Until Dawn [PS4]
- Thread starter Shortbread
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Deleted member 11852
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From the PlayStation Life interview with Shuhei Yoshida, talking about the lack of general marketing for this game:
Hard to tell what happened witn Until Dawn but perhaps Sony's marketing teams felt it would do fine without a push. It's been a surprise hit with all the gamings sites I regularly visit and even those who were initially unconvinved by it (Iag Higton at Eurogamer, everybody at VideoGamer.com) were completely won over once it got going.
Personally I think they nailed the pacing, like many a good horror the game starts out slow so you get a chance to explroe the character's personalities without the stress of a crisis which only emphasises their reactions when things start to go bad.
PlayStation LifeStyle: How do you determine the level of marketing and promotion that a game gets before launch? It seems like some critical darlings and good-sellers (recent example: Until Dawn) get little push compared to some others. What are the deciding factors?
Yoshida: Each region has its own marketing department with its own goals for a year and its own budget for the year. Of course there are lots of relations among the regions and Worldwide Studios, but differences could be based on the popularity, like of the genres or titles. Each marketing department makes the final decision how much a particular product gets pushed.
That said, sometimes games like Until Dawn find great reception from reviews and consumers after launch. In that case, some additional marketing push can be created to sustain the momentum post-launch. I hear great support continuing in all regions [for Until Dawn]. It’s not like Uncharted, but still, our marketing departments are responsive to the reactions from consumers.
Yoshida: Each region has its own marketing department with its own goals for a year and its own budget for the year. Of course there are lots of relations among the regions and Worldwide Studios, but differences could be based on the popularity, like of the genres or titles. Each marketing department makes the final decision how much a particular product gets pushed.
That said, sometimes games like Until Dawn find great reception from reviews and consumers after launch. In that case, some additional marketing push can be created to sustain the momentum post-launch. I hear great support continuing in all regions [for Until Dawn]. It’s not like Uncharted, but still, our marketing departments are responsive to the reactions from consumers.
Hard to tell what happened witn Until Dawn but perhaps Sony's marketing teams felt it would do fine without a push. It's been a surprise hit with all the gamings sites I regularly visit and even those who were initially unconvinved by it (Iag Higton at Eurogamer, everybody at VideoGamer.com) were completely won over once it got going.
Personally I think they nailed the pacing, like many a good horror the game starts out slow so you get a chance to explroe the character's personalities without the stress of a crisis which only emphasises their reactions when things start to go bad.
Sigfried1977
Legend
I never got the impression that the Order was heavily marketed either. Always seems to me like Sony acts rather restrained in that field in general. For example, every time R*, Square Enix or Ubi release something big, the whole city seems like it's plastered with game specific billboards.
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Deleted member 11852
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I saw a fair amount of marketing for The Order here in London but zip for Until Dawn.
The order got a super bowl ads irc, so thats big. Sony marketing team need to be smart and aggressive, can't be like PS3 gen anymore. If they didn't plan for a huge marketing push for UD prior to the post release success, they still got a chance for Oct holloween. Not many games get a second chance for marketing push post release like this game does; I always thought it was weird to release before Oct or even Sept anyway. Seems like the game was in development hell and they just wanted it out as soon as its ready.
That PSX/E3/Gamescom demo from 2014 where entire hall of people screamed at dev to pick the laudest crowd choices was the best marketing this game got. At that moment the game "clicked", almost everyone got the clear impression that this game is best played with friends, making choices in a rush and watching kids stumble through funny, non-serious, B-tier slasher tale. 
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Deleted member 11852
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Aren't YouTubers just preaching to their target audience who are more likely to be aware of these games? I remember when I had my PlayStation 2 I played a lot more games than I do now (more time back then) but I really didn't keep that up to date with games sites so GTA III was already out when I first saw an ad for it.
Maybe things have changed..
Creating the atmosphere of Until Dawn
http://www.develop-online.net/tools-and-tech/creating-the-atmosphere-of-until-dawn/0214056
http://www.develop-online.net/tools-and-tech/creating-the-atmosphere-of-until-dawn/0214056
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