I swear, Greg Costikyan has to be the most well-meaning and yet ultimately self-defeating individual in the games industry. I’ve somewhat loudly disagreed with him in the past, but he’s clearly an intelligent and motivated guy. His new company, Man!festo Games just launched its website. The idea behind Manifesto is to be a games portal for indie games, near as I can tell. Problem is, unless you’re a developer or part of a very small group of fans, being indie isn’t an attraction. It’s a non-factor. It’s an attempt to make the creator more important than the product (Harley Davidson, for instance, whose motorcycles are overpriced pieces of crap compared to Japanese motorcycles, but command superior prices due to the power of the brand), but that takes a lot of money or just an extremely clever delivery, and Man!Festo has neither.
Then I go to the site. It’s so bad, it makes me want to cry. I feel as if my eyeballs have been torn to pieces by rusty knives. What is Greg thinking? What is Man Fest (erm, Man!festo) trying to accomplish here? They’re looking to essentially publish games on the web (ie offer them to the end consumer) and take a cut of the price, delivering the remainder to the developer. Man!festo had asked us if we’d be interested in getting involved, but I preferred to wait until they launched and see what kind of site they put together before signing up. Nothing personal, but I wouldn’t want to tie Iron Realms to a product/service until I know how that product/service is going to roll. Where does one even begin to explain what’s so bad about this site? What the site needs is a 100% redesign, and not just graphically. The flow of information needs changing and the basic purpose of the site needs re-thinking. As I see it:
- The site does way too much promoting of Greg Costikyan. Who cares, with all due respect? If you’re looking to help developers sell to anyone beyond other developers (and that is not a large crowd), then nobody is going to care that you are publishing these games on the web. Go to Miniclip, Popcap, whatever. How many of them have an entire section of the website devoted to the personal speaking appearances of the founder, particularly when that founder is, again, with all due respect, not responsible for any mainstream game successes. It’d be like me devoting a whole section of our Iron Realms portal to speaking engagements at things that my customers are not at, like GDC. The customer and his/her needs are the thing, not you.
- The visual layout. My god. I feel like I’m being assaulted! There are links here, sections there, words turned on their side running vertically up the left, there’s a whole freaking section that appears to be from Greg’s personal blog. What the hell?!
You know what? I had a whole list of things that’s wrong with this site, but nevermind. The only solution to this site is to entirely redo it, and start with the name. Drop the gimmick, find something that says, “I want to play some kickass, hardcore games that don’t involve EA.” Please. Seriously, please. Don’t argue, because I’m right. It’s not that I have some sort of expert insight into the web. It’s just that….it sucks. It just sucks. I’ve talked to a number of other experienced indie game developers, and the overwhelming feeling is the same. We’re your content. That’s not a good sign. Iron Realms, for instance, would love it if Man!festo (or, hopefully, the same idea renamed and re-attituded) could become a viable channel to customers looking for a boutique, quality experience, but…ugh.
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August 28th, 2006 at 8:53 am
Hamumu
You got it… but you left out “YOU HAVE TO REGISTER TO DOWNLOAD A DEMO!?!?!!?”
August 28th, 2006 at 9:21 am
Brent Michael Krupp
Yeah, everything you said and all kidding aside, Man!festo seriously does make a person think first of a gay [male] porn site before starting to wonder what else it might be. Perhaps something political. Certainly not a game site.
In slight defense of Greg, he is quite famous… in the world of paper wargaming/boardgaming. Still, not likely to be a huge draw for the indy games they hope to host.
August 28th, 2006 at 9:45 am
Matt
Greg is famous in the video games industry for one thing: Complaining a lot. I mean a lot. The guy seems to, previous to Man Fest, have spent most of his time speaking a game developer’s conferences and complaining about how bad the industry is. To his credit, he’s actually putting his money where his mouth is with Man Fest, but it’s so horribly, horribly done it hurts.
He replied to me this morning via email and said paraphrased, “I’m sorry the site is not to your taste.”
Ok then. Talk about missing the point. My personal taste has nothing to do with it.
August 28th, 2006 at 1:21 pm
Bob Kelly
Yes, it has problems - I posted my points there too.
