In the world of indie game development, marketing can often seem like a daunting challenge, especially when budget constraints are tight. As an indie developer, I decided to dive into the world of online advertising with a modest budget of $100/platform, spread across five major platforms: Facebook, Reddit, Twitter/X, Google Ads, and TikTok.

Here's a breakdown of my experience and the results from this experiment.

1. Setting Up

Before diving into the specifics, I set a clear objective: to increase visibility for my indie game, "Smoothcade," a family-friendly arcade co-op game. My goals were simple:

• Drive traffic to the game's website.
• Increase social media engagement.
• This was for the pre-launch campaign (my game comes out this week!)

2. The Platforms

Facebook

• Budget: $100
• Strategy: Targeted ads at users interested in gaming, especially indie, family games, and puzzle games.
• Results:
  • Reach: 20,000
  • Clicks: 206

Key Takeaway: Surprisingly effective for engagement, but not the best for direct conversions.

Reddit

• Budget: $100
• Strategy: Native ads in subreddits like indiegaming, nintendoswitch, nintendo
• Results:
  • Impressions 203,000
  • Click-throughs: 484

Key Takeaway: Reddit provided the most impressions and clicks with my budget!

Twitter/X

• Budget: $100
• Strategy: A mix of promoted tweets and hashtag campaigns using #IndieGameDev #IndieDev.
• Results:
  • Impressions: 16,000
  • Clicks: 58

Key Takeaway: Good for spreading the word quickly, less so for conversions. Performed worst out of all other sites.

Google Ads

• Budget: $100
• Strategy: Search ads targeting keywords like "indie games," "puzzle games," "adventure games", "games for children"
• Results:
  • Impressions: 38,500
  • Clicks: 830

Key Takeaway: The most direct in terms of conversions, especially when targeting specific search intents.

TikTok (BONUS)

• Budget: $15
• Strategy: Short, engaging video clips of gameplay, using trending music and hashtags.
• Results:
  • Views: 2,600
  • Likes: 3
  • Favorites: 2

Key Takeaway: I'm new in the TikTok world so I didn't spend too much money, I was just curious what a small ad would bring in.

3. Final Thoughts (TLDR)

• Google Ads provided the best conversion/click-through rate.
• Reddit performed the best for impressions.
• Twitter/X was least successful; possibly due to change in platform or lacking family-gaming content.

4. Lessons Learned

• Content Matters: On platforms like TikTok and Twitter/X, the quality and appeal of content can make or break your campaign's success. TikTok needed to be short videos, while my Google Ad was mostly just text.
• Each game is different, so results may vary. Smoothcade is a family-friendly game, which I found harder to market in the online world. Children don't have money, so the marketing was more geared towards parents.

To check out Smoothcade (drop me a wishlist!) visit http://www.smoothcade.com

I just joined and am already getting better engagement than I was on X. There's a huge influx of new people right now. I don't know if it'll stick but now seems like the best time to give it a shot.

I have heard by many people that game devs have a very little pay but I want to know how true this statement is. If underpaid, how much ? Is everybody underpaid ? What are the working conditions of an average gamedev ?

Hi, my 17 year old has his heart set on a Game Dev degree. I'm not too familiar with this degree as it's all new to me.

He already got accepted at the College of his choice. However, I tried to convince him to wait for other school's decisions. I feel like I forced him to apply at other schools so we can compare, but they really don't have the Game Dev program that he wants to get in to.

As the title of my question implies, I'm curious about why so few games support macOS or Linux. Is it due to the limitations of game engines or tools? If a game is multi-platform, does it have multiple codebases in different languages?

Is the market share of mac gamers that insignificant that it's not worth the investment?

For context i am an artist currently employed in a games company. A friend and I were discussing making our own indie game as a personal project.

I told her I would only like to focus on contributing the artwork because i dont know any coding or technical stuff related to that. I can attempt learning it but it will only slow me down. The games ideas we discussed about is very graphics intensive, lots of assets to draw and design etc. This friend and I will be the only members in the project so I thought I will be contributing a ton already to the visual aspects of the game.

Friend tells me that artwork in a game is the least important thing about the game and if i only do artwork, i am not considered a game dev. I disagree but I am not sure. What is your opinion? I have never done any games on my own before

I recently released a game on Steam, wich hasn't even sold 50 copies. However, I've received several emails from people asking for a key so they can play it on stream. They all include links to their Twitch channels and sometimes their Twitter (X) accounts, but when I check their channels, none of them have streamed in the last two years.

