Hello from Paragon Marketing
By
Ad Astra,
Posted on: 2010-04-16 09:39 in CoH and CoV General Discussions
So how much can I buy a mint condition Wrath of the Lich King comic book for these days?
Why release a costume creator when people can already use one via the existing free trial?
Sorry guys, all of these ideas are just more attempts at reinventing the wheel.
Let's say Paragon Studios actually did hire Piers Anthony to do a story arc. Who's going to know about it? The existing playerbase that already plays the game? Or would they have to resort to doing something crazy like...Oh, I don't know...Advertise the game? So why not just save the money it would cost to hire Piers Anthony in the first place and use that money to advertise the game? I know, crazy...
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Multiple megabyte application that costs the developers no server resources, which not only itself serves as an advertisement for one of the game's major differentiating features but serves to generate hundreds or thousands of images which also serve to advertise that feature, versus multi-gigabyte download that costs server resources and functions for a limited time? I dunno, I think there's room for both. The best kind of advertising is the kind that people actively seek out.
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Originally Posted by Positivity
Why release a costume creator when people can already use one via the existing free trial?
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@SPTrashcan
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It's just another way to promote the game. It should be pretty easy to pull the creator out of the game and make a stand alone version, and it would be a significantly smaller download. People are more likely to download a few hundred megabytes rather than 3 GBs. And then the creator hopefully builds some excitement to further entice people to do that huge download.
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Originally Posted by Positivity
So how much can I buy a mint condition Wrath of the Lich King comic book for these days?
Why release a costume creator when people can already use one via the existing free trial? Sorry guys, all of these ideas are just more attempts at reinventing the wheel. Let's say Paragon Studios actually did hire Piers Anthony to do a story arc. Who's going to know about it? The existing playerbase that already plays the game? Or would they have to resort to doing something crazy like...Oh, I don't know...Advertise the game? So why not just save the money it would cost to hire Piers Anthony in the first place and use that money to advertise the game? I know, crazy... |
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Regardless of a different app, this is a good reason for changing the character creator workflow.|
Originally Posted by Hallowed
Agreed. That's my major reason for wanting an off-line capability. Though instances like this are not limited to server maintenance. A simple server or internet connection hiccup can do the trick. I've lost several hours of my life this way (granted, I'm ridiculously meticulous/obsessive about my costumes).
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In order not to be tied to the servers, the character creator should allow for costume creation in the client before needing to log in.
This in itself would be a nice marketing tool since you could still launch the client and fiddle with toon looks before logging in, meaning that unsubbed/expired sub people can dress up their toons but not play them until they login/subscribe.
If this was done during the downloading/updating process, the devs would get bonus points.
Not sure how many people do wait for the long reinstall/new install download, but I've seen plenty of people complaining about long wait times for the install. At least if they had access to the costume creator during those times it would mollify them to some degree.
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Completely agree.|
Originally Posted by Dark_Respite
Your Facebook shows a six-second teaser for GOING ROGUE. In just a couple of hours, there were over 50 comments of players clamouring for more. (And come on, guys - six seconds? WTH? Teaser length could be 30 seconds without giving too much away, while still giving enough flavour and hints to have players going "GIMMEGIMMEGIMME!")
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3) More vids in general - way back when, there were at least a couple of videos per issue (ESPECIALLY when COV came out). They don't take that long, especially if it's just the "run in and film stuff" variant. 4) Film the M&Gs, and get them up on YT ASAP. There is absolutely NO excuse for it taking FOUR MONTHS to get a 1-minute video up about HeroCon 2009. NONE. Get SOMEONE with a videocamera to stand in the back, film the M&G and the panel, upload it to someplace where Marketing can watch it and security-vet it, then get that thing on YouTube as quickly as possible. That would go a LONG way for showing players that can't make it that you still want them to feel 'involved'. |
4) Absolutely agreed. i'm a fairly regular attendee at the Tilde Cafe which is a free event hosted at various locations in CT and every cafe event has a camera there to record the talk and post it to youtube within a few days. It should be possible for Paragon Studios/NCsoft to do that with every meet & greet or other public events. Even if you can't spare an intern or helper monkey to record the event, i'm sure that there are fans of the game who would volunteer to show up early and set up a camera and microphone(s) to record it for you.
