PAX West 2016 Panel: Community is the New Everything

(ALL. THE. PEOPLE.) Photo credit: @artofchelleelle

While attending PAX West 2016, I had the opportunity of hearing from some C-level executives in the gaming industry about engaging a new type of gaming community and how that plays a role in the success of the titles and companies gamers know and love. Corporations, indie startups, marketing (or not?), how to get a job in gaming, and the rules of engagement… read on for more learning!

*Please note: Some of the comments made by panelists were paraphrased and may not be direct/ exact as I was typing these notes as fast as my fingers would go on my phone!*

Panel: Community is the New Everything

Panelists:

Kyla Kennedy (Executive Director of Publishing at SixFoot)
Jeremy Gaffney (Executive Consultant and Consultant, known for his work at Carbine Studios, NCSOFT, EA and more!)
David Reid (Founder & CEO of MetaArcade)
Troy Hewitt (Co-Founder, Director of Communications & Connections of uGen World)

Terms/ Abbreviations:

CCP: Crowd Control Productions, an Icelandic video game development and publishing company
CSM: Council of Stellar Management; elected group of people that represent EVE Online members to CCP

Questions:

1) What has been the evolution of games and gamers?

Jeremy: It’s now big online gaming, not box gaming. Like the Wild West with rules. Now, games like League of Legends allow devs and gamers to play together.

Kyla: It used to be that marketing was the main means of communication to an audience. Crescendo marketing was used right before, during, and right after launch and required lots of money. Now, gaming companies engage community members and early adopters to test their games.

David: Working with community alleviates the “crash and burn” problem (we’re talking millions of dollars). Building things in cocoons is usually a flawed approach. Forums, beta testers, and general community help. But, triple A corporations don’t do that. The indie side does. Sometimes it takes just a dozen people to help you calibrate (or recalibrate) and run in the right direction.

Jeremy: People get backlash from hype marketing (talking about hyping things up and not delivering to an audience as they expected). In the future, I can see more backlash coming to paid game players and “Let’s Plays”.

2) What does community mean in your company?

Jeremy: Transparency. Be honest with yourself about your game. Do very little with hype.

David: The sooner you put concepts out to the community, the better, especially if you’re headed down a bad path. Don’t make a colossal mistake. With that comes responsibility… You must have a gut check to get feedback quickly. Take note though: people can be tough.

Kyla: Community (it is a division of Six Foot) almost got put under marketing. But, we wanted it as a pillar. Gamers are smart. They want to feel valued, heard, important. The community team needs to make sure needs and wants are communicated back to the company. David: You don’t have to take the feedback from the community, but you should let people know you’re listening. And have some good reasons why you’re not implementing from their feedback.

Jeremy: If you’re a small company, those who are doing coding, design, and programming are also working in social media… They’re sacrificing time (often doing a lot of overtime), but they know the community. At a big company, the concern is whether or not the right communication is even happening internally between teams. The best folks are playing the game actively and with the dev team. Or, they’re doing so many things at once, like a small company.

Kyla: Being transparent is important. But, you don’t want to reveal too much. We once delayed game a twice. We decided to write a letter to the community to be honest and make sure we got it right before we sent it out. The community was really empathetic, more so than most publishers think. Troy: “Gamers get it.”

Jeremy: But, gamers do get angry. Pick people who are well-spoken and passionate. Engage with people that give you smart feedback, not “good” feedback (like a pat on the back). You want someone with articulated answers. Also, if you go off on someone for getting angry at you, they know they can get your goat, so they feed into that. You teach your community how to behave.

David: How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. That is how you deal with an angry community.

Kyla: You can create a post in a forum in response to arguments.

3) Do you embrace the notion of expanding community beyond that community person?

Jeremy: CCP started a Council of Stellar Management because of cheating employees at CCP. It was voted on by the gaming community. Twice a year they meet with the dev team. It’s like a small nation. The CSM was that vehicle for CCP.

4) Why do you think the shift is happening?

