Post by Amberbaum in Thoughts on Patreon comments

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Twitter and Tumblr seem to be one of the main-hubs for VN news. If you could post your updates there then that could draw some attention. It will be small or barely non-existent. If another dev or dev team, with some followers, share your post then that's a different story. Then there are blogs that specialize on this type of content like VNs/romance or sci-fi. Problem is, the only Tumblr blogs I know of, who act as a content-sharer, are deep in Covid-wasteland and are barely active because of that.

Sadly I'm not part of any Sci-fi or gaming group/forum. I think you'd have much more success with getting people to try out your demo on the right discord channels. Again, I'm only part of 3 channels and one of them is from another small dev, who's parody fan game got pulled down by itch.io. ...

As for writing something else to build up some foundation, that's a good idea. Problem is: Does it even interest you? Do you even like to write high fantasy or will it snuff out any interest in continue writing?

If you want to go the last route, remember that "magitech" is a thing. It's basically your bog-standard medieval or baroque setting with magic that is more handled like technology (powering street lights, ect.). The main protagonist can be a detective, a disgruntled soldier of war or some heiress of one of the biggest "powerstone-thingy" provider, who gets involuntarily involved in all kinds of political power-struggle... for example like succession game the princes and princesses play for the throne.

Lastly maybe sleuth around other indie VN devs that have much more experience when it comes to selling and marketing games. The Lemmasoft/ren'py discord server seems to be a good start for that. They even have an introduction section to introduce your idea game:

https://discord.com/invite/6ckxWYm

Frozenstar2 years ago

Thanks for the tips. I am in the Ren'py Discord already! I'm just really bad at marketing myself. I tend to feel like I am pestering people so I usually keep my questions to a minimum. Hopefully when I put out a game, I will feel more confident about joining the discussion.

Yes, I enjoy writing both sci-fi and fantasy! :) I think I just have more of a love affair with sci-fi because it's so much harder to find, especially hard science sci-fi. Most of the sci-fi out there is of the Star Wars/Star Trek variety, where the technology doesn't make sense and most of the aliens are just colorful humans. (Don't get me wrong... I enjoy that, too, but it leaves something to be desired.) On the flip side, fantasy is a dime a dozen, and often lacks logical world-building and inconsistent rules, but it allows room for lots of creativity.

I'm currently sketching out a new idea...

Amberbaum2 years ago (1 edit)

Most of the sci-fi out there is of the Star Wars/Star Trek variety, where the technology doesn't make sense and most of the aliens are just colorful humans.

Yeah. I guess the tech feels just so antiquated after a time. And the colourful humans definitely are the bog standard of sci-fi. It's like the Asari from Mass Effect. They are basically like space elves. If you aren't into women then you absolutely don't get the supposed "allure" of them, because everyone is supposedly into them. Meanwhile I'm just like: "What... my female heterosexual brain does not compute."

Then there's space magic AKA biotic. It's blue. I love Mass effect, but you can smell the formula.

and often lacks logical world-building

Yeah, hence why I recommend treating it like technology. It's rules won't be as solid as hard science. But maybe you can put some numbers on it. I remember reading a novel where barrier magic was a subtype of magical study by itself. Mages basically had to do mathematical calculations to erect a barrier and do some geometry. It's cost energy to create one and it has to be sustained.

Oh and I found this on the wiki from r/indiedev:

https://old.reddit.com/r/indiedev/wiki/resources#wiki_marketing

Frozenstar2 years ago

Yes, those are great examples! I do enjoy this kind of sci-fi as much as the next person, but I want the other stuff, too. I agree, though, about treating your technology as technology. Unless you are dealing with a chaos realm or something equivalent, there's no reason that even your high fantasy realms shouldn't be ruled by, well, rules. Just because you don't know WHY gravity exists does not mean that it doesn't, etc.

That is a very neat concept, by the way, about using magical calculations to erect barriers. Very cool! I think I have an interesting magic system sketched out for this new concept and the start of what could be an interesting plot. But wouldn't you know it, I've come up with like...two more sci-fi stories in the process? @_@

I really appreciate you linking me that marketing page. That's really helpful! Thank you! :)