Privateer Press Shows Us How It’s Done

Privateer Press has posted a video advertising the next issue of No Quarter magazine (their house publication) and its feature article: a how-to on building a functioning “mechanika” drawbridge. The drawbridge looks great and I’ll totally be picking the issue up, but its worth noting that very few game companies are actually taking advantage of online media effectively.

• Wizards of the Coast really started things with their series of videos about the 4.0 release of D&D – got a lot of people very interested, but they totally failed to follow-up on it…
• Fantasy Flight Games has been using video advertisements to get people jazzed about specific games – the spots are great, but they don’t really lead anywhere (though the Conan video is a step in the right direction)…
• WotC has started actually using their Facebook profile to post interesting comments and is actually starting to generate interest from other users

From my perspective, PP’s new YouTube ad is probably the best use of online medium for a game publisher – its short and to the point, uses the medium effectively and leads me directly to a product. I think WotC is starting to get the idea with their Facebook activities, but we’ll have to see if they actually start using it to get people excited about specific products.