4 ms·

>Most of their success is due to being fortunate enough to get a bunch of coverage. From screenshots, most aren't very spectacular. Stardew Valley takes the for

>Most of their success is due to being fortunate enough to get a bunch of coverage. From screenshots, most aren't very spectacular. Stardew Valley takes the formula of an existing series (Harvest Moon). >To make a successful anything, it's 90% marketing, 5% quality, and 5% luck. If the right person finds your product and endorses it, quality doesn't matter. You'll get guaranteed sales. It's then that it takes quality to sustain those sales. I strongly disagree. Stardew valley did well because it is a fun game with good graphics. That's it, it's fun and addictive, graphics are good and it gets the gestalt right. Stardew Valley is just a truly truly fun game in which you say "just one more day" a bit too often. It's just that much fun. The game is FUN and addictive. Did I mention I had a lot of fun playing it? It has nothing to do with marketing it had everything to do with how I played the game and whether I had fun or not. The first time I picked it up I poured in more than 40 hours in a single week! And that's a lot! I just read this article about the creator who spent 4 years making Stardew Valley and it is a really interesting read: https://www.gq.com/story/stardew-valley-eric-barone-profile https://www.gq.com/story/stardew-valley-eric-barone-profile

beaconstudios 8y ago
the point is that if the game wasn't well marketed, you wouldn't even know it existed in the first place.
- bspammer 8y ago
  Definitely not true, I've never seen an advert for Stardew Valley but it's talked about all over the internet because it's a really good game.
  - beaconstudios 8y ago
    > but it's talked about all over the internet Word-of-mouth is marketing too. Perhaps you are thinking that marketing === advertising? Because marketing doesn't have to be advertising. Building a community, attending conferences, getting influencers to play your game - these are all marketing activities. If people are talking about the game, it's surely fueled by a quality experience but marketing has to bootstrap that conversation.
    - Draiken 8y ago
      Word-of-mouth might be marketing, but it's not something you can work towards. To get that you need a good fun game. IMO that's not a marketing effort, it's a symptom of a good unique game. I'm not a marketing expert tho, but I can't think of any way to force word-of-mouth onto people.
      - beaconstudios 8y ago
        the game's quality acts like a force multiplier for word of mouth, essentially you're more likely to promote or talk about a game you enjoyed. But you need some critical mass for that to have any real impact. What good is it if each player refers 1.5 others on average, but you only get to 5000 before the game becomes old news? Most games don't continue to sell forever and the hype will die out eventually, so you want that hype to reach a large audience quickly.
  - fiblye 8y ago
    And few of those people discovered the game by scrolling through steam. Most found it through a youtube playthrough, word of mouth, and "word of mouth" (i.e. how all content is marketed these days)
noirbot 8y ago
I think it's also important to point out that Stardew is in an odd place as a "remake". It's one thing to try to make the 10th battle royale that's coming out this year, and another to do what Stardew did: be, as far as I know, the first full-featured Harvest Moon-like to come out for PC, and also come out at a time where it had been a while since ANY good Harvest Moon game had released, even on consoles. It filled a niche for gamers who had grown up playing HM on Gameboy, but hadn't been able to really scratch that itch. If anything, his choice of genre to work in was genius. It was a passionate and pre-made fanbase that was craving a new game to jump onto, and he happened to make an excellent game as well. It also helps that HM is a highly generic game/genre. There's very little about what makes the original games popular that is trademarked. I played thousands of hours of a couple of them, and I probably can't name any of the characters any more. You can easily make an "off-brand" remake, and most people won't miss anything specific. You wouldn't be able to just go make a knock-off Pokemon and have it work, even though the demand for it on PC is high.

beaconstudios 8y ago

the point is that if the game wasn't well marketed, you wouldn't even know it existed in the first place.

bspammer 8y ago
Definitely not true, I've never seen an advert for Stardew Valley but it's talked about all over the internet because it's a really good game.
- beaconstudios 8y ago
  > but it's talked about all over the internet Word-of-mouth is marketing too. Perhaps you are thinking that marketing === advertising? Because marketing doesn't have to be advertising. Building a community, attending conferences, getting influencers to play your game - these are all marketing activities. If people are talking about the game, it's surely fueled by a quality experience but marketing has to bootstrap that conversation.
  - Draiken 8y ago
    Word-of-mouth might be marketing, but it's not something you can work towards. To get that you need a good fun game. IMO that's not a marketing effort, it's a symptom of a good unique game. I'm not a marketing expert tho, but I can't think of any way to force word-of-mouth onto people.
    - beaconstudios 8y ago
      the game's quality acts like a force multiplier for word of mouth, essentially you're more likely to promote or talk about a game you enjoyed. But you need some critical mass for that to have any real impact. What good is it if each player refers 1.5 others on average, but you only get to 5000 before the game becomes old news? Most games don't continue to sell forever and the hype will die out eventually, so you want that hype to reach a large audience quickly.
- fiblye 8y ago
  And few of those people discovered the game by scrolling through steam. Most found it through a youtube playthrough, word of mouth, and "word of mouth" (i.e. how all content is marketed these days)

noirbot 8y ago

I think it's also important to point out that Stardew is in an odd place as a "remake". It's one thing to try to make the 10th battle royale that's coming out this year, and another to do what Stardew did: be, as far as I know, the first full-featured Harvest Moon-like to come out for PC, and also come out at a time where it had been a while since ANY good Harvest Moon game had released, even on consoles. It filled a niche for gamers who had grown up playing HM on Gameboy, but hadn't been able to really scratch that itch. If anything, his choice of genre to work in was genius. It was a passionate and pre-made fanbase that was craving a new game to jump onto, and he happened to make an excellent game as well. It also helps that HM is a highly generic game/genre. There's very little about what makes the original games popular that is trademarked. I played thousands of hours of a couple of them, and I probably can't name any of the characters any more. You can easily make an "off-brand" remake, and most people won't miss anything specific. You wouldn't be able to just go make a knock-off Pokemon and have it work, even though the demand for it on PC is high.