Ryan Schneider, Community Manager
Corey Garnett, Community Architect
Insomniac Games

5 years ago, landscape dominated by enthusiast print, some early web sites. One dominant console manufacturer, G4 new on the scene. A monologue, hub and spoke. No social element, came from a publisher or a trusted source.

2009 = OMGWTFBBQ! Tons of sources of info, tons of discussion. Cable TV vs “big 3” networks. Devs have podcasts (Insomniac Full Moon show). Print dissipated. Chaos reigns! Now a dialogue, graph is way more complex. Now we see Major Nelson on Xbox because people want to see the face and understand the source to evaluate whether it is credible.

Knowledgeable fans = one person wrecking crew or a one man army for good. Beer analog, we want to make a pub for our beer loving experts. Community not new == comic book store, sci fi convention. This is not a new concept.

Perception vs Reality. Just sit online banning people with the EZ-Ban button, right? Just bitch at production all day right? Voice of the consumer, so there is some truth there. What reality is – community site design, suggesting product features, research / trend forecasting, fan mail / studio spokesperson, social media monitoring and updating, forums admin, marketing / in-game copy, mock reviews. A/V editing, one of the most important roles. If marketing is a car, video is the fuel. Full time job, producing more video content than the publisher is. Content, content, content – and manage that content yourself. Focus test coordination.

Why do we care? As an independent, this is a sound business strategy. People want to look for Insomniac, not Sony. Celebrate our fans! Insomniac Defense Force. These are the guys correcting factual accuracy for you at 3 AM. Perspective – can be too close to your own stuff. “It’s the economy, stupid”. Community is a mobile force, want them to have a sense of ownership in the title.

Evolution. Arcade community > early internet (BBS / Prodigy) > last gen consoles. Halo as the Gutenberg Bible of getting people excited about community. Modern era: Steam, PSN, Xbox Live. Console community boom in the last few years. 2004, few had a community manager, 2009 tons of people do.

So how did we implement this technically? Technical architect.

Up Your Arsenal / Deadlocked era: First generation forums & chat. Eventually chat system went away, too much work to moderate. Planted the seed. First stages of game integration, hacky PC app to pull leaderboards from game to website (by pretending to be a PS2 client). No integration, no individual player stats.

Resistance FOM: Much different title with different audience and community. Previously centered on studio website, build that or build something new? Decided to built MyResistance as separate thing. Destination for all things R:FOM. Game integration, stats. Leaderboards. Unlockables from direct community participation. Big hurdle was budget / headcount – skunkwork ops without much real support and unproven. Lack of platform (PS3) and back-end feature support, still evolving now but at the time couldn’t authenticate users via web. Little production support, no art so had to make due.

Creative solutions = familiar and free tech (php, My SQL, SimpleMachines forums). Used in other avenues, could make them act and look as needed. Something of a labor of love got around some resource limitations.

MyResistance 2.0 – new stats, new DB, new ways of conveying to players. Was able to move away from Sony middleware that caused problem. Internally developed stat tracking and storage (Eskimo), used in PSP title as well. Near real time updates. Greater flexibility to community design needs. Refined internal processes and external relationships. Solid visual design evolution was a success. Top tier titles needed to have top tier websites that could last as long or longer.

R2 web portal tie to comics, PSP games, forums, blogs, etc. “The ticker”, a design that can put up a “name in lights”, calling out successes regardless of the size of the feat. So pull from different data sources into this, use awareness of who you and your friends are, put them in the ticker. Implementation never fully reached the desired design, but still worked well and can be expanded in the future.

“Combat Badges” = the player’s baseball card. All their accomplishments in game and on the forums. Could call out 4 self-identified badges.

Success had led to more publisher inclusion, working with many more teams and external vendors. Too many cooks in the kitchen! Who really controls community? Always the developer’s, if you let the publishers do it, it isn’t in your own best interest. Unfamiliar and incompatible technologies, moved away from free proven tech to managed proprietary forums, had problems with people not delivering on time and couldn’t just step in and get it done. That “get it done” attitude didn’t extend to the 3rd parties. Forum issues were a big problem for community and they were very familiar with the old forums with all their features and functionality. Still cleaning up those problems. Scope got out of hand, more resources is fine but they have to be able to deliver on time. Were naïve in believing in multiple phases of launch – you have one shot, got to get it working or fans won’t stick around.

PS3 Ratchet dropped the multiplayer component, and fell out of the community. Refreshed the Ratchet destination site and went through all the same problems but with a different set of people, a lot of the same mistakes made. Committed to move forward and gain control of those communities. Return to tech that helped build community in the first place.

What have we gained? Better games! Fans not afraid to tell us when we messed up. Co-op missing in R1, 8-player co-op model in R2. Passionate, devoted following turns customers into fans. Don’t need to ask them to do things, they just become supportive on their own. Good studio PR – community day flew in all the volunteer moderators and public and have a day hanging with the devs. As an independent developer any opportunity like this should be pursued. All positive coverage.

To build your own community… 10 Commandments of Community. Had some fears about sharing information or losing trade secrets, damaging the brand. WWTD – What Would Ted Do, if you aren’t sure what to post, don’t do it.
- Thou art thy experts. We are the ones with the vision. Others have opinions, can’t let that get out of control.
- Thou shall know thyself. Scope control. Start small.
- Thou shall integrate with production. Community is not an add-on. Can’t wait until launch.
- Thou shall build a divine database. Track who you are talking to and what they say.
- Thou shall not screw thine fans. Make sure you always move them to a better destination. Disc is just the beginning.
- Thou shall love thy neighbor. Community functions, be positive, don’t slam the competition.
- Thou shall create. Someone needs to create content for you, don’t wait on the publisher.
- Thou shall keep thy promises. Develop a routine pattern, patch slips matter to the fans.
- Thou shall find internal champions. Need the people who can actually do the work and have the passion, harness that energy.
- Thou shall hire good partners. Don’t just take off the shelf middleware. Due diligence.

Start today – social media. Social media can’t be the end in and of itself. Lowest % of people who use that info for purchase decisions. Amplifies existing messages. Great place to get started but not a complete picture.

For tomorrow – podcasts, newsletters, widgets, iPhone apps. Own a cause – open source code sharing (Nocturnal Initiative). Community days. Design contests. That may seem little to us but huge to the fans.

5 Predictions:
- Necessity marketing. Measurement of a game’s vitality. Retweets, preorder metrics.
- Games as a service. Game ship is just the beginning. 24/7/365. DLC, UGC.
- Complete game / community transparency. Part of dev from the very beginning.
- Multimedia connectivity. Don’t end when console shuts down. iPhone, console browser.
- Community as monetization vehicle. Fans look for more, giving them more. Tiered approach – WSJ subscription as a model? Higher level community access as a way of making money.

By the numbers, do we really need community? 78% of consumers trust peer recommendation. 14% trust advertisements. 41% word of mouth, top of the list. Don’t wait for publishers or agencies, they aren’t as passionate or know as much as we do. Are you an empty bar or a packed one? Are they drinking your beer or not, can they find your brand label?