It seems like if what you're showing is what you understand they find appealing and fun, then surely that's what should be in the game. You give them that.
But instead, you give them something else that is unrelated to what they've seen on the ad? A gem matching candy crush clone they've seen a thousand times?
How is that model working? How is that holding up as a marketing technique???
This doesn't answer the question but it's amusing.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2348100/YEAH_YOU_WANT_THOSE_GAMES_RIGHT_SO_HERE_YOU_GO_NOW_LETS_SEE_YOU_CLEAR_THEM/
Brought to you by the guys behind the recent remasters of Klonoa and Katamari Damacy
How is that holding up as a marketing technique
-
the kindergarteners playing roblox on their mom's phone don't care
-
you already have their malware and that's all that matters
-
Does anyone understand the point of advertising a game doing something that, after downloading, it does not do?
They're called "lies."
When I was pitching games to publishers, this was how they would test game ideas to see if there was interest. You essentially sent them a few minutes of gameplay or faked gameplay ideas and they would create these ads.
The ads are for testing game concepts, if an ad have enough engagement the game is made.
That doesn't feel right. Most of the time the game is something incredibly simple, like counting or moving blocks around, and the ad is showing someone playing it incredibly poorly. Like too poorly to be real, like they can't count to a number like six or can't move the triangle in a circle hole. I've always felt that's supposed to frustrated the viewer, who will then want to download the game to play it correctly. But by then they realize it's not even the same game that's in the advertisement.
Anti-user features are a major thing. People are dumb enough with technology you can get away with openly screwing over your "customers". The antifeature in this case is "it's not actually the advertised game, it's a cheap pay to win thing".
Presumably, people download this thinking it's cool, and then end up playing it anyway and whaling for the "developers", who may literally be four people, one of which reskins existing games, while everyone else does sales and marketing.
One of the funniest advertisements I've seen on youtube was basically someone on tiktok going "Okay, I'm gonna try this game out called 'Insert Incredibly Generic Title Here'. Is it a fake game? Let's see." 10 seconds of them playing level 1: "okay, I blew up that barrel and got some coins. Looks like it's not a fake game." And that's the advertisement: Our game is a game that actually exists and isn't an appstore scam.
This isn't even the worst offender: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3_E9iW_wTk
There's actually a game made of these games called, hold your breath: "Yeah! You Want "Those Games," Right? So Here You Go! Now, Let's See You Clear Them!"
Okay the real question, is there a good version of this game genre?
