Oh lord, my first devlog of our game, and I made it THE WEEK BEFORE RELEASE! Well, this is going in the "how I screwed up" section of the post mortem. Oh well, I'm here now!

                So how's progress? Great! The script is done, we got the backgrounds, music, and sprites created, our GUI and code are looking nice, and I have the lore compendium programmed and ready to be added onto! Really, all we need now is a one sprite, one background, and our cinematographer to have a field day with the code!                 

               Now if that was all I wanted to talk about, this would be a pretty short devlog! And with this post being so late into the game, I want to make the most of it. I can't do a roadmap a week before release after all, but I show you how NOT to market your game!                

                So here's a tip about releasing games on Steam: you want that page up early. Even if it lacks the bells n whistles, it serves as a place for your consumers to congregate, wishlist your game, and show people that you mean business. It's much more credible to tell people that you're making a game with a shoddy page than with no page. And most importantly, people can wishlist your game, and get notified of its release and any sales that it's involved.

                Itch DOESN'T do this much to my chagrin. In fact, Itch has a "just released bonus" that applies only upon the creation of your page. By creation of your page, I'm not talking a "coming soon" page, I mean that the bonus applies when you make ANY PAGE. So unlike Steam, it's not a good idea to make a page until you have a released game. Or so I thought…

                March of the Emissaries is a jam project. With it being free, I'm not banking its success on sales. What matters to me is the views, downloads, and comments. And while the bonus would improve those factors, I don't think it justifies waiting so long to make a page. With an Itch page, I could've post a link to it in my twitter and other social media. I have a call to action for my followers to pursue. Even if they can't wishlist it, they can still follow my Itch for the release or to view my other projects. I would appear more credible to others, and I could've funneled my followers to our community discord. There's so much promotion I missed out on over this misunderstanding. Imagine if I made this mistake when marketing a commercial game?

                I think the most egregious downside to not making the itch page was a lack of devlogs. Without a game page to post them too, I was hesitant to write any. Itch does allow you to write devlogs directly on your profile, but I wanted them to represent March of the Emissaries. I could've got some practice with building up hype or sharing the development process with other devs. I think it might've been perceived better than Tears of the Mermaid where I released FIVE post Mortems to maximize the marketing. I mean no one complained, but I felt bad…

                With all of this in mind, I would not advise disregarding Itch's viewer boost either. Combined with good tags, the boost to views is nothing to sneeze at. I would just consider the project you have in mind. In my case, a jam project's goal is more focused on completion and doesn't care about sales (just donations to help fund the steam page hint hint…).  I could see myself releasing the steam page as the main hub for a commercial project, than publishing the itch page once the game is released to take advantage of the boost. After all, the Steam community is much larger than Itch. Sure I'd need to shill out $100, but that's the least of my worries when developing a game has a lot of expenses. If anyone has any of their own tips, feel free to post down in the comments section!

                In conclusion, make the Itch page early if you're making a jam project. In fact, I'd go so far as to recommend releasing it as soon as possible. The marketing benefits I listed are too valuable to pass up, and you can use the opportunity to become familiar with Itch's UI. Any devlog you make can direct people to the project it's focused on, and a nice set of devlogs makes a project's developer appear active and friendly. If only staying locked in our rooms was all it took to get people interested… Why is game development so hard?!

                I hope you got something our of this blog. Be sure to leave a like and a comment, and follow my Itch for more devlogs just like this one! Be sure to check out Tears of A Mermaid if you haven't, it's free!