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How to promote 0k and get new players

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2 years ago
I kind of like the way the website looks right now, but I guess it can use some tweaks so it doesn't look like a website from the 1980s. It doesn't look that way to me but some Modernists might think so (I think it has some old charm).
+0 / -0


2 years ago
Website work etc would certainly be a big improvement. It just takes someone to come along and do it.
+1 / -0

2 years ago
Website is done with csharp, so tremble in fear. Also with an engine from the 1980s, I would not like to attract folks with this expectation...
+0 / -0
If somebody would upload say some of the tournament videos with commentary to the Steam broadcast channel it might help. Some of those pre-recorded broadcasts will have 3k + viewers at any given moment. I do believe only developers are allowed to use pre-recorded video on the live broadcast channel. Normal players can only broadcast live game play.

Although, if you are using the Steam version of the game, then you can easily broadcast the games. Right now no players are doing so. 12:25pm CST.
+3 / -0
I'm afraid I'm going to have to start a little long-winded and I'm not sure, if my post really fits to this thread:

Are there any statistics, which are available for the community?

- total registered players
- average active players per month
- average active players per month playing playing 1v1
- average active players per month playing teams
- average active players per month playing FFA
- average active players per month playing vs. AI
- average active players per month playing vs. Humans
- average active players per month playing singleplayer

Plus the related development of trends. Would be nice to have some up-to-date statistics on the website, which are regulary/automatically updated.

When I was clicking through different maps and on the last related battles, I realized there is some kind of hidden community within this community. Lots of lobs, playing vs. AI only. Some users also just playing now and then with their buddys, but are not part of anything else like teams/FFA/1v1.

My subjective impression is, that there are "enough" player within this small community - but a lot isn't really part of the online human vs. human community.

Recently I became top 50 in the matchmaking ladder and this is basically not a skill-based achievement. I'm faster in climping the ladder due inactive players getting unrankend, then getting elo in battles (Maybe 10-15 ranks in 1 week). Besides not enough players play regulary 1v1 or matchmaking in generall (the 1v1 Tournament October 23rd 2021 does help and recently there are more players available for 1v1. So I think Tournaments are good for promotion).

I was like top 80 and a total lob, when I realized, that a ladder is existing. We definitly need more active players!

I think the dev interview is good promotion as well. Thanks for the insights and doing such a great job on this game & community, AUrankAdminGoogleFrog!



Also thanks to all users who have Zero-K content on Youtube:
[Spoiler]
CArankAdminShadowfury333: Shadowfury333 Youtube
AUrankAdminGoogleFrog: FroogleGog Youtube & GoogleFrog Zero-K Youtube (very old)
SErankGodde/ SErank[Er0]Godde: Godde Youtube
CHrankAdminDeinFreund: DeinFreund Youtube & FreundForgotPassword Youtube
GBrankPRO_rANDY: PROrANDY Youtube
NLrank64_Bit_Dragon: 64-Bit Dragon Youtube
USrankluckywaldo7: luckywaldo7 Youtube
USrankentropy3: Entropy Wins Youtube
gameinnovator: gameinnovator Youtube
veri Zero-k: veri Zero-k Youtube
GBrankPRO_Dregs: Haz Tee Youtube
DEranktpHonkiTonk: Honki Tonk Youtube
DErankDragon99:Nachschublager Youtube
USranktehbloxxer502: tehbloxxer502 Youtube
ROrankDan Helyar: Dan Helyar Youtube
USrankNerdoSuave: Nerdo Suave Youtube
USrankL.J. Lim: L.J. Lim Youtube
@Kajio: Kajio Youtube
@Isaac Hurley: Isaac Hurley Youtube
@Cerin: Cerin Youtube
USrankMasterOfRoflness: MasterofRoflness Youtube
USrankkaen: kaencastszk Youtube
USrankAdminmaackey: maackey Youtube
@vvolas: vvolas Youtube
DErankArtur D: Artur D Youtube
ATrankhokomoko: hokomoko Youtube
@Inde_Irae: Inde_Irae Youtube
PLrankZenfur: Zenfur Youtube
RUrankizirayd/ ROrankMrOrion: izirayd Youtube
USranktherxyy: therxyy Youtube
NLranknr1_rANDY_FAN: nr1_rANDY_FAN/Daywalker Youtube

Zero K is a great game. More lobs than in any other game!
[Spoiler]

//Update UTC: 20 March 2022 / 16:05 PM: User vs. Youtube Account
+5 / -0
That was an excellent post, DErankiwantusername.