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Originally Posted by Foundsavant
Ehhh... not drinking anything that's called Sprunk.
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Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Drinking, eating, using it to clean the sink; all not happening with anything called Sprunk.
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Originally Posted by Durakken
Sprunk better not turn into a meme or i will hurt someone...
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Hire a good artist, writer, colorist, and letter. Get Image on bored. You got yourself a comic. The whole venture costs maybe 2.5 to 5 grand and as long as you sell more than 3000 copies, which is a definite with CoH (and not to mention customary that distributors buy 10k of the first issue), you make profit on every issue even if it sell bad and you break even after 2-4 issues if the entire thing is a flop. Comics are only difficult to manage when you don't have money and/or a company to back you. You have both. |
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David Nakayama is already hired. Check. Troy Hickman has done the comic in the past, namely the most popular arc of the run that was turned into a popular arc of missions. As long as you pay him at least two dollars, he's on board. Check. |
Originally Posted by Durakken
Bull. Hire a good artist, writer, colorist, and letter. Get Image on bored. You got yourself a comic. The whole venture costs maybe 2.5 to 5 grand and as long as you sell more than 3000 copies, which is a definite with CoH (and not to mention customary that distributors buy 10k of the first issue), you make profit on every issue even if it sell bad and you break even after 2-4 issues if the entire thing is a flop.
Comics are only difficult to manage when you don't have money and/or a company to back you. You have both. |
This would be the All-Star Team of CoH comics. Hickman had the best touch with story and dialogue, not to mention fleshing out the characters, and judging from numerous comments on the board, even the POTENTIAL of another Sister Psyche bathing sequence by Nakayama would ensure enough sales to turn a profit, ie, Bucks. Return on capital invested. If little indie comics can make money, a revived CoH comic with THOSE TWO could certainly make more than a few bucks.
Black Pebble, you guys are most of the way there already. You get those two together and you would have a GREAT comic. Read Troy Hickman's arc in the back issues of the CoH comic, and compare that to the recent Through the Mirror arc, which is a fine arc that simply has some mediocre writing in stretches. There is a REASON why Cyrus Thompson's statue is in front of the train station in Kings Row, and there is a REASON David Nakayama was hired to do art.
Imagine a Going Rogue comic tie-in done by those guys. Make it happen, BP!
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That is exactly my impression as well, and one of the most pernicious problems with trying to "listen to the players." Half the time, when someone says "listen to the players" what they say next is something I hope the devs don't actually do. If the players were all in anything remotely close to unanimity about the details of what they wanted done and not just the vague generalities, it would at least be easier to "listen to us."
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Originally Posted by SaintNicster
Actually, I was under the assumption that bringing in outside people was exactly the purpose of the Guest Author program (hence the "GUEST" in the title). The Dev's Choice system was to directly promote people/arcs that are made by current players. Also, Mercedes Lackey plays the game, and is a part of a big RP supergroup.
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guest author was first used in reference to people who's AE missions were turned into canon...ie those who already play the game and is from within the community.
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Originally Posted by SaintNicster
Actually, I was under the assumption that bringing in outside people was exactly the purpose of the Guest Author program (hence the "GUEST" in the title). The Dev's Choice system was to directly promote people/arcs that are made by current players. Also, Mercedes Lackey plays the game, and is a part of a big RP supergroup.
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Honestly that sounds made up.|
Originally Posted by Durakken
guest author was first used in reference to people who's AE missions were turned into canon...ie those who already play the game and is from within the community.
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I'm pretty certain the term "Guest Author" was first created in I14 beta to distinguish non-player arcs from player authored arcs: the first arc to be designated a guest author arc was I believe pohsyb's imp arc**. It was later focused to be arcs written by authors invited to write arcs.
As far as I know No player's AE arcs were ever turned into canon. Not even Feargas' arcs are canon.
Edit: And I believe that was to test the feature, not specifically to necessarily designate him as a "guest author" in reality.
