Spread the Word!

How you can help!

By Craig Fraser Posted January 19, 2008 21:50:04

SINS is finally here!
The enthusiasm of everyone here has been a real inspiration during development. The magic of multiplayer is going to depend on strong community leadership. Our mission now is to hit critical mass so the community is able sustain itself. We want to see the forum, ICO, and IRC traffic continue to ramp up so that there will be an abundance of players of all skill levels ready to play!

There are been a number of people who have generously volunteered their time and skills to promote the game over the course of development. Lately there have been a number of people who also want to help out, but don't know how. Well this is for you:

Forums
1-mention SINS in other forums
2-add a banner, link, or SINS quote to your other forum signatures.
3-visit this forum and the SINS channel at Stardock Central once a day. Motivate guests to learn more about SINS.
4-welcome new members in the forum and help them become better players so the player base can grow!
5-word your post titles carefully
6-Create posts the describe the emotional attributes of the game that a first time player can relate to.
7-seek and destroy trolls and correct misinformation about the game wherever you can.

E-mail/IM
8-mention sins in a newsletter/mail list
9-add http://www.sinsofasolarempire.com to your e-mail signature
10-send an email to your friends linking the game.
11-Put SINS in your MSN message

Clans
12-start a new SINS clan
13-introduce your existing clan to SINS
14-introduce another clan to SINS

Create
15-design a custom game map or mod
16-create your own sins fan art, banners, and stories
17-create a gameplay video for YouTube or add a response to the existing videos.

Your Website
18-create a SINS fan site
19-place a SINS banner/link on your site
20-write a review or start a sins blog.
21-Add SINS to your Facebook (or similar site)

Other Websites
22-write comments, rate the game, add to your wishlist and participate in polls on sites like these:

http://blogs.pcworld.com/gameon/archives/006444.html
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/sinsofasolarempire/index.html?tag=result;title;0
http://pc.ign.com/objects/775/775249.html
http://www.1up.com/do/gameOverview?cId=3154358
http://pc.gamezone.com/gamesell/p30977.htm
http://www.quartertothree.com/game-talk/showthread.php?t=36431&page=4&highlight=sins+solar+empire
http://www.gwn.com/games/gameinfo.php/id/25633/platform/pc/title/Sins_of_a_Solar_Empire.html
http://www.strategyinformer.com/pc/sinsofasolarempire/screenshots.html
http://www.gamingtrend.com/GameInfo/GameInfo.php?GameID=5463
http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/50683
http://ve3d.ign.com/poll/194/Most-Wanted-2008-PC-Games
http://forums.penny-arcade.com/showthread.php?t=20697&page=4&highlight=sins+solar+empire
http://www.gamingnexus.com/Default.aspx?Section=Article&I=1614
http://www.next-gen.biz/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=8618&Itemid=2
http://www.greatgamesexperiment.com/game/SoaSE
http://www.gamealmighty.com/story-individual/story/Sins_of_a_Solar_Empire/
http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/?AID=174644#1461889 (More Review links)

23-Update the SINS Wikipedia entry, and revive the RT4X entry

Recruit
24-schedule a release game party
25-organize a SINS tournament
26-talk to people at school, work and clubs about SINS gameplay.
27-e-mail game magazines and websites about your experience/expectations with SINS.
28-visit/phone/email your nearest game store and ask about SINS.
29-reset the homepage on demo computers
30-Set the SINS wallpaper wherever you go

Check this post for updates.

*when linking to the site match the title of the page exactly. This will improve search engine ranking.
*don't spam forums or cheat in polls - this will hurt us in the long run.
*send us your ideas!

Banners: Visit this thread for banners
Avatars: Visit this thread for avatars

+61 Karma 104 Replies 32 Referrals

I spread the good word on a few sites I am a member of :

http://www.teamfortress2fort.com/
http://www.2old2play.com/
http://forums.relicnews.com/
http://www.ocforums.com
http://www.geek4ums.com/
http://www.gamerswithjobs.com

29-reset the homepage on demo computers

Devious!

@IC/SD - someone should make a a news thread on http://EvilAvatar.com

Lets not forget about a tip to the following webmedia sites:
http://pc.joystiq.com/
http://blog.wired.com/games/
http://www.gamedaily.com/pc/

Here is a big one especially for TV and teenagers:

http://www.g4tv.com/xplay/blog/index.html

Additionally if someone knows the guys at Penny Arcade contact them as well.

On a side note: for those of you at universities reset all lab computer homepages as well.

16c: Already done

http://forums.sinsofasolarempire.com/?forumid=409&aid=172537#1422944

I can't wait for this thing!!! If you time release with a snowstorm to keep people out of work that would help too!

@IC/SD - Some more places for you to send official info. These are mainstream venues:

PR Newswire (VERY, VERY Important)
http://www.prnewswire.com/

Business Wire (Important)
http://www.businesswire.com/

PrimeNewswire
http://www.primenewswire.com/

Marketwire
http://www.marketwire.com/

As I said in my numerous PMs I would contact agencies of this type for you but since I dont have an official relationship with SD/IC I cant do so in good faith nor can they publish anything I give them.

If you guys can get on PR or BW it is almost guaranteed to give you massive general news outlet circulation on a global scale.

Yeah, I'm gonna try to get the word out there. I talked to one guy telling him that I was the lead scripter guy for Dawn of Victory, he asked "what game", I told him Sins of a Solar Empire...and he didn't know what I was talking about. I may write up a little mini-review but my site's down for well-needed maintenance.

Very much anticipating release though, and I think the coverage from IGN etc etc will prompt a pretty huge influx of new players.

lets not forget gametrailers.com

That place is also great for blogs and such (which i so bad at

)

I found sins because I was looking for news about homeworld. If you make a fansite its probably worth adding a page relating to homeworld to pull people in from the search engines eg a page called "the next homeworld" that talks about the good features of homeworld and why sins is going to best each one. We can get away with that on fansites, but it probably can't be done here on the main site. Could also make pages that target other games we can source players from. Then link to them from those other games' forums, blogs, and comments to boost the page rank.

Your will be done, master!

Now if only I had a signature banner to use...

[/subtlehint]

Now if only I had a signature banner to use...

Don't you mean if only you had a signature? There are several signature banners floating around... Spartan made a half dozen, and let me assure you they are hawt.

Thanks but I want to redo them with more refined graphics I just have not found the time. I also wish I had access to the [Classified] version to create new ones based on the graphic material for real salesmanship on the graphic side but there is nothing I can do about it since I'm not part of it at the moment and likely wont be until game is released.

im highly surprised koscky hasnt made a hasslehoff joke yet...

I also suggest for SD/IC to set up a "store-front" on eBay, Yahoo, and Amazon as well. Just getting listed for the 10 tens of millions of page loads in the game section as well as searches for keyword (Homeworld included) everyday will surely do a lot to drum up impressions at a minimum. It would be a nice background buzz.

High:

Low:

oooohh.. purty!

Hawt! I like the Marza one, but that first animated one with the close-in on a strip across the guys eyes is weird...

Great stuff!

Damn you guys stole my idea (starts to delete head shot banner files).

I'm curious as to why you guys did not put the URL in the image. I assume it is because you assumed the user will make the image interactive and do the link code wise.

Anyway cool looking nonetheless. What I would really like to see is a banner with each ships for each race on it. That was going to be my next banner project after the head shot banners and done in stages finishing after the release. This is so because I dont have the most current version and thus access to the all the ships. You guys do however (not so subtle hint). I think the banners would appeal to "homeworlders" as well as other space sim focused players. The head shots appeal to RPG types methinks.

@Ron - what are you talking about?? I dont see any ships or animated ones....

Number 5 from the top is animated, as is number 8. Number 8 is a rather funny Marza based one -- one shot shows the title of the ship (Marza Dreadnought) next one is a pic, last one is a quote "gimme a planet to bomb!".

WTF?? I only see four (4) images and they are not animated. I even downloaded them all to check. We must be living in separate realities - I wanna live in yours.

You don't see that one?

"Tell me, Picard, how many lights do you see?"

There are 8 banners, and the Marza one is DEFFINITELY great!!!

It this a FireFox issue?

UPDATE: Yes it is a browser issue. IC - come guys FireFox is the best dont give into the darkside!!!

I am seeing it fine in FireFox.

Hmmm.... Very strange indeed.
I could seem all in IE but I cant in Firefox and I have no custom stuff running for Firefox at all.

Quoting for a test.

Not to turn this into a tech support thread derailment, but...

As I imagine you've seen, that's an empty quote.

It seems you're filtering the gifs, for some reason (as the ones you can see are all jpgs). Just as a simple test, I've converted one of the jpgs to a gif -- see if this shows for you: