![]() ![]() "It has an engaged community that thrives on word of mouth, and has an audience that isn't limited to our usual bubbles," said Tran.īut at this point, TikTok probably isn't a bubble. Tran said a TikTok going viral certainly "makes a dent" in sales but mostly it all falls into that larger and more amorphous bucket of "awareness." Unlike games like Before Your Eyes or Slappyball, Among Us was already really big when its presence was added to TikTok. Imagine the PR person for Call of Duty tweeting their face every time. They also frequently feature Tran's face, which Tran admitted would feel a lot weirder on other platforms. But crucially, they feel down to Earth and instantly relatable, aka the heart of TikTok. "Since I work in the indie sphere I knew I didn't need our content to have the same polish you'd expect from say, a AAA studio," said Tran. Among Us is one of the most popular games of the moment, and its TikTok videos are charmingly amateurish. The video game industry is a little under two weeks away from the start of E3, its (typically) annual event in which game companies spend millions of dollars preparing fancy and professional trailers and stage shows to impress gamer wallets. Among Us didn't get a TikTok account until last December, well after Among Us had cemented itself alongside games like Animal Crossing and Fall Guys had come to define pandemic games. The opposite of a game in need of more attention by trying to ride TikTok algorithms is Among Us, the multiplayer deception game that became hugely popular during COVID-19. That really sucks for us, and for every indie studio, because we have mouths to feed and a company to run!!" "Unfortunately it’s a myth that great games market themselves," said Kaman, "so if an influencer decides on a whim not to play your game or a press outlet decides not to cover it, that can completely ruin your launch momentum, and then it's gg. This is exactly what drew Riley Dirksen, the designer of Slappyball, a game where "it's hands playing volleyball." You don't have to hire a fancy marketing firm. It's also, frankly, cheaper and easier for a normal person-developer or fan-to make a TikTok and roll the dice. "The first reaction we get when suggesting to go on TikTok with a game is that people think it’s 'baby stuff' or an app 'where teenagers dance,'" said Reisenegger, "but it feels that this perception is changing." It's a lot harder to go viral on YouTube when you only have a few subscribers. What's specifically unique to TikTok is how the platform wants regular and completely unknown people who do something clever and interesting to blow up. Reisenegger has gone viral a few times on his personal TikTok, the most popular being a video viewed two million times where he's genuinely shocked at the revelation someone might use a pair of scissors to cut up a pizza cooked in the oven. ![]() "I’m quite into making videos and a lot of my work is based on social media so I thought it would be a fun thing to try and figure out." "I decided to set myself some lockdown goals to keep busy and one of them was to go TikTok viral," said Reisenegger. That TikTok was cut together by indie games marketing firm Future Friends Games co-founder Thomas Reisenegger, who specifically spent COVID-19 trying to grok TikTok. wishlisted on Steam more than 2,000 times, drove 120 people into the game's Discord server. As a direct result of the video, the game was, among other things. A recent TikTok for a cute upcoming adventure game, Omno, went viral and hit 1.9 million views. That broader sentiment of not being familiar with TikTok is common, as is the natural desire to try and tap into an obviously large and passionate audience. "Hearing that he gave me credit for introducing him to a game he highly enjoyed was something that is completely beyond my wildest dreams." "It felt so surreal to know that one of the biggest YouTubers I grew up watching had featured me in one of his videos," said Co. PewDiePie ended up making a video playing Before Your Eyes that currently has more than seven million views. The Wholesome Games video (1.5 million views) led to the video (4.1 million views), which itself directly caught the eye of influential and regularly controversial YouTube creator PewDiePie. Going viral is alchemy, not science, but it's also far more effective, and this is what kept happening to Before Your Eyes. Traditional marketing is blasting advertisements in front of people and hoping for the best, but these days, people can see through that. "It gave me confidence that Before Your Eyes could be enjoyed by Gen Z," said Messex, "which I was unsure of prior to release."īut, again, the nature of virality is that one thing can lead to another. ![]() It would surpass a million views in a few days, and currently has 4.1 million views. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |