Re: A simple thank you
 

Sigh .
I would have liked to discuss a bit about the complexity of Victoria compared to Domininions though http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif .

So 1 Last try http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif . You just write all the excuses because you know yourself that Victoria is by no means as complex as Dominions but don't want to admit that i am right once with this claim after the motto "every dog has its day" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...es/biggrin.gif .

Re: A simple thank you
 

Maybe you'd waste less time if you stopped repeating yourself.

Re: A simple thank you
 

That's why I said that it depends how one defines "work". If the goal is to sell through retail to make profit, than it didn't work. If it was done for vanity or for publicity, that it worked. For example, some people pay to publish their books.

Stardock is showing healthy profits because they sell other (non-game) products, that's also a reason why it was worthwhile for them to invest into electronic sales software and infrastructure. Brad was mentioning that he was prepared to take loss on GalCiv for Windows from the very beginning. And, interestingly, in each of his attempts to sale various Versions of GalCiv through different retailers he got burned every time. Not sure why he thinks it will be different next time http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif Maybe, having his games in retail stores helps to promote his business software, so he doesn't mind taking a loss.

Re: A simple thank you
 

Perhaps. I'd waste even less time if I ignored you. Consider yourself welcome to go back into the woodwork you crawled out of. Bye.

Re: A simple thank you
 

I can just imagine wearing a cowboy hat, sitting on the top of the engine of a bullet train yelling "Yeehaw" as we go plummeting into a canyon from a bridge. Right beside me Quantum has on his maid outfit and a terrier mumbling "best intentions!".

Re: A simple thank you
 

just to keep this on topic, what I really don't understand is why Arryn feels the frontal armor of the T-34 was so second-rate:

Re: A simple thank you
 

Thats half of it (Brads half). Anything along the line of what Strategy First offered creates a time frame to pay off expenses before there is a profit. SF tried some things to boost sales which didnt happen and has now filed for bankruptcy.

Developers tend to feel that their game never sells as well as it would have if its not seen by every gamer. To an extent thats true but the charges for getting games into retail can kill the profit margin. At this point Brad is making obvious moves to increase his "name brand" status. We will see if he is going to shoot for the same retail level as Shrapnel does, or something more mainstream. For his own games he is willing to gamble abit more than for developers who are talking to him, which only makes good sense.
but that is thru the stardock software.
That may have been part of why developers like Brad and Tim create their own publishing companies like StarDock and Shrapnel.
I dont think anyone is arguing the obvius advantages of Digital Downloads. Just that its not available yet unless you want to create the system from scratch which is a heavy gamble. There are plenty of publishers willing to offer the higher-priced gambles and there are plenty of them being ranted against right now by their developers or becoming headlines with their firing, dropping projects, or bankruptcy.

Re: A simple thank you
 

If Brad's intention in selling retail was solely advertising, that's still a valid reason. Making a profit from doing so would be a bonus in that case. However, I sincerely doubt he'd go through the effort of getting hitched with Ubisoft if he didn't intend to seek a profit from retail. Seems to me that the possible "reward" from using that as an ad technique wouldn't outweigh the effort involved. I'd think he'd get a better bang for the buck advertising in other ways. Which leaves the profit motive, since Brad doesn't strike me as the vain type.

Has he said, anywhere, that he has actually lost money on GalCiv sales? Or that GalCiv's Online sales aren't profitable?

Re: A simple thank you
 

You misquoted me. I said "cheap tinfoil and spit". If you're going to quote me, please get it right.

Re: A simple thank you
 

In between all the flame wars, there is some interesting stuff here. This forum is the only one where I have wished for a kill filter http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif Fascinating.

Anyway, the download load and peak problem could possibly be solved by some of the emergent technologies such as Torrent. As for piracy, in games like dominions, I would go for a CD-key like the one already in use, or maybe a bit more advanced. This is from a techies point of view. I'm image that Torrent is probably not so easy in the windowsworld.

Re: A simple thank you
 

What the hell is your problem this time Arryn?

Re: A simple thank you
 

Possibly quite true although "emergent" is a key word. The pros and cons of it are still being examined. It comes down to a tried and true high chance of steady checks vs a gamble into new territory for the chance of a higher return. If I were marketing my own game my recommends might be different than if I were trying to suggest how a company should represent their clients.

