How-to for Improvement

[Chasing]

*put in rants section as it's more my opinions on how the game could be drastically improved in a realistic light than an open suggestion geared toward the Virtrium staff*

Heh @ above

Search engine optimisation would help in this respect; I can't help but wonder if, for example, this forum has a robots.txt that tells search engines not to index and store pages. If it does, that's a mistake. So is not having appropriate heading text on every page, and a home page that doesn't, explicitly, in machine-readable words, say what the site is about. The video is good, but a search engine can't SEE it.

So lets give some easy, constructive and free SEO suggestions


1. Install Robots.txt on the webserver roots

Why?

The robots.txt tells the search engine spiders (aka googlebot) what parts of the website it can crawl. If you don't specify crawl all, then the spiders will make up their own minds and most likely skip content.

You can generate a robots.txt in under a minute using the Google webmaster tools (then you just copy and paste).


2. Install XML sitemaps on the webserver roots

Why?

This makes it easier for the spiders to find all the relevant content on the webserver. Sitemaps will help speed up indexing into the search engines and may pickup content that a spider might not normally crawl.


3. Add metatags to the Istaria.com home page

Why?

Metatags are a bonus way of adding extra content to the search engines.

Specifically there are 2 metas to focus on

1. <meta name="keywords" content="" />
2. <meta name="description" content="" />

There are 0 metatags in use on the www.istaria.com homepage


4. Organic Keywords on Istaria.com homepage

An 'organic keyword' is a non ad word or phrase that is embedded into the page source that the search engines will pickup on. Basically aligning a webpage for free to its subject audience.

Why?

Here are the current organic keywords on the istaria.com homepage

• virtrium Count is 6 @ 4.72%
• istaria Count is 5 @ 3.94%
• trademarks Count is 5 @ 3.94%
• content Count is 3 @ 2.36%
• chronicles Count is 3 @ 2.36%
• llc Count is 3 @ 2.36%
• update Count is 3 @ 2.36%
• gifted Count is 3 @ 2.36%
• dralnok's Count is 2 @ 1.57%
• doom Count is 2 @ 1.57%
• site Count is 2 @ 1.57%
• view Count is 2 @ 1.57%
• press Count is 2 @ 1.57%
• game Count is 2 @ 1.57%

These are the organic keywords I would go for

• Istaria
• Horizons
• MMORPG
• MMO
• Dragon
• Dragons
• Game
• Games
• Online
• PvE
• Player vs Environment
• Massively Multiplayer Online
• Role Playing
• Free
• F2P
• Free to Play
• Fantasy
• Housing
• Non Instanced

and so on.......

There is a nice tool that will generate possible keywords
http://www.virante.com/seo-tools/lda...-optimizer.php

Note. it won't be 100% accurate


5. Cleanup the Istaria.com homepage

Before I say why I need to put this into context

Its been mentioned before that money is spent on advertising Istaria on Google Adwords.

Feedback by players in the last thread was that they have never seen said adverts.

Refs
http://community.istaria.com/forum/s...ad.php?t=21656
and
http://community.istaria.com/forum/s...ad.php?t=23785

Do they exist? Yes they do




Why?

1. Okay so a potential new player has clicked on one of these ads. Great.
2. Then they are redirected onto the Istaria.com homepage.
3. Then we hit a big problem

There is nothing on the Istaria.com homepage to further sell the game to a potential player (excluding the video) after they click on the Google Ad.

• No bullet points of what the game offers.

• Nothing that explains the unique features and selling points.

• 'Get the Free Trial Now' is on an image. Two problems with that.

1. The word 'Trial' is an immediate no-sale. People don't want to play trials. They want 'Free to Play'. Istaria does have a Free to Play account.
2. The alt tag on the image is incorrectly setup and the filename of the jpg is wrong as 'trial.jpg'. Both are very important for SEO.

• The News and Press release sections are over a year out of date and not easy to read (get rid of the Horizons renaming bit that is a major putoff)

• The Dralnoks Doom picture suffers from the same type of problems as the Trial picture. No Hook or correct alt tags and filename.

My point here is why spend all this money on Adwords when the content behind the Adwords is not effective.

Just wasting money really.

The whole process from "Search Engine -> Advert -> You_really_want_to_play_istaria_page -> Signup" needs to be slick.

You have a couple of seconds to hook or bait a potential new player (most won't sit there for full length of the movie).