But at least he’s putting money where the mouth is.
And you, you’re just another whiney blogger with an opinion. I think Greg needs the opportunity to transform from being famous for complaining to someone able to change the industry.
He’s got balls. I respect that and you, as a blogger who cares about gaming and development, should to. It’s your choice.
August 28th, 2006 at 1:30 pm
Matt
Yes, I’m a blogger with an opinion. I’m also a successful developer of indie games, and was asked to sign up with Manifesto before they released, so clearly Manifesto looks at us and companies like us as potential content providers. Their entire mission, apparently, is to enable indie developers (like us) to publish our content more effectively on the web without being ‘abused’ by larger games portals.
If you’d read my article and my comment above, you’d see that I do give him props for putting his money where his mouth is. Unfortunately, that money has been ill-spent thus far and has resulted in a site that has as much chance of selling significant volume to game players as my grandmother’s homepage does. If I’m wrong, I’ll be happy to eat my words and sign up with Manifesto, of course.
August 28th, 2006 at 2:01 pm
Alex
Wow, that is an ugly ugly site.
But I think the name disturbs me more.
August 28th, 2006 at 3:00 pm
Greg
Well, it’s generally a mistake to respond to these things, but perhaps I’ll try.
>being indie isn’t an attraction. It’s a non-factor.
I think if you said this to a fan of indie music or film, they would disagree. There is value in the freedom to express individual vision that you can rarely obtain in the conventional markets. I agree that there are few gamers who today have the same opinion of “independent games,” but then, there aren’t all that many gamers who have even been exposed to the idea of independent games. If we are to achieve substantial distribution for independently created games, one of the necessary jobs–probably the most difficult one–is to cultivate an audience aesethetic that does indeed think “being indie is an attraction.” While doing so is non-trivial, I also don’t think its impossible–it has happened for music and film, after all–and indeed, if I thought it were impossible, I wouldn’t be doing this.
>What is Man Fest (erm, Man!festo) trying to accomplish here?
You’re right that we are a portal retailing games. I think you are missing the other side of the equation, however; independent music and film fans tend to be fanatical about the products they love, and again, we are attempting to create a parallel phenomenon for independently created games. Consequently, it can’t just be about retail; it also has to be about creating a sense of community and engagement, and providing interesting material, so that people are motivated to return to see what’s new, not just when they hear about a game they would like to purchase. Consequently, we need the review et al. material that’s appearing in The Word, and we need active forums, hence the featured post on the front page, and we need to impart the sense that customers aren’t merely consuming, they are engaged in a conversation with a company that has a mission and a voice. So to say that there is a lack of clarity in terms of pounding home “buybuybuy” is, I think, missing the point.
>The site does way too much promoting of Greg Costikyan.
Here, you may well have a point; I believe I will ask Johnny to write our next soapbox, and over time, I believe that the personalities of our other staff will come out, as well. I realize that no other retail site of which I am aware does anything to foster the notion of personality or voice–but again, I’m attempting to foster a sense of engagement between our staff and the community, and it is my firm belief that if we succeed in doing so, that will be one of our chief competititive advantages.
As for the Events, as I already said in email, this is not, as you have characterized it, a list of my speaking engagements, although my speaking engagements are listed. It is also a list of other events of interest to our audience, such as the IGF deadline, and in future will contain items of more immediate interest, such as tournaments and developer chats. (Indeed, since we exchanged email, Randy Chase announced some SpiritWars tournaments, and I have added them to the Events list.)
>The visual layout. My god. I feel like I’m being assaulted!
>He replied to me this morning via email and said paraphrased, “I’m sorry the site is not to your taste.”
I believe my comment via email addresses your comment here. This is indeed a matter of taste. Here and elsewhere, I have been accused of both choosing an amateurish logo, and having an amateurish design. Our logo was designed by a person who is employed full time as the branding designer for a major New York branding agency; our site design was created by someone who has had work featured at SIGGRAPH, and has worked as creative director for companies including Sesame Workshop and Space.com. You may dislike the aesthetic, but to term them amateurish is factually incorrect.
