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Marketing Sandbox Ideas

Posted: October 9th, 2013, 10:28 am
by Mike
What ideas do people have on how we can help the public learn about Sandbox? What webpages should we post on? Who should we contact? Who is willing to help spread the word?

Marketing Ideas -
Create a marketing team
Sandbox Twitch Stream (s)
Try to get into magazines
Gaming Webpages (Any suggestions?)

Re: Marketing Sandbox Ideas

Posted: October 10th, 2013, 5:31 pm
by personman61
I heard of http://www.polycount.com from dota 2 items; mabye this is more of the target market you are looking for. Plus, they probably can help add more free models.
Have you tried talking to other game companies or indie game makers. Get help from people who have shown their game to the world. I would love also to see some other companies' support with models from their own games.#HowCoolWouldThatBe :idea:
I would like to see more videos about the scripting for idiots like me. :lol:

Re: Marketing Sandbox Ideas

Posted: October 10th, 2013, 5:47 pm
by Mike
Thanks!! Maybe I can offer to pay them a bit per model and get stuff going like that! Kind of how the Dota2 store works I think. As for the scripts we're actually having a bit of a discussion on possibly using one of the more mainstream scripting languages such as Ruby, Lua, Python, etc. We're trying to evaluate the pros and cons but ease of use and power are definitely huge factors. We want to make it as easy as possible to make the game you want!

Re: Marketing Sandbox Ideas

Posted: October 10th, 2013, 5:47 pm
by Mike
Thanks!! Maybe I can offer to pay them a bit per model and get stuff going like that! Kind of how the Dota2 store works I think. As for the scripts we're actually having a bit of a discussion on possibly using one of the more mainstream scripting languages such as Ruby, Lua, Python, etc. We're trying to evaluate the pros and cons but ease of use and power are definitely huge factors. We want to make it as easy as possible to make the game you want!

Re: Marketing Sandbox Ideas

Posted: October 10th, 2013, 6:03 pm
by Captain_Ahab
I'm not sure there is a good answer for these things yet.
What, exactly, is the target audience?
What makes Sandboxgamemaker better than other free alternatives; why should anyone pay money for Sandbox?
How would the software be used? Will solo play, or on-line play dominate?

Until those things can be answered concisely, marketing will be disorganized.

Given that Sandbox has always been aimed at the younger audience where Sandbox's speed and extreme ease-of-use is a major asset, I think aiming advertising at education and parents of the young would be most useful. Advanced users would most likely move towards other software, such as Unity, UDK or other more established and advanced engines that are available for individual use at no/low cost.
This strongly implies that development should continue to make the system even easier to use and modify. A more polished interface that is easily themed. A series of easy to understand, yet deep tutorials/tips'n'tricks for map making and game scripting with plenty of examples.

Community contests might aim towards pushing the engine to extremes and make those textures and models available to purchasers with full encouragement that the paid users contribute as well; make paying for the software something like a membership to a sort of club with some benefits.
Close attention to licensing needs to be enforced in whatever form is decided.

Tesseract is shiny, but unfinished as yet with Mr. Eihrul making commits daily and sometimes hourly ( or so it sometimes seems ).
The main feature from that rendering engine is destructible environments without lighting "recalc"s. That should be a feature that is pushed and used in example games even if a full physics engine, like Bullet, isn't used [yet].
That would be something that sets Sandbox above alternatives like Sauerbraten or Red Eclipse and others, and thus more likely to be purchased.

just thoughts off the top of my head.

Re: Marketing Sandbox Ideas

Posted: October 10th, 2013, 6:05 pm
by Captain_Ahab
Mike wrote:Thanks!! Maybe I can offer to pay them a bit per model and get stuff going like that! Kind of how the Dota2 store works I think. As for the scripts we're actually having a bit of a discussion on possibly using one of the more mainstream scripting languages such as Ruby, Lua, Python, etc. We're trying to evaluate the pros and cons but ease of use and power are definitely huge factors. We want to make it as easy as possible to make the game you want!
FICL!
http://ficl.sourceforge.net/
I love FORTH.
and its fast.

Re: Marketing Sandbox Ideas

Posted: October 10th, 2013, 8:40 pm
by personman61
Capt , what I mean by "Target Market" is people who will support the making of the game and the exploration of their own ideas, but still good points to think about. #HatersGoingToHate

And mike, if you use ruby or python, here is a good website I found to teach the languages.http://www.codecademy.com/learn
Glad to help :D

Re: Marketing Sandbox Ideas

Posted: October 10th, 2013, 9:51 pm
by Captain_Ahab
personman61 wrote:Capt , what I mean by "Target Market" is people who will support the making of the game and the exploration of their own ideas, but still good points to think about. #HatersGoingToHate
What I mean by "target market" are the people at whom the marketing efforts are targeted.
Those are the folk who might support Sandbox, but might not, yet may be swayed to our side.
People who "will support the making of the game" have already decided so targeting them will gain little.

On the internet, talk is cheap, so discussing the engine won't sway many people. You have to show them.
The best marketing might be showing off a few well made, high quality videos that demonstrate what the engine is capable of.
That is to say, videos that prove Sandbox is as capable, or more capable than the alternatives. That its easier to get such results is the big selling point.

Re: Marketing Sandbox Ideas

Posted: October 10th, 2013, 10:34 pm
by esequiel14
Promote PAS on youtube more thast how I find it.

Re: Marketing Sandbox Ideas

Posted: October 11th, 2013, 4:33 am
by personman61
Capt is right, more videos.

Here is another website i known about that you may be able to promote sandbox on gamejolt.com