Advertising

[Rizzla]

This thread is not meant to be offensive or accusational in any way. Also, if this belongs in a different board feel free to move it.

I have some questions, as well as ideas on the subject of getting more people on FH. People complain all the time that the game is dying, and yes, compared to how it used to be, it is. My question is, back when the game first got started, how did the staff at the time draw people in? Was all of it just people from Impressive Title who wanted to play a similar game? I know not everyone here got to play IT at all, so that can't be entirely true. Word of mouth, perhaps? Yes, that may have worked back then, but is it entirely reliable now, with all the false information that goes around about this game? I don't think so.

What I'm saying is, if some of you think this game is dying/has a declining playerbase, do you want to try to help it in some way?

The one thing I can propose that I haven't heard said before is advertising. Not paid advertising, just like word of mouth, but more official and targeted at different communities and audiences. Here's a (bad) example, a big journal made on dA about FH shared to animal art groups aside from the FH group itself. It can be done, can it not? It's not like this game isn't progressing, even if we don't have the source code the staff are still finding ways to update the game... so maybe it's time to try updating the community a little too? Some people just don't see the game from all angles, and people from different corners of the internet would have zero biases.

[Valar.Morghulis]

One great form of advertising for the game before were YouTube videos.
People now still make FH YouTube videos, but they're all 30 seconds long..
I find that very annoying though.
Also, the reason why there isn't many people in game is because most of them don't know how to register and they don't know when the registration is going to be open.
There are still thousands of people trying to join the game, they just either don't read about the registration and don't know that It's open at random times or they are not very good at reading English so they pretty much can't do anything.

And If you or someone else wants, they can of course advertise the game! And maybe tell people that registration opens every few hours and the best way to register is just to set a reminder every one hour 'till they catch the registration open.

[Warriorstrike]

You bring up a good topic, and I'll try to address some of your questions. c:

My question is, back when the game first got started, how did the staff at the time draw people in? Was all of it just people from Impressive Title who wanted to play a similar game? I know not everyone here got to play IT at all, so that can't be entirely true. Word of mouth, perhaps?

I'll only be speaking off what I know, as I did not join Feral Heart during its birthing year of 2011 (or 2010, if we refer to its first release) nor play Impressive Title before joining FH (I joined a year later). There will certainly be others whom did actively play one or both games during that time who could probably provide you with a better answer, but I'll do my best to offer what I know. A large part of Feral Heart's initial playerbase consisted of those whom already played Impressive Title; as KovuLKD's new animal game and official replacement of IT, naturally people were intrigued and wanted to know what all the hype was about. So, part of FH's popularity in its initial official release was determined by a pre-established following of LKD's projects (namely, IT). Many of the staff that FH first employed were staff on Impressive Title--there was a rollover effect in more ways than one from IT to FH, although the games themselves are two separate games.

Another significant factor of attention to the game was generated through YouTube videos. Valar mentioned this above, so I'll reiterate that this was a big part of advertising. I discovered FH on a different forum, but YouTube videos were what offered me a physical glimpse at what the game looked like. For those of you whom have used YouTube for viewing videos over the past few years, you may notice that the dynamic has changed quite a bit. That dynamic changes how people would respond to a video advertising FeralHeart, especially how effective it would be compared to five years ago, but it would still be a way to get the word out there. Staff have entertained the idea of a YouTube channel for a while, but it all comes down to how and when staff would go about it.

The one thing I can propose that I haven't heard said before is advertising. Not paid advertising, just like word of mouth, but more official and targeted at different communities and audiences. Here's a (bad) example, a big journal made on dA about FH shared to animal art groups aside from the FH group itself.

Having Feral Heart being advertised on other forums, games, etc., would likey be an effective way. I found FH through a thread on WolfQuest's forum. Sharing through word of mouth can be a very effective way to gather buzz about a game. However, this isn't something that has to be done by staff, alone--users can take this into their own paws, as well. Tossing out the name of a game on a forum (a game, a Discord server, etc.) you regularly visit can bring attention to a game that people might not have been aware of prior. Depending on the platform you wish to advertise on, you may run into the complex of a dislike for advertising on their site, so as long as you are mindful of this and respect the views of other peoples' platforms, I would encourage anyone willing to do so.

Staff has been considering ways to advertise the game, and while our focus at the moment is dedicated to release of the next patch, any thoughts/suggestions are welcomed. Thank you for sharing your ideas with us, as they may hopefully have an impact on how the word of FH is spread around.~

[Jango_Fett]

honestly if someone with decent editing skills put in effort someone could whip up an actually decent trailer for the game or some form of advert.

