How is BYOND Advertising?

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Oct 5 2009, 11:00 pm
In response to Tom
Tom wrote:
It works fine for me. Also, ##guest (and ##local) is documented at http://www.byond.com/docs/publish, which is linked from the "Make EXE" creation screen.

Ah, my bad then, and it's even in the article as well.

That is the top checkbox in the pager Preferences/Games. Do you have it unchecked, perchance?

It's checked, the problem was that I tried only appending ##guest to the address (of a hub entry that doesn't have a live game), not with something else like ##local##guest. My mistake.

You are correct that the "Make EXE" launches byond.exe, but if you do ##local##guest or ##remote##guest it is effectively hidden since it only exists (in the taskbar) until DS starts up.

Yeah, but it shows the splash screen, though - could that be removed for ##guest when it's used in conjunction with ##local? Obviously it's quite needed to show it with the other options like ##remote, but for ##local all it does it show up for a second or two then disappear anyway, which is a little ugly.
Oct 6 2009, 12:32 am
In response to Tom
Tom wrote:
You should be able to launch games directly in DreamSeeker via the Make EXE. Just append ##guest to the url to bypass key login.

Well, that's certainly very helpful. How about tweaking the ui for making an exe then? Add radio buttons for each of the ## commands so I can easily toggle them on and off. I guess the problem isn't that they aren't there, it's that the documentation for them is hidden away in the tail-end of an online beginner's guide.

It would also be nice to save the hub path (and radio buttons) so I don't have to configure it every single time.

It seems to me that if you are distributing a game, rather than BYOND, having a BYOND key is not so critical. You'd rather players just boot the game directly (no pager) and "register" their identity with the game, rather than BYOND. I may be looking at this wrong, though.

The last page of most installations have a checkbox to run the installed application. BYOND should have something similar.

[x] Run (Packaged Game Name)
[x] View Readme
[ ] Create BYOND account.

Creating a key would be completely optional. If users decide to make one they should be able to register or activate an existing key right before starting the game. After creating a key they would log into the game with it rather than as a guest.

Having never used Steam, I'm curious to what exactly you've been able to do with BYOND games there and how we might expand on that.

Nothing, all I did was basically create a shortcut to the game on my "already installed" games list. I have no idea how to get on Steam for actual distribution.

Valve isn't the only distributor though, there are other similar companies like Impulse Driven and Greenhouse Games. I think they're all worth a look.
Oct 6 2009, 2:43 am
In response to Tom
Are you considering embedding into Steamworks ([email protected] with subject Steamworks inquiry), or trying to independently distribute via Steam publishing ([email protected])?
Oct 6 2009, 6:06 am (Edited on Oct 6 2009, 6:12 am)
In response to SuperAntx
SuperAntx wrote:
Some big things which are missing from both methods is the ability to place a shortcut on the desktop, start menu, and quick launch. There should also be a way to create a key without launching a web browser when the installation is finished.

You actually can add start menu entries AND desktop shortcuts( desktop shortcuts as of the latest version, released a minute ago, thanks for the idea ) using dmb2exe. Just make sure you have 'Make Installer' check-box ticked and then navigate to the 'Installer Options' tab.

I fully agree with the key creation thing though. Even though you can cover it up using an in-game screen-name, it'd be better if a quick and easy installation-window based key creation method was also implemented.
Oct 6 2009, 6:43 am
In response to Metamorphman
How would you create a key without access to the internet, which I thought was the main point of delivering everything (BYOND and the game as exe)?
Oct 6 2009, 7:47 am
In response to Schnitzelnagler
Oh, of course the installer would access the internet. It would ask the server if the key is already created, or if it isn't to send a conformation email to the user's address., etc., etc.

All I ask is for the process to be stream-lined in the installer.
Oct 6 2009, 10:03 am
In response to Tom
I haven't looked into how it all hooks into Steam, but when you launch a game in steam, a notification comes up on all of their online friend's machines that says "User123 started playing Game123". That way if a friend wanted to join in, they would know where, and an easy "join" button for Steam distributed games makes it super simple. That said, not being a game sold on Steam tells me integration would be limited at best.

