I'm currently working on an expansion pack for Wonderland, with new levels, gameplay elements, etc, as well as a level editor. Since I want people to be able to easily trade levels, I was thinking of setting up a discussion forum to do just that.

I've noticed that player forums for indie games have not been very successful for most people. Retro64 used to have one, no longer does. Just noticed that Mking took theirs down. Dexterity's gets very little traffic (much less than the indie board), although there are some levels posted I see. I used to have one for Intensity XS/ReCharge, but ended up closing it since people used it more to contact me with questions, rather than discuss the game amongst themselves. When SmallRockets first opened theirs I remember it being hounded by someone posting serial number cracks. PomPom's seems get some good discussions going, although it is again more due to the constant involvement of Mike/Miles (and a few groupies!). I don't know of any other indie board with more than a few posts.

So... are they worth the hassle?

Why do you get lots of registrations, but very few of these people check out (and post on) the boards? What could be done to make them more active?

I'm thinking that, if I do have a new board, I might put a link to the discussion forum from the game's main menu. That might at least make people aware of it.

I'm also thinking about the possibility of going one step further, and _only_ have access to the forums from within the registered version of the game, i.e. not from the website and not from the demo. This might improve the quality of the discussion (again, _if_ there is any).

Any comments, thoughts, especially from those of you who post on player forums or moderated forums in your past and present lives? ;-)

Patrick

After I found the Dexterity forums I was REALLY surprised by the lack of posts. My first thought? Wow, these Dexterity guys must not sell many games. (Which I now realize is false.)

I don't know, I guess my feeling is that shareware forums are *rarely* popular (in terms of activity), and you probably LOSE more sales than you gain. I mean is someone MORE likely to download and register your game because you have a message forum that hardly anyone seems to use?

Just my couple 'o coppers.

>>and you probably LOSE more sales than you gain

That's an interesting thought. Does an empty forum cause you to look bad (mine has had ZERO posts) and could that really actually cost you sales?

Maybe I should just get rid of mine...


__________________
Damon Du Bois
www.wizardslab.com

I've got a friend who runs a forum for his game-in-progress Claim Stake (http://www.claimstake.com) (he posted a beta test request here several weeks ago). He keeps the forum active through close involvement with the discussions; without his regular involvement, it probably wouldn't be nearly as active. Basically, I think most gamers aren't all that interested in talking with each other. :)

Kai-Peter has a pretty good forum going.

When I open mine, I think I'll register a few names to begin with and start a few threads myself. It's a little decietful, but I think it might make people less nervous to post in a thread that was already started.

Forum activity depends heavily on the type of games you offer. Many players have told us that while they enjoy playing our games, talking about them in forums is just a bit too fanatical. My guess is that if you focus on more hardcore genres like RPG and strategy, you're more likely to get an active forum going. Younger people also seem more likely to have time to chat in forums than older people with families.

I just put up the forum to my (upcoming) game.
www.universalsoccermanager.com/forums/

they are quite empty now :)

My thoughts are:
- as Steve said, forum are useful only for certain type of games. Strategy/RPG forum are the most used. It is more likely someone will put post like "what must I do to kill the Red Dragon Zzykyll?" than "hello guys" :)
- forum are useful also for ONLINE games, or EDITABLE ones. Look at forums for games like NWN, Everquest, etc.

What I am planning to do to increase forum activity:
- insert myself some (I hope!) interesting thread
- talk about "general things". since my game is related to soccer, I'll talk about soccer in general hoping to draw some attention
- making announcement about patches and updates directly from the news section of the forum, so the user get used to check there and maybe he'll also start browsing

But remember, not everyone has the time to write or read posts. I think it's difficult even for commercial games to have crowded forums...! is more likely to have good forums about general subject, or if the game is really a great success or is full of strategies/aspects/secrets like MMORPG or similar.

In addition to Game Tunnel I run a very large Tropical Fish website, seems a bit off topic I know, but give me a chance.

Forums in my estimation are website killers. They tend to come in two types. Those that are well-used and those that are not. The ones that are not well-used tend to give visitors the idea that no-one visits the site. For the gaming business, I believe this can certainly be detrimental to the website and the business.

The forums that are well-used also do not benefit the site. My experience with them is that if they become well-used, they increase site traffic specifically to the forum. The people who visit the forum tend to not visit any other parts of the site, or really help to pay the site's bills while increasing the site's bills substantially. (you might consider this forum, which is a great service, but likely a money drain, not a money maker) Certainly with all the games downloaded off of your websites, most of all of you have to focus on bandwidth more than I have to. Still, I've had to switch hosts 5 times in the last 3 years of my fish website's existence due to the fact that I was exceeding the amount of bandwidth that I have. I now exceed 25 GB a month on the website...it doesn't have a single download on it, so that bandwidth is all due to traffic. A large portion of that is the forum, perhaps 67%. Keeping that number of people visiting the site is desirable, and enjoyable, so that is the upside.