Also a good bet. The game is available from many sources while the key is purchased thru a company site. Basically its the "shareware" plan which has had many years to create its own extensive history base on its effectiveness.

There are others things being tried. Kiosks which burn a CD, a man behind the counter verifies ID and credit card info, then operates the dedicate software to purchase the key. With specialized software talking to each other at each end it cuts out alot of problems and puts purchasing back into stores without the "buy bulk inventory and get stuck with it" headache. The music and movie industries are examining it also. It has things going for it but is also new territory.

Re: A simple thank you
 

[quote]
Gandalf Parker said:
Possibly quite true although "emergent" is a key word. The pros and cons of it are still being examined. It comes down to a tried and true high chance of steady checks vs a gamble into new territory for the chance of a higher return. If I were marketing my own game my recommends might be different than if I were trying to suggest how a company should represent their clients.

Im not sure if Torrent really offers any better distrib than if you just popped ISOs into the newsservers.

Also a good bet. The game is available from many sources while the key is purchased thru a company site. Basically its the "shareware" plan which has had many years to create its own extensive history base on its effectiveness.

There are others things being tried. Kiosks which burn a CD, a man behind the counter verifies ID and credit card info, then operates the dedicate software to purchase the key. With specialized software talking to each other at each end it cuts out alot of problems and puts purchasing back into stores without the "buy bulk inventory and get stuck with it" headache. The music and movie industries are examining it also. It has things going for it but is even newer territory.

What would make Digital Download really come to bloom would be for a company with national spread of servers create a new service handling the download portion.

Re: A simple thank you
 

So, we're coming to the conclusion that it didn't work for Stardock. Though "advertisement" effects and increase in "brand name recognition" are somewhat hard to estimate. And the way their Online purchases and patch downloads were organized, it was hard not to notice their other products, so I suppose that was part of the plan.

I haven't seen any statement from him on that. Surely, Online sales are profitable. But whether they have made enough to offset development costs, I don't know. But I remember him saying that if not for Online sales, GalCiv would be a total financial failure. Which just probable says that they've got very little from the retail deal.

Re: A simple thank you
 

It actually has one. And it works well enough.

Re: A simple thank you
 

I'd ask you the same question, except I already know the answer. Please feel free to join Truper. The two of you are quite the matched pair, lurking like sharks in the depths always on the hunt for a tidbit (which would be me, in case this allegory eludes you) that they can chomp on. I only wait for the inevitable day when you'll choke on it, or some other shark will decide to feed on you and see how well you enjoy being on the receiving end.

Bye.

Re: A simple thank you
 

One question on protection :
I have little knowlegde here but maybe somebody has :
I myself bought Diablo 2 and Warcraft 3 . Blizzard checked their CD-keys when you played Online .
I know there existed a lot of SP-key generators for Diablo 2 as well but was there one for MP too ?
Or did this system work quite well so that if you intended to play Diablo 2 in MP you were forced to buy a CD ?
Cause this is the only protection that works i can think of but i have to little knowledge to know if it works at all or if there is nothing you can do against Piracy in various forms .

Re: A simple thank you
 

The Bnet servers validate the keys for MP play, not the client-side software. So pirate keygens and codes are only useful for SP. But that's not all. D2 has a very effective CD copy-protection scheme as well. Blizzard went to great lengths to layer their anti-piracy defenses.

Re: A simple thank you
 

Please don't bother trying to scare me with such tales, I've been around Star Trek vs. Star Wars debates on usenet far too long for such tactics to bother me.

Re: A simple thank you
 

My most successful thread... I wonder why I'm not proud...

Re: A simple thank you
 

So do you think it worked well then ?
I thought so i just ask because i remember that Blizzard thought that closed B-net is save in general but after some time the weirdest hacks occured and ruined the game when there were suddenly weapons which did 2000 or more damage etc. .

And could Illwinter/Shrapnel then do something similiar that at least the people who want to play MP have to buy Dominions 3 ? I think this would result in at least slightly higher sales too http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif .

Re: A simple thank you
 

As it happens, Dominions already has a specific protection for MP play, since the 2.08 patch; I do not know the specifics however.