I happen to like the aesthetic. I realize that it is not “clean;” that is purposeful. It is intended to impart an vigorous, punk-y, independent feel. That being said, there are a lot of things that need tightening up, and we will be doing so over time.
FWIW, I will mention that I find the black-on-brown text on the Ironrealms website rather difficult to read.
August 28th, 2006 at 3:20 pm
Mike Rozak
UI does tend to be a personal preference. The UI design’s preference becomes “important” when it offends too many people, scares too many people away, etc.
Personally, I find most web sites are way overloaded with junk, especially the various games portasl I’ve visited. Games portals tend to have very gaudy use of color too. Manifesto games isn’t particularly different in clutter/saturation than any other games portals.
Given a choice, I’d choose the art style displayed in Iron Realms web pages (for example), which have less clutter and more subtle coloring, to the manga or carnival-style art that most games portals display. But then again, I’m not a typical customer.
August 28th, 2006 at 3:34 pm
Matt
Greg wrote:
I think if you said this to a fan of indie music or film, they would disagree.
Perhaps, depending on the fan. I like good music and good film, which happens to sometimes be indie, which would make me a fan of indie music and film, except that who owns it and how it was funded and that kind of thing don’t matter to me any more than what brand of camera it was shot on. It’s the end result that is the thing. I’ll grant that there are certain indie music and film fans for whom things like how it was funded matter in terms of their enjoyment of the final product though.
There is value in the freedom to express individual vision that you can rarely obtain in the conventional markets. I agree that there are few gamers who today have the same opinion of “independent games,” but then, there aren’t all that many gamers who have even been exposed to the idea of independent games. If we are to achieve substantial distribution for independently created games, one of the necessary jobs–probably the most difficult one–is to cultivate an audience aesethetic that does indeed think “being indie is an attraction.”
I’m not sure that’s true. I think you’re mushing together and unjustifiably equating ideas like innovation and interesting with a method of production.
You’re right that we are a portal retailing games. I think you are missing the other side of the equation, however; independent music and film fans tend to be fanatical about the products they love, and again, we are attempting to create a parallel phenomenon for independently created games. Consequently, it can’t just be about retail; it also has to be about creating a sense of community and engagement, and providing interesting material, so that people are motivated to return to see what’s new, not just when they hear about a game they would like to purchase. Consequently, we need the review et al. material that’s appearing in The Word, and we need active forums, hence the featured post on the front page, and we need to impart the sense that customers aren’t merely consuming, they are engaged in a conversation with a company that has a mission and a voice. So to say that there is a lack of clarity in terms of pounding home “buybuybuy” is, I think, missing the point.
I’m not arguing that the information you have isn’t important to have or that it’s not important to foster a sense of community (though I’m fairly unsure that it is important to foster a sense of community around a retail games site). I’m arguing that the entire experience as it is put together now is confusing, difficult to use, and makes me unsure if the site is about selling me some games to play or pushing an agenda. Perhaps there is room for both. I doubt it though.
I believe my comment via email addresses your comment here. This is indeed a matter of taste. Here and elsewhere, I have been accused of both choosing an amateurish logo, and having an amateurish design. Our logo was designed by a person who is employed full time as the branding designer for a major New York branding agency; our site design was created by someone who has had work featured at SIGGRAPH, and has worked as creative director for companies including Sesame Workshop and Space.com. You may dislike the aesthetic, but to term them amateurish is factually incorrect.’
I don’t care who created it. It still sucks, sorry. There’s just not a nice way to put it.
I happen to like the aesthetic. I realize that it is not “clean;” that is purposeful. It is intended to impart an vigorous, punk-y, independent feel. That being said, there are a lot of things that need tightening up, and we will be doing so over time.
No, it’s not “clean” but that’s fine. It can have any look you desire as long as it allows for a good user experience that lets someone find what he or she is looking for.
FWIW, I will mention that I find the black-on-brown text on the Ironrealms website rather difficult to read.
Ugh, yeah, thanks for bringing that to my attention. That’s horrid. Someone appears to have broken the homepage, as that is NOT what it looks like/is meant to look like.
–matt
August 28th, 2006 at 3:46 pm
Matt
Ironrealms.com page fixed. CSS file had its permissions changed somehow. Thanks for the heads up Greg.