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You may be right, it's not like I've gone on some extensive search. What I said is just from my memory. I apologize saying it like it was 100% fact... most don't distinguish anyways.|
Originally Posted by Arcanaville
Honestly that sounds made up.
I'm pretty certain the term "Guest Author" was first created in I14 beta to distinguish non-player arcs from player authored arcs: the first arc to be designated a guest author arc was I believe pohsyb's imp arc**. It was later focused to be arcs written by authors invited to write arcs. As far as I know No player's AE arcs were ever turned into canon. Not even Feargas' arcs are canon. Edit: And I believe that was to test the feature, not specifically to necessarily designate him as a "guest author" in reality. |
I've only heard 2 people ever be considered guest authored... Hickman and a now dev person...
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However, they would still have to take the time to create the API.|
Originally Posted by CuppaManga
I actually know how you can make smartphone apps available without actually developing them - it involves creating an API for smartphone developers to use. Things like being able to read in-game email (but not send for obvious reasons), see if your friends are online, etc. PM me if you want more details, I don't really want to post something long and derail the discussion here on a fairly minor point.
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No clue how long that would take.
Black Pebble - If the reason(s) for not proliferating the costume program are no longer valid (I recall it had some kind of legal reason, not sure if it was connected at all to Marvel's House of Litigation as stated above, so Go Go NCSoft Legal team!?) but you don't have the time, what if you could offer some kind of endorsement/license/whatever to someone who made one for mobile devices? At least say "If you contact us, we will see if we can approve of it as a fan-thing"?
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If the go through Image... Image retains no rights to the product and handles all the publishing and such. All that a team that makes an image comic needs to do is provide a packet displaying the comic, the team, etc... They do have a thing about not publishing things that have already been published in some way, but from what I have seen that seems to only apply to independents like myself... They also apparently take out a "1 time fee" from the returns of each issue. So if say you publish a comic through them and it makes 10k they take out 1k...if that same issues requires more printing they don't take out another fee...so if it makes another 10k, your overall profit is 19k and not 18k... They do this for each issue and you are able to publish as often or as sparsely as you want... The only real reqs is that the team you put together has to be the same team working on the book or you have provide some sort of consistency thing, but again that seems to only apply to independents... and is because of a quality thing... when you have the company and money to back you they aren't going to have as much of a problem.|
Originally Posted by Schismatrix
All Sprunkiness aside, i do like the suggestion of reviving the comic book, especially if the setup you suggest works.
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The reason that I think the comic book had so many problems is because it wasn't taken seriously enough by someone, they failed on their end which resulted in a ton of complaints, and then the dropping of the comic. If you have people that take it seriously enough or have people that will take care of the problematic parts I don't see where the problem comes in.
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6 authors announced in two waves.|
Originally Posted by Durakken
You may be right, it's not like I've gone on some extensive search. What I said is just from my memory. I apologize saying it like it was 100% fact... most don't distinguish anyways.
I've only heard 2 people ever be considered guest authored... Hickman and a now dev person... |
Bill Willingham, Rooster Teeth, and Scott Kurtz
Mercedes Lackey, Troy Hickman, and Austin Grossman
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There's several - Hickman, Mercedes Lackey, Austin Grossman, the Red vs. Blue guys (IIRC). Pohsyb wasn't a real GA, just had that one up on beta to test the GA flag.|
Originally Posted by Durakken
You may be right, it's not like I've gone on some extensive search. What I said is just from my memory. I apologize saying it like it was 100% fact... most don't distinguish anyways.
I've only heard 2 people ever be considered guest authored... Hickman and a now dev person... |
Hmm, interesting - no "Guest Authors" page at the wiki...
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I sent him an email once...|
Originally Posted by Black Pebble
If you know Piers Anthony, Ill talk to him.
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I got a reply, too! Then again, the reply was written by his assistant... >.>
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Originally Posted by Durakken
And this is different from paragonwiki because paragonwiki focuses on mechanics and has lore as a side thing more or less that just happened to be a part of other information gathered rather than focusing on it...
