Request to Help with Tutorials, Publicity, & Voice Acting

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

Hello!  I'm Mah-Dry-Bread, I've been doing video game videos on YouTube for going on 7 years now and currently do it as a full time job.  I also do some voice acting on the side.  I wanted to offer to help out however I can.  I've been a lifelong fan of RTS games and 0 A.D. really caught my interest after a fan told me about the game and I gave it a try.  I went to the official YouTube page and saw that not much gets uploaded there, and the few bits of gameplay there seem to be a bit choppy, and seemed to be recorded by someone who wasn't the most comfortable in front of a live microphone.

I wanted to offer my help.  I'd be interested in doing some regular videos on the game, both for the official channel and for my own channel to help promote the game.  I'm not asking for pay, I just want to do my part to help the game grow.  Despite being in an alpha state, it's genuinely better than some RTS's that I've paid quite a bit for.

I'd be more than happy to do tutorial videos, gameplay videos, live streams, and even voice acting if there is a need for any of that.  My only rule is that if we are to do live streams, I can't do them on Twitch.tv.  I'm a Hitbox.tv first party partner, so I'm not able to stream video games on other websites.  That said, Hitbox.tv has a large international viewer base so it might actually help in spreading the game to people who aren't native English speakers more than it would on Twitch.

 

If anyone involved is interested, just let me know!  I tweeted at your official Twitter earlier and the person running it told me to come here to discuss this.  Thanks for hearing me out everyone, and have a nice day!

[sanderd17]

First of all, thank you for the offer.

Our release videos normally don't have voice comments on it. So I wonder what video you're referring to. And though @BrynnOfCastlegate makes our release videos, she doesn't have an easy job with our sub-optimal release schema. Releasing stalls our development quite a bit (we must stop implementing new stuff, and switch to testing and debugging only), so we prefer to keep our release testing short, which also doesn't give a lot of time to create a video.

That said, there's certainly nothing stopping you to make videos on 0 A.D. for your own channel. Several players and gaming channels have made videos of 0 A.D. (of a big variety in quality), and we're happy to see these videos (even if they complain about the lag in our game, or other issues).

Allowing videos for the official channel is something different though. I don't think our official channel should have the typical gameplay videos you make, but more tutorial videos and videos showing (new) features of the game. But that's just my opinion (as a single dev), and we'll certainly talk a bit more about it with the team.

Btw, we're also not bound to any streaming service, and prefer to keep it that way. I don't know what implication it would have with you being bound to a streaming service, and making the official videos.

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

Here is an example of what I mean by a video with commentary on the official YouTube channel: 

 

 

The person very much seems to know what they're talking about, but the gameplay's footage is choppy and they seem a bit microphone shy.

 

Like I said, if I were to be doing videos on the official YouTube channel, it would most likely be tutorials.  My typical playthroughs don't seem like they'd fit on a company YouTube channel, but I've done a ton of things over my near 7 years on YouTube, not just playthroughs.  I'd probably do guides for individual teams to show what is unique about them, tutorial videos to teach people how to play, and strategy videos to teach people strategies they can learn to start handling harder difficulties.

 

Don't worry, you wouldn't be bound to any streaming service for associating with me.  According to my contract, it only applies to me and the only restriction is that I personally as an individual can not host a stream where I play video games on a non Hitbox.tv service.  I can still stream anything where I don't play a game on any service, and I can also participate in a stream of any kind on any website that I'm not personally broadcasting.

By the way if you're interested, I'm sure Hitbox.tv would absolutely love to have you make a streaming channel with them, with no exclusivity of course.  They like to work with indy game studios to promote them, including representing them at conventions to help spread the word.  I've got a direct line of contact with multiple of the higher ups at Hitbox and they're all extremely friendly and always looking for devs who want to work with them.

 

Thanks again for your time and consideration, I appreciate it!

[Stan`]

Would you consider making a video to "showcase" what you can do ? =)

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

I could do that.  What would you like me to showcase specifically?  A test tutorial?

