Videogame Marketing and PR Vol. 1: Playing to Win

I just received a copy of the Videogame Marketing and PR book in a PDF format.

'The definitive guide to mastering the essentials behind making, marketing and promoting product to the world’s fastest-growing, most exciting entertainment business – the $13.5 billion computer and videogame industry (what is this? SW+HW combined globally or something else?) – is finally here. Everything you need to play with the pros is right at your fingertips. The future of interactive entertainment is clearly headed towards easieruser interfaces and more accessible games. People want to play what they want, when they want.'

The name of the file 'Sell more videogames' is inviting especially since I wrote an entry on Burger King games to the Nyt pelittää blog (yes, it's in Finnish) and got a number of comments related to the topic in general.

At this point I cannot share the wisdom related to how to top the charts, improve review scores or inspire millions of fans. Anyhow while browsing the pages I noticed a number of 'future predictions'. They are always interesting and I have written about the future of games before so here we go. Maybe this will help to figure out what type of games to make in able to top the scores?

'The kicker being that convergence is inevitably the future – just not of the kind most companies envision, pumping millions into ill-advised Hollywood spin-offs without understanding that it’s the theme and end product, not name-brand talent or red carpet premiers, which ultimately
drive videogame sales.'

'This year, next year, 2012 – every single one of these now seemingly avant-garde concepts will be commonplace.'

“I just hope people realize that you can break out of the mold and do stuff that’s
cool and original. Dating simulators – that’s the future...”
— Jeronimo Barrera, Producer, The Warriors/Bully

'In terms of the future of game marketing, I’m sure the new bullsh*t bingo words are “UGC” and “social networking.” Consumers want to create or tailor marketing messages to be meaningful to them specifically.'

'For mobile providers, connected gaming across various platforms is the future.'

Lessons to be learned? New innovations are old ideas? The same old same? When are we starting to really consider WHO is the gamer? For whom are we actually designing games? Project Horseshoe is a nice source for such information. Check out their ideas of building innovative games.