Is the Media destroying the game industry?

One of the key factors that you’ll notice in this industry is that if your game does not have the right PR behind it, the game won’t sell. Even with the right marketing stragety main-stream websites and magazines may not publish anything about the game.

In the case of EDI’s Morning’s Wrath, our first PR went out near the release of the game October 2005. It wasn’t until I sent Gamespot.com 3 copies of the same PRs that they publish a page about the game in December 2005. Now with Malathedra Gamespot along with other major websites still have yet to publish anything about the title even though it was announced on June 1st 2006.

How are developers supposed to reach the gaming audience when the media doesn’t cover their game?

Author: DaveWeLike

I'm the editor of StuffWeLike.com.

4 thoughts on “Is the Media destroying the game industry?”

  1. You must whore yourself out to the industry.

    Send them a free demo copy of the game. And then keep pestering them to play it and try it. With product in hand, they are more likely to do something about it. But a busy site like GameSpot doesn’t have all the time in the world for the small independent developers, such as your game.

    I’m sure if you had ties to EA or something, then maybe you’re game would’ve gotten some coverage sooner. But that’s not even the point. So you got coverage, congrats, but people have to look at it. You need to advertise places so people know about it and become interested. Then they’ll start looking around, and then your game might start doing well.

    I don’t know I could just be babbling, but uh, yeah. Good luck with the game industry thing. =)

  2. Media coverage isn’t a right, and naturally those who can have bigger ad budgets will get bigger coverage. Getting any coverage at all without a promise of full-page ad buys says something about how your game might appeal to their audience, though.

  3. Those guys must get a lot of emails. I imagine you almost have to bribe to noticed for an indie game. For an RPG I might fedex a Tokkien’s novel along with a copy of the game. Not sure what you could do for a city building game..;)

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