Re: A simple thank you
 

Shrapnel isn't remotely close to large enough to be able to afford to create the server farms needed for even a small-scale Version of that sort of thing. If they cannot afford to invest the resources to provide electronic downloads, nor are willing to take the risk, what makes you think they could do centralized server gaming (which is costlier and riskier)?

Re: A simple thank you
 

You had really good intentions. It's hardly your fault that the thread got hijacked into a discussion of what they could do rather than what they have already done. OTOH, it seems inevitable, given that thoughts of the past often spur people to ponder the future. And thus one topic leads to another. Heh. Looked at that way, you should have known better. It's all your fault! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: A simple thank you
 

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gifI'll restate what's already been said. We do offer some of our games via download. The reason a select few of our titles are available by download is not because we "cannot afford to invest the resources." I think our stance on this has been addressed in earlier Posts. Are we willing to "take the risk"? What's risks are you referring to? The risk of a high rate of customer dissatisfaction?

Re: A simple thank you
 

It will help if you keep in mind that there is "copy protection" against legal owners making casual copies for their buddies, and there is "crack protection" against pirates. Dominions does have a level of crack protection involved with the serial key which fights pirated copies. But they do not try to stop you from putting the game anywhere you want or making backup copies.

Re: A simple thank you
 

Fine, I'll rise to the bait by responding with "what dissatisfaction?" You mean the "dissatisfaction" of all the Dom 2 players who download the demo (which someone pointed out is about the same size as the regular Version of the game), fall in love with it, and then buy the game? The "dissatisfaction" of all the Dom 2 players who have to resort to masses of player-written documentation because of all the critical info needed to be able to successfully play the game in MP that is not present in the manual, said maunal being a key reason which Richard (and others) cite as to why a fully-working Version of Dom 2 isn't made available for download? The "dissatisfaction" in having to download a large file, when the demo is of comparable size? The "dissatisfaction" in having too many people queued up waiting to download patches, when I've yet to see anyone complain about such a thing?

So I ask you, what "dissatisfaction" are you referring to? So far, the only "dissatisfaction" I've seen mentioned on this forum is from people wishing for, what to them is, a more convenient and speedy way to get the game they want.

Yes, Annette, I'm well aware of Shrapnel's stance. Excuse me if I don't happen to agree with it, nor the justifications that have been used in support of it. You're entitled to your position. And, while I honestly like Shrapnel and its contribution to the gaming industry, please don't expect all of your customers to meekly accept everything that officials of Shrapnel say as Indisputable Truth merely because you (that's a general 'you', not you personally) say it. I gave up blind obedience and unquestioning belief well over three decades ago when I broke with Catholic church doctrine, and over two decades ago when I left the Republican party. Even in the military one is permitted (to a point), and even encouraged (to a degree), to question what one is told.

Re: A simple thank you
 

Is the key somehow checked ?
Cause there are key generators for almost everything http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif .
For Diablo 2 e.g. though thnx to the CD-key check each time you played in battle.net at least if you wanted to play MP you were almost forced to buy a copy afaik .

If anyway possible i would wish a small official server for Dominions 3 anyway and if Illwinter would then check the cd-keys would hopefully result in a bit more sales .

Re: A simple thank you
 

Yes. I said that in my Last reply to you.

What makes you think that it might increase sales? What makes such a system better than what you can now do with Dom 2?

Re: A simple thank you
 

I hesitate to post here, as my Posts usually end discussions for some reason, http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smirk.gif but here goes...

Well, since Arryn thinks we (that's a personal 'we', not a general 'we') are lying to all of you I will answer her arguments for the others here that want more information as to our philosophy regarding downloads and who might entertain that we know a little about this business.

1. We have offered downloads in the past and still do, although our download games are also offered as physical product now. The games we offered as purely downloads are the worse selling games we have ever had. Why is that? We believe there are two main reasons. One, the fact that a whole lot of people don't like downloads (see 2 below) and two, the ease of piracy as the manual is in electronic format.

2. The games that are offered as either download or physical product are sold as physical product 4 to 1 over downloads. Why is that? Our guess is most people want physical product. When they spend money, they want something they can hold in their hands.