Here is a snippet of how I try to advertise the game on CD.

What Istaria offers

- Player vs Environment (PVE) world play
- Cooperative game play, not competitive game play
- Mature and experienced community
- Extensive Adventuring System and Multiclassing
- Extensive Crafting System and Multiclassing
- Unique Dragon race
- Continuous game world
- Real time building construction
- A Free-to-Play Account type

What Istaria does not offer

- Player vs Player (PVP)
- Raids
- Instancing
- State of the Art Graphics
- Fast game play (and burnout)

Summary

These are 5 relatively easy changes that could be made (at no cost except time) that will create natural ranking growth (and with point 5. more new subscribers).

SEO is a massive subject and there are many many many things that could be done to a website to improve its rankings and unique visitors.

The SEO process itself can take 6+ months to start to work (if you do naughty SEO things the search engines will spot it and you get blacklisted).

From my point of view hiring a SEO 'expert' to fix a site is not really worth it. All the information you need to do SEO is buried in the Internet. You just need common sense, attention to detail, and mainly time to be able to make changes.

PS

Before anyone points out to me about SEO flaws on the CD site I am aware of most of them but i dont have time to fix (One of them needs a massive code change).

And for information for Dec 2010 only (up to 29th), there were 10292 Unique Visitors and a total of 904507 Hits on the CD webservers.

Somehow I don't think 10k of ppl play Istaria so I am assuming that Unique Visitor conversions are very low (when I use it as a comparison against the Istaria webservers).

Now back to your regular scheduled programming....

[Dakoren Ironhand]

PS

Before anyone points out to me about SEO flaws on the CD site I am aware of most of them but i dont have time to fix (One of them needs a massive code change).

And for information for Dec 2010 only (up to 29th), there were 10292 Unique Visitors and a total of 904507 Hits on the CD webservers.

Somehow I don't think 10k of ppl play Istaria so I am assuming that Unique Visitor conversions are very low (when I use it as a comparison against the Istaria webservers).

Now back to your regular scheduled programming....

*just got done with the programming part*

So now we've made a few code changes to the CD site. This mainly is generating more SEO friendly URL's. Besides that we've now a fully dynamic sitemap that displays all public pages on one page.

http://www.crimson-dawn.org/?pn=Sitemap

As you see from the link above we've "replaced" our numeric system by a name based system which SEO seems to love.

[Chasing]

*just got done with the programming part*

So now we've made a few code changes to the CD site. This mainly is generating more SEO friendly URL's. Besides that we've now a fully dynamic sitemap that displays all public pages on one page.

http://www.crimson-dawn.org/?pn=Sitemap

As you see from the link above we've "replaced" our numeric system by a name based system which SEO seems to love.

True

But....

What I was trying to illustrate was easy and simple changes that could be achieved to boost unique visitors and conversions. IE not have to hire someone.

The URL change is

• Not easy to do
• Will be restricted by the CMS being used
• If not done properly will break every link on a site
• Requires specific code changes in either PHP or ASP
• Requires specific schema changes in the backend SQL server
• Is most likely incompatible with the forum system on community.istaria.com
• Impacts sitemaps and robots.txt
• and so on......

[Kesqui]

One more major SEO thing that should be done on all the "static content" pages - headings and actual keyword-rich text.

Pages should be structured with:

<h1>What this page is about headline</h1>
<h2>Subtopic headline</h2>
Content
<h3>sub-subtopic</h3>
content
<h2>Second Subtopic</h2>

And so on. For example, the home page of www.istaria.com could be something like:

<h1>Chronicles of Istaria - MMORPG</h1>
<video section - show video code here, with TEXT below it>
<h2>Play as a winged, fire-breathing dragon or as one of Istaria's humanoid races</h2>
<p>Blurb about the game - use the bullet points Chasing has suggested to highlight the good points about the game, Istaria/Horizons' unique selling points</p>
<Free Trial box - show the Free Trial image here, but rephrase as Chasing has suggested. You want to point out that there IS a free-to-play option!>
<h2>Free to Play Human Characters Forever - Download here</h2>
<p>Blurb about the free-to-play - include limitations.</p>
<h3>14-Day Free Trial of Dragon Characters</h3>
<p>Blurb about the free trial and the advantages of paid subscriptions</p>

And so on.

[Raeshlavik]

While I agree, getting more eyeballs to look at Istaria is a good thing, I'm curious what the conversion rate is... How many people who download the client are still here after 1, 3, and 6 months?

