Greetz Agents and Space Pirates!
So you all know we have some stuff in the works behind the scenes, and a few of you pestered me to the point of writing a blog about it. (Actually it’s sorta true; I wanted to post what we were doing timeline-wise).
New GUI for StarPirates (Early June) : First or second week. Players will have a choice of the present navigation or a graphic interface. the idea is that many potential players sign up, get to a wall of text, and run like hell. I mean we’ve made it almost a rite of passage to figure out how to play the game BEFORE you’re allowed to play. So we’re making it a lot easier, and more attractive, to sign up, start playing, and ENJOY playing. This is only planned for StarPirates at the moment. Once we learn a bit more about it, we are likely to expand to SB! The earliest possible date to go live for this is June 8th.
Video Blog (Early June) : Second week. A friend of mine has asked her sister to try the (new look game) and video blog about it. The idea is to get the input of a new player, and show that to the world. It’s inspired by some great existing SP videos. I’m excited because it’s a chance for a non-traditional gamer to showcase what she thinks about the game and perhaps more importantly the game community. I’m not sure if she’ll run her own blog on this, but I do know she’d post the daily blurbs to youtube.
Advertising/PR (Early/Mid June): First few weeks. We’ve made 2 more custom ad deals with comics. One of them is a Space-ship based comic, which is cool. That’ll go live pretty much right after the new look is in place. T’other is one of the big three web comics out there, so that should be interesting. We had been talking on and off for a while, but finally both our timings overlapped so that’s cool. It looks like mid-month but we’ll see. Also, a few journalists have been in touch. One particular story we were interviewed for is about growth paths of games like ours. It’s in a big-ish website that I read (when I have time), so kinda cool. I’m told that goes live this month. Between all of these, I’d assume the end of June will have a lot more pirates and agents than the start of the month!
Web Comic Awards (until mid-June): Winding to a close. We’ve had a few rounds of voting on them, with active participation by some great webcomics and a lot of active voting by almost every player in the games. Don’t forget to thank Project Wonderful as they are putting up one of the two prizes! They’ve also been a great promotion partner for us during our two years of growth!
We’ve started chatting with the webcomic journalists and podcasters. A few write ups already — check out Fleen and comixtalk.
WOW, I know that’s a lot. We have plans on some other things too, but until we can get them to a well-tested point, then I’m not comfortable discussing it.
Don’t forget to say hi to a new player today; and don’t rob ’em. I know, I know, so unlike me!
Cheers,
AdminArrBilly