Fortress Forever

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-   -   Ideas for promoting the game (https://forums.fortress-forever.com/showthread.php?t=20474)

Mikael_hs 08-24-2009 12:59 PM

Ideas for promoting the game
 
2.4 is on the go, and once out I think it's a great opportunity to try to increase the playerbase. Anyone got ideas on what can be done here? Spam gameforums? ;P

One thing I think is important is how "newbies" (that might have played public for a while) are welcommed in pickups; I've personally seen how there can be a bit of grumpiness because one team "has to have the newb" = loosing. This could of course easily be avoided by having the newcommer play with all the best players of that particular pickup, which then balances the team. Something every admin should think about frankly... If we ever hope to have leagues again, the transition from pubs to pickups (clanstyle gaming basically) needs to be as smooth and enjoyable as possible.

Firefox11 08-24-2009 01:13 PM

T-Shirts.

Seriously, how's that the FF shirts were never made in the end? I wanted one =/

Ricey 08-24-2009 03:28 PM

What I'll try and do is post some flyers (Nice glossy ones) up in Fullsail's buildings, I gotta get permission first though.

Mikael_hs 08-25-2009 12:47 PM

Fullsail's buildings, what's that?

MonoXideAtWork 08-25-2009 02:50 PM

the buildings on the campus of the fullsail college.

eternity94 08-25-2009 04:26 PM

The problem with marketing FF is that there is not one single theme. Most other well marketed games have a theme to fit along with all the posters and videos. FF does not have a central theme at the moment.

You dont necessarily have to change the gameplay in FF, just stuff like Menus, An opening video. Just stuff that will catch the eye of anybody watching it. Then blitz all known modding sites with the video, that also has a bunch of other gameplay of good players to go along with it.

I can guarantee that you will see more players downloading 2.4 when it comes out if Fortress Forever manages to get a theme.

Gemini Saga 08-25-2009 05:49 PM

I think that FF should be tagged as "more fast paced TF game alternative" or something else. It's necessary to disassociate FF image from TF2 image.

To evaluate differences about these two games and focus them. What is FF strong points like a TF game? What are TF2 differences?

The problem is to captivate new players. Old TFC fans knows about it but newbies not.

Ricey 08-25-2009 05:58 PM

FF just needs porn

MonoXideAtWork 08-25-2009 06:05 PM

show rather than tell. marketing 101.

public_slots_free 08-25-2009 09:29 PM

FF needs more zombies

Credge 08-25-2009 11:42 PM

Hey guys, the best way to advertise FF is to have an incredibly large friends list of those who play TF2 and L4D and then play FF. Whenever I've played FF in the last week or so I've had numerous people ask me what it was.

Whether or not they cared enough to look in to it is a different matter.

Ostrich_Eggs 08-26-2009 01:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ricey (Post 448113)
FF just needs porn

Replace flags with horse dicks. problem solved.

I see at least 10 new people a day that NEVER come back, and that's just what I see. If even one out of those 10 people would stay then we'd have a good community. The biggest complaint I've heard about the game is that it's too confusing. I've heard it multiple times and everyone knows it's true. The lack of any ingame tutorial is inexcusable. It should have been in the game from launch and if not that then 2.0...

Ricey 08-26-2009 03:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ostrich_Eggs (Post 448152)
Replace flags with horse dicks. problem solved.

I see at least 10 new people a day that NEVER come back, and that's just what I see. If even one out of those 10 people would stay then we'd have a good community. The biggest complaint I've heard about the game is that it's too confusing. I've heard it multiple times and everyone knows it's true. The lack of any ingame tutorial is inexcusable. It should have been in the game from launch and if not that then 2.0...

The game it's self is not confusing, you are in a CTF Map, all of the official maps have loading screens that tell ya what to do. What confuses people is the tricks, which is optional in pubs. Status Icons are in the game, which tell you, the flag is here. And even if you didn't know what it was you'd go and try and get there to see what it was. I know this may come off as being a douche bag, but if you can't figure out on your own, then I am sorry go play a game that does allow retarded to rule over everything, AKA WoW.