If the conversion rate is low, paying for more eyeballs isn't going to net much.

I also agree that Istaria only appeals to a certain type of gamer and therefore advertising should be targeted at that subset of gamers for the maximum return on investment.

But, why can't Istaria kind of meet people halfway? You know, make it easier for people to get invested in the game and stick around.

I started a topic yesterday asking the simple question "what keeps the long term players playing?" as I sort of fall into that category though my total 'in-game' play time is probably just over two years. I was merely curious as to what the folks who've been playing since 2004 do in-game; what keeps them going?

Now that I've had a chance to read the entirety of the thread, it appears that in this small sample of the player base so far, the long time members are here because of other long time members and, in general, are very heavily invested in something (lair, plot, guild, projects, etc.) in the game world.

Oh, and playable Dragons of course.

So, it would seem to me, based entirely on this small sample, that player retention would center around:

A) Getting new players involved with a group shortly after character creation, mostly to stave off the 'ghost town' feeling so often attributed in casual reviews of the game (see mmorpg.com for example).

This could be problematic if the group issues I experienced during my leveling are still in existence: I was only a couple levels lower than the other Dragon I teamed up with for a few days, which led to my death I don't know how many times as other critters would join in randomly (from like a half mile away) and everything insisted on driving me like a tent peg even if the other dragon was doing all of the damage... Eventually I gave up and just solo'd the rest of the way - it was easier and safer, but way, way more boring.

A solution might be to fix the above issue (if it isn't already), create a new default chat window in the UI to an official NPA channel (a third chat box shouldn't be that bad considering the average screen territory folks have now (we've come a long ways from the 1024x768 that was prevalent when Istaria launched)), and perhaps add the ability to see similar level (tier) folks on the big map as it'll clue folks in as to where the action is for their level.

B) Getting new players involved in land ownership quicker...

This has problems too as land ownership is the carrot VI uses to make operating capital, so they can't really just go and give land to everyone who signs up.

But would it be possible to have a community plot/lair somewhere that is sandboxed? Meaning, new players can play with the tools and skills and build things that get automatically deconned into novians after a set period of time.

It might even be possible for a new player to temporarily 'rent' a vacant plot/lair for a bit of time, then have it revert to the community and return novians to the player when the timer expires...

Something like that.

This gives the player an opportunity to check out the building features (which are extremely cool) without having to pony up the cash. They even get something out of the effort (novians and skill points) that might convert to a landowner account because they have it, but cant use it, unless they pay for it.

This is sort of how Second Life does it, and they're in kind of the same virtual land business.

Just some ideas...

[Raeshlavik]

create a new default chat window in the UI to an official NPA channel

I just got around to rolling up a new biped, and am very pleased to see the chat tutorial is the very first thing to be shown to a new player.

Awesome!

I'd still recommend "New Player Assistance" being added to the tutorial text as a example, just to get people in there by default, but that's just me.

[Dragonboy]

Only people from all the servers will need to start using the game created channel... On chaos we mostly use a player created version.

[Draelen]

I wholeheartedly agree with getting more eyes onto Istaria, Armametus makes one of many good points:

[...] This is clearly one of those games that's like a literal dimond in the rough. There are so many other, far more well marketed MMOs out there that a game like this is easily crowded out and hidden. If we start to make a statement for ourselves, devs and players alike, we might draw a little more attention to ourselves and get more people to check it out.

So, yeah, uploading videos to media websites would be one means of getting noticed.

In the past I've always been on the lookout for any games with dragons as a playable, characterised race with thought and depth applied to their playability and history, encountering things like I of the Dragon and Drakan. I've always had a bit of a soft spot for absolutley anything related to this, regardless of depth.

I was made aware of the Istaria.com site near the end of 2009, due to some nice artwork I saw for it (I'm looking at you Nambroth ;p), however, I did not see much on the front page showing off the dragon aspect to Istaria, and I filed the game at the back of my mind as interesting and forgot about it, until I actually started a few weeks ago (and very glad I did).

Chasing's overview of some comparatively easy changes that can be made to the site for SEO purposes, and observations is an extremely helpful perspective (the content of that post is of both the quality and value of recommendations that would normally have to be paid for to get ;p), even implementing a few of those basic points would help capture others out there with similar likes and desires for a game such as Istaria.

