples to back up the theory with regards to this ever occurring in games. Fair enough.
This would apply similarly to games because it's been shown that people almost always categorize games in comparison to another game in their mind. While I don't think that SvM would affect ALL indie games negatively, it would affect that subset of wacky political themed indie games. And as someone that is
, I personally don't like the idea of having to fight through possible bridges being burned.
Stalin Vs Martians has about as much to do with wacky political commentary as my cock does. You're conflating two entirely separate things to make a potential disaster scenario.
For instance, mainstream review sites rarely cover smaller independent games. If a reviewer gives one of these games a chance because of the "wacky title" it could burn him on even trying out a similar game afterwards. That's no good. And burned customers would be less excited about furture similar products in general.
You're showing a woeful misunderstanding of how people, the public and journalists actually work. Look, it's this simple - if you tickle a journalists fancy with your game, if you excite, interest or intrigue them, they'll cover your game. Seriously, it's that simple. It doesn't matter if they played a shit one the week before, the day before or an hour before. It doesn't matter if you play "My Massive Penis" which is a crap game about a cock in a DDR form and then play "Woah, Look At The Size Of My Cock" which is the same game but brilliant - the brilliant one will win out despite its wacky title. It'll get coverage because it interests them. I know, hard to fathom that people might actually behave like people not some theoretical model that exists in your head isn't it?
Please, have a read of
Gillen's brilliant piece on marketing Indie games if you haven't already. It may be a good few years old but every word of it still rings true.
I don't knock them for marketing their game or getting it pushed; I fault them for not putting more time into the actual design of the game and attempting to make it less buggy. My game might not be fun or balanced properly, that's the player's opinion, but as a developer, it's my job to try and at least ATTEMPT to make a product worth selling for some reason. Heck, I didn't even push Ad Pets at all because it was strictly niche and knew that most of the public wouldn't "get" 1984 gameplay.
Oh god, the public get 1984 gameplay just fine - I've been running RR for the best part of 5 years at the helm, and we're as 1984 gameplay as you bloody get considering we cater specifically to folks who like that sort of thing and yet, we still get folks from outside that little niche who love that stuff, lots of them in fact. Stop looking to point the finger at outside forces for the love of all things computational. If it's a specific niche product then it'll only ever appeal to a specific niche, that's cool - but that's your decision, your choice. Not "the public don't get it".
And here's one more revelation for the road. Different folks have different motivations when producing work. I like that. You take it as your own responsibility to produce a fully working, "less buggy" product. Someone else might not. Someone else might just do it for shits and giggles. They're both valid approaches. You don't have to like it, but they are.
So my motives are simply a "shame on them" as opposed to wanting them removed or anything. Indie developers have a hard enough time as it is; it kind of sucks when things that finally get some attention are half-arsed.
Hahaha, brilliant. We're at a point in time when it's easier than ever to make a noise a an Indie. Probably the easiest its ever been to get coverage and to get the word out and "we have a hard time of it". Do excuse me if I attempt to stop pissing my pants for a second at how absurd a notion that is.
You make your own bed in this life, man. Go and make yours. Angry Barry looks ace, you can do it, I'm sure.
I'd highly recommend dropping the persecution complex though, it does you a great disservice.
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