Is the Internet right about games marketing?

During the development of Shitlings I've watched tons of yt videos, talks, read articles, blog posts and bumper stickers - everything regarding promoting games and finding audience. And there were always some things that didn't sit right with me. A feeling, that "Just following these 3 simple steps" isn't going to solve all the marketing issues for me. And yet, there is plenty of people showing statistics, making very convincing arguments and explaining these things for hours. So what popular advice works and what doesn't?

Announce the game on Steam as soon as possible

Well... No. Sure, you want to announce the game well in advance to be able to gather wishlists over a longer period of time, but rushing it too much can be really bad. First of all, you won't gather too many wishlists until you have a convincing, high quality art ready. I've made this mistake, announced the game on Steam with low quality, early screenshots, pretty bad trailer etc. And what happened? I've lost the initial wave of interest, people visiting the Steam page would immediately see low quality and unfinished product. So don't bother. Don't lose time and energy on Steam announcement until your game really looks close to what it will look like on a release day. Of course, if you have time and resources, you can try to do this earlier. But consider the opportunity cost.

Just send your game to a festival, most games that succeed take part in several festivals

Eh... the issue is, with current number of projects getting pitched to festivals, they are either curated or won't really provide any significant visibility. The problem with festivals is selection bias. If there is group of event curators that accept your project and it gets a decent visibility on a festival, it means the project is good, grabs attention and is attractive at the first glance. So high quality projects get accepted to curated events. There, they get a lot of views / wishlists because... they are good. So sure, apply to events to fully utilize the projects potential. Just don't think that it will automatically skyrocket your wishlists if the project isn't exceptional. Like in top 5%. Also there aren't that many festivals. It can be pretty hard to find anything in your genre over a period of several months. And often several months is all you have to market a game at it's peak state.

Reach out to your target audience, post on gamers groups, reddits etc

This one I feel like is the closest to a reliable strategy. Finding your niche and interested players can help a lot. But... If you, as a game developer, can find a community that would be interested in supporting your project, other game developers can find it as well. It leads to a terrible cycle where such communities get dominated by developers instead of gamers. So it's basically sales people selling to other sales people. Or tourists complaining that wherever they fly, there are other tourists.

It's simple, just spend a bit of time and it will work

I'm sorry to say this but for most people it won't. Statistics are brutal. Also it's not a bit of time. Most people struggle to even finish their small indie game, taking away 2 days a week for marketing and community building is simply unrealistic. But sure, you can see tons of experts in all online communities for game devs, saying it's easy and they do it all the time. I have a feeling that there are more of these experts than successful games a year.

So what does work?

Just make a f*** good game. Then follow all of these tips, understanding that they are just multipliers on top of your game quality level. Until you get above a certain threshold, no amount of posts, no festivals, no clever outreach can sell your game. But if you are already above said threshold, you can try this:

• Post regularly on all possible channels. Depending on a channel, gifs and shorts are better than images. Post 2x a week.

• Have a plan to squeeze as much as possible out of any marketing event there is. Making a playtest? Tease it, announce it, start it, finish it, sum it up

• Try very different formats, possibly let different people approach it from different angles.

• Influencers, festivals and media. Outreach whenever you have anything to offer that might have value to them. Send hundreds of emails. Then follow up.

• Do this over several months before the release and you're done. EZ

Just to be clear, I'm in the middle of the project. These are my conclusions right now, my opinion on this topic can change. But this is how I see it right now and how I plan to approach it from now on. Let's see if it works...