In addition to what you said, there are a couple other things, small things, that can help get ZK rolling and pick up more players.




First off, the community needs to be less toxic to nubs. Far too often I have been in a lobsterpot and some nub is being flooded with curse and insult labels because of some crazy strat he's working on. If a nub is going to be a nub, his rank will show accordingly and the algorithm that balances the teams will also act accordingly. Now pointing out things to or advising a new player is one thing, actively whining about it, ranting and raving, and complaining like a spoiled young man with too much time on his hands is another.

Then there's advertisement. I plan to help with this eventually, when I get a little more money I'll pay to get some ZK advertisements running on various sites and this will help collect more players.
+2 / -0
2 years ago
I've still been spaming in all chat in League of Legends to play this game

It still doesn't work :/
+2 / -0
2 years ago
Zerok marketing on Tik tok and BOOM insta blowup
+1 / -0
DErankiwantusername , here is more zk-related content (by ATrankhokomoko)

GBC anthem



Guide to unit renames



conference talk (Spring & Steam, an Odyssey)



conference talk (Double your contributors using these 3 simple tricks!)



also (by DErankkatastrophe via http://zero-k.info/Forum/Thread/29911 )
https://soundcloud.com/nachtskommtdermitbewohne/tenlittlelobstersraw
+1 / -0
that lists above could be added to the media page?
+1 / -0
2 years ago
quote:
Are there any statistics, which are available for the community?


For matchmaking: https://zkstats.antihype.space/#logtime

For steam: https://steamdb.info/app/334920/graphs/

+0 / -0


2 years ago
DErankiwantusername - Haz Tee is my youtube.
+2 / -0


2 years ago
quote:
Are there any statistics, which are available for the community?

We have some stats but they aren't public anymore since spamming the queries to produce them would strain the server. A static set of stats could exist.

The underlying event for the following stats is players in games that exit normally. Essentially, if someone is a player in a battle that resulted in a battle thread, they show up in the stats.

This is the seven day average players since Steam.


Here is the chart ever since the infrastructure to create it came online. The average is over four weeks.


Here are some other stats that are generated. Retention is particularly difficult because we can't know whether someone who left after a week is going to return.

Everything above captures multiplayer games (including coop on the server) but misses singleplayer and spectators. So it's a lower bound. Steam provides an upper bound (for Steam users only though) based on players who merely launch ZK and do whatever. It says we have about 1000 unique daily players at the moment (averaged over seven days), about 250,000 total 'owners', and a median play time of 1 hour and 6 minutes.

I'm not sure what you're going to do with these stats. Is the aim to do something and check later whether it had an effect?
+5 / -0
Good day & thanks for all those feedback.

USrankSkrid: I don't think the community is so toxic.[Spoiler]1v1 and small teams is mostly really friendly. I experienced a lot of support, when I was beaten up by someone. Lots of tips, hints etc. afterwards.

Big teams is for sure different. But I guess this is only caused, because there is most of the time just 1 active big teams with players, while other team-rooms are empty and it's quite hart to get them filled. It's quite a huge loss of time, if you have subjectively a bad/unfunny big team games. IMO this is the cause of all the resign spams & other unpleasant/impolite behavior. Once the game is screwed in your mind, you cannot just start a new game.

USrankTeejayx6: Don't know if TikTok is the right target group. To have a viral ZK-challenge might be the way.

DErankAdminmojjj: Thx, updated.
GBrankPRO_Dregs: Thx, updated.

FRrankmalric: Thx for the idea with those steam statistics.

AUrankAdminGoogleFrog: Thx for the ZK statistics. Yeah. lots of queries would be kind of DDoS.

I mentioned other statistics, which mostly likely are not existing. The initial idea behind my post was:

This is a small community, for an RTS niche. Plus it's open source and build up on people contributing to it by the means of private free time, donated money & volunteer activities. This means in any case it'll be hard to expand this community, even with an more professional approach.