[SKIP IF YA DON"T WANT TO HEAR A LONG RANT]
Problem with gamers nowadays are that they expect that EVERYTHING should be able to done by EVERYBODY regardless of skill. I'll give an example on what I mean:
I use to play wow, was on a huge server in a top guild, was one of the first to clear MC on the server, WITH 40 people.(I'd go back to my UBRS Raid days, but no thank you) Then BC came out, oh no more 40 Mans! Why? Because people cried because they couldn't do what others put so much time into. Then Wrath came out, they cried because only 11% of the world killed Illidan, (Which I was one of those 11%), then wrath got nerfed in the raiding field, it's now a joke. Hopefully ya see where I am going with this.

We could also look at Halo,i am not a halo player but I understand the game. Halo doesn't have alot of the fancy stuff FF has in terms of skills, but yet it does good. Why? It's backed by a HUGE company with millions to through into advertisement.

The first TFC game I ever played was to sub in for my friend in a PUG, i had no clue what I was doing and got completely OWNED, few games later I understand what was going on and kept playing. I didn't stop playing because I was confused, i kept playing to figure stuff out.

This was oh.. what? 9 fucking years ago? Players today EXPECT to be able to join a game and be able to do everything, and have every little thing handed to em.I repeated my self, zomg
----------------------------

Yell at Squeek for the training, if he still is in control of mapping it. That in it's self takes a massive amount of time and is in no means a small feat, as Squeek has a Person life(LAWL HAHAHA) and other jobs in the team.

I still don't understand how this game is confusing, I can conc, am I the best, no Janick rape's my white ass, but can I pull off some nice ones? Yes. Can i do a max railgun bounce and completely own Squeek, OF COURSE BITCH! railgun_bounce : 100000! CTF? What's confusing about that. AvD, same thing. Follow people see what they do.

I must be a fucking genius if I understand the concepts of a CTF Game



I'm done, i need a fucking beer, SATAN GET ME A HOOKER!


OH, FF NEEDS BETTER ADVERTISEMENT SYSTEM

[AE] 82694 08-26-2009 03:42 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ricey (Post 448156)
I'm done, i need a fucking beer, SATAN GET ME A HOOKER!

Satan is the hooker fool.:shock:

Bridget 08-26-2009 06:46 AM

Small community of decent people > Large community of failures

gibz 08-26-2009 02:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mikael_hs (Post 447994)
Ideas for promoting the game

Shoes.

RunningRabbit 08-26-2009 04:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by eternity94 (Post 448088)
The problem with marketing FF is that there is not one single theme. Most other well marketed games have a theme to fit along with all the posters and videos. FF does not have a central theme at the moment.

You dont necessarily have to change the gameplay in FF, just stuff like Menus, An opening video. Just stuff that will catch the eye of anybody watching it. Then blitz all known modding sites with the video, that also has a bunch of other gameplay of good players to go along with it.

I can guarantee that you will see more players downloading 2.4 when it comes out if Fortress Forever manages to get a theme.

+1'd

OneManArmy 08-26-2009 10:18 PM

I think promoting the game isn't a top priority right now. Helding new players is.
Just imagine how many people leave the game as soon as they realize that they cannot get the basic idea behind this game. FF is completely unintuitive, you can do somewhat well from the beginning only if you played a similar game before. Comprehensive in-game help is a must, another good thing would be organizing IRC channels, dedicated to teaching new players.

Ihmhi 08-26-2009 10:24 PM

It's very much my priority and my job, but it's not easy getting things like writeups.

There's a few behind-the-scenes reasons why P.R. has been sucking lately as well, but there's not much I can do about that.

Epidemic 08-27-2009 01:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ricey (Post 448156)
The game it's self is not confusing, you are in a CTF Map, all of the official maps have loading screens that tell ya what to do. What confuses people is the tricks, which is optional in pubs. Status Icons are in the game, which tell you, the flag is here. And even if you didn't know what it was you'd go and try and get there to see what it was. I know this may come off as being a douche bag, but if you can't figure out on your own, then I am sorry go play a game that does allow retarded to rule over everything, AKA WoW.

[SKIP IF YA DON"T WANT TO HEAR A LONG RANT]
Problem with gamers nowadays are that they expect that EVERYTHING should be able to done by EVERYBODY regardless of skill. I'll give an example on what I mean:
I use to play wow, was on a huge server in a top guild, was one of the first to clear MC on the server, WITH 40 people.(I'd go back to my UBRS Raid days, but no thank you) Then BC came out, oh no more 40 Mans! Why? Because people cried because they couldn't do what others put so much time into. Then Wrath came out, they cried because only 11% of the world killed Illidan, (Which I was one of those 11%), then wrath got nerfed in the raiding field, it's now a joke. Hopefully ya see where I am going with this.

We could also look at Halo,i am not a halo player but I understand the game. Halo doesn't have alot of the fancy stuff FF has in terms of skills, but yet it does good. Why? It's backed by a HUGE company with millions to through into advertisement.

The first TFC game I ever played was to sub in for my friend in a PUG, i had no clue what I was doing and got completely OWNED, few games later I understand what was going on and kept playing. I didn't stop playing because I was confused, i kept playing to figure stuff out.

This was oh.. what? 9 fucking years ago? Players today EXPECT to be able to join a game and be able to do everything, and have every little thing handed to em.I repeated my self, zomg
----------------------------

Yell at Squeek for the training, if he still is in control of mapping it. That in it's self takes a massive amount of time and is in no means a small feat, as Squeek has a Person life(LAWL HAHAHA) and other jobs in the team.

I still don't understand how this game is confusing, I can conc, am I the best, no Janick rape's my white ass, but can I pull off some nice ones? Yes. Can i do a max railgun bounce and completely own Squeek, OF COURSE BITCH! railgun_bounce : 100000! CTF? What's confusing about that. AvD, same thing. Follow people see what they do.

I must be a fucking genius if I understand the concepts of a CTF Game



I'm done, i need a fucking beer, SATAN GET ME A HOOKER!


OH, FF NEEDS BETTER ADVERTISEMENT SYSTEM

<3 :lol:

Mooga 08-27-2009 02:43 AM

Eat more babies

Credge 08-27-2009 04:02 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bridget (Post 448164)
Small community of decent people > Large community of failures

I agree.

Except we have a small community with SOME decent people in it. It would require all of them for that to be true.

Mikael_hs 08-27-2009 12:07 PM

I think an ingame tutorial would be great, however I can't code and so it's up to the dev's... 2.4 is nice and might help a bit with the current confusion, but an ingame tutorial and/or a decent tutorial-video would be great too. I might just make that video myself I guess.

Regardless, with an added ingame tutorial-video as well as a playable tutorial, people should have an easier time learning the game... I remember when I first started tfc, I thought it was SHIT; but I stuck around cause my best friend was playing it like crazy, and after a few weeks it got real fun (I got help with bh, hh concing, wtf the game was about etc). Patience is a virtue, but that's not one we can count on from NEWBS ;)

ps. 2.4 should have ryu's avi in the menu, but have it start from when the medic concs into frame on sd2 (the long intro isn't needed there).

Every clan (any left?) should adopt a newb!

Ostrich_Eggs 08-27-2009 08:50 PM

Quote:

The game it's self is not confusing, you are in a CTF Map, all of the official maps have loading screens that tell ya what to do. What confuses people is the tricks, which is optional in pubs. Status Icons are in the game, which tell you, the flag is here. And even if you didn't know what it was you'd go and try and get there to see what it was. I know this may come off as being a douche bag, but if you can't figure out on your own, then I am sorry go play a game that does allow retarded to rule over everything, AKA WoW.
That's not going to fly if you want leagues or a decently populated community. The entire game is balanced around concing/bunnyhopping/movement. When you take those things away you're presenting a pretty shitty game. It gets even worse watching other players move 300% faster than you while you just get killed over and over. All of these things factor in to a rage quit and a lost player.