3. Downloads as a percentage of those games unit sales create over 10 times the customer service requests as do physical products. Add to that the increase in behind the scenes man hours of maintaing the servers for downloads and you have a big expense in downloadable products. This is not a bigger expense than offering physical product, which is quite expensive also, but on a par. So if we aren't saving money and we get more sales with physical products, why do downloads? Due to these facts, in June, I (that's a personal 'I', not a general 'I') made the decision that we would offer no new downloadable games. Expansions, however, may still be offered as downloads, we haven't decided yet on the avenue to take with them.

We are working on the finishing touches on our first MMP offering with our own dedicated servers (look for an announcement later this month) so we are probably a wee bit larger than Arryn thinks.

Oh and Arryn, if you are still reading this, please stop the flaming that is going on in this thread. Or I will stop it. And that is a personal 'I'.

There are some good discussions here folks. Please don't let my post end them.

Regards,

Tim Brooks
President
Shrapnel Games, Inc.

Re: A simple thank you
 

Tim: If you're going to be putting up the infrastructure for a MMP, I wonder if it would be too much to ask that Shrapnel run a dedicated Dom2 server. The community currently has access to the server run by St. Esben, but the demand for server time is greater than the supply. I've no clue whether you could justify the expense, but I thought I'd ask anyway http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: A simple thank you
 

Shrapnel has a number of games which could use a good PbEM game site. Dominions 2 and Space Empires IV are probably the 2 biggest crowds (both excellent games and for many of the same reasons if you want to check them out).

Thats why Ive been pushing for some of us to come together and create a generic web structure that can easily support adding different games.
http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/thr...93&fpart=1
Ive searched and searched, and Im very surprised that there doesnt seem to be one. The closest I could come up with as a ready-made package was one of the BBS packages which would amount to basically being a web-forum allowing uploads.

I would like to see one written as SysAdmin-upward (making best use of having the whole machine to itself), rather than WebMaster-downward (which is best for a package you might add to a machine as a user). I have a dedicated server I can use for it.

Re: A simple thank you
 

This has been an interesting thread for me (other than the flame war, which is actually the first really serious-seeming one that I've seen on a Shrapnel forum - usually people here are remarkably polite and reasonable - probably why I keep coming back).

I'm particularly interested because I've experienced all three of the distribution methods being discussed here, and I'm curious as to why some some methods seem to be prefered by people.

I've bought most games in retail stores, in fact, I bought GalCiv that way - which I did not like a fraction as much as I liked SE IV, truth be known. And I didn't see much different about GalCiv than your general retail game. Needed to be patched, and generally paid a lot of money for something i ended up not being crazy about - par for the course.

I bought Dom2 through Shrapnel's website, after I got the demo in PC Gamer. Played the demo until I loved it so much I had to buy the game, then bought the game Online - my first Online purchase - and now comes the kicker - waited 2 weeks to get the game, because I live in a small town in Canada and they apparently carried my copy to me ON FOOT!

But that wait did give me a chance to play the demo through, oh, 40 times or so. So basically I experienced all the drawbacks of the on-line system; I was reluctant to order something on-line, had to wait a long time for my product and even had to use customer service for my out-of-US credit card.

And guess what, they were great! Shrapnel was very responsive and helped me out - which is big for me, as I'm a customer service manager - and I was fully happy when I finally got my order.

And I ordered SE IV not too long after- no fear or worries this time, and it only took a week. No problem after the Last time. All the problems i had didn't turn me off one bit from ordering Online - why? Because the product was great - the service was great and the support was great.

Now, I've also gotten software Online via DD, and haven't been much impressed - albeit that it was mostly apps. Long download times (even now that i'm on ADSL) for the complex stuff, and exactly the same reluctance to provide credit card info Online. So how is direct download better? If you want this game - or any other Shrapnel Game - you'll buy it, hells with how you have to do it.

I thought the real problem with Shrapnel was not their distribution - which keeps their costs down and lets them pay devs more, but their marketing. Lets face it, for a lot of people, they go and browse the game store and see if anything looks cool, and that's how they find out about stuff, or they hear about it on game review sites or in magazines. I'm a serious strategy game player and I'd never heard of Shrapnel until I saw the demo in PCG (I think it was PCG anyways, quite a while ago).

I don't think Shrapnel needs to put games on shelves in stores, or allow you to download their games directly, although both I'm sure open up their own portion of market share - they need to make more great games and get the word out there through marketing that they exist - Field of Dreams was wrong - you have to build it AND tell them about it, before they come... How you get them to it will work itself out, because people will come to quality.

