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 Forum index » Meta » General META Discussion
[LOCKED] [META] Making ARGs More Popular
Moderators: imbri, ndemeter
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Passenger 23B
Boot

Joined: 05 Apr 2006
Posts: 16
Location: Los Angeles, CA

 		[META] Making ARGs More Popular
Deleted-- post was moved by moderators from thread it was intended to be a part of.
[This action overruled again by SpaceBass]

I'll just be brief and not post on the meta-subject again in order to not have this go permanently off-tangent.

Whether or not the valenzetti sites are real, I think if ARG's are going to become more popular (and possibly eventually attempt to attract a larger audience) the key element is advertising. There's no reason they couldn't have paid advertising on an ARG-related in-game webpage. The name brand alone would identifiy it as being not in-game to most players, but the click-ability of the ad would also mean that it can pay for the game programming-- much like commercials during a television broadcast.

I agree, though, that the fan stuff would not be intentionally linked and could potentially become troublesome to the game.

We'll just see how this particular ARG, if it is indeed an ARG, develops when the sites go up in May. I hope it is an ARG-- I'm excited for it to be! Nevertheless any new Lost mythology should be pretty interesting and fun.

** Split from this topic - enjoy the metagoodness! -- jamesi
Post body reinstated for context. -SpaceBass

PostPosted: Wed Apr 05, 2006 11:10 pm
Last edited by Passenger 23B on Thu Apr 20, 2006 3:22 am; edited 2 times in total
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Pixiestix
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Joined: 26 Aug 2004
Posts: 2465
Location: Tomorrow's Talk Studios

 		I think ARGing as a genre is still far too new to say "if the genre as a whole is to become more popular than this and that NEED to happen". The most perfect example of why not is right here -> sub-genres.

There is a very distinct line between grassroot games and ad camps. I think the popularity of a grass roots game is based on the communities that play it getting the word out. Urban hunt started by way of casting calls for a reality tv show in the very real places people would expect to look for those casting calls. The fact that someone who is an ARGer found it because they also love reality tv shows helped bring it back to the ARG community.

Grassroots games are less likely to pull in a new crowd than an Ad Camp. They are created, maintained, and paid for in two totally separate ways at times. There are some people who prefer grassroots games, and others who prefer ad camps.

I think in the case of grassroots games, advertisements are not a bad idea. It could definitely help with funding. The problem becomes however - if you get direct permission to advertise for a company, you are now company sponsored. How many rights do they have as far as your site goes?

For example, Company A may not sponsor a site that has a serial killer transsexual midget character in the game, will they pull funding or your rights to link to them? I've dealt with the rights of sites to not be linked from personal websites with content they object to, and those objections are 100% their discretion.

Personally, I am not going to click on an ad for pepsi on a site about haunted soda and NOT think the game is an ad camp for pepsi. What is advertised can also become a problem.

For non-grassroots games {Ad Camps} they already have funding and sponsorship. A company is not going to advertise for competitors, and they don't need to advertise for themselves sine that is what their game is already doing. There were no links to halo from the ILB sites - yet everyone went in flocks to it. In the cases of most mainstream ad camps, they have the advertising to pull people in and keep the players provided the game itself is done well - in some cases {stella} the game fizzles and fades.

I can see maybe an ABC site having an advertisement for Disney world in a 100% appropriate place on their site – but it has to 100% blend in or you lose the believability of its placement and you get an automatic peak behind the curtain {which in an Ad Camp isn't 100% bad – we knew ILB was an ad for Halo2, so knowing who the puppet masters were did not take away from the game, however it was out of game knowledge}.
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PostPosted: Wed Apr 05, 2006 11:44 pm
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Passenger 23B
Boot

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PostPosted: Thu Apr 06, 2006 2:48 pm
Last edited by Passenger 23B on Thu Apr 20, 2006 3:22 am; edited 1 time in total
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imbriModerator
Entrenched


Joined: 21 Sep 2002
Posts: 1182
Location: wonderland

 		I was not the moderator that moved your post and, while I can understand wanting your post read in its intended thread, it was a great topic for discussion here in the Meta forum and I'm sorry that you deleted it.

