Today I worked on the press release again. One section kept bugging me every time I read it. And I wrote that press release about 5 months ago :). It hadn’t change much after its first incarnation but this paragraph kept annoying me. Today I think I’m happy with that paragraph for the first time in 5 months. Here’s the new version:

Chapter I’s story revolves around a thief named Jack who is on an industrial espionage mission to steal the blueprints of a new product. However, as he makes his way into the office complex, he discovers much more to this place than meets the eye. As unnatural sounds and horrifying visions begins to unravel before his eyes, Jack begins to have the unnerving feeling that he has become the target of a malignant presence and he isn’t allowed to leave… just yet. Jack’s terrifying journey will lead him to several mysterious encounters that will leave their marks on his mind as well as his flesh.

I wasn’t happy with that paragraph because I wasn’t sure what to write there. I didn’t want to write about the game’s story too much. I hate that actually. That’s also the reason I hate watching trailers and reading the backs of books. It’s incredible how spoiler filled those things are. Take a book for example. I remember reading the back of a 300 page book in the store. Came home and read the book in 2 days. To my amazement the backside had summarized the first 200 pages of the book in about 100 words. Now where is the fun in reading a book like that?

One of the biggest rules of moviemaking is putting everything that’s expensive as close to the end as possible. Take any multi-million dollar action movie for example. Those movies are prime examples of showing this rule in action. I remember reading somewhere that about 50% or more of the budget was spent on the last 10 minutes of Alien vs Predator. Look at all the Transformers movies.

I think there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. Nothing at all. Now the problem lies with the marketing side of things. Since movies are primarily marketed with their trailers, those trailers must impress the audience. Now the best way to impress an audience is to show them cool stuff. And for 99% of action movies, the cool stuff is at the end of the movie. These trailers usually show the best parts of the movies, meaning the end parts, and you can quickly fill in the dots about what will happen in the movie. I absolutely hate that. This is the reason I stopped watching trailers about 10 years ago.

Frankly, I just wanted to write, “this is a horror game. Buy it. If you don’t like it I offer 100% money back guarantee. No questions asked.” I think it’s a lot more mysterious that way.

But as you’ll probably agree it’s a pretty bad marketing strategy:)

I have struggled to strike a balance between telling some of the story and making it interesting, and keeping most of the meaty stuff out. I think this version does that. At least I hope so. Maybe I’m a psycho focusing on one paragraph nobody’s gonna read anyway, but that’s the way I’m.

Other than that I struggled with the website a little bit more, but that’s no longer news :)

That’s about it for today folks.

Cheers.