We all did.

Well, that's my rant. And let me do what this thread was intended to do in the first place - say "Thanks Illwinter, thanks Shrapnel - thanks to all the forum junkies. I spend more time than is healthy here, and I don't feel bad about it at all."

Re: A simple thank you
 

Wow, back on topic after 6 pages- I can't belive it!

Re: A simple thank you
 

It's almost all on topic. Some of it is merely ... palatable. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

And say,QM! When is the next Twilight due, since you say your email of working? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

Re: A simple thank you
 

We are looking at this. It is something we have wanted to do for a while now and have it on our list. But doing it right takes time.

Re: A simple thank you
 

Murph:

We actually do alot of marketing - the PC Gamer Demo was how you heard about us right? The problem is we are dealing in niche markets, and there is no good way to reach the niches. You either have to pay alot of money through magazine ads to reach a small percentage of potential customers, or rely on reviews to do this for you. PCG or CGW wants close to $20,000 for a full page ad, and we reach mainly people that aren't even interested in our type of products. It just doesn't make sense to do this.

The hardest thing we do is try to find avenues to reach our niche customer base that is cost effective. The best ways we have found to do this is through paid search engine listings. Truth be told, the fans themselves (word of mouth) equates to more sales than anything we do marketing wise.

Re: A simple thank you
 

This thread became interesting again... Thanks Shrapnel ! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

I'm an advocate of downloadable products, but that may be because
1/ I'm not in the US so have difficulty finding some of *my niche* games
2/ I've a good DSL bw and I'm savvy enough with tech things to manage that without too much problems
3/ I don't fear buying Online (much less than carrying banknotes in my wallet in fact http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif )
4/ I'm not convinced that piracy would make a sensible hit to games like Shrapnel's ones - the guys pirating that woul anyway never have bought the game whatsoever, at 99%...

But I agree that the tech infrastructure isn't quite ready, and requires too much investment for a company like Shrapnel when compared to possible profit.
Some people (Stardock-type) will have offer other companies secure and efficient d/l platforms to make this profitable to small publishers- and big ones will surely be scared to death by piracy issue for some years more http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/eek.gif !

BTW Tim if you want a full page in PC4War, the French mag which has proudly edited more than 20 pages on Dom2 in 3 issues http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif, sure it's less than 20K $ !!

Re: A simple thank you
 

I must concur with PDF about the usefulness of downloadable products, though Shrapnel games can actually be bought outside the US without having to put a mortgage on your house (the format of the games do help to cut down on shipping rates, and some countries have their own stores to avoid annoying things such as duty taxes and the like).

On the other hand, I recall one independent adventure game sold for 30 euros (pretty cheap), and where the shipping cost was also of 30 euros, plus various banking fees and the usual duty taxes. Am I the only one who finds this to be a tad bit expensive? Oops, it looks like I am starting a rant about my main pet peevee.

Re: A simple thank you
 

About the book as a copy protection and why I bought Dom2:

I am severely annoyed by the incompleteness of the Dom2-Manual and I am craving for a merge with Liga's excellent manual addenda (BTW: Thanks to Liga!)- but there wont be any, since on the one hand the manual is not available electronically and on the other hand selling a cheap revised manual would disable its copy-protecting function. This is very sad. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif Any solution here?

Maybe Shrapnel could sell cheap revised paper manuals to owners sending in their CD-Key as legitimisation, but the bureaucratic overhead would make that probably more expensive than the game itself. Printed manuals are also bad since they tend not to keep up with the patches as well.

Conclusion: I like printed manuals and I think I have bought games just because of printed manuals before, but this would have not been the case with Dom2 if I had learned about the game from a friend who would have had the manual: I hardly use the Dom2 manual, but I definitely rely on Zen's freely available MagicItem/SummonMonster documents above anything else, since they give an digestible overview over all the possibilites - especially to know these facts in advance before researching/empowering and exploring manually! Without those, I couldnt play! BTW: Thanks to Zen!!!


