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Okay folks I see a pattern here I guess its all about advertising!

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 10:59
monkey man
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Well
I have spent some time on these forums and have looked at all the creative games that everyone has created.

After all my research i think it comes down to 1 thing

ADVERTISING

there are some great and not so great ideas here but no one knows about them.

What can we as a collective whole do?

I can use a sniper rifle and pick off a bunch of folks and on the news talk about BGDF ( a little extreme I admit) I keep going back to the fact as a whole we have power as individuals we cannot be heard.

Any thoughts???

Wes

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 11:32
#1
devin
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so what

what do you want to do
like i could put a link to this site on face book
or just make a blog

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 12:04
#2
monkey man
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I am thinking much bigger

I think we should pool or resources and get some serious national exposure.

Qvc, or something like that. Make our own boardgame channel.

Yes it will cost money but a little from everyone may go a long ways

unless i am completely stupid and this isn't a forum where we help each other and it's just everybody for themselves and if so, well then I guess nothing will get accomplished!

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 13:14
#3
Brykovian
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I think we need to start with

I think we need to start with a definition of what the BGDF is for. In my opinion, it has mainly been focused on game design, and not quite as much on game publishing.

Of course, it's not like self-publishing or selling games is ever discouraged. But, I see it similar to the difference between being a song writer and a musical performer. Some do both ... but there are a lot of talented song writers who simply work directly with an artist (or label) and are not out there booking gigs and selling records.

In your other similar thread, larienna suggested finding a way to get a game broker familiar with BGDF and to work essentially as BGDF's "standing broker". I think that might be a more beneficial approach than QVC or other end-product-sales-oriented exposure.

There are a small handful of game publishers -- such as Z-Man and the new Tasty Minstrel Games -- who are already aware of BGDF and have tapped its members for their talent. Expanding this sort of exposure among the publishers would be a good avenue, imo.

There has been discussions in the past of having a BGDF-sponsored annual design contest -- a sort of "American Hippodice", but the planning discussions bogged down in logistics and other complexities (not to mention realization of the sheer amount of work needed to pull something like that off).

So ... I do like your "we should work together to get better exposure" thinking ... but think we need to narrow-in on exactly what sort of exposure would fit best.

I think it's worthy of some continued discussion.

-Bryk

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 13:55
#4
simpson
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there are some great and not

Quote:
there are some great and not so great ideas here but no one knows about them.

Two things:
1. Design/Development portals generally are isolated away from enthusiast sites. Most video gamers don't go to a video game dev site for info on their passion -- they go to review & preview sites.

2. Designers/Developers/Publishers know about the site. Like Bryk says, publishers & design teams have worked with a number of people here on the site. If you personally want to work on a design team, then its up to you to get involved -- network with other designers, there is no signup sheet.

Don't get me wrong, I think getting some designers together to work collectively on projects or even having a short-run production studio would be snazzy. But realistically, you would have to expand game design into team management, logistics, financial, marketing...from what most would consider a hobby or weekend market.

simpson

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 13:56
#5
metzgerism
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monkey man wrote:Well I have

monkey man wrote:
Well
I have spent some time on these forums and have looked at all the creative games that everyone has created.

After all my research i think it comes down to 1 thing

ADVERTISING

there are some great and not so great ideas here but no one knows about them.

What can we as a collective whole do?

I can use a sniper rifle and pick off a bunch of folks and on the news talk about BGDF ( a little extreme I admit) I keep going back to the fact as a whole we have power as individuals we cannot be heard.

Any thoughts???

Wes

I don't think you really GET what this place is for. It's not necessarily about the "collective whole," it's about various individuals coming to BGDF and making the games that they create better. Nobody's going to come by BGDF and magically publish the first game that they see prototyped in photo, that'd be stupid.

I really don't understand this groupthink mentality - your game creations are your own, and you should be glad that you have a forum in which to discuss them and fine-tune them.