The Istarian Life Dragons forum has over 16k posts, outshining the Bi-Peds section, there is little doubt for what one of the top reasons that fellow Istarians come here for, myself very much included ;p

Edit: Which reminds me, the devs are continuing to do great work with Istaria, pushing out impressive updates and listening out for bug-squishing opportunities. Solitaire is always on the lookout for the aesthetic and immersion aspects and desires of our fellow clawed friends, usually not being afraid to venture into 3AM territory at night to explore some interesting projects

[Raeshlavik]

Edit: Which reminds me, the devs are continuing to do great work with Istaria, pushing out impressive updates and listening out for bug-squishing opportunities. Solitaire is always on the lookout for the aesthetic and immersion aspects and desires of our fellow clawed friends, usually not being afraid to venture into 3AM territory at night to explore some interesting projects

Yes. On the whole the team here is incredibly dedicated to their labor of love. Even a lot of the players are borderline rabid about the game.

As for getting the word out all I can suggest is that people who like the game just need to mention it in other places - your favorite forum, other gaming sites, a passing comment in your 'other' MMO, your friends...

For example; when I'm playing I post occasionally in the Istaria forums over on MMORPG.com - short stories, patch notes, things like that... Because every post in that forum shows up on the front page of the site for a few minutes and gets 20-30 views - each view could be a potential trial player.

To keep from looking like some kind of shill, I limit my posting to the occasional bit about the game from a character's point of view or something - but if more folks posted or replied to questions there... I've seen how many new players it can generate and it's fairly impressive.

I think it might even be better now that tier-2 has been revamped as that's about the time folks would tire of the rinse-repeat "trainer" quests.

Part of this strategy is to have elder players hang out in NT (which several still do) if only to play signpost for new players and answer questions. Adult/Ancient dragons work best for this as they are obviously not new players (though there are a few adults who hang out in NT on chaos that seem pretty green yet).

Just the other day I fielded several quest step questions on Kaeliss and every time the 'ctrl-q' quest log thing was missed by the player - but once you tell them, they run off to go find the sandstone just like they're supposed to.

In fact, it might be nice to have a wearable title, like <afk>, that says something like <player guide> or similar, just to denote someone who is 'on duty' and available to help new players.

[Shinkuu]

I don't know where you all got the idea that this is a hobby for us. This is a job and some of us are paid for the work we do. Yes, there are volunteers, but not everyone is a volunteer. Some of us, however, do have other day jobs we also do that aren't related to Istaria (not everyone on the staff does, but some do).

To address Armameteus' concerns, obviously we don't want the game to stagnate and die. We wouldn't be adding new features and content on a regular basis if we did.

It seems that you guys can be a bit under staffed and probably under funded compared to what I think some people expect because they are far too used to the likes of Blizzard who is enormous and can throw money around like it is going out of style.

However, I think if they take a few moments to clear their head of unrealistic expectations and then take a look at what you are doing then they will see that your point is quite valid. You are making steady improvements, changes, fixes, and adding additional content. You can only do as much as time and money will permit but it seems to me that you are DOING just that.

Big change takes time and comes slow but I see pretty much non-stop incremental changes and improvements in the game. There is almost ALWAYS some new delta being worked on and a slew of bugs being nailed down in this game. That is NOT the sign of a dying game or one who's staff does not care or does not want to make it ever better.

So quite honestly: Good Job and I look forward to your work as we move on into the future.

[LOVWYRM]

Well spoken, Shinkuu!!

[velveeta]

hails and all praises for the mighty gods of istaria! may they rule over us for the millions and millions of years!

for amon and all the devs and all the volunteers and all the peeps who toil in any form to bring me the home i love more than real life, i wish to thank you all for everything you do. i may not agree with all the changes, but each one is a step forward, and compared to some gods we have had, that is a 1000% improvement!

i truly appreciate all your hard work and eternally thank you for your efforts on my behalf. would that i could show my gratitude in more substantial ways!

[joemarra052075]

hails and all praises for the mighty gods of istaria! may they rule over us for the millions and millions of years!

for amon and all the devs and all the volunteers and all the peeps who toil in any form to bring me the home i love more than real life, i wish to thank you all for everything you do. i may not agree with all the changes, but each one is a step forward, and compared to some gods we have had, that is a 1000% improvement!

i truly appreciate all your hard work and eternally thank you for your efforts on my behalf. would that i could show my gratitude in more substantial ways!

Here Here!