I assume you don't play many PC games, and that's why you have never used Steam, but I recommend trying it out and buying Crispy's game on their store(for testing purposes, of course). Although Steam isn't a game creation environment like BYOND, it is a game and server discovery tool like the BYOND website. In that way it is worth checking out, just to see how they handle everything. One interesting thing is that they chose to embed the community website into their program, while BYOND chose to remove the embedded website(although the whole game/messenger concept is different than BYOND's, so it makes since for both parties).
Oct 8 2009, 12:55 am
In response to SuperAntx
SuperAntx wrote:
With the normal make exe command you link the exe to a hub path (SuperAntx.Decadence) rather than including the game files in the package. You can't do this with dmb2exe so there's no way to check for updates.

Actually if you define world.hub and world.version, the game will contact the BYOND HUB regardless of whether you're using dmb2exe or not. If world.version < current game version, then it'll output a 'There is an update!' and will link you to the hub page.

You're either completely online or completely offline. There needs to be a mix of both.

Don't know what you mean there... dmb2exe does nothing to hinder your online/offline status.
Oct 14 2009, 4:22 am
Hey just wanted to give you an update of what came of all the e-mailing I went around doing. And that's nothing. I'll try next month, with this kind of thing it's about catching an editor or a person who is doing a topic related to our field.

In the mean time, when discussing this with people, a lot of them felt ashamed to show BYOND off to not only their friends but total strangers, thinking they would be put off by the anime.

Also, the website is a little bit too much. For reference, check out Yo Yo Games (Game Maker's website) http://www.yoyogames.com

Also, any update on that video of BYOND?
Oct 14 2009, 5:11 am
In response to Sariat
Sariat wrote:
it's about catching an editor or a person who is doing a topic related to our field.

That was to be expected, now wasn't it?
What I wonder is, after some 'school amok runs' in Germany, the TV was on a 'Ego shooter are the source of all evil'-trip.
Has there been a similar media witch hunt in the USA?
I figured that would be a decent chance to get 'on air', if you can tell them that they should less report about the 'bad ego shooter only', but name alternatives as well that might educate children and help with their creativity.


Sariat wrote:
felt ashamed to show BYOND off to not only their friends but total strangers, thinking they would be put off by the anime.

Did you ask them why they would not promote one of the other banner guilds?
With BYOND Action, Casual, RPG and Strategy, you should have some 'Animé free'-area that you can show off.


Sariat wrote:
Also, the website is a little bit too much.

How is it too much?
I found the reference of the competitor you mention even more confusing (I use that product as well and struggled searching material over there).
Oct 14 2009, 12:30 pm
In response to Schnitzelnagler
Honestly over the years I have told plenty of people. I mainly pointed out the fact that it can make games, showed them to the dev forums.

Friends and Strangers.

Not Everyone is put off by Anime. Infact some people simply don't care and some people actually enjoy it.

Constant remakes of the same anime that only a paticular group watches - well that can be annoying. But I don't point that out I just show them the developer side of byond. To be honest I haven't played Any games on byond for A Long Long Time. Have Always been overcome with wanting to make my own but never reaching anything that can be called completeion.
Oct 14 2009, 12:37 pm
In response to Schnitzelnagler
Sariat wrote:
felt ashamed to show BYOND off to not only their friends but total strangers, thinking they would be put off by the anime.

Did you ask them why they would not promote one of the other banner guilds?
With BYOND Action, Casual, RPG and Strategy, you should have some 'Animé free'-area that you can show off.

Sadly this tends to be the way I feel too. BYOND just has a bad reputation and its hard to want to share parts of it when the rest is such as mess. Its like showing someone a bowl full of creepy crawlies with a diamond in the middle. They aren't going to see the diamond. (Yes, that's a crappy illustration).

I do like the idea of referencing individual guilds instead of BYOND as a whole, but the problem is that these guilds are all "mostly dead":

BYOND Action: 171 active players (wow!) on action games, but the guild only averages about one post each month.