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 14:35
#6
monkey man
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well I bet you would be a

well I bet you would be a kick in the pants to party with.

I appreciate your negativity as far as building your own ideas. But the subtext here is not about building the games, it's about selling the games.
Boardgame designers that don't work for Mattel Hasbro or whomever have a pretty darn difficult time.

Very few people would want to co create games, but a service like gamecrafter(which is a great idea on the surface) is a way to help people. It is a good way for people to sell them. Problem not many people have never heard of gamecrafter or tasty minstreal games or whomever. But I have a mailing list of about 2500 and guess what now they have.

So if this is a place for people to run "ideas" up the flagpole why would you treat this idea like a red headed step child?

Wes

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 14:42
#7
Dralius
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monkey man wrote:But I have a

monkey man wrote:
But I have a mailing list of about 2500 and guess what now they have.

2500 random people or 2500 people that you have a resaon to believe have an interest in games?

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 15:17
#8
metzgerism
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monkey man wrote:well I bet

monkey man wrote:
well I bet you would be a kick in the pants to party with.

I appreciate your negativity as far as building your own ideas. But the subtext here is not about building the games, it's about selling the games.
Boardgame designers that don't work for Mattel Hasbro or whomever have a pretty darn difficult time.

Way to pull the straw man.

If you go back and read what I said, and then read your original post, you might actually understand what I meant. Of course, given what you just said and how you wrote it, I'm having doubts.

Why would I be opposed to people developing their own ideas and be active on BGDF?

monkey man wrote:
Very few people would want to co create games, but a service like gamecrafter(which is a great idea on the surface) is a way to help people. It is a good way for people to sell them. Problem not many people have never heard of gamecrafter or tasty minstreal games or whomever. But I have a mailing list of about 2500 and guess what now they have.

So if this is a place for people to run "ideas" up the flagpole why would you treat this idea like a red headed step child?

Wes


1) Everyone active here knows about Game Crafter and Tasty Minstrel.
2) I think that a lot of people would want to co-create games, including myself. The problem is that generally I don't want to co-create the games with a non-established designer that I know simply from the internet. If I'm going to get a co-design going, my best friends or game group will be helping me out.
3) I treat it like a red-headed stepchild because this site is about designer co-consultation and development of a game design, from inspiration to publication. I'm really not sure what it's missing, it's not BGG after all and making a "union" for ludographers is a little much.

I don't know what else to say...basically, this site is what it is (a resource and community), and I really don't know what else you want it to be.

EDIT: An idea is only an idea until it is developed into a game. Pitching and selling "ideas" doesn't get you anywhere. It has to be developed first, and that's what BGDF is for.

It's easy to come up with ideas (themes or mechanics) but it's hard to actually make a succinct game out of them. Hell it's easy to go to the hardware store and buy several buckets of paint, but throwing them all at the wall isn't going to make art (notable exception being Jackson Pollock).

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 15:49
#9
gameprinter
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Yes. It's all about advertising.

Interesting discussion on what the role of BGDF should be. I'll stick to the original post topic though and just say that yes, it's all about advertising and marketing. This is the main argument against self-publishing. You can build a better Moustrap game, but the world will not beat a path to your door. You can come up with a really awesome game design and sell 2500 copies. You can get a Shrek license and print Shrek bingo and sell 100,000 copies. Is it a shame? Yes. Is it the truth? As far as I can tell.

As a whole, "niche" market board and card games are getting loads of press this year. Purple Pawn did a great state by state breakdown of local press articles on board games recently. With all this exposure, I think we're going to see a slow turning towards adults playing games, which will change the product mix of mass market sellers, which will mean good games selling more copies. Mattel is already working this angle, since Hasbro has locked up the kids' market.

That said, I don't think this change will happen overnight. Nor do I think that all games will benefit equally. The mass market is still not ready for Agricola - if only because it's price point is too high. The price point for mass market is still going to be under $30. Even produced in large quantity, some great games are not going to get that low.

