Advertising.

[Ichibod Trill]

don't know about other countries, but in UK advertising for this game (and most others, sucks), outside of the industry you wouldn't know they exist.

Console games fair slightly better especially at Christmas, but PC games never make a mark.

I Know they sell well inspite of this, but raising awareness wouldn't hurt, its not as if the production companies can't afford it, the games industry is massive now, bigger than films and music.

 

[Yellonet]

Same in Sweden... I've seen one(1) commercial which included HL2.

 

[Steve]

Well, why spend extra money on television advertising? Millions of people already know about it, right? And each one of those people tells just one of their friends, well...yeah. Anybody in the advertising business will tell you that word of mouth is the most powerful form of advertising.

 

[Ichibod Trill]

All other industries which produce commodities for the mass market spend large portions of their budget on advertising.

The entertainment industry spends more than any other.

More ppl buying games = more money to develop games and hardware = better games and hardware.

 

[Steve]

All other industries which produce commodities for the mass market spend large portions of their budget on advertising.

The entertainment industry spends more than any other.

More ppl buying games = more money to develop games and hardware = better games and hardware.

Right...is that supposed to be a rebuttal of my statement? Because I'm not quite getting it.

 

[Mr-Fusion]

Game publishers don't have enough money to spend on mass marketing campaigns through TV etc. Movie distributors do.

Budgets for big films are around $350 million dollar range.
Big games have budgets of around $30 million.

As you can see, room for international advertising is sparse in the area of games. There's just not the same amount of money being thrown around per game as there is per movie.

As time goes by there's less and less games but they have higher budgets and longer development periods. Statistically the PC game industry is being raped by consoles. There's just not the same monetary opportunities in PC gaming as there is for consoles. And it's only going to get worse before it gets better BARRING some absolutely mindblowing advance in PC gaming......which probably won't happen.

So don't expect much TV advertising for PC games soon or in the future.

 

[Ichibod Trill]

Right...is that supposed to be a rebuttal of my statement? Because I'm not quite getting it.

if by word of mouth, we have gotten where we are, adding larger advertising budgets will get us further.


wasn't a rebuttle just an observation, i don't ever do anything as risque as rebutt, don't have the energy

 

[oMeSSiaHo]

I work at Circuit City and we have a big ass display by the doors. That location+holiday shoppers= great advertising! Maybe Valve and Vivendi are just subtle. Its actually kinda cool, every day on my way into work I get to say hi to Gordon, Alyx and the G-man! :E

 

[CriYam]

People who play pc games more than likely have a computer which is online. Internet "buzz" destroys any puny tv commercial.