So I come from a somewhat polarized view. The likelyhood of a forum on a gaming site getting as large as the one on my fish site is low. However, if the forum stays very small I believe it is still a detriment to the site. Even on Longbowdigital Arts, where they have a fairly active forum I believe it is a detriment as most of the posts are rants against the company/games.

Still I put Forums on all my websites, though I've seriously considered removing them several times. They seem to be a no-win situation in my considertation of them.

I think it just really depends on the game. On our forums, the topic that has the most activity is the Cry of the Ancients forums. There are about 300 out of the 500 total posts in those alone. That doesn't count the internal forums that are maintained for the game that easily outpaces what is on the site. One thread, I think it's call the Tap Room or Bar room or something like that, has over 175 posts alone.

From what I can tell, the key seems to be the social and interactive nature of the game. CotA is built with a social aspect in mind. It's meant for players to communicate with each other to advance in the game. This promotes the use of the bulletin boards. Other games which are just downloadable have practically no social interaction between players. I can't see a game with no multi-player component getting a lot of forum usage. It will just look bare.

Lots of interesting points made.

I still wonder if making the forums restricted to registered users helps the potential sales killer and piracy issues. Although it still has the potential of being very empty or turning into a complaint forum (which could turn away your current customers from future games).

As for trading homebrew levels, any other suggestions that might work? I personally would rather not test and play and weed out all submissions and then post the best ones, although I realize that's an option. Another option would be to program an automatic site for submitting levels, voting on levels, displaying ranked lists of levels, but I'm not sure I have the expertise to pull that off well enough. For those of you who supply level editors, is this an issue?

Patrick

Even on Longbowdigital Arts, where they have a fairly active forum I believe it is a detriment as most of the posts are rants against the company/games.

Hmm... I never considered about that.
In effect the most diffused use of forums is to complain about the games and author/s.
I've seen a lot of rant posts in commercial games forums, so I think that indie would be no exception: infact there are some people who like to insult and complain every time they have a chance :(
For now I'll leave the forum on my website, but if the posts are really low or if some unpolished people start to show up, I think I'll close them down and think twice before opening another...!!!

For a level exchange I actually think the forum is a good idea, a lot easier than creating a 3 pronged web program to upload, sort and restrict use. You could create a web program that restricted use of the upload portion, but not the download portion, taking care of that problem. It also makes the downloads available to everyone. Don't think that type of thing would be too hard to do in .asp, for someone who used asp... you chould check php resource or cgi resource as well and be inventive with what is there.

Here are a few stats pulled from the Mistaril forum (http://www.mistaril.com/forum):
Registered users: 120
Total threads: 114
Total posts: 777 (My posts: 197, 25% of total)
The forum requires registration before allowing posting.

I am very satisfied with the forum. I think there are a few issues that contribute to that:

1. Clear goal. I think the primary reason why the Space Station Manager forums are successfull are because they have a clear goal: to work as a communication channel between people having an interest in the development of the game. A secondary reason is exchange of add-on content, an important but small part of the current traffic on the forum.

2. My active contribution. My contribution to the forum comes in two forms: posts and new releases. I post on most weekdays and do a new release with two weeks intervals. A forum is like a garden, it requires extensive love and care to take root.

3. Type of game. SSM is about creating things. Many games include level editors that let players create their own content, but in SSM everything is player content. This type of player is maybe a bit more keen on contributing to the forums. I don't really agree with the hardcore aspect, I estimate that many of my players are casual and have strong family obligations.

Generally speaking only a small percentage of players join up on the forums. Older players tend to contact me by e-mail, but are generally satisfied when they find out about the forum. Older players post less regularly but they usually post much longer and more tought out than the younger contributors. I think this aptly reflects how time usage patterns vary among players.

Regarding bandwidth issues that Cyrus mentions, I think a dedicated server with 300-500GB of bandwidth is easily able to cope with the forums. The forums are barely noticeable on the server. But I think the difference between Cyrus forums and SSM forums is the goal, I will gladly spend 100GB of bandwidth on the forums as long as they work this well.

I have negative experience with forum, but I have in plans strategy game release somewhere mid. of next year, and I think I will set forum for it, because it may attract some hardcore strategy game players, and they used to use forum for AARs, hints, annoncements and discussion.

For indi I think newsletter does most of what forums do for retail games. If you do not need forum, do not set it. Empty forum is quite a sad picture.

Originally posted by Eagle EXE
When I open mine, I think I'll register a few names to begin with and start a few threads myself. It's a little decietful, but I think it might make people less nervous to post in a thread that was already started. [/B] '

Oh my God !
Maybe all of you are just Steve posting under different names !!!???

Originally posted by BarrySlisk
'

Oh my God !
Maybe all of you are just Steve posting under different names !!!???

Holly jebus, you can accuse me of being Steve when I eat meat, do not move more than 20 times from my computer to my refrigerator, and have such a teribly spielinc?

I agree that a dead forum does give the impression of damp sales. I think you can encourage user activity but it does require a lot of extra work. A thriving player community can vastly increase sales and improve your product. If you cehck out KP's forum, you will lots of suggestions, bugs etc. that otherwise would not get shared.

On the topic of putting the forum interacting within the app itself, just remember how Everquest players spend hours and hours doing little but chatting away through the game when they just as easily could be using MSN, AIM, ICQ, or Yahoo Messenger. There must be some kind of mystique about communicating from WITHIN the app itself. So this might be a good idea. Especially if the communication between players seems like an element of fantasy. You really can't make such communication seem a part of the game if you do it from your website. Website forums would seem too detatched from the game itself to seem a part of that alternate reality. But this may not be what you want to do with your forums anyway...

Originally posted by Punchey
On the topic of putting the forum interacting within the app itself, ...

Yes, I think that could be quite good and fun if done properly. In Wonderland, I had thought about having a "market square" where Stinky and Loof could wander and leave messages for other players (including custom levels, etc). Sort of like a crossing between Wonderland and Animal Crossing. I would definitely get more attention and activity than a separate forum.

However, I see two main problems with it:

1. I should really have a separate person taking care of the online side of things (to do it well it takes a lot of expertise and extra time that I don't necessarily have... and you'd definitely want to do it well)

2. Given that it's a family game the problem of making this environment child proof might be too much to handle for an indie game. (see also past thread on this board re: disney's online kids world).

Ahh yes... childproofing / making it family friendly... that is a challenge indeed. It's a shame we live in a world where we have to worry about stuff like that... such a shame...

You could always spend alot of time writing up an intelligent word replacer to find all permutations of words that would be objectionable. But ofcourse, that doesn't do much to curb potential pedophiles. I guess anything where children are the primary audience will have difficulty implementing any sort of on-line community. There are just so many issues to that... in fact, IIRC, there are even laws against it. I recall that there was some law against contacting a minor (or someone below some age). I'm not sure the extent of that kind of law, but it might stand in your way.

I think if you want people to communcate about your game, making it easily accessable from within the game is important- but maybe a difficult trick.

But having a dead message board does not look good.

Miko and Molly has an Internet score board. When I saw that only one person had a score up there I pretty much assumed that there were no sales. And you can use it right from the game, so I'm not sure what that's all about.

I can't think of any time I liked a game but decided not to buy it because the player forums were not very active. If a potential customer is on-the-fence, I can certainly see how witnessing an active forum might push them towards the purchase. But I can't really see how a dead forum would stop a sure sale. That is, compared to having no forum at all, I personally don't think a dead forum causes a reduction in sales. This is just my opinion from my own perspective, and since my forum is rather dead at the moment maybe I'm just being optimistic. ;-) OTOH, if I bought a game and I had issues with it, a dead forum might make me more likely to get a refund on the game, but only if nobody responded to my questions on the forums AND email support. But that's just me.

What about if you took testimonials from your players? Take a few comments from your fan mail (if any) and place it on the front page. This wouldn't serve as a replacement for the forums, but how useful are they?

Originally posted by elund
I can't think of any time I liked a game but decided not to buy it because the player forums were not very active.
I think the real concern is that someone just visiting the site and seeing the dead forum would get the (possibly false) impression that the company is unsound. This visitor would then abandon the site without bothering to learn enough about the game to determine whether or not it is of interest. I think there is some truth to that concern. Image may not be everything, but it sure does count for a lot in marketing and advertising.

I've had good success with a forum on my site, but my game is much more like a traditional commercial product than most indie efforts. It tends to attract a more hardcore, less casual crowd, and those people are used to forming active online communities around a game while it is in development.

I've noticed that even with most of the major commercial games, the web forum is used to build a community (i.e. develop a market) before the game is complete. Once the game comes out, there is a brief flurry of new posters and and a drift of "how do I kill the foozle?" threads. And then after a month or two, the forum is nearly dead as everyone begins to move on to the next hotly anticipated game in development.

Before a game comes out, all the fans are in the same boat. None of them really know what the game will be like, and there is a lot of speculation about release dates, anticipated features, multiplayer rivalries, and so on. Once the game comes out, the community tends to split into the early adopters and everyone else. The people who have the game become different from those who don't have it due to the secret knowledge they have acquired. The people who don't have the game find it harder to communicate with the ones who do because the playing field is no longer level. Even those who have the game have less to talk about amongst themselves. Speculation was the common fabric of the community. Those who know the answers find there isn't much to say about them.

Starshatter does look like a commercial game. I know this is off topic, but how many people are on your team? Is it just you?


_____________
Damon Du Bois
www.wizardslab.com

Originally posted by damon
Starshatter does look like a commercial game. I know this is off topic, but how many people are on your team? Is it just you?
Thanks!

Yeah, I like to say that it's a team of almost one. I've been working on it part time while I hold down a regular day job to feed the family. Although, in the past year or so, I've added a friend who is doing some of the artwork and design, so now it's a team of almost two.