BYOND RPG: 259 active players on RPG games. Last BYOND/news post was in July. Over three months ago. Based on the number of downloads that the title graphic received, it averages about 2500+ visitors each month.

BYOND Strategy: Only 21 players (pretty sad), but ACWraith posts pretty much every week. Kind of ironic.

BYOND Casual: 100 players, mostly from Icon Ultima and Chatters. Last blog post was in January. I half think they should just disband this guild and list its games elsewhere. Based on the number of downloads that the title graphic received, it averages about 300+ visitors each month.

I'd hate to ask people to link to sites that really don't have much activity... If these sites were anything remotely similar to sites like Stratics, which, at a glance, has 5 people regularly posting updates, then maybe they'd be something to worth linking to.



Sariat wrote:
Also, the website is a little bit too much.

How is it too much?
I found the reference of the competitor you mention even more confusing (I use that product as well and struggled searching material over there).

I agree. I don't see how that web is any better than BYOND.com.
Oct 15 2009, 1:03 am
In response to Foomer
Foomer wrote:
I do like the idea of referencing individual guilds instead of BYOND as a whole, but the problem is that these guilds are all "mostly dead":

Well, I guess it depends what you expect.
When I link to a guild, I see it as sort of 'listing for games I could like' with special benefits.
The main factor for me is in displaying quality games I want to try, or you might say structural display of pre-analysed data.
All the fuzzy blogging and sort aren't mine anyway, though I know by the success of Twitter and Co., a majority might think different here.
Oct 15 2009, 9:01 am
In response to Schnitzelnagler
Schnitzelnagler wrote:
All the fuzzy blogging and sort aren't mine anyway, though I know by the success of Twitter and Co., a majority might think different here.

People tend to flock to sites where there's other people around to interact with. If they visit the site and see that everything looks dead and nobody has posted in weeks, they're going to assume (correctly) that there's not much happening there and move on.
Oct 15 2009, 9:16 am
In response to Foomer
Foomer wrote:
Schnitzelnagler wrote:
All the fuzzy blogging and sort aren't mine anyway, though I know by the success of Twitter and Co., a majority might think different here.

People tend to flock to sites where there's other people around to interact with. If they visit the site and see that everything looks dead and nobody has posted in weeks, they're going to assume (correctly) that there's not much happening there and move on.

Which is precisely the magic of Twitter -- there's a constant stream of information readily available for anyone who might come along and be interested in it. I think ACWraith was the one who suggested that even minor tweaks to the system or small news updates for individual games be broadcast so that the community feels more alive than it presently is. I tried it for a bit with my BGC system and the amount of commenters increased with each post, even drawing in people that aren't even watching my blog. Of course, the semester has since started and I've had issues allotting enough time to work on it recently, but the "if you build it, they will come" principle still applies.

Of course, the application to games is tenuous at best. For the most part, the majority of the players hop from Naruto game to Naruto game with little concern for what else BYOND has to offer, while the remainder of the players and developers have grown largely apathetic in the face of such a large, unswayable mass of users. I know that Icon Ultima largely panders to the former group because of the large-scale roleplays that happen there, while I expect BGC to draw in only a very small number of returning players.
Oct 16 2009, 12:57 pm
In response to Sariat
About YoYoGames, isn't it possible to publish BYOND executables on there? I haven't found any restrictions saying you can't publish a non-Game Maker executable on there. Has anyone tried this?
Oct 16 2009, 1:16 pm
In response to Warlord Fred
No, the Yoyo Games FAQs clearly says...

A: First, welcome to YoYo Games! YoYo Games is a social site built up around a gaming community that is hooked on Playing, Making and Sharing games made with our Game Maker product. Game Maker is a free tool that allows you to create your own games easily.
Oct 16 2009, 2:07 pm
In response to The Magic Man
Aside from that, I get the idea that their whole "product" is centered around Game Maker. Trying to distribute a BYOND game there might be much like trying to distribute a Game Maker game at BYOND.
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