Advertising Improvement
What makes a game successful? Things that may come to mind are production values. “It has to have totally sweet graphics!” you may say. “The soundtrack! It has to match the game and be fun to listen to, even when you’re not playing!” or “It’s all about gameplay! Addictive puzzles, intriguing fight systems, and detailed environment builds are a must!” Well that’s all true. However, that is only one side to the coin. Think in terms of food products. You can create a great food. It can be cookies, pasta, pop-tarts, whatever. You can have this great product, but will lots of people desire to buy it simply because it’s great? How will they know it’s great? That’s where marketing and promotion comes in. If you want people to know you’ve got a great product, you have to tell them about it. The success of a game depends on the quality of the game and the advertising campaign. Whether it’s TV commercials, radio broadcasts, flyers, or magazine ads, this stuff is a must. A good advertising campaign can even sell a game that totally sucks, as long as it gets the audience interested. EarthBound is a great game, but when it was first released in North America, it didn’t sell so well. Quite frankly, it sold badly. Why? A lame marketing strategy. There are several things they did wrong. If it were up to me, I think I could have fixed their mess, and made EB every bit as popular as Super Mario. Then maybe we would all be anticipating Mother 12 instead of 3. The things I would improve would be the in-store advertisement swag, the television marketing, and magazine ads.
“This game stinks.” stated the promotional poster board. Sorry, kids. Reverse psychology only works in the movies. The thick green fumes that covered the bottom right area didn’t help either. I doubt most kids who saw this thought of it as a good thing. (Personally I didn’t care. I was drawn in by the screenshots.) Whichever “genius” thought of that slogan deserves to get kicked. It clearly represents a very, very small portion of the game like when you fight Master Belch (yuck!) or when that kid farts in the Chaos Theatre. The text summary that followed the slogan was pathetic as well. It just talked about how the game was full of bad smells and stuff. There might have been something about the main plot in there, but I can’t remember. It misrepresented the game’s main point and didn’t show any real substance of what the game was. If it were up to me, I would have made the slogan “This game rocks!” at the very least, or “Battle an alien invasion! Foil Cultists! Eat Pizza!”. For a summary I think it should have been something like “This is Earth Bound. You’re a normal teenager living a normal life. Though most normal teens don’t suddenly start developing psychic powers that let them shoot lightning and teleport all over the world. Most normal towns don’t get attacked by alien invasions, either. After a freak meteor accident near your house, you discover that you are destined to be a hero that must save the world. It seems like a tough goal, but don’t sweat. You’ll have some good friends to help you out: a pretty girl with seriously powerful PK, a science tech wiz, and a swordsman prince will back you up. On your journey you’ll search exotic locations across the planet to battle the forces of bad attitude. Don’t forget to have fun while you’re out and about. There live jazz concerts to attend, slots to play, and museums to explore. What are you waiting for? You’ve got a destiny to fulfill!”. I think that sums up the game pretty well and gives a sample of some of the fun things you can do. That would definitely work better than “OMG! This game stinks! Don’t buy it!”. The posters were pretty cool, though. It would have been nice if they had a variety of different posters. Another thing is that Nintendo should have pushed the game, toy, and department stores to have Earth Bound in those demo console stations like they did for Super Mario World and Super Metroid. Then people have gotten a taste of what EB was really like. I think that it would be cool if you reserved a copy of EB, you would get either ness’s red baseball cap or yellow backpack. With those modifications to the in-store campaign, I feel it would have been a major improvement over the initial “effort”.
The next problem was with the television marketing strategy. What was the problem? There was none! Having a bunch of commercials playing everyday would have reached a very broad audience. I have some details on what kind of commercials they should have made. I think it would be best to start off with Ness asleep and the meteor crash, and then some footage of Ness at the crash site. After that could be some footage of Ness walking around Onett. Then some footage of the Sky Runner flying in the clouds would play. Some footage of Fourside skyscrapers would be nice. Ness digging through a trashcan would catch some attention. Next would be a scene of Paula locked in the cabin. Following that would be a scan of Winters, fading into Jeff asleep, fading into Jeff atop Tessie. After that would be scenes of Poo walking around Dalaam, and then meditating atop the mountain. After that there should be some group scenes, like in the Deep Darkness, Scaraba (Near the pyramids.), Lost Underworld (With dinosaurs around!), and Dusty Dunes Desert (preferably near an oasis). In addition, there has to be some Runaway 5 concert footage. Within all this should be some battle footage. Preferred enemies would be Master Belch, Starmen, Frank, and Blue Cultists. As far as battle animation goes, I think some PK Special Ù, PK Thunder, and PK Star storm would get the audience pretty excited. The animations would have to retain their original sound, even amidst the music and narration. With all this game footage we have established a part of the plot, aroused speculation, built up hype with cool, funny, and weird game moments, introduced the main cast, and shown some game play and mechanics. Now we must focus on the second aspect of the commercial. What kind of music should it have? I’m thinking along the lines of the Sky Runner theme, Hippie battle music, the first Runaway 5 concert, and the main theme. My justification is that these songs are upbeat and could be good attention getters. Finally there’s the narration. I think the voice should have been an older teenager. His voice should be upbeat and a bit tough sounding, but not totally hardcore “bad dude” or annoying. There would only be a little dialogue to carry the point of the video footage. That one idea for what the television ads could have been like.