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 19:50
#10
InvisibleJon
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Can you develop it further? Set specific goals and milestones?

monkey man wrote:
I think we should pool or resources and get some serious national exposure.

QVC, or something like that. Make our own boardgame channel.

Yes it will cost money but a little from everyone may go a long ways

I admire and respect your enthusiasm. I encourage you to develop the idea further, with specific goals and specific steps to reach those goals. I know that I'd need to see a more detailed plan before I'd invest any serious amount of time (let alone money) in it.

Consider answering questions like:

• What (Be specific!) would you like to advertise, and what would be the purpose of the campaign?
• Who is the target market?
• What do you want your target market to do after experiencing the ad? What is their "call to action"?
• What benefit do the financial backers of the ad campaign receive? What's in it for them? (Money, status, reputation, etc.)

A long time ago, a good friend told me that writing a good business plan is the art of putting black stuff on white pieces of paper that looked so good that it makes people want to give you little green pieces of paper. That's the opportunity you have here. You have an interesting idea, but it's still vague and fuzzy around the edges. Take your idea and refine it. Give it a specific form. Polish it and make it shine. Make it so irresistible that every person on the forum who reads it says, "Wow! That can't possibly fail! I've got to get on board with it!"

I wish you the best of luck.

Jonathan

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 20:04
#11
apeloverage
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I think there are two groups here:

i) people who've designed a ready-to-sell game

ii) people who are working on/have an idea for/years ago made one (or many).

I'd put myself in group ii , and I'd suggest that most people on this site are in this position as well. I have copious notes for a game, but it's a few projects away from being made.

Whereas the original poster is talking about activities to help group i.

The existence of some way of promoting games might encourage some of group ii to pull their finger out and get their game finished - just as lulu can encourage people to finish their book. However I think that most people on this site would be better served by activities to help people get from group ii to group i.

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Thu, 07/30/2009 - 20:25
#12
metzgerism
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Great quote on a business

Great quote on a business plan.

I'm not trying to stir anything up here, believe me. I just don't think that BGDF needs to be anything "larger" than it is right now. If you wanted to make a board-game design guild similar to the SAZ (http://www.s-a-z.de), then that's a different story.

But it's the BGDF, where the "F" stands for forum, not union, not guild. It's an area for revealing concepts and presenting designs. It's a soapbox/debate discussion area. There's no leadership, we're just fellow designers discussing how to design.

/end own soapbox.

Licensed games have kicked ass but with Catan going mega-hit recently, there's a market for something new. Consider it to be much like the videogame market for now, where licensed games sell, but people want the good stuff now.

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Fri, 07/31/2009 - 10:35
#13
monkey man
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I am not trying to reinvent the wheel here

Yes Iagree this forum is a forum for game developers, but my theory is that there are a lot of group ii developers that would love an oppurtunity to make thier game a reality as well as group i who have a tremendous amount of trouble getting people to notice them.

I have found a web based radio group that a person could produce thier own radio show, actually thier own station that could be committed to boardgames developers and players.
Interviews, commercials, tailk show etc. dedicated to the boardgame industry.

www.wirewaves.com

maybe something like this would be beneficial to us all. And benefiting all is not a bad thing.
There are some here for self and some who see the game industry as a whole and could see the benifit for themselves and others by enlightining the general public to the fact games are fun, family entertainment.(holy cow my kid can read and stragegize)

I mean in this economy aren't we all starting to realize spending time is better than spending money. $50.00 to go to movie 2 hours vs.
$50.00 for a boardgame that can be played for 100's of hours.

again I am not trying to reinvent the wheel it's just that this forum has some like minded people. I am in no way trying to change that just using it as a launch pad for a new idea to benefit all.

And yes 2500 customers who have bought my games, henceforth are people who would be interested in games.

I am also aware that everyone on this forum knows of gamecrafter etc.

But I want the public to be aware. Why? simple answer the more who know, the more will buy!

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