–matt
August 28th, 2006 at 7:52 pm
Greg
Matt:
I’m not going to go on further. But I want to go off on a tangent.
1. Achaea’s business model is based on item purchase rather than subscription.
2. The single most successful MMO on the planet at present is Kart Rider, in Korea, which is based on item promotion, rather than subscription.
3. You were here first.
4. Isn’t there something promotable about this?
August 28th, 2006 at 8:01 pm
Matt
Well, promotable how? Within the industry, it’s promotable to some extent, but does the end user really care? The press might care, but we don’t have any pretty pictures to show them, which diminishes our value to a reporter/editor. We’re small and can’t throw big 9 figure numbers in their faces either. In fact, the only national coverage we’ve gotten, beyond maybe a couple things in Wired or whatnot, was a 90 second segment on one of the popular G4/TechTV shows. We got that attention, however, for introducing addictive narcotics (called ‘gleam’) into Achaea.
If you know something I don’t about using the fact that we were first to promote our games, I’m all ears, believe me.
August 29th, 2006 at 7:42 pm
Pentharian
About the comments relating to indie games:
I never have considered myself to be any sort of “indie” gamer, let alone indie music/movie fan. I happened upon Achaea something like five years ago at a site that was called, I believe, “gamedex” or something like that. I was bored and in front of a computer that I did not have any permissions on, so I was looking for a game I could play in my browser. Achaea was the third or fourth listed (alphabetically) in the RPG category, so I took a look and immediately was attracted by the website. Unfortunately, port 23 happened to be blocked as well so I had to wait until I was elsewhere to start playing, but play I did.
Until that point, I had never played any game that I didn’t buy at Media Play or Best Buy, etc. Since that time, I have bought only one game (Neverwinter Nights Diamond, since I saw it in the $10 bargain bin).
If you are looking for a way to entice gamers, focusing on those who are already members of the “indie gamer” community isn’t necessarily where new customers are to be found. I think IRE had a wonderful idea with the poster contest a while back. If you make your game available and generate interest in any sort of forum where a casual gamer might see it, it would likely be better than advertising to the indie community, where many of the existing people are already dedicated to the product that lured them into the scene to begin with.
Slightly rambling, but I think my original intent was to give my personal viewpoint, which generally is supporting of what Matt said, but also might give some insight into who might be finding games where, and what factors matter.
August 30th, 2006 at 1:45 am
Marc Watson/Richter Carthan
Yes, the website seems to be somewhat visually assaulting, everywhere at once, in your face. It’s perhaps made well, but I’m just not feeling it.
Oh, and as an update, they’ve posted that you no longer have to register to download demos. A necessary correction to a silly mistake in the first place.
August 30th, 2006 at 6:19 am
Joseph Monk
While I don’t like the design of that site, it’s not as horrible as some of you make it seem. Well, compaired to what I’m used to seeing daily. For example, look at these four major Korean sites.
http://www.naver.com - One of the two biggest portal and search engines.
http://www.daum.net - The other major portal/search engine.
http://www.cyworld.com - The largest community site.
http://www.koreatimes.com - One of the major newspapers.
August 31st, 2006 at 12:37 am
Bob
Unfortunately, I am not Greg’s target audience, so I don’t think my opinion will hold as much weight as it might otherwise. I don’t have much interest finding new games, and I’m generally indifferent to their independent status.
Anyways, I agree with Matt that the name is by no standard flattering, but I don’t think it would turn me off from using the site. As far as the layout goes though, I find it distracting. At first glance I want to be able to see the top voted games (a feature in development), half a dozen randomly selected or new games, and one recommended game. All with descriptions no longer than those currently used under New Games section (less than 100 words). I don’t care about the Soapbox and I don’t understand why it is one of the first things presented to the visitor. Navigation by the top menu seemed fine and intuitive for what I wanted to find.
The only thing I’ve noticed in the 30 minutes of browsing and typing this response that I really disliked was the language: it’s too informal. The “dialogue” between Me and Vicky when describing Aveyond does nothing to help me understand what the game is about. Gibbage’s description was the best among them.