The game gets a large influx of new players already, but they all just leave after one game. The focus shouldn't be getting people to play, but rather getting people to stay.

Edit: I've also seen that new players are pretty reluctant to ask questions about the game. Maybe they are just shy?

Ricey 08-27-2009 09:07 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ostrich_Eggs (Post 448275)
That's not going to fly if you want leagues or a decently populated community. The entire game is balanced around concing/bunnyhopping/movement. When you take those things away you're presenting a pretty shitty game. It gets even worse watching other players move 300% faster than you while you just get killed over and over. All of these things factor in to a rage quit and a lost player.

The game gets a large influx of new players already, but they all just leave after one game. The focus shouldn't be getting people to play, but rather getting people to stay.

Edit: I've also seen that new players are pretty reluctant to ask questions about the game. Maybe they are just shy?

Um, there are players who have been playin for a while who don't even bhop. So I find that point invalid. This isn't like TFC where you have to time it or use a script, it's Strafe Right Look right, strafe left look left while jumpin, and in 2.4 it's just strafe/look + hold jump. 2.5 will probably be Strafe + hold jump ;( (AND NOT USE FOWARD)

Any newbie who first joins a game for the first time will get owned, no matter what, thats the whole point of being a newbie. You are new to it. L2Play, the basics should be easy, everything else should be learned through play, not given to you like a little baby. I can easily reference some WoW shit, but I won't.

Bridget 08-27-2009 09:12 PM

They are reluctant to ask questions because the community is full of fucking assholes who flame them. Indeed, it's true that Fortress Forever sees a great influx of players. Every other night, there are three to four WhenFFWillOut payers on the Talos server messing about. But, as stated, they don't come back. You know what Fortress Forever needs? Some character! It feels so empty and blank in comparison to Team Fortress 2. It doesn't need characters, per se, but some more character in general would be nice. I play Team Fortress 2, then return to Fortress Forever. It feels 'hollow' in comparison without the witty vocal lines and distinct characters. Again, doesn't need characters, just character.

zE 08-27-2009 09:36 PM

i kinda agree with Bridget, the problem is the new players that u see everyday, that dont came back, for me clanstyle ff is good every pickup player kinda like it, for me the main issue with ff is the pub scene, isnt that much fun compared to tfc. Give back teleport spread infection and all possible stuff to lame around, thats where the fun is, u can always write down new rules for the pickups so it wont afect the clanstyle side.
Teleportssssssssss!

Credge 08-28-2009 01:50 AM

I dunno if pubs are more fun in TFC, but I do know that the majority of the pubs I played in in TFC were on maps like Avanti, Dustbowl, and other maps of that style while most pubs in FF play maps like Monkey and Aardvark.

I don't blame people for not coming back for CTF. It's not a fun pub style game type. There's a reason Valve makes very few CTF maps for TF2 and why even fewer servers play them. Also why servers empty when CTF comes on.

It's just not a fun game type for pubbing (also, not fun for TF2).

Bridget hit the other part of it right on the head. The game lacks character. Using the old TFC Toon Models that Jester converted brought a lot character and charm.

But, I dunno. FF is one of those mods that most games have. Small, loyal fanbase that slowly dies off until the next patch and this fluctuates until the devs lose interest.

Mikael_hs 08-28-2009 01:29 PM

This was supposed to be about ideas to promote the game, but all some of you do is whining about what you think's wrong; well unless you got a way to actually fix it, it doesn't belong here. Go create your own topic for that purpose...

