How I promoted my game for free through YouTube
Hi, Habr. I think it would be good to introduce myself. My name is Novichkov Andrew, I myself come from Ukraine (Kiev), at the time of this writing, I am 21, I live in a small one-girl with a girl and a little kitten. My interest in games came to me at the age of 5, when my father brought home the prefix Dendy. My first game was Mario. This mustache Italian deprived me of game virginity and opened the world of video games. I was so shocked and inspired by the games that I could look at the scenery at the level for five minutes or listen to the initial song in the game menu. When I was 13 years old, our family bought the first computer and then I just lost my head. This was a new level. I looked at all this with admiration and understood that these games are created by people just like me. Then why am I worse? Therefore, my 13 years have become the starting point for game dev. I felt that I wanted to get into this movement.
So, how well I could draw only three letters on the fence, I began to learn programming. My first language was Pascal, but we both then realized that we were not on the way, and I went to Visual Basic 6. Unfortunately, I did not immediately realize that this language is weak and dead, but it became a good basis for me to understand the essence of programming. I talked on gaming forums, made acquaintances, considered myself a cool developer and participated in various game development contests to gain experience. Over time, I realized that I could not achieve the desired success using free graphics on the Internet, creating games through WinForm in BASIC and not having my own style. And it was a shame every time to ask artists to draw for my game. My experience was lower than the economy in Syria, so I started working on it. My friend the artist taught me to draw graphics on a computer and find my own style, while at home I studied Unity3D and game design. I had a strong motivation to move forward. By the way, I got a good knowledge base of game design from the book “The Art of Game Design” written by Jesse Shell. And now, a year later, when I turned 20 years old, I understand that my level has become much higher and I am ready to try to write my first commercial game. I could not wait any longer.
I understood that I was nobody and call me in any way. I was afraid that if I create a game, then my friend, another friend of mine, and my girlfriend will know the most about it. Therefore, I needed to gain my audience and support group. But how to do it for free? For this, I chose the most trash and memorable alias, namely Flatingo. Further, I created a YouTube channel under the same brand, where I talked about game development, game development, drawing for games, game design, as well as how I personally make my game. It was a kind of game developer blog. I created funny and short videos, making it a kind of show, thus differing from the competition. Fortunately, there were not many bloggers on this topic in Russian YouTube. I distributed my videos in all corners of Russian game devs, for which I was hated and loved. I distributed video on all game development sites, game public places and wherever there is game development. For example, if in the video I drew a character for the game, then I could easily share such videos on all drawing sites, which gave an additional response. I began to bypass obscure places or small publics with an open wall, because there is no life there, just a bunch of brazen spam. The young guys (schoolchildren and students in the common people) went fine, but older people did not like my presentation of the material. This is normal.
')
So, when I launched this YouTube machine, I began to actively create the game. I wanted to create a small project with a twist. Before the development of the game, I was inspired by the Super Meat Boy games and the old Adventure Island, so I connected the balance of these two games and it turned out to be my own, different mechanics. As I draw vector graphics in Illustrator, I decided to use my favorite, flat design. Drawing all the graphics for the game took me about 3 weeks. I stubbornly shot videos for my channel, promoted my videos and made the game. The audience slowly, but began to appear. On my channel subscribed 5-10 subscribers per day, which could not but rejoice. Everything went like clockwork until something happened.
For 2 months of development I managed to draw all the graphics and create several levels for my game. I even fit into the deadlines set for myself, but one fine summer evening, my laptop fell out of the window on the second floor. It was a disaster. In the evenings I loved to open the window into the courtyard in the evenings, turn on the desk lamp, put my computer on the windowsill, brew delicious fruit tea with snacks and turn on my favorite music, but I could never think what could happen to me. Later it turned out that in theory it could still work, but unfortunately the motherboard and the hard disk "flew" in it. HDD. The service center told me that it would be easier to buy a new HDD. Well, it hurt. I had to buy a new laptop and start all over again, but now using Dropbox.
By this time, my channel began to gain new momentum. In one of my videos, I borrowed a piece from a video of another foreign author, for which a lot of negative criticism fell on me in different places. True, I did not think that it would cause such a violent reaction, but now I know that hate is also an advertisement. I said earlier that 5-10 subscribers subscribed to my channel per day? Forget it! Since then, 40-50 people per day subscribed to the channel consistently. Hayters began to denounce my nickname everywhere, thereby making me an advertisement. I simply watched their attempts and did not enter into conflicts. I also asked a couple of small game editors to write about me, which cost me only mutual PR. After a couple of months, I noticed that when I publish a video somewhere in new places, they wrote in the comments: “ Oh, is this Flatingo ” or “ Ty, and here is it? ". It remains only to finish the half-created game, but first I added English subtitles to all my videos and started promoting them over the hill. The algorithm is the same, only instead of VK I used Facebook, instead of Picab was Reddit, well, and other game dev sites. Let me just say that to develop over the hill for free at times more difficult, because there is more competition and sometimes you just do not have time to notice.