Finally there’s the magazine advertisement aspect of marketing. I think there were a few EB ads back in the day. We would have to get ads in the top selling / most popular gaming magazines of that period. In addition I think it would be a good Idea to have purchased ad space in popular children’s magazines and the like. The design of the ads would have to be spectacular. The overall design would have to have complete gestalt. All the elements would have to flow and balance in harmony of each other. The text would be something similar to the poster boards. Screenshots should consist of meteorite shots, Sky Runner shots, battle shots, and Fourside. The ad would also include some clay figures, and EB related, low opacity outline graphics in the background. Maybe it would be good to have several ads, each with a different theme: one could be about the main story line, another about the locations, another about PK and battle game play, and one about the wacky humor. Each would have a unique color scheme and screenshots that reflected the ad’s theme. The importance of a good game magazine campaign for game developers is of course to reach the consumers that most fit the largest target audience for your product: in which case the target audience is gamers and the product is your game. They are the bread and butter of your sales, so you have to make it count. By getting the attention of your main target audience, you’ve already won half the battle. Another aspect off the importance of a good magazine ad is this: when you watch a short TV ad clip, it’s over as quickly as it began. The chances of you remembering it aren’t perfect. However when you buy a magazine and see an ad for a game, you have more time to look at it and take in what you’re seeing. I think this lets it embed itself deeper into a person’s memory and subconscious than just a quick 45 second TV ad a few time a week. That way the person gains an honest interest in the game, and is not just hype driven.
I feel that my ideas would have worked well, as long as it fit the budget. By using effective marketing strategies EB could have become way more popular and well known. With advertisement tactics that attract a large general mainstream audience, the target audience, and properly showing Earth Bound for what it is, the original campaign would have been much more successful, and brought in huge profits. Though it can be argued that a part of Earth Bound’s appeal is its cult status, I will always love EB as my favorite of all time whether it’s popular or not. This is Skyrunner signing off. Goodnight.
What makes a game successful? Things that may come to mind are production values. “It has to have totally sweet graphics!” you may say. “The soundtrack! It has to match the game and be fun to listen to, even when you’re not playing!” or “It’s all about gameplay! Addictive puzzles, intriguing fight systems, and detailed environment builds are a must!” Well that’s all true. However, that is only one side to the coin. Think in terms of food products. You can create a great food. It can be cookies, pasta, pop-tarts, whatever. You can have this great product, but will lots of people desire to buy it simply because it’s great? How will they know it’s great? That’s where marketing and promotion comes in. If you want people to know you’ve got a great product, you have to tell them about it. The success of a game depends on the quality of the game and the advertising campaign. Whether it’s TV commercials, radio broadcasts, flyers, or magazine ads, this stuff is a must. A good advertising campaign can even sell a game that totally sucks, as long as it gets the audience interested. EarthBound is a great game, but when it was first released in North America, it didn’t sell so well. Quite frankly, it sold badly. Why? A lame marketing strategy. There are several things they did wrong. If it were up to me, I think I could have fixed their mess, and made EB every bit as popular as Super Mario. Then maybe we would all be anticipating Mother 12 instead of 3. The things I would improve would be the in-store advertisement swag, the television marketing, and magazine ads.
“This game stinks.” stated the promotional poster board. Sorry, kids. Reverse psychology only works in the movies. The thick green fumes that covered the bottom right area didn’t help either. I doubt most kids who saw this thought of it as a good thing. (Personally I didn’t care. I was drawn in by the screenshots.) Whichever “genius” thought of that slogan deserves to get kicked. It clearly represents a very, very small portion of the game like when you fight Master Belch (yuck!) or when that kid farts in the Chaos Theatre. The text summary that followed the slogan was pathetic as well. It just talked about how the game was full of bad smells and stuff. There might have been something about the main plot in there, but I can’t remember. It misrepresented the game’s main point and didn’t show any real substance of what the game was. If it were up to me, I would have made the slogan “This game rocks!” at the very least, or “Battle an alien invasion! Foil Cultists! Eat Pizza!”. For a summary I think it should have been something like “This is Earth Bound. You’re a normal teenager living a normal life. Though most normal teens don’t suddenly start developing psychic powers that let them shoot lightning and teleport all over the world. Most normal towns don’t get attacked by alien invasions, either. After a freak meteor accident near your house, you discover that you are destined to be a hero that must save the world. It seems like a tough goal, but don’t sweat. You’ll have some good friends to help you out: a pretty girl with seriously powerful PK, a science tech wiz, and a swordsman prince will back you up. On your journey you’ll search exotic locations across the planet to battle the forces of bad attitude. Don’t forget to have fun while you’re out and about. There live jazz concerts to attend, slots to play, and museums to explore. What are you waiting for? You’ve got a destiny to fulfill!”. I think that sums up the game pretty well and gives a sample of some of the fun things you can do. That would definitely work better than “OMG! This game stinks! Don’t buy it!”. The posters were pretty cool, though. It would have been nice if they had a variety of different posters. Another thing is that Nintendo should have pushed the game, toy, and department stores to have Earth Bound in those demo console stations like they did for Super Mario World and Super Metroid. Then people have gotten a taste of what EB was really like. I think that it would be cool if you reserved a copy of EB, you would get either ness’s red baseball cap or yellow backpack. With those modifications to the in-store campaign, I feel it would have been a major improvement over the initial “effort”.
