Every game developer knows, it’s a mistake not to make abusive use of the hype machine. If you want your game to do well, you want people talking about it.
And, if you’re really next-level about this kind of thing, you can get people talking about it before they even know what it is they’re talking about. This delicate hype-machine art from is known as “making an announcement that you’re going to be making an announcement” – or the meta-announcement, if you’re familiar with the jargon.
Square Enix North America, clearly seasoned professionals at this, have been making use of the key hype-building catalyst – social networks. Dave Hoffman, executive producer, has tweeted the following:
“Working on two new things. Well, one is ‘sort of’ new. Announcements should be coming soon! Wish I could say more but can’t.”
Clearly the man has done this before, including both the obscure “kind of new” hint, as well as the somewhat overused “I have this awesome secret but I can’t tell you “ gambit.
The folks over at GamingEverything have done a little detective work however, noting that Hoffman’s LinkedIn profile states he is involved with “five development agreements”, further nothing that Supreme Commander 2 and Dungeon Siege 3 must be two of those five – which leaves us with three mystery projects to hype over.