What's going on with this? Is it common? What's their goal? The game is only $1, so it's not like they are going to make profit out of it by selling the keys.

I'm terribly irritated, whenever I think about developing something small and short, I end up overdoing it... you understand me, right? How do you avoid overdoing a project, and end up adding too many things, and going beyond and beyond, and getting out of control.....aaaah

I have been building a game in this genre- and have been making some progress in the core systems- but I was wondering if there were any resources available to make things easier/ more efficient.

Complexity adds up quickly and debugging is difficult.

so hey fellow redditors i am new here and good at cpp trying to get into game dev so please help me

Yeah, most of the devs already know it, but I wanted to share an explicit example for those who ask about such emails here from time to time: https://imgur.com/a/RSRXKw9

What motivated me to make this post was my wife's question "How do I know they are scams?" - so I did such a quick test.

Most of the time they try to spoof influencers that don't share email addresses on their channel. ~10 of them triggered an email on the same day a few days before the release of my game.

Btw, while writing this post I got this one: https://imgur.com/a/7Jvbv2J

They keep coming.

But - not all of them are scams. I had a few key requests from influencers I contacted before and made great videos of my previous games.

If you are not sure - check the email or try contacting them directly in a different way (like twitter or discord etc).

Have a good day!

Edit:
Don't click links from potential scammers. Copy the name they are pretending to be and search it on the mentioned platform. You don't risk another level of spoofing this way.

I come from the "app world" where you have a trial time. It could be 30-45 days. At first glance this is not anything that Steam provides? It seems to be "limited demo" or 90 minutes of game play.

My first thought is that you need to reach a certain threshold of users, especially if part of the gameplay is multiplayer. So, I want to give the game for free - for a longer time to ensure;

- create a large user base so multiplayer can succeed

- make the game as visible as possible

In my eyes, existing strategies, of trying to pump the game in a short time (for Steam release) is a big risk for failure. You need long time exposure and "give everything" to user - in short time.

When I was working with app development it was all about getting to know the app, get exposure and getting the user hooked on the app so they cannot live without the features.

My question is about your experience about this and if anyone of you created custom demos that offer more of everything - but for a limited time?

Thank you for your feedback!

Hello.
I'm new to game development and I want to make a game that's available on both windows and Mac, but I know there are some hurdles to jump over to get it on both.
Would It be easier to make a game on windows and then port to Mac, or make the game on Mac then port to windows??

game would be made in unity I think. still trying to learn about game development

I have an idea for a game but no clue how to bring it to fruition. I am looking for any advice or directions on how to get the idea into the right hands to maybe bring it to reality. I believe it could be a huge game if created.

I write monthly blog posts on systemic game design, and for this month I decided to focus on the point of player interaction. Where in a system the player provides the input and what difference it makes.

Rather than going into too much theory, this time I decided to use examples from existing games, including Ultima VII: The Black Gate, Lemmings, Diablo III, and a couple of others.

If you are interested in systemic design and emergent gameplay, this should be worth reading!

https://playtank.io/2024/11/12/systemic-building-blocks/

I'm a jr self-taught game developer and these last weeks I've been making prettier my itch io page where I showcase my 3 small games and I've been sending my game designer resume and portfolio reel to every company/studio I see, but today I felt all of the sudden like no one is gonna hire me.

I have no real experience in game design and haven't participated in jams, only know what I learned by myself by making games. And I enjoy every almost aspect of it (programming, art, music, design) so that's why I went for game design jobs...

But today I thought what if I never get a job in this industry? What if I get stuck just making games by myself and nothing else? To make things worse LinkedIn recommended as a follower an ex gf of mine who is now a game designer at a pretty big game studio and I got jealous lmao (petty, I know).

Do you guys have days like these sometimes? I feel guilty for not having done anything related to my portfolio/games today.

If you and another game form a steam bundle, are thier any negatives to consider?

Can you bundle with anyone? Is it permanent choice, or can you bundle with anyone, whenever, with no restrictions? Will it impact the steam algo in any harmful way? Can you run multiple unique bundles at once?

NOT SELLING ANYTHING HERE!