--------------


So to give a complete feedback about a humble customers perception of why I bought Dom2, here is my view. I bought Dom2 because:

• Its a pretty good game. (BTW: Thanks to Illwinter!!!)
• I think it is a must to support smaller enterprises. My father once had a small scale craftsman's enterprise before retirement. Hence I still avoid big super-stores in favour of small shops on almost any kind of good. I also buy Audio CDs from non-mainstream bands much faster.
• Word of mouth. Someone recommended it in the Warlords4 forum. Aftewards I spread the game among all my friends vigorously. I also saw a good review in a major german IT-magazine, but that was already too late - I had already purchased the game.
• The demo. Paying for something I cannot test has given me bad surprises (eg. Warlords4 - as mentioned by someone else above I thought "4 is good (or at least as good as 3)". It wasnt, but that in turn made we aware of Dom2!). So either a demo or a 'friend's copy' are a must for me to buy a game now. However, I also gave away my CDKey to a few trusted friends in order to get them hooked on the game and/or to set up a server which I cannot. Some of them bought Dom2 now, some dont play at all. Somehow people always prefer the 'real thing', although I do not understand it myself since the liberal Dom2-Demo allows quite extensive testing (but does not solve the problem of letting a non-player setting up a server http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif ).
• CD-Key-check introduced with the patch helped me to convince some friends to buy their own copy in the end. Sad but true. The downside here is that only few fellows thus delayed others buying it - either all buy it together or no one at all. Still the CD-Key-check is a perfectly acceptable thing for me, as it doesnt prohibit me to play at home on my desktop and while travelling on my latop. This is important! And I dont even need to remember to carry the CD with me. Well-done in my opinion!

The way of distribution is not a factor for me:
Either I want to buy it or I dont. Once I've made this decision, I take a look at that aspect of distribution. Usually I like to go to the game shop next door to order a specific game. I dont play that many games, so I do not browse for games in shops. For Dom2, I needed to order it from a german web-seller recommended here in this forum a while ago. This was unconvenient because of the german law which requires complex age-verification, but it wouldnt have changed my mind. A download is nice, but I dont like it for the fear of conncetion-breakdown. In the end, the german web-seller was even cheaper than buying directly from Shrapnel (taking post&packing, PayPal US/EUR conVersion and Shrapnels irregular appearing 10% discount offers into account).

Re: A simple thank you
 

There is a difference between marketing and publicity. Both are things that the publisher handles. Publicity requires time and effort, while Marketing requires money (ads, visits). If you remember, companies like Intel had full page ads for every one of their titles in every game magazine and they went bankrupt. An extreme example I know but it points out the diffrence. Marketing is like chain-store retail. It serves to increase brand-name and logo recognition, but it creates a larger gap before there are profit checks in the mail. Its all gambling.

I think Shrapnel does the publicity very well. I dont think there is a game magazine or major game site or forum or games newsgroup that you cant do a search for Dominions on. And the info is correct (you would be amazed at how many emails it takes to correct little things). If you see any gaps, let us know.

Im outside my element (I should stick to talking about servers) but I think marketing would be more than a decision of the publisher. Since it involves money-investment it would be more of a discussion between publisher and developer. Just a guess

Re: A simple thank you
 

As a shareholder of Intel, I'd say that the world's biggest chipmaker being bankrupt might be news to a lot of folks. Did you, perchance, mean "Interplay"?

Re: A simple thank you
 

Yes sorry. I meant InterPlay

Re: A simple thank you
 

Niche markets have their problems, but throw in a niche customer and you have a problem. I live in Kenya and like the turn based strategy game niche and find it hard to buy any game software, never mind within our little niche! Recognizing that I am an unusual and rather small market, I will still throw out my two bits.

Game software is pretty much not available here, with the occasional pirated CD coming in from the Far East. If I want legitimate games, I can do one of three things. One, download. Two, mail order. Three, fly to Europe or North America and buy retail.

This year I took my vacation in Zimbabwe, so I did not get to do my yearly pilgrimage to a games store and I am hurting for new games. I have used mail order before, Dom II and SEIV amongst others, but things also go missing in the mail at a fairly high frequency. As such, I have been exploring downloading games. From my somewhat arbitrary survey, based upon my tastes, I have found that this is an area which is not terribly well developed on a commercial basis and problems arise fairly often. Good, secures systems may exist, we handle our payroll Online after all, but they are not common. I find downloading to be about as problematic as my regular losses to the Kenyan Postal Service.

As such, I find myself booking a trip in November and planning to get my games that way. Well, actually, Mom put her foot down about not seeing me in over a year, but I will take the opportunity pick up games along the way. What my point is that in locations where the mail service is decent (most of the rest of the world), it would beat my experiences with downloading. I would argue, as a customer, that while downloading is seductive, until the systems improve, mail order is better.

PS Any good games stores in Phoenix? I am stopping there on the way to Mom and Dad in Canada.

Re: A simple thank you
 

I worked in Gabon for about two years and I've been working for four years in the Solomon Islands. One of the problems with downloading games (or any other kind of digital content) is the often poor quality and unreliability of internet connections in these countries.

Re: A simple thank you
 

deccan,

We have direct satellite link (VSAT), so our connection is pretty stable. At least since the admin guys got the genarator fixed...

The government here recently broke up the government monopoly on internet and we are starting to see some really positive changes. Privatization is good. Free trade is good. Those of you who do not believe it should come visit and see where trade protectionism costs lives, not jobs. Sermon finished.

I hope things pick up for your link, it is frustrating to have such a poor connection.

Re: A simple thank you
 

Aye to that! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: A simple thank you
 

Well, that worked better than I thought it would. Back on track and everything, which is good, because this is an interesting thread.

As to publicity and marketing, I know exactly the difficulties being described with niche markets. I'm helping a friend develop a board game for Columbia Games based on the Peloponnesian War (Pre-Roman Athens vs Sparta - but I'm sure most everyone on this forum does NOT need me to tell them that). Board wargaming is as niche as niche markets get, so the way we're doing it is developing the game, setting up options for pre-sales and printing and shipping dependant upon the amount of interest as shown by pre-sales numbers.

Of course, we both have other jobs... But the niche problem is the same. Actually, sometimes the thing to do is really burrow into your specific niche - for example, this game is going to be: 3 hours long, 2-player, at least 2 scenarios, using the core block rules - everything else is up in the air, but with boardgames, you almost have to pick a niche and go with it.

It's not exactly the same with computer games of course, there are notable cross-genre (and what's a genre but a pretty big niche, really) successes - sweet Rome: Total War, my copies in the mail.. But by-en-large, cross-genre is more of a risk than simply doing something within established fields. Hence all the Diablo, or Warcraft or FPS clones out there.

So yes, how do you do niche marketing? Word of mouth is best, really, although making your product available in demo form is a good way to get people (like me) interested. I absolutely agree that a full-page ad in PCG is not the way to go for Dom2, but similarly, neither is investing all the money in server architecture and software development so that a few people can buy and download the game Online. I mean, the point of any business is to figure out the way that works best for you - that is effective both in terms of cost and time and customer happiness. If Shrapnel feels that they found there solid ground on this, wicked, because it means that we can get the benefits of great developers work, AND that they can get the benefits of our cash money.

Oh, and Saxon and deccan, I've been to south america where free trade and privatization, enforced by the World Bank and the WTO have allowed multi-national corporations to gain control of water supplies and other essentials of life. I'm all for limited free trade and privatization, but I have grave concerns about "free" trade that the WTO enforces, which does not allow countries to stop selling products or resources once they start.

I live in an area with vast water and energy resources, and as the water and envery shortages get worse in the next 20 years, I fully expect to see armed US soldiers on the dams and rivers that flow past my door, and free trade will justify their being there. But that's a whole other can of worms.

Re: A simple thank you
 

I'm not sure what that means. How can countries be forced to sell things they no longer want to sell?

Water and energy resources issues are normally subject to specific (and sometimes very old) treaties that fix prices and supplied quantities between countries, hence creating huge distortions, and not directly through free trade (i.e. varying prices and quantities traded according to supply and demand).

But this is really a whole other can of worms.

Start an OT post on this subject and I'll happily jump in. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Re: A simple thank you
 

Perhaps because they're obliged to do so by treaties they've had to sign in exchange of loans and such?

The book's obviously biased, but nevertheless I found Michel Chossudovsky's book "Globalization of Poverty" a good read. If nothing else, at least it gives several case studies on subject of How Can I Totally Mess Up Weaker Economies. Such education is always good for aspiring rulers of the world. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif