Best way to grow a game and community from near nothing?

Help and Feedback Game Design Support
#1

Hey!
I’ve taken this last month to focus on a game of mine.

Straight to the point, I’ve got about 5.5k of my own, and 5k of my friends Robux for this game.

How should I build the game up with this?
I’m looking for a discord community + active players on the game.

I was considering Ads (see all 4 below) but they got low click rate (0.20% (80%) (0.88%) (20%) when I tried with a small amount (250 - 500 Robux each)

AdvertOne Done

done ad2
done ad2160×600 43.2 KB
ad3 done
ad3 done160×600 29 KB
ad4 to use
ad4 to use160×600 47.4 KB

I’m considering Sponsoring however looking for guidance still.

4 Likes
#2

While sponsors and advertisements can be a great way to get your game out there, you really need a little bit of a community to start with. Try to invite some friends and have them invite their friends to get some players in your game before running any kind of advertisement.

On that note, I personally think sponsors are the way to go of the two Robux advertisement methods. They put your game right up one the game page where people are looking for a game to play (just make sure you have an attractive game icon, hah).

Remember, good games take time. No good and detailed game is an instant overnight success. Growing a strong community/player base takes time and effort. So keep putting as much in as you want to get out, and you’ll get there eventually!

Love those advertisements by the way.

1 Like
#3

The ads are looking great.
If the game can run on mobile,I advise you to advertise on mobile instead.
Usually mobile ad has higher click rate,since the games ad shown on mobile will appear on game list,
while web ads just display on the side of the web.

Also,I think apart from sponsoring ln roblox.
You can also try to advertise on twitter community,and try to see if @roblox_rtc or tagging help you to promote your game.

#4

This is the truth! Mobile comparability is key to a game being successful. The majority of Roblox players are on mobile so you’d be missing out on a lot of potential players if your game is PC only.

#5

Thank you for the compliment on the adverts!
Thank you for the advice too, the server currently has about 30 members.
Was aiming for 100 before sponsors but don’t think I’ll be able to reach there.

EDIT; For new msg; Yep! Game is fully mobile compatible, I’ll focus that.

#6

Hey, that’s a great start! Everyone starts somewhere. Just try to build a little bit of a foundation (which is sounds like you’re already doing) and then try to run some sponsors. Best of luck to you!

Edit: Glad to hear it is mobile friendly, huge win with that.

#7

Thank you once again for the advice!

1 Like
#8

Thanks!
The game can run on mobile, so I’ll be running the sponsors on mobile.
Thank you for the information about the adverts being more seen on Mobile.

I’ve tried Twitter but so far no luck (w/ tags), not really too strong with Twitter.
I checked out @roblox_rtc, thank you for the suggestion. Will be trying to get involved with them!

1 Like
#9

Some points to consider:

  • Testing the ads was the right move. Those ads won’t do anything for you, as nicely produced as they are. Back to the drawing board. You can get much better CTRs than that but it will take some experimentation.
  • Is it your goal to make a community specifically based around LinkedSwords? If so, consider advertising directly to the sword fighters at the games they frequent and provide features specifically for those people. If not, consider moving away from the LinkedSword because it’s not really suited to a general audience.
  • That in-game link is probably against ToS…
  • The game concept seems kind of lacking in its current state. Maybe I’m wrong, but it’s hard to imagine people staying interested in this over a long period of time.
1 Like
#10

  • Yeah for the Adverts I’ll most likely create some new ones and hopefully get some higher Click Rates through the new ones.

  • Yes that’s my goal, I know LinkedSwords aren’t the biggest community currently, however, believe it’d be able to work if done correctly, which I’m trying to do.
    Thank you for the tip about advertising directly!

  • Yeah I had a feeling the link may’ve been against ToS, so I’ll remove it. Thanks for the heads up.

  • Preformatted text The game concept currently the released version, isn’t updated. I’ve been working on updating everything around the game, the newer version has a lot better GUI’s with some more features, and going to be adding more. Also, the map is 3x as big, it loads depending on the playerCount.
    But, from what you saw, what do you think could be improved and any suggestions?

#11

LinkedSword fans might end up being the only people willing to play your game. As previously stated, it will be important to serve those people what they want. I’m not one of those people and only hear from them occasionally. These suggestions are just an educated guess and it would be better to ask actual sword fighters what they want.

  • Have something to compete over. This is already true with the bounties so maybe that’s already covered.
  • Do what you can to secure against exploits. Both times I joined your game, people were exploiting, and I hear this problem is rampant in the sword fighting community.
  • Keep the sword mostly the same. Do not use different meshes, do not use retextures, do not make mechanical changes (except for security). Sword fighters do not play casually; They consider this to be a serious sport so the rules need to be consistent or else it will be considered casual. I think over time they’ve become more open to trails and kill effects.
  • Have unlockable cosmetics to let people show off their achievements and feel like they’re making progress. These could be special effects on their sword, or tags that appear before their name, or some garment to add to their outfit (in martial arts they have colored belts, could do something similar to that maybe).
#12

Thank you once again for the advice and suggestions! I appreciate it a lot.
I’ll definitely be applying these.

#13

I think your main competition would be Custom Duels because almost everyone in the SCC plays there. It’d be hard to grow unless you can possibly target an audience different from the SCC or make something better than Custom Duels. If you have a big name in the SCC then you might be able to make it succeed, but referring to my previous point, it’d be wiser to target a different audience.