DarkieJ 08-28-2009 06:58 PM

bah.. alot posters have a bad attitute here haha!
Meaby its a good idea to make a movie when the patch is actually coming to cheer some people up, If its a nice movie i think alot people will watch and try FF, Meaby create it like when you visit this site you see it once or something like that.
i really think ff has the potional to be and to get a large communty (i have fade in it:mrgreen:)

Bridget 08-28-2009 06:59 PM

We are still in line with the discussion, dumb fuck. By addressing the flaws and problems with Fortress Forever, we make the game more appealing and easy to pick up for the beginner, which in turn makes the game easier to promote and advertise. We are doing as you suggested. Here's an idea for promoting the game; Make it easier to pick up. Give it some character. Fix this, and fix that.

@DarkieJ: 2.1 had a preview video. It did exactly that. I must have watched the damn thing over a hundred times in anticipation for that patch. In fact, on the day 2.1 was to be released, I had bought Team Fortress 2 to calm my excitement. I played for maybe five minutes, then someone told me 2.1 had been released, and I gave up on Team Fortress 2 for a few days while I played FF 2.1 (This was before I realized TF2 was a piece of shit, too. So, I was choosing a free mod and its new patch over a retail game and the features I was unaware of yet.)

Fortress Forever just needs some minor spicing up. Some character. It needs something to encourage the player and to reward the player. I recently became a beta tester, and let me assure you that Fortress Forever is progressing quite nicely. I would personally bet 2.4 to be the best patch FF has ever seen so far. ;D

DarkieJ 08-28-2009 07:01 PM

Do you actually play it? :P

Bridget 08-28-2009 07:15 PM

Fuck no.

Mikael_hs 08-28-2009 08:08 PM

The topic is not "problems with the game", neither is it "ideas for improving the game" or "a place to vent"... No the topic is "ideas to promote the game", and unless you have trouble reading you should be able to get some grasp on what I'm asking for. If you don't have any ideas for that then go put a new topic with either of the afformentioned suggestions. If we all were a bit nicer to each other maybe that would with the promoting-bit as well.

If a newer patch would be worse than any old, there wouldn't be much of a point updating now would there? 2.4 adresses most of the issues talked about here, and that's why its a fucking waste of time talking about those issues (or any current issues for that matter) just before a release. If you still wan't to whine after 2.4, then feel free to do so. Until then stick to the damn topic... please.

Bridget 08-28-2009 08:45 PM

You don't seem to understand anything, do you? We can promote the game by making it more enjoyable and more simple to learn. (Web Definition for Promote: "contribute to the progress or growth of;")

DarkieJ 08-28-2009 09:52 PM

Quote:

(Bridget) Fortress Forever just needs some minor spicing up. Some character. It needs something to encourage the player and to reward the player. I recently became a beta tester, and let me assure you that Fortress Forever is progressing quite nicely. I would personally bet 2.4 to be the best patch FF has ever seen so far. ;D
Cant wait to check 2.4 out ;), i know the ff 2.1 video it was very nice!
ff isnt tf2 or call of duty that you need to unlock weapons or whatsoever so i dont really know what u mean, Give more detailled suggestions :lol:.
For pub play it is really just the maps what makes people leave, The game is about fine for me, but for newbs its hard to kill a skilled player. so meaby make some maps where skill is not the thing. Like turkeyburger in tfc

Bridget 08-28-2009 11:00 PM

In Team Fortress 2, the announcer has a distinct personality. She's bossy and mean and you feel like trivial little soldiers in her evil plan for world domination or something. Each team has a unique base design. The red team's have more of a laid-back relaxed warm red colored base made of wood, and the blue team's base is more a concrete, steel, dull grays and blue industrial feel. Each class is distinct in shape, each class has its own unique personality. It just feels really spiced up, interesting, and full of life. Again, I'm not suggesting we go that far, but ... yeah.

Credge 08-29-2009 02:05 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mikael_hs (Post 448367)
The topic is not "problems with the game", neither is it "ideas for improving the game" or "a place to vent"... No the topic is "ideas to promote the game", and unless you have trouble reading you should be able to get some grasp on what I'm asking for.