[feneur]

I've had the thought recently that it would be nice to have something going up on our Youtube channel in between releases, so I'm certainly liking the idea. It would be good to know what you are capable of, and how good you are at accepting constructive criticism etc, before making you any kind of "official Youtuber" for 0 A.D. though. A test tutorial would be nice, do you have a suggestion for a topic or would you like some suggestions?

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

Don't worry about constructive criticism, reading 10,000 YouTube comments a month is part of my job.  There is literally nothing you can say that can hurt my feelings, by all means criticise whatever I make to death.  Criticism is the most productive form of feedback, it's the only way I can improve.

Well, what would you like to see most for a test tutorial?  I could do something very basic like one just teaching how to move the camera and order units in a quick 5ish minute video, or I could do a video on general things to help people who have the controls down, but are still pretty new to RTS's and stuff.  You know, stressing the importance of building a strong economy, teaching good rules of thumb to keep from neglecting one's military, showing how imporatant control groups can be and convinient ways to set them up, stuff like that.  Really I'm up for whatever you guys are, I'm just spitballing ideas.

Also if you ever want to talk to me in private either to know me or to plan things, You're more than welcome to contact me on just about anything.  Email, Skype, Discord, whatever works best for you.

[Yves]

In my opinion, tutorials how to play the game aren't particularly interesting. There are some around already and even though I've enjoyed watching some let's plays on Youtube, I've never watched a pure tutorial video about a game on Youtube. In addition, gameplay is still changing quite a bit and tutorials could be outdated soon.

Traditional let's plays don't seem to work very well for 0 A.D. either. We don't have a single player campaign yet and only some multiplayer videos were really interesting to watch for me.

What really sets us apart from other games is how our development works. There's regularly new content to showcase and gameplay frequently changes because of new features or balancing changes. Something like the development reports, but in a video format, could work and could also attract new developers. You can search in the Announcements and News forum for these development reports. I'd say some well commented multiplayer matches would also work and modding or creation of a custom map in our map editor, but I don't know how well the modding and mapping suits you.

EDIT: These guys do it pretty well with development reports in video form: wolfire.com

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

I'm useless when it comes to modding and making maps, but I could do a video series following the development reports if you'd like.

When you say well commentated multiplayer matches, are you more interested in a live commentary while participating in a match, or a shoutcast of a game from an observer perspective?

 

Also just my anecdote, but I personally look up tutorials of games somewhat frequently on YouTube.  I tend to play a lot of obscure strategy games and often they don't have the best built in tutorials, so online ones do well.  Actually one of my all time most successful video series is a tutorial series on The Guild II: Renaissance that both teaches you how to play, and then teaches in depth on every class.  I'm actually the first result on all of YouTube for "The Guild II Renaissance" because of those videos.  I'm also the second result on YouTube for "Age of Empires 3".

My video that just teaches the basics of The Guild II Renaissance has nearly 50,000 views, and it's not even a well known game.  Some people just really appreciate a good video tutorial.

[feneur]

Would you be up for creating a tutorial for those who are familiar with other similar games? I.e. for people who have played Age of Empires/Empire Earth/Rise of Nations/etc, and just need a quick intro to which things are similar and which things are different? Basic tutorials are probably nice to have in a more long-term perspective, but I think a quick intro for that demographic would be nice to have (+ as has been said the gameplay will still change a bit before the game is finished so it's probably not worth having you spend too much time on in-depth tutorials which will need to be redone in the end anyway, having to redo/edit a smaller video should be less wasteful with your time).

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

I could do that.  It helps that I've played those other series so I know where people are coming from.  I'm a huge Age of Empires fan, I played quite a bit of Empire Earth 2, and Rise of Nations is criminally underrated.

[Yves]

I don't had anything specific in mind for multiplayer. It's maybe just because I think that multiplayer games are way more interesting than single-player games. They are more dynamic, more surprising and more challenging (even though wraitii, mimo and the others did a very good job with the AI ) .

My comment about tutorial videos was just my personal preference. If you have something in mind, go ahead and give it a try.

[Dade]

Welcome to the community!

If you ever need some videos as "what you should never do in a 0AD match", I am your man

I think @feneur pointed you in the right direction and those comparison videos would probably be appreciated by many RTS players. As for tutorials, I think the most useful and long-living videos would be related with economy management and building layouts. Anything else from this, as already advised in other posts, is subject to change, given the new features in each release and balancing attempts.

Anyway, I am not a dev or the sort but It's nice news to see we are drawing attention of professionals like you. Hence again, welcome!

PS: Had big problems with PC, expect me to play back soon as in A19

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

I think that's literally the first time I've ever been called a professional.  Usually I just get snide comments about not having a "real job" or cynical people who just assume I just want publicity.  I feel like I speak for a lot of smaller YouTubers like myself when I say that most of us just love video games and want to give back in some way, and that's why we try to find games that get less attention that deserve more.

[wackyserious]

This is good.. You should also suggest the game to some of your Let's Play - Youtuber friends, and maybe do a collaboration video/match with them to double the exposure.

SergiuHellDragoonHQ also does 0AD Let's Plays, and has a good amount of subscribers too.

ReformistTM does like historical warfare games, but he doesn't have 0AD contents yet (He mainly plays First-Person type games tho)

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

I actually have next to no friends in YouTube who are even remotely as well known as I am, and I'm very small fry.  I have tons of people on my show who are my friends, but most either don't do YouTube stuff or have under 500 subscribers.  I'd love to do big collaborative videos on strategy games like this with other big YouTubers, but I'm a complete nobody.

Unfortunately on YouTube, some channels get big after a year and some stay small for over 6 years.  I have some very hardcore viewers, just not a ton of them.

[wackyserious]

Try to contact SergiuHellDragoonHQ on Youtube. He does play 0AD online multiplayer match with his friends and other people.

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

I can try, but you'd be blown away at how many YouTubers just don't respond to other YouTubers who are smaller than them.  Most just either don't have the time to look into their channel to see if they'd like to hang out and play games, or just don't want to.

[sanderd17]

Perhaps you could make a video showing off some of the new seleucid art:

It would in any case already be useful for the release video to have some recordings for that.

[niektb]

How about showcasing some mods?  (the Norse from Millennium A.D. have some special gameplay possibilities that most people don't know and I wanted to do a video / article about that since long ago)

Edited May 11, 2016 by niektb

[Lion.Kanzen]

Or make a how use SVN with tortoise in Windows, isn't hard but unknown resource to play latest  version .

[nebkas]

something like this ?
 

 

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

Hey, just an update.

I may or may not have strep throat coming on.  My fiancée has it and I'm starting to feel a bit sick, so I may be getting it but I'm not 100% sure.  If so, it might be a week or so before I can record again, so the test tutorial type thing might take a couple weeks.  I'll try and get it done much sooner if I dodge this bullet.

In the mean time, this is a tutorial type thing teaching the very basics of a game about a year ago: 

 

That's the one that ended up netting me the first result on YouTube for the game.  Also about half of the first page of videos on YouTube for it are mine, strangely enough.  darn fun game by the way for anyone who hasn't played it.  Also my audio quality is a lot better now than it was in that video, I've been learning a lot about audio engineering and I just got a new proper studio headset earlier this week to help me with EQ.

[niektb]

51 minutes ago, Mah-Dry-Bread said:

Also my audio quality is a lot better now than it was in that video, I've been learning a lot about audio engineering and I just got a new proper studio headset earlier this week to help me with EQ.

If you need a bit of help there, I have a bit of experience in Sound Engineering  (and also have software for Audio Processing etc. etc.)

Edited May 12, 2016 by niektb

[Mah-Dry-Bread]

I appreciate the offer, I might take you up on it at some point.  I use Adobe Audition for all of that stuff, and I've got a couple of friends who are experienced with that type of thing, as one is a composer and voice actress and the other is an audio engineer.  It never hurts to get more opinions from experienced people though.  Thanks!