The next problem was with the television marketing strategy. What was the problem? There was none! Having a bunch of commercials playing everyday would have reached a very broad audience. I have some details on what kind of commercials they should have made. I think it would be best to start off with Ness asleep and the meteor crash, and then some footage of Ness at the crash site. After that could be some footage of Ness walking around Onett. Then some footage of the Sky Runner flying in the clouds would play. Some footage of Fourside skyscrapers would be nice. Ness digging through a trashcan would catch some attention. Next would be a scene of Paula locked in the cabin. Following that would be a scan of Winters, fading into Jeff asleep, fading into Jeff atop Tessie. After that would be scenes of Poo walking around Dalaam, and then meditating atop the mountain. After that there should be some group scenes, like in the Deep Darkness, Scaraba (Near the pyramids.), Lost Underworld (With dinosaurs around!), and Dusty Dunes Desert (preferably near an oasis). In addition, there has to be some Runaway 5 concert footage. Within all this should be some battle footage. Preferred enemies would be Master Belch, Starmen, Frank, and Blue Cultists. As far as battle animation goes, I think some PK Special Ù, PK Thunder, and PK Star storm would get the audience pretty excited. The animations would have to retain their original sound, even amidst the music and narration. With all this game footage we have established a part of the plot, aroused speculation, built up hype with cool, funny, and weird game moments, introduced the main cast, and shown some game play and mechanics. Now we must focus on the second aspect of the commercial. What kind of music should it have? I’m thinking along the lines of the Sky Runner theme, Hippie battle music, the first Runaway 5 concert, and the main theme. My justification is that these songs are upbeat and could be good attention getters. Finally there’s the narration. I think the voice should have been an older teenager. His voice should be upbeat and a bit tough sounding, but not totally hardcore “bad dude” or annoying. There would only be a little dialogue to carry the point of the video footage. That one idea for what the television ads could have been like.
Finally there’s the magazine advertisement aspect of marketing. I think there were a few EB ads back in the day. We would have to get ads in the top selling / most popular gaming magazines of that period. In addition I think it would be a good Idea to have purchased ad space in popular children’s magazines and the like. The design of the ads would have to be spectacular. The overall design would have to have complete gestalt. All the elements would have to flow and balance in harmony of each other. The text would be something similar to the poster boards. Screenshots should consist of meteorite shots, Sky Runner shots, battle shots, and Fourside. The ad would also include some clay figures, and EB related, low opacity outline graphics in the background. Maybe it would be good to have several ads, each with a different theme: one could be about the main story line, another about the locations, another about PK and battle game play, and one about the wacky humor. Each would have a unique color scheme and screenshots that reflected the ad’s theme. The importance of a good game magazine campaign for game developers is of course to reach the consumers that most fit the largest target audience for your product: in which case the target audience is gamers and the product is your game. They are the bread and butter of your sales, so you have to make it count. By getting the attention of your main target audience, you’ve already won half the battle. Another aspect off the importance of a good magazine ad is this: when you watch a short TV ad clip, it’s over as quickly as it began. The chances of you remembering it aren’t perfect. However when you buy a magazine and see an ad for a game, you have more time to look at it and take in what you’re seeing. I think this lets it embed itself deeper into a person’s memory and subconscious than just a quick 45 second TV ad a few time a week. That way the person gains an honest interest in the game, and is not just hype driven.
I feel that my ideas would have worked well, as long as it fit the budget. By using effective marketing strategies EB could have become way more popular and well known. With advertisement tactics that attract a large general mainstream audience, the target audience, and properly showing Earth Bound for what it is, the original campaign would have been much more successful, and brought in huge profits. Though it can be argued that a part of Earth Bound’s appeal is its cult status, I will always love EB as my favorite of all time whether it’s popular or not. This is Skyrunner signing off. Goodnight.
