How to sell your game?

I've been working on a game in Blitzmax for a while now, and its getting towards the stage where I feel the end may be in sight.

Everything about the game is controlled by mouse/2 mouse buttons.

Everybody who plays it, loves it. Its a simple idea but stupidly addictive.

I'm not prepared to go public with it yet (a big problem being that it needs a fair bit of graphics work). I think its got the potential to do really well, in the right marketing hands, but I don't really know the best places I should be looking to do this.

I've considered handling it all myself but at the end of the day, I'm not a salesman so I'd rather concentrate on the games side of things and leave the sales to somebody who knows how to maximise them.

I'm also worried that, as good as I believe my game is, I (and the small number of people who have played it) may have been horribly misguided somewhere and could be the only people in the universe who don't think its crap. I guess thats a demon I'll just have to face sooner or later but currently, I'm scared of showing it to too many people.

So, I'm a bit stuck for a way forward.

Would you say it was super-casual ( eg: Luxor ) or more neat-idea,great-niche-appeal ( eg: Gish ) ?

I'd go for the non-exclusive contracts with Big Fish, Reflexive, etc... You might want to contact Oberon Media also for more marketing efforts.

yeah I'm with Jeremy but it does depend on the type of game as Gabriel says.

Similarish question.

Anyone know mush about StarDock? (In relation to Publishing)

In fact I've got a list of portals that I would tackle if I wasn't working with a game producer who'll do that for me. If your game isn't suitable for portals then maybe the best route is to security wrap it and flog it yourself, but you'll have to get into marketing it which may not be that thrilling - depends on your outlook...

There's this guy Joe Lieberman who does PR work as well. He's really good at getting your stuff out there and has contacts at all the magazines etc... Recently there's been a lot more indie games showcased around partly because of him I'd say.

Check out his services:

http://www.vgsmart.com/

It probably falls into the 'super-casual' bracket, although its not match-three.

Are Reflexive any good alongside the likes of, say, Popcap, Real Arcade?

Popcap are a publisher. You won't ( I don't think, correct me if I'm wrong ) get a non-exclusive deal with Popcap. They only take on games they expect to make huge sums of money too, so if you *can* get them to take it, you probably should, and not worry about the non-exclusives, because Popcap have great distribution.

Reflexive are good. They're more generous than most of the portals, and they always display developer names. They have a very nice control panel, and are great people to deal with. ( They answer emails, always pay on time, don't waste your time asking for information you gave them seven time already. ) They don't shift as many copies of as the really big guys, but they shift enough to be well worth bothering with.

Beyond PopCap, if it's Super-Casual, I'd have to agree with Jeremy. Sell it on your own site ( well you don't *have* to, but you may as well get some direct sales and build up some traffic for the next game ) and push it out to as many non-exclusive sites as you can. I'd start with Oberon, they have a lot of clout, and then RealArcade, BigFish, Reflexive, MiniClip, PlayFirst, Boonty, et al.

I wouldn't throw it at all of them at once. Give each a couple of weeks to get back to you. If they like it, they may want to discuss an exclusive of some kind ( IE: Real might want it for six weeks before you let anyone else have it, for example ) and agreeing to this gives you the opportunity to negotiate for a higher percentage or an advance. ( Contrary to popular opinion, it IS possible to get an advance if they like the game enough to want an exclusive. )

sound advice. Also if you don't get replies, try again - several times.