[WolfQueen]

to be honest, i think pretty much everyone who might be interested already knows about feralheart and advertising will overbear it's welcome.
i believe the decreasing amount of online players has a lot to do with the registration cycle. having to wait until a specific hour in a day to register kind of turned people off from the game after a while. as less and less new people come in to replace the old ones, the population decreases. in order to make feralheart as popular as it was years ago the registration system needs to be open 24/7 again, but i don't think that'll help much at this point.

[Valar.Morghulis]

to be honest, i think pretty much everyone who might be interested already knows about feralheart and advertising will overbear it's welcome.
i believe the decreasing amount of online players has a lot to do with the registration cycle. having to wait until a specific hour in a day to register kind of turned people off from the game after a while. as less and less new people come in to replace the old ones, the population decreases. in order to make feralheart as popular as it was years ago the registration system needs to be open 24/7 again, but i don't think that'll help much at this point.

Yep, I kind off agree with the registration thing.
But I'd like to add, if you look at the analytics, you will see that  "Average registrations per day:86.78" which means that around 87 people catch the registration and register every day.
Now imagine if the registration was open. There would be too many people registering every day, and unfortunately out server can't handle that.

[Wyldercat]

I'm not going to restate what other players have already said, but I strongly agree that this game could use some TLC in the advertising department. I know sites such as Flight Rising or Im.vu (is imvu even still around?) have very frequent appearances in sidebar ads from my memory. Perhaps some kind of good publicity as well to get rid of our bad associations in the furry mmo community. I know we have a fairly small userbase, but with so many talented people, perhaps some streams or raffles whether for charity or to pay for better advertising certainly couldn't hurt. (Assuming we could put that together. This is just a suggestion and I understand it may be improbable.)
Also, I partly agree with registration. It's good to keep in mind that a website calculated algorithm may not be entirely accurate. While the average is pretty high for a single day's registration number, keep in mind outliers, such as the days of past updates or the game's launch would have had a very high amount of registrations. However, I don't pay much attention to the site traffic, so I can't really say whether or not this would be true.
I don't see harm, however, in increasing the frequency of open registration time. I believe it is open at 2 times a day for 2 hour periods (correct me if I'm wrong), but perhaps increasing it to 4 or 6 hour periods or more frequent intervals open could turn away less potential users without overloading the servers. I know it exists for a reason and all, but I honestly think we could get rid of the login page at this point. Unless there's more to it than security measures, it's been quite some time since the attacks on the game (to my knowledge). If possible we could have an easier alternative or an automatic pop up window with the login page or something of the sort. If possible.

[Valar.Morghulis]

I'm not going to restate what other players have already said, but I strongly agree that this game could use some TLC in the advertising department. I know sites such as Flight Rising or Im.vu (is imvu even still around?) have very frequent appearances in sidebar ads from my memory. Perhaps some kind of good publicity as well to get rid of our bad associations in the furry mmo community. I know we have a fairly small userbase, but with so many talented people, perhaps some streams or raffles whether for charity or to pay for better advertising certainly couldn't hurt. (Assuming we could put that together. This is just a suggestion and I understand it may be improbable.)
Also, I partly agree with registration. It's good to keep in mind that a website calculated algorithm may not be entirely accurate. While the average is pretty high for a single day's registration number, keep in mind outliers, such as the days of past updates or the game's launch would have had a very high amount of registrations. However, I don't pay much attention to the site traffic, so I can't really say whether or not this would be true.
I don't see harm, however, in increasing the frequency of open registration time. I believe it is open at 2 times a day for 2 hour periods (correct me if I'm wrong), but perhaps increasing it to 4 or 6 hour periods or more frequent intervals open could turn away less potential users without overloading the servers. I know it exists for a reason and all, but I honestly think we could get rid of the login page at this point. Unless there's more to it than security measures, it's been quite some time since the attacks on the game (to my knowledge). If possible we could have an easier alternative or an automatic pop up window with the login page or something of the sort. If possible.

It's open around every 12 hours as far as I know. And It's one hour long. c:

[Wyldercat]

It's open around every 12 hours as far as I know. And It's one hour long. c:

So two hours a day then.

[Valar.Morghulis]

It's open around every 12 hours as far as I know. And It's one hour long. c:

So two hours a day then.

Yeah.