Gw Temp

WuJing makes an article on how to sell yourself. Erhm..yeah, original, nah it's about how to get people to join your game group, successfully.

You’ve finished your game now all is in readiness! You got the stand-alone game ready, you got the zip file ready to distribute, and you upload and get ready to post it on several forums so people can see. Wait, maybe your game is just starting and you need to gather a team together. You have your idea written out and ready to share. It is in these stages that the most neglected part of game making takes place. The advertisement stage!

As amateur game makers, you get the chance to learn a whole slew of nifty game making skills. You learn to make graphics, you learn to write music, and you learn to do so many things. One thing that most people don’t seem to learn is how to advertise themselves and their ideas. This is a crucial skill and can make or break a game in several ways.

The first hint to advertising yourself is in your proposal. Maybe you’re planning to gather a team for your game; well this is where a lot of mistakes are made. You must sell yourself for people to want to join with you. You must follow these simple tips:

1) NEVER seem like you’re out of control. People don’t want to join a group where it seems like the leader can’t lead. Make sure you seem calm and have answers ready. Even if you are sweating from stress and you have no idea what’s going on, the appearance you show to others as the leader is the emotion they will emulate. If you’re stressed they are stressed. If you’re calm, they are calm.
2) NEVER be stupid about your own idea. “I don’t know” does not go over well. If someone has a question, do your best to answer it. If you don’t know the answer, then stall for time. “Well, I don’t have the information on me at the moment, I’ll get back to you on that at such and such time…” and then FIND THE ANSWER.
3) GRAMMAR, SPELLING, AND ENGLISH (or French if you’re yellow)! The biggest turn off to joining a project is when the author of a thread misspells words and shortens others. Nothing is worse than “PLZ join my group, k?” or “My group is incredibled. You shuld join.” PLEASE use a spell checker. A good clue for a grammar check is to read what you wrote out loud. If it’s grammatically incorrect you’ll notice it.
4) Be friendly. It is AMATEUR game making after all, not a serious game making company. The more fun and friendly a group seems the more that a person would want to join.

So you’ve got your group, you made you game… SUCCESS! Its finished, its time to put it out to the general public. This is a very important stage. A good advertisement will make people want to download your game. Here are some rules to adhere to:

1) GRAMMAR, SPELLING, AND ENGLISH (or Chinese if you deliver fast food)! Again, the biggest turn off to a project is the author of its advertisement making grammatical errors and shortening words. It’s just such an important thing that I had to mention it twice.
2) Don’t try to sound high and mighty. It sounds like a no-brainer, but in reality people do it all the time. If you come off like your game is God’s gift to gamers then people are going to make sure to find every problem with your game and point it out to you.
3) DO NOT talk about its shortcomings. If someone asks about this problem or that, discuss, but in the main advertisement do not even mention how this isn’t so good or this doesn’t measure up to that.
4) Don’t take criticism personally. If something is not so good, and someone mentions it don’t get into an argument. Someone might think twice about downloading a game knowing that there is something so bad in it that it sparked an argument (and if they do download it, it might be for the wrong reason).
5) Make everything sound really exciting. Use a lot of exotic words and phrases. Use your skills of communications to make everything sound twice as good as it really is. Don’t say “This hamburger is really good,” say “This scrumptious hamburger just makes me melt into a tongue orgasm (not sexually!)”

Well, that’s really about it. Advertisement is all about drawing someone else in. Don’t write what you think is good or what you like, but tell the audience what they want to hear and what they like. Getting others to have interest in your ideas is all about selling yourself, so get out to that gaming corner and whore it up!

-WuJing