Because a big “Join our community discord server!” on the game’s title screen isn’t enough apparently. They have to put a flashy animated GIF at the top of every update notification, change the name of the game’s Steam forum to “Join Our Discord!”, and even reply to posts in the Steam forum saying “You should join our discord so we can chat about it!” as if a forum isn’t a good place to chat about the thing that’s already being discussed.

Bitch please, if I wanted to be in the hell that is Discord I’d already be there, you can stop asking.

  • douglasg14b@lemmy.worldEnglish
    152·
    22 hours ago

    Eh, it’s entirely logical.

    Let me explain:

    • The area that most indi developers underperform at is… Marketing. Many of them put their heart and soul into a game and then completely fail to gather a community or audience that is interested in such a game.
    • so what is one of the easiest ways that a developer who has effectively no social media skills can gather a community of interested individuals to talk about provide feedback and announce changes to?
    • most of the target audiences for most games are going to be on social media
    • You expect to chat with your community and so do your users that care
    • Discord is a well-established platform, with a large ecosystem and many integrations meant to target games
    • The developer chooses Discord as it is effectively the best option for their situation and available resources

    This makes perfect sense. I don’t see why you should be outraged about something of this sort.

    That said:

    If you don’t want to join the Discord, you don’t have to.

    • ByteOnBikes@discuss.onlineEnglish
      10·
      21 hours ago

      I was like OP. I fucking hate discord.

      But then, this little indie game in early access had a bug, but I couldnt find where to email them. So reluctantly, I joined shitty ass discord, sent the dev a screenshot, and within like 15 minutes, the dev was able to figure out the fix.

      I stuck around and saw more threads. Updates, future fixes, other people doing speed runs, even a place people were making fan art.

      And that’s when he realized Discord isnt so shitty, because that solo dev now has all this conversation and people motivating them.

        • ByteOnBikes@discuss.onlineEnglish
          1·
          3 hours ago

          From the perspective of the indie dev who was able to make a life, career, and grow his audience… Id think they’d be happy with that outcome.