But, if there are lots of players playing single player or now and then with their buddies, it might be possible to direct their attention to playing online (1v1, teams and maybe even tournaments). This would lift an already available target group more into the community. I honestly have no idea how to do it. Besides I'm maybe wrong with this.

Until now I haven't donated to ZK yet. But give the how great the game is, I'll do it any ways sooner or later. ATM I'm playing a lot with the thought to redirect my donation to Google ads or Youtube ads and have some low budget targeting running in the background. Like for X €/$ per month that all user interessted in certain other RTS games will get unter the right circumstances get ads for ZK.

Like 10,00 - 15,00 € per month for a year could have an effect.

Per group would be AFAIK:

Total Annihilation
Balance Annihilation
Sanctuary
Age of Empires
Stronghold
Rise of Nations
League of Legends
Not Original Total Annihilation
The Cursed
P.U.R.E.
Spring:1944
Kernel Panic
eXtended Total Annihilation
Evolution RTS
Dota
+ others

So something simple would run alongside. The beginning of the pandemic, for example, can be easily seen by new players and old ones who became active again. If necessary, this can also be measured by a trend or a later survey.
+4 / -0


2 years ago
quote:
Like 10,00 - 15,00 € per month for a year could have an effect.
Per group would be AFAIK:

We tried something very similar in the past with very limited results. We did get a lot of funny comments on the facebook ad with stuff like "wow, zero-k ad, never thought i'd see that". I think most of the people in this narrow space are already aware of ZK.

But also that experiment was run very briefly and data gathered was very not rigorous.
+2 / -0
Tik Tok now is the best way to promote something.

It is hard to do so on youtube or twitch because you need followers base to gain attention but not so on tik tok when your videos could be randomly swiped in.

Of course, still gonna need to align to some tik-tok meme.

Im not a content creator nor video editing pro, so, good luck out there!
+1 / -0
2 years ago
AD

Do you like configuring shit? Then Zero-K is for you! You can spend literally days exploring all configuration options and configure EVERYTHING and never play!

been exploring configuration options for past few days :)

PS on other games I mostly end up configuring them till perfection and then playing 5 mins and never more :D
+0 / -0
2 years ago
https://zero-k.info/Forum/Post/245176#245176

quote:
Also thanks to all users who have Zero-K content on Youtube:


This should go in the wiki? I didn't know about most of the content and this info being in a thread is easy to miss.
+0 / -0
2 years ago
I'd love for this game to blow up one day, as IMO, it is one of the best RTS games out there including the "biggies". I'd play this over C&C any day, between the QOL and the team behind it not trying to get their greedy hands on your bottom dollar as well as the fact that this game is actually mainained. I grew up playing the old Dune RTS games, where multiplayer went out of support within years of launching.

Though I found the early part of this game to be abit too "large" and "complicated" when I started out, in fact, I played for a bit many months before I decided to give this game another go and only on the second time was when I truely understood it, among the most complicated systems being the overdrive. Though I was alot younger then.

Honestly, doing the first ~5 campaign missions helped me alot more than the games' tutorial.

About the toxicity mentioned earlier in this thread, there's absolutely been a fair amount of toxicity toward clearly new players in team games, though I have noticed that it's become alot less common in the recent months since I started playing, really it's only been a few players actively being toxic, many of which I haven't seen in ages or have gotten better (from what I've seen). If you're part of the latter, I want to especially say thank you and well done.

A big part as to why it took me so long to want to actually play in team games was due to this toxicity and unreasonably high expectations and pressure you feel like you have on you to play well when playing a team game.

Though this game I've found also has quite alot of "noob traps", most notably perhaps being storages. I would place a good 20-30 of them in campaign missions before I learned they were "bad" in team games. And I'm sure there are some noob traps I still, now after over 300 hours of gameplay still get caught by.
+6 / -0
2 years ago
If you own other RTS games on Steam, could name-drop Zero-K in a review. For example, "not a bad game, nice story, but controls and strategic balance aren't as good as Zero-K, which is open source." I've discovered several games after hearing about them in a similar way.
+2 / -0
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