How turn Dominions from a niche game to an MMO

[alhorro]

It's not so easy to make a niche game widely popular.
I think it's not a secret, that it's possible to run cracked Dom3 absolutely for free (and play MP without any troubles), just a conscience matter. However people even in my country (where vast majority use cracked copies, and buying games = exception) are not eager even to try Dominions.

Shrapnel marketing has always been surprising me. I can't understand why it was llama who'd made the server, but not the official devteam. Additionally it's quite easy even for a single lazy web-developer to make a user-friendly web-interface for finding games, diplomacy, tracking results, etc. After launching such services Shrapnel could buy some articles in popular gaming resources, launch ad and SMO campaigns.

However, in my opinion, it's still possible to make Dominions popular and profitable.

Find a venture investor.

Hire a good manager, some decent interface designers, as-coders and several PR/community managers.

Convert the game into a f2p browser flash game. Seriously. Flash is just enough to handle Dominions client-side. It's also about 50 times easier to make changes and improvements.

Make a killer-ui for everything. Easy-messaging and trade in one-click, auto-saving, history, statistics, gamefinding and subfinding tools, blogs/forums for every game, and much more. Translate the game into all major languages.

Keep tracking players' results with exp system. Allow unlocking some nations, pretender/ingame bonuses, general options with levelling, or alternative buying (this system is most efficient in mmo, proved many times). Bonus points limit is customizable for every game. Levelling gives you several random bonus options (like skills in HoMM, or cards in various CCGs) while purchasing allows getting any particular bonus you want instantly. Exp system also motivates for efficient games and subs, no staling.

Host special games regularly — megagames, interesting scenarios, mods, tournaments. Charge some money for participating.

Maintain massive ad and SMO campaigns. One banner with a hot chick and loud words on some popular entertainment site could bring more players, than all our puny attempts to convince friends to start playing.

Dominions have small, but very loyal and selective community. And we could be a base for a much bigger startup.