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Print Edition StoriesWednesday, December 3, 2008
MIT-hosted panel tells game makers how to sell
By Mass High Tech Staff
In their own words: Chris Dyl, CTO, Turbine Inc.
At a panel discussion of video game marketing held at MIT last night, Joe McDonagh, director of creative development at game developer 2K Boston, summed up the general sentiment of the panel when he said that if you are not thinking about how to market your game from the very beginning, you will fail.
That general theme was reinforced throughout the evening by McDonagh’s fellow panelists: Sarah McIlroy, founder and CEO of Fashion Playtes Inc. of Marblehead; Alex Rodberg, director of brand marketing at Turbine Inc. of Westwood; and Stacey Clement, vice president at 360 Public Relations LLC.
Another point driven home was the need for smaller game startups to embrace the need to do their own marketing and PR -- not only because of the fact they likely don’t have the capital to invest in outsourcing that job, McIlroy said, but also because they are the most enthusiastic about their game and are the ones best able to convey that enthusiasm to others.
The panel, moderated by Mass High Tech acting managing editor Rodney Brown and put on by the MIT Enterprise Forum of Cambridge’s Interactive Entertainment Special Interest Group, was sponsored by IBM Corp.
2K Boston created the hit game Bioshock when it was known as Irrational Games, prior to being acquired by 2K Games in early 2006.
Turbine is a venture-backed game developer and publisher that specializes in massively multi-player online role-playing games such as Asheron’s Call, Dungeons & Dragons Online and Lord of the Rings Online. With a $40 million Series C round announced in April, Turbine now has raised a total of $88 million in venture financing, beginning in February 2005.
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