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A lore book would be different, because there's a LOT of game lore which does not actually exist anywhere outside the Paragon Studios offices.
http://www.fimfiction.net/story/36641/My-Little-Exalt
Things that I would like to see:
-Offline Costume Creator (with the ability to save, load, etc)
-Out-game messaging program. I remember back in the day, there was a way to communicate with people on Battle.net without actually having to load up the game. And I hear you can msg people cross-game now with Battle.net (If you're on WoW, you can msg someone on Diablo or whatever)
For the sake of simplicity, this could be global based. Bonus points if it showed server/toon name/faction. I'd love to have a plugin for Trillian for something like this.
Reasoning behind this: I hate logging into CoH to find that either my friends are offline or teams are full/busy etc.
-Smart phone app would be cool - Messaging capabilities (like mentioned above), "friends online," and such would be nice. Heck, even a tab to check if my stuff at WW sold would be cool (with the amounts listed)
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Originally Posted by Durakken
Bull. Hire a good artist, writer, colorist, and letter. Get Image on bored. You got yourself a comic. The whole venture costs maybe 2.5 to 5 grand and as long as you sell more than 3000 copies, which is a definite with CoH (and not to mention customary that distributors buy 10k of the first issue), you make profit on every issue even if it sell bad and you break even after 2-4 issues if the entire thing is a flop.
Comics are only difficult to manage when you don't have money and/or a company to back you. You have both. |
See this is why Black Pebble is incompetent. He can't even say David Nakayama
Black Pebble's initials are BP: Nuff said
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Originally Posted by Foundsavant
Ehhh... not drinking anything that's called Sprunk.
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I'm holding out for Bouncy Bubble Beverage, from our friends at Paranoia.
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Question for everyone:
If they went ahead and made your dreams come true by releasing a costume creator and hiring top-notch talent to create a series of CoX comics, how would they inform the world of these developments? Would they just splash them up on the main page and hope it works itself out from there?
Well with the comic Image cross promotes if I remember right and putting out an actual comic puts it in the hand of comic shops which promotes in their own way. Most comic shops pretty much buy anything new... all buy anything that is liekly to seel which CoH is... and you know... it hits your demographic so >.>
once you have that out there you have pretty much free monthly advertising for anything else.
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We asked for this back in CoH beta. We were told it couldn't be done because it was "baked into" the game.|
Originally Posted by Captain Fabulous
It's just another way to promote the game. It should be pretty easy to pull the creator out of the game and make a stand alone version, and it would be a significantly smaller download. People are more likely to download a few hundred megabytes rather than 3 GBs. And then the creator hopefully builds some excitement to further entice people to do that huge download.
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They said the same thing about power color customization.
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Sprunk - Wasn't this from GTA: San Andreas before it was from City of Heroes?
Comic Book - I'd go with Web distribution rather than print. Look what The Old Republic is doing with their comics and the art on the first one is total garbage. Have Hero1 help write the story arcs so at least they touch on what's happening with the game. I mean you hired Dave as your lead art guy and I loved his stuff. It's what got me interested in the CoH world in the first place.
One thing I hear from people about City of Heroes is part of the reason they can't get into it is due to the lack of lore or at least the lack of accessibility of the Lore.
There's an idea for smartphone apps: online Comic Books which aren't beyond the scope of amateur web-cartoonists.
Free access to costume creator - Here's an idea: If you can allow someone to have a 14-day free trial that severely limits what they can do in it, what about an unlimited trial that limits you to level 1. This way you have access to the costume creator but you won't be able to go past level 1. You'd probably have to severely limit expired accounts to only new characters only allowing access to the older characters if they re-sub up.
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Which they then did for the Korean market anyway. There apparently are a lot of things we're told can't be done that they've managed to find a way to do at some point.
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Originally Posted by Domacett
We asked for this back in CoH beta. We were told it couldn't be done because it was "baked into" the game.
They said the same thing about power color customization. |
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To be blunt, the former is probably a lie and the latter is definitely the truth. Power color customization basically required new code to be added to the game and for the color-tintable things to be often replaced with things that are actually designed to be tintable. Even so, there are still many things that are not tintable because the work hasn't been done to redo them to be color customizable yet.
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Originally Posted by Domacett
We asked for this back in CoH beta. We were told it couldn't be done because it was "baked into" the game.
They said the same thing about power color customization. |
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