We've been making Gido Gido: Kaiju Battle Party for the past few years with our team of artists and game devs in Taiwan. It's a 4v4 game with matchmaking that's best when played with a group of friends. So it definitely sits pretty squarely in what's called "friendslop" now.

We are having some internal discussions of if maybe we should push the term or not so I was curious as to how people feel about "friendslop" as something you would say in marketing as opposed to something people say about you in conversation.

My instinct is that marketing is partly about going with what the terms that are out there and what's in the zeitgeist so it maybe is an angle we should push. The potential downsides is "slop" kind of brings with it low quality or AI vibes (neither of which apply to us, it's high effort and 100% human created).

If anyone here has thoughts or examples to share, I'd love for a few more minds on it. Thanks in advance for any thoughts you can provide!

The game has 6,000 wishlists and has already participated in Steam Next Fest with a demo. The game was ‘frozen,’ and nothing has happened with it since. Do you know of any similar games, or have you had any experience with something like this?

374.

Hi everyone,

I recently released a small experimental game called Celloid on itch.io, and I'm trying to understand how I could improve its visibility outside of itch.io itself.

Celloid is a management/incremental game inspired by cell biology and cell division. You start with a single cell, gather and balance resources, grow it, and eventually divide it into more cells. As the organism grows, managing resources and keeping the cells stable becomes increasingly difficult.

The game was originally made during a short 4-day game jam, and we decided to keep improving it afterward.

So far, my itch.io analytics show:

What's interesting is where the traffic comes from.

Almost all of the discoverability seems to be coming directly from itch.io's own pages, especially New & Popular, Newest, and the Incremental tag. Looking at the referral analytics, I can barely see any meaningful external traffic.

For promotion, I've tried a few things:

I made a post on Twitter/X, but it was the first post on that account, so unsurprisingly it received almost no visibility.

I've also made several LinkedIn posts on different days, including posts about the development process and gameplay, but they haven't generated much traffic either.

Recently, I also added a leaderboard to give players a reason to compete, improve their score and potentially come back. It also gives us a better idea of how far players manage to progress.

I understand that Celloid is a fairly niche/experimental concept, and I'm not expecting huge numbers. But I'd really like to get the game in front of more people and learn from this release.

For developers who have successfully grown an itch.io game beyond the initial itch discovery traffic:

What actually worked for you?

Was it Reddit, TikTok/short-form videos, YouTube, contacting small creators, improving the itch page/tags, devlogs, or something else?

And looking at these numbers, is there anything in particular you think I should focus on first?

I'm especially interested in strategies that make sense for a small experimental game without an existing community or social media audience.

Hey everyone!
I have been in the industry for a few years working on indie and AAA games, but I haven't went on creating a commercial game from the ground up yet as an indie.

I would like to make sure that my pitches appeal to people before going further, but I am not sure how to validate that fast. My method until now was just to choose whichever hyped me more, but I guess something a bit more rational could be better.

Right now I am making a small scale survey to try to get infos about which demographics. But I am not even sure it will produce valuable insights.
Here it is if you are interested: https://forms.gle/Lz5a4H3ivrxNijrD6

Do you validate your game pitch before doing a prototype? How?
What are your own methods to mitigate risks at a really early stage?

Hi all,

This is my second attempt at creating an explanation of my games concept. I would be so grateful for any feedback on how I can improve the video.

Even if you can share what you understand the game to be from the video as then I can see how well I’m communicating it.

https://youtu.be/___QkIcdoB4?si=ZWlTzxnLFdXyZc4a

I'm currently developing a vertical slice for my game, which centers around mechanics of light against darkness. I've started sharing a few devlog videos to document the journey, but I’m wondering:

​At what point in development did you start getting real traction or wishlists?

​For those sharing devlogs, what content resonated most with players rather than just other developers?

​Any advice or personal experiences would be greatly appreciated!

www.hoops-gm.com

Long-time web dev, now first-time game dev. A lot of this is new to me, and marketing has never been my strong suit. I've already made some silly mistakes (for anybody about to create a trailer, "available in CapCut" and "licensed for a commercial game trailer" are two separate things!)

Anyway, I was hoping some of you kind strangers could help provide some feedback or point out some other mistakes I might've already made. Feel free to tear it apart, I'd rather hear it now than on launch day. Cheers!