4 Strategies to Decide Your Game's Genre

One of the most important decisions is made at the very beginning

You want to make a video game, but you aren’t sure what kind.

Do you make a platformer? A strategy game? A first-person shooter?

*Or maybe you have a vague idea, but you’re not sure if it will work.

The truth is that your game can be successful in any genre.

But because video games are a “hit-driven business” it’s like playing the lottery, so you want to increase your odds as much as you can.

These are the strategies I’ve learned that you can utilize to make your life a lot less stressful as a developer.

1 — Understand Your Target Audience

Games are meant to be played by people, so trying to make a game in a genre that you don’t understand is a lost cause.

You need to understand your target audience on such a deep level that you should know what makes a game in that genre fun.

In other words, you should be motivated to work on your game because it is something you would want to play yourself.

However, blind passion will not make a game successful.

There are countless stories of passionate developers who worked tirelessly on their projects for months, or even years, only to have nobody play their game.

Why? Because those developers didn’t:

2 — Pay Attention to Market Trends

Let’s say you are passionate about 2D platformers.

Maybe, like me, you grew up during the Super Nintendo era, and playing those kinds of games in your childhood motivated you to make 2D platformers of your own.

So you spend months or years making a 2D platformer.

On release day, you anticipate countless people playing your game.

But the truth is the opposite: no one cared. And you cry.

So what happened?

Think about it. How many other game developers played 2D platformers growing up?

Look at the online tutorials for game dev — they’re flooded with “how to make a 2D platformer” advice.

And of course, just look at the online marketplaces themselves!

If you go to Steam and filter for the tag “2D Platformer”, you’ll find over 5,000 results.

Your game is literally one among thousands. Why should anyone play it?

You can’t just make “the game you want to make" — you need to make a game that appeals to other people, too!

Look at the games people are playing today — for example, Minecraft or Fortnite.

These are not 2D platformers — they are 3D online multiplayer experiences.

If you’re not passionate about “trending” genres, then maybe you can simply borrow some inspiration from them to put into your 2D platformer.

That way, you can take the elements that appeal to current audiences and make them fall in love with the same kinds of games you happen to enjoy.

Don’t be afraid to make your game stand out!

3 — Know Your Skillset

This theoretical talk is all well and good, but can you actually make it happen?

Usually this is just a matter of time and experience.

If you’re passionate about the game, you’ll find a way to build it.

…Or so you think.

What you imagine will only take 2 weeks often ends up taking 2 months.

What you imagine will only take 3 months often ends up taking 3 years.

Don’t try to build a 3D open-world MMORPG as a beginner.

If you come up with a great idea but it’s beyond your skillset, put it aside for now.

Especially because your idea will reveal its flaws over time anyway.

So what makes for a reasonable idea?

Know your strengths and weaknesses.

If you’re good at logic and bad at drawing, make a puzzle game with simple graphics.

If you’re good at drawing and bad with numbers, make a story-based game.

Your goal is to get something out there.

4 — Leverage Your Genre’s Viral Elements

Last but certainly not least, you want your game to have elements of virality.

You can accomplish this most easily by choosing to make a game in genres with lots of replayability, such as strategy or simulation games.

If streamers and online content creators decide to pick up your highly replayable game, they can use it to produce a near-endless amount of episodes relatively quickly and easily.

Of course, at some point they will always move on to another game.

But you want to keep them coming back to yours as much as possible.

Your game will be shown repeatedly in front of their large audiences, doing most of the marketing for you.

If your game is in a less replayable genre, like a visual novel or point-and-click adventure, then you won’t have that competitive advantage.

That said, even games like visual novels CAN go viral — see Doki Doki Literature Club — but you need to use shock value or controversy rather than replayability.

You just need to know how to best leverage the properties of your game’s genre in order to make it go viral.

That’s It!

With these 4 strategies in mind, you’ll be able to decide on a game genre that you’ll enjoy working on and bring success to your game studio.

You’ll be far ahead of the 99% of game developers who just go head-first into building a game without even thinking about the advantages or disadvantages of their genre.

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Or if you’re already subscribed, let me know your game’s genre in the comments.