Winter came. On my channel I started adding 70-100 subscribers per day and I finally finished the game. By the way, if someone is interested, then my game is a hardcore 2D platformer with puzzle elements and cartoon graphics, in which the main character is a nice kid named Luppi. My game is called - TheLooppy. The development of the game took me 5 months, but if it were not for the incident with the laptop, then I think that I would have done it in 3 months. When developing the game, for me the main task was to bring the game balance to a good level, convenient gameplay and nice graphics, for it is with these three things that the player faces 98% of the total playing time. In general, I think it turned out not bad. The game will make you think about how to solve this or that puzzle to achieve the goal, make you pretty run around the level of your enemies and make it clear that you can reach the goal in the game in different ways.
Of course, I planned to publish the game via Steam Direct and my friend helped me with this. For me it was very important to surround myself with good guys from the sphere of gamedev. I think that creating a good game alone is quite realistic, but to become a cool developer without friends and an audience is very difficult. Of course, it was not without a funny case. For example, my minor subscribers wanted so much to play for Luppi for free, that they made up funny stories, seeming to be cool publishers or friends of major bloggers on YouTube, so that I could send them a key. Sly, but I still love them. I was glad that at the end of the game I had at least some audience of several thousand subscribers. Now, this is someone to play.
The game began to be sold in early February and I immediately told this to subscribers in all social networks and YouTube. At the time of the release of the game, or rather, for 5 months of development, I managed to get an audience of 8K subscribers without investing a penny. For the first 3 days the game brought me almost $ 150, considering that the game costs only $ 2. After 7 days, the game has already brought $ 210. Trifle, but nice, especially since this is my first commercial game. The only advertisement for my game was my channel and my social networks. It's exactly a week now, as the game is available on Steam, but YouTube has had a few small reviews of my game, and in the personal Vkontakte I received the art of the main character, and with great pleasure I published them in a group. By the way, on the first day of sales, subscribers found a bug at the very beginning of the game, because of which players began to return money. It so happened that on some PCs the game worked many times faster than planned, but in one short evening I fixed this bug and released an update.
Well, here I have such an interesting experience with my first game. I did not spend a penny on advertising and game development, but I gained a small audience of like-minded people. During the development of the game I was approached 3 times with an advertising offer for my channel, so I even managed to make some money on it. In the future, I plan to develop further in the field of game dev, creating new projects and finding new like-minded people. By the way, I noticed that some developers are also reviewers of games on YouTube, and then deliberately promote their games through their channel. As a rule, due to simplicity, such channels gather an audience faster than channels about game development. I really like my hobby. I hope you also love what you do.
Briefly about the long road
So, how well I could draw only three letters on the fence, I began to learn programming. My first language was Pascal, but we both then realized that we were not on the way, and I went to Visual Basic 6. Unfortunately, I did not immediately realize that this language is weak and dead, but it became a good basis for me to understand the essence of programming. I talked on gaming forums, made acquaintances, considered myself a cool developer and participated in various game development contests to gain experience. Over time, I realized that I could not achieve the desired success using free graphics on the Internet, creating games through WinForm in BASIC and not having my own style. And it was a shame every time to ask artists to draw for my game. My experience was lower than the economy in Syria, so I started working on it. My friend the artist taught me to draw graphics on a computer and find my own style, while at home I studied Unity3D and game design. I had a strong motivation to move forward. By the way, I got a good knowledge base of game design from the book “The Art of Game Design” written by Jesse Shell. And now, a year later, when I turned 20 years old, I understand that my level has become much higher and I am ready to try to write my first commercial game. I could not wait any longer.
The first steps
I understood that I was nobody and call me in any way. I was afraid that if I create a game, then my friend, another friend of mine, and my girlfriend will know the most about it. Therefore, I needed to gain my audience and support group. But how to do it for free? For this, I chose the most trash and memorable alias, namely Flatingo. Further, I created a YouTube channel under the same brand, where I talked about game development, game development, drawing for games, game design, as well as how I personally make my game. It was a kind of game developer blog. I created funny and short videos, making it a kind of show, thus differing from the competition. Fortunately, there were not many bloggers on this topic in Russian YouTube. I distributed my videos in all corners of Russian game devs, for which I was hated and loved. I distributed video on all game development sites, game public places and wherever there is game development. For example, if in the video I drew a character for the game, then I could easily share such videos on all drawing sites, which gave an additional response. I began to bypass obscure places or small publics with an open wall, because there is no life there, just a bunch of brazen spam. The young guys (schoolchildren and students in the common people) went fine, but older people did not like my presentation of the material. This is normal.
')
But what about the game?