David: There is no developer who will love their game as much as their fans. Fans usually do better than game developers! When it’s your job, your best fans do a much better job that your developers do at times.

Kyla: Players want to feel part of the process.

5) Is the shift towards “community as a development partner” here to stay?

David: The more it is a game as a service, the more it’s important.

6) How has marketing and PR changed the face of this new movement?

Kyla: Marketing has changed. We used to do crescendo marketing… Free to play games can last a long time, so it’s important to be careful on financing. We recently engaged with streamers to play before closing the beta version on one of our games. We got lots of signups that way.

Jeremy: The community is a listening function. Community doesn’t suffer fools. There’s a level of maturity in the gaming community.

7) Where is community organizing your company?

David: Community doesn’t really fit neatly into any of those… A well-run community is the shortest path between you (your product) and your customer. Marketing and community teams need to be on the same page.

Kyla: But, we still have to rely on marketing for those flashy game trailers and getting us to PAX. PAX is awesome.

8) When did you really realize these were humans you were making games for?

Kyla: For me, it was PAXEast where we interacted with players. Sometimes you forget why you’re making these games. Players make your games.

Jeremy: People who meet and get married in your games. How many of you have made deep friendships in the gaming community?

David: Looking at reach, frequency, impressions… It’s easy to lose sight of the individual person. CCP helped: the advent of consumers have a broader influence in the communications mix. People are growing communities through blogs, streaming, videos…. So different since the Xbox 2 launch. No more PR trips, taking Walmart and other buyer companies’ CEOs to golf…

9) How do you reach out to people to help promote your games? Are their numbers and stats important?

Troy: We’re not going for the “PewDiePies” (more commercialized). We want “regular” people who are non-misogynistic and aren’t generally bad people, are in it for the long haul, and are fun to watch.

David: It’s still more of an art than a science. The size of the audience may not be as important as the conversations that are happening. You never know who that one person is who has the spark. PewDiePies are like a marketing buy.

Jeremy: There’s blowback on the inauthenticity of that stuff. That won’t sustain in a mature audience (a.k.a. critical audience). Some popular gamers use games as a vehicle for their personalities. It doesn’t matter what game you play. The best bet is someone who likes your game. But, at the moment, it’s kind of a mix. But, we’re starting to see blowback.

Kyla: You’ll never go wrong with supporting someone who plays /streams your game. We’ll support anyone who’s passionate about playing our games

Other thoughts:

Kyla: It’s important to make new community members feel welcome.

Troy: There are some people who just want to watch the world burn, but there are definitely some early adopters you want to pay attention to. Kyla: We love player developers. It could get you a job!!! Dev pays attention because it’s things they don’t have time to do.

Key Takeaways:

Traditional methods of marketing don’t always work in the gaming world today. Your best bet is reaching out to the gaming community and choosing some key leaders.
But, marketing and community still need to work together.
Don’t forget to consult the community on your game BEFORE it’s done in development. You could save yourself from a “crash and burn” situation by getting feedback early on. “Fail Fast”.
Be authentic, don’t hype. You’ll get major blowback from the community.
Gamers are smart. They want to feel valued, heard, important. So, communicate and be transparent.
You teach your community how to behave. Lead by example.
You don’t have to take the feedback a community gives, but you should let people know you’re listening. And have some good reasons why.
The community can be understanding, but it can also be tough. It doesn’t suffer fools.
If you want to be a sought out as company representative in the community, be yourself, be a good person (a.k.a. treat others with respect), and have fun with your games.
If you want a job at a gaming company, design and develop things that can go into those games. You’ll impress the companies- dev doesn’t have time to do those kinds of fun side projects! Plus, companies are looking for things that are “plug and play”, or things they can immediately use in their games.

I spoke to some Twitch representatives at the con and they said that many of the panels will be archived to their site. Hopefully this is one of them! Regardless, I hope you enjoyed learning from these experienced C-level executives. Tune in for more PAXWest 2016 learnings!

Yours truly,