Matsumori Days

Ever since kentona unveiled the site statistics, I've been thinking of how to improve on this game's overall statistics. Unless I'm terribly, terribly mistaken, that means advertising. Before I do that, I want to understand what the more downloaded (or talked about) games have that I don't. My observations:

1) They have awesome, or unique (read: Space Funeral) graphics. In this respect, this game mostly looses. I do use some custom graphics, but the are done in the same style of the RTP. The only way people like RTP graphics is when they are done "right". I'm not sure what that means, but I'm attempting to research it.

2) The game has technical prowess the likes of which I didn't think possible in RPGM. While Averice is an excellent example of this (particularly when I first signed on to RMN), there are probably other examples that have slipped my mind at the moment. Again, my game losses in this category too, as I want to keep the game as simple as possible on as many fronts as possible.

3) The game exists on other websites. This is the Visions and Voices, Hero's Realm, and other heavy-hitters. These games, generally, have other attributes that attract those downloads. I'm not exactly sure what the draw of Visions and Voices is, but I've played Hero's Realm. It certainly has that old-school feel, and it has a certain charm to it, but I wasn't having much fun playing it. Maybe I'm totally dead on the inside? In any event, this is not the case of Matsumori Days at all. In fact, I'm certain that if I post Matsumori Days elsewhere, it will either be ignored (like it is now), or garner exceptionally negative feedback that is not constructive at all.

Then I have to remind myself that my audience is not necessarily the RMN developer community. I know I want to cater to the Story Chaser (kentona article reference!), but I'm not exactly sure who else I cater to, given what I have.

I guess what I'm saying is that I want some kind of feedback on this game, and I know I can get feedback from going to places outside of RMN (even inside RMN), but I'm afraid of what that feedback would entail. The last time became overconfident, I asked for a Let's Try. And we all know how that ended up: with a project cancellation and practical reset of this project.

I have always wanted to make this game something to be proud of. Something that can stand on it's own, despite the lack of anything that would make it stand out. I'm not sure if the game is at that point, or what I need to do to get there, but that is what I'm striving for.