So, when I launched this YouTube machine, I began to actively create the game. I wanted to create a small project with a twist. Before the development of the game, I was inspired by the Super Meat Boy games and the old Adventure Island, so I connected the balance of these two games and it turned out to be my own, different mechanics. As I draw vector graphics in Illustrator, I decided to use my favorite, flat design. Drawing all the graphics for the game took me about 3 weeks. I stubbornly shot videos for my channel, promoted my videos and made the game. The audience slowly, but began to appear. On my channel subscribed 5-10 subscribers per day, which could not but rejoice. Everything went like clockwork until something happened.
Feil
For 2 months of development I managed to draw all the graphics and create several levels for my game. I even fit into the deadlines set for myself, but one fine summer evening, my laptop fell out of the window on the second floor. It was a disaster. In the evenings I loved to open the window into the courtyard in the evenings, turn on the desk lamp, put my computer on the windowsill, brew delicious fruit tea with snacks and turn on my favorite music, but I could never think what could happen to me. Later it turned out that in theory it could still work, but unfortunately the motherboard and the hard disk "flew" in it. HDD. The service center told me that it would be easier to buy a new HDD. Well, it hurt. I had to buy a new laptop and start all over again, but now using Dropbox.
I need more
By this time, my channel began to gain new momentum. In one of my videos, I borrowed a piece from a video of another foreign author, for which a lot of negative criticism fell on me in different places. True, I did not think that it would cause such a violent reaction, but now I know that hate is also an advertisement. I said earlier that 5-10 subscribers subscribed to my channel per day? Forget it! Since then, 40-50 people per day subscribed to the channel consistently. Hayters began to denounce my nickname everywhere, thereby making me an advertisement. I simply watched their attempts and did not enter into conflicts. I also asked a couple of small game editors to write about me, which cost me only mutual PR. After a couple of months, I noticed that when I publish a video somewhere in new places, they wrote in the comments: “ Oh, is this Flatingo ” or “ Ty, and here is it? ". It remains only to finish the half-created game, but first I added English subtitles to all my videos and started promoting them over the hill. The algorithm is the same, only instead of VK I used Facebook, instead of Picab was Reddit, well, and other game dev sites. Let me just say that to develop over the hill for free at times more difficult, because there is more competition and sometimes you just do not have time to notice.
Game created
Winter came. On my channel I started adding 70-100 subscribers per day and I finally finished the game. By the way, if someone is interested, then my game is a hardcore 2D platformer with puzzle elements and cartoon graphics, in which the main character is a nice kid named Luppi. My game is called - TheLooppy. The development of the game took me 5 months, but if it were not for the incident with the laptop, then I think that I would have done it in 3 months. When developing the game, for me the main task was to bring the game balance to a good level, convenient gameplay and nice graphics, for it is with these three things that the player faces 98% of the total playing time. In general, I think it turned out not bad. The game will make you think about how to solve this or that puzzle to achieve the goal, make you pretty run around the level of your enemies and make it clear that you can reach the goal in the game in different ways.
Publisher
Of course, I planned to publish the game via Steam Direct and my friend helped me with this. For me it was very important to surround myself with good guys from the sphere of gamedev. I think that creating a good game alone is quite realistic, but to become a cool developer without friends and an audience is very difficult. Of course, it was not without a funny case. For example, my minor subscribers wanted so much to play for Luppi for free, that they made up funny stories, seeming to be cool publishers or friends of major bloggers on YouTube, so that I could send them a key. Sly, but I still love them. I was glad that at the end of the game I had at least some audience of several thousand subscribers. Now, this is someone to play.
The game began to be sold in early February and I immediately told this to subscribers in all social networks and YouTube. At the time of the release of the game, or rather, for 5 months of development, I managed to get an audience of 8K subscribers without investing a penny. For the first 3 days the game brought me almost $ 150, considering that the game costs only $ 2. After 7 days, the game has already brought $ 210. Trifle, but nice, especially since this is my first commercial game. The only advertisement for my game was my channel and my social networks. It's exactly a week now, as the game is available on Steam, but YouTube has had a few small reviews of my game, and in the personal Vkontakte I received the art of the main character, and with great pleasure I published them in a group. By the way, on the first day of sales, subscribers found a bug at the very beginning of the game, because of which players began to return money. It so happened that on some PCs the game worked many times faster than planned, but in one short evening I fixed this bug and released an update.
Epilogue
Well, here I have such an interesting experience with my first game. I did not spend a penny on advertising and game development, but I gained a small audience of like-minded people. During the development of the game I was approached 3 times with an advertising offer for my channel, so I even managed to make some money on it. In the future, I plan to develop further in the field of game dev, creating new projects and finding new like-minded people. By the way, I noticed that some developers are also reviewers of games on YouTube, and then deliberately promote their games through their channel. As a rule, due to simplicity, such channels gather an audience faster than channels about game development. I really like my hobby. I hope you also love what you do.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/348804/
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