I'm not going to delete this thread, I'll leave that up for an admin to decide (I'm a bit skittish on deleting posts that aren't spam and locking posts unless there's some horrible trolling going on, which I've never done) and, while I don't have the original text that you wrote, I'll keep the question out there based on the title and Pixie's previous response just for those that would like to discuss it. And, please, feel free to join in on the topic Smile

edited to add: looks like space has spoken while I was posting, thanks for getting the text back for me space Smile

PostPosted: Thu Apr 06, 2006 3:29 pm
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Pixiestix
Resident Angry Midget


Joined: 26 Aug 2004
Posts: 2465
Location: Tomorrow's Talk Studios

 		I asked jamsi for a thread split {just like i said i would in order to not have a thread jack}. I was unaware he was going to full on move the last post, i was under the inpression the post would basically just be copied here to start the meta convo {not knowing how exactly thread splits are done}. It is a good topic - I just felt that the meta aspect did not apply to lost so much as ARGing in general, and any response I {or many others} might have would be meta ARG related - hence I asked for the move here. But just because I asked doesn't mean it had to move, I am goign to assume Jamsi {and now Spacebass} felt the same way as me. I'm sorry if this offended you, no one had those intentions...
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Remember kiddles, bad PMs get the wrath of the Vulva Puppets
PROUDLY owned by Gizmo, the wonder ARG pug!

PostPosted: Thu Apr 06, 2006 7:20 pm
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MageSteff
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Joined: 06 Jun 2003
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 		Re: [META] Making ARGs More Popular
Passenger 23B wrote:
...There's no reason they couldn't have paid advertising on an ARG-related in-game webpage. The name brand alone would identifiy it as being not in-game to most players, but the click-ability of the ad would also mean that it can pay for the game programming-- much like commercials during a television broadcast.

I agree, though, that the fan stuff would not be intentionally linked and could potentially become troublesome to the game.


I can understadn PMs wanting the game to pay for itself, however, putting together a good grass roots game does not have to be costly (yes, we DID one and for less than $500 so can you!). However, I don't see any reason that PM couldn't use something like google ads, WHERE APPROPRIATE. Ads on a "corporate site" would make it difficult to suspend disbelief, but on a personal forum (such as Find Araya did) I don't have any problem with it. Lots of small Forums are doing it to help defray costs. I don't have any lasting problems with product placement unless the product is getting shoved under my nose in a brute force kind of way. Finding out that GM has sponsored Where is Benjamin Stove? really raised my eyebrow because there has been no real mention of Flexifuel vehicles (they are trying to slide alchohol and such in on a very minor way Wink ) I liked hearing about the flexi fuel vehicles before, but to learn that GM is also sponsoring other methods of getting the word out (Play the game - listen to a short talk about them while everyone is patting everyone on the back is a small price to pay for a free game), is a fun way to get the word out.

I am watching PPX to see if the map/puzzle cards and associated products do well enough to help sustain the game, but for most campaigns, the cafe press items usually do not fly off the shelves fast enough to actually help with the finances.

I don't think we should be afraid to try different things and see what works and what doesn't, and how we can tweak the "doesn't work" to make it fit a bit better. Growing and learning are good, allowing things to get stagnant just because that is the way it has always been done, is generally speaking bad.

Within the ARG community, other people are trying the full game generated in game forums, and others still are trying out the mixed use in-game/out-of-game on the same board. As well as having spaces that are strictly player resource, or PM resource. I like diversity. DIversity is good. (Breaking a TOS just because you don't agree with it is bad - go start your own game space and set the rules however you think it would work best. Wink yes I am a Flaming Nutter )

With the success of Mind Candy and 4orty-2wo, among others... the commercial model can work - ARG not as the generating cash cow, but as the advertisement for the cash cow. Done right, everyone has fun, the product gets noticed (and if really well done, gets free publicity as everyone else reports on it), and the game has the cash to spend on upgrades to things like number of sites that can get hosting, number of people who can afford to do nothing more than work on the game quality full time and not have their own paycheck suffer. If the commercial games do nothing more than bring in fresh faces to play and create more grassroots games, everyone comes out a winner on the long run.

I hope the FInd Araya PM gives us a financial breakdown at some point, and let everyone know if the google ads did help defray some of the costs of the game, and what if anything they might suggest doing differently as far as the ads financing.

Banner ads are ok, once you scroll past them, you don't see them. Or they are on the side, not interferring with my reading and puzzling. I HATE pop-up ads though, so if the site includes too many of those, it may deter me from visiting the site.


As for what you think about my opinion :shrug: if you don't like it at least I got 10% of my daily posting done. I have no life.
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PostPosted: Thu Apr 06, 2006 10:48 pm
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SirQuady
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Joined: 15 Jan 2006
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 		Re: [META] Making ARGs More Popular
MageSteff wrote:
If the commercial games do nothing more than bring in fresh faces to play and create more grassroots games, everyone comes out a winner on the long run.

Well, think about it this way...If advertizement is what you want, then you want lots of people to hear about your product. Therefore, the more companies that make good ARGs, and thus bring in new players, the more people that are there to hear about their product. (I'm sure that many people here, even if (and especially if) they aren't playing WIBS, know that it was an ad for GM's Live Green think Yellow campaign for Ethanol cars). Thus the better job companies )and grassroot teams) do, the better investment the ARG is!
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PostPosted: Sat Apr 08, 2006 12:51 am
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