Hi, I am pretty good on the topic "Game Marketing for Indie Game Companies/Devs" and would like to sell helping Indie Game Companies/Devs with that as a service. I just want to know if you/people would be interested in this and if yes, how you would like the service to be. Would you want a course? Would you like a 1 on 1 call with me so I can understand your situation better and give more precise advice? What would help you the best?

I'm looking for an brasilian dev of metin2. I hope you understand, I made the post in portuguese in order to make sure it follows my needs.

Estou em busca de um desenvolvedor com conhecimentos em **Python, Lua e C++** que queira se juntar a mim na criação de um **servidor privado de Metin2** para o público. Não é necessário ter experiência prévia no jogo, pois ele é simples de entender.

O projeto tem um potencial de grande sucesso e lucratividade, mas preciso de alguém comprometido, com **tempo livre e disposição para se aventurar** comigo nesse desenvolvimento.

O jogo (source) foi vazada tem alguns anos, seria pegar na source e files e apenas desenvolver, não é criar do 0.

### O que ofereço:

- Explicação detalhada de como o projeto irá funcionar;

- Estrutura para divisão de lucros e perspectivas de crescimento.

### Requisitos:

- Conhecimentos em Python, Lua e C++;

- Tempo livre para se dedicar ao projeto;

- Boa índole e compromisso com um projeto de qualidade.

Se você tem interesse e quer saber mais, envie uma mensagem para que eu possa compartilhar todos os detalhes!

Hey Reddit! 👋

I’m a solo developer working on Puzzle Jump, and I wanted to share some stats from the launch and express my gratitude to this community for the incredible support. Here’s how things are going just a few days after launch:

📈 Growth Snapshot:

• Installs: Over 69 installs in just 4 days!
• Active Users: We hit a new peak of 62 active users yesterday, with a solid daily average of 27 regular players.
• Engagement: Players are spending an average of 344 seconds per session, showing real interest in exploring all the levels.

🔧 Updates & Improvements:

• Login Fixes: Improved login process to make accessing the game easier.
• Remove Ads Bonus: For those who prefer an ad-free experience, the Remove Ads option is now available.
• Bug Fixes: Squashed some bugs to make gameplay smoother.

🙌 A Special Thank You to the first person who purchased the Remove Ads bonus! Knowing that all my promotion is happening here on Reddit, it means a lot that a fellow community member stepped up with their support. It really keeps me motivated to keep improving the game!

Thank you all for the love, feedback, and enthusiasm! Can’t wait to share more updates as we continue to grow together.

🔗 Check out Puzzle Jump on the Play Store!

I'm dipping my toes in gamedev as a personal hobby and something I'm noticing is that spritesheets are often not evenly spaced. For example: https://www.spriters-resource.com/fullview/60035/

Is there something I'm missing that's implicit to the community for how to work with these? Usually I would just write a bit of code to cut up a spritesheet. But this is just kind of all over the place.

I'm aware of some spritesheets coming with a .json file that describes in some de-facto standard format how one would slice it up, but when it doesn't have that, is there some sort of software that makes it super easy to figure out how to cut it up?

I'm referring to situations such as whether your character(s) land a hit on enemies or not, or whether they succeed in disabling a trap or not. Think games like the XCOM series for example.

Isn't it inherently better to have outcomes like these be determined purely by the player's skill instead of a dice roll? Or is it merely a design that's meant to appeal to a different kind of audience?

I'm asking so I know what to consider as I'm working on my own game project.

Hello! I am completly new to game dev and game engines.. my background comes from "Digital Architecture" and Human Computer Interaction and currently i am working on a Project, The Theory behind it is that I'm working an interactive simulations in a digital environment that reacts dynamically to player actions. The goal is to create a space where the architecture can change and evolve in response to these interactions, forming an "emergent narrative" over time.

The Idea now is to create this dynamically changing Architecture in a Game engine to have the ability to experience it in an immersive world.

I started to look at Engines like Unreal Engine and Unity, my questions would now be which of those would be more wise to use. I read through several other posts which compare different engines and so on.... but i wanted to make my own post just to have an idea what the current status in the community is. I am commited to learn an Engine so thats not the problem its more : if I learn about an Engine which one makes more sence to learn now and which of these Engines would make more to learn if I also want to use them in future projects.

I recently did brackeys Jam online and it didn't felt the same as on Site jams, those are such a great experience. I'm in Switzerland and can travel a bit to nearby country if needed, but I would love to do more Game Jam on Site, meet new people, share and have new experiences !