I've already explained the best way you can advertise a mod without actually changing the mod on the first page.

1. Play other games and gain steam friends. L4D and TF2 are good games to do this with as they are very popular while being team oriented games. CS is another popular option.

2. Then, play FF.

Suddenly: People.

The only other alternative would be to advertise through Steam. That, while being the best option, is not very realistic. Even further, that massive amount of advertisement will not be very good for the mod if people aren't sticking around ANYWAY.

People will try it, be bored, and leave.

In other words.

THE BEST WAY TO ADVERTISE THE GAME IS TO HAVE A WELL POLISHED PRODUCT

That, my friend, is the point. There are tons of mods I can play if I want to play them. Why do I want to play THIS mod? By having a product that represents itself by its own merits, it becomes easier to promote.

So, what is Bridgets idea for promoting the game? Making it highly polished by giving it character.

Mikael_hs 08-29-2009 10:20 AM

Quote:

You don't seem to understand anything, do you? We can promote the game by making it more enjoyable and more simple to learn. (Web Definition for Promote: "contribute to the progress or growth of;")
And you think the best time to suggest changes in current gameplay is just before release of a new patch, which will alter the current gameplay anyway?

Quote:

2.4 is on the go, and once out I think it's a great opportunity to try to increase the playerbase. Anyone got ideas on what can be done here? Spam gameforums?
Is this really that hard to understand? If anyone comes up with anything concrete like: "I think the major problem why people aren't sticking around is THIS (possible in conjunction with THIS), and THIS (again possibly in conjunction with THIS) is how we fix that problem", then yeah that might be ok (especially if it's NOT related to issues that only exist in 2.3 and not in 2.4!); but what many - but not all - here have been writing has amounted to nothing. If you have an issue you like to talk about, then you would have to be more specific than "ff needs more character", "ff feels hollow compared to tf2", or "ff needs some minor spicing up, some CHARACTER"; such statements don't say very much and indeed don't belong here imo. The only thing concrete I've seen from you is that we need wittier vocal-lines. Well since you're a beta-tester I would think you know the changes there, no?

Also I'm not a dev so if you really want to make any changes and just not talk about it (which indeed is much easier and seems much more popular, but also quite pointless), you should not rage here but with one of them. You should also stop calling people dumb-fuck; I know it sounds supercool and makes you feel powerful, but it's just as pointless as suggesting changes HERE and PRIOR to imminent release of a new patch, when you think for 5 secs and not 1/2 sec about it. :)


I think you (Credge) gave good suggestions regarding:

Quote:

1. Play other games and gain steam friends. L4D and TF2 are good games to do this with as they are very popular while being team oriented games. CS is another popular option.

2. Then, play FF.
Do lots of people still play quake live? :P

Mikael_hs 08-29-2009 10:43 AM

skimming everyone's posts, these are the ideas expressed thus far:

1. Post Flyers on College Campus (or any decent place for that matter) -> good idea everyone do it.

2. T-shirts (really?)

3. Have a huge friendslist with people who play other sorta similar games, then they'll ask you what FF is and might play -> everyone can do this so please do.

4. Organizing irc channel, dedicated to help newcommers -> will talk to newcommers and see if they'll like that. If so I'll get it going.

5. Video tutorial (to help transition form public gameplay to clanbased) -> might make one myself.

The rest are solely game-changes:

5.Ingame Tutorial -> there's one already which is real good but it's not entirely finished.

6. Stuff for LAMING around (teleporters, spreading infection etc.) -> talk to devs not me

7. More Character -> talk to devs not me

Also an obvious one:

8. Spam gameforums and attatch ryu's promo-video.


Anything I missed?

My hope is that we can have a surge of sorts ONCE 2.4 IS OUT, and that the combination of an improved game, especially on the public front, with our ideas can bring about new ppl. So if everyone does at least many of the things expressed above, as well as anything else that's good for advertisement-purposes, we might make things happen.


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