On Developers Submitting Games to TouchArcade

Discussion in 'Site Feedback and News' started by arn, Sep 17, 2008.

  1. arn

    arn Administrator
    Staff Member Patreon Silver Patreon Gold

    Apr 19, 2008
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    Hi All,

    The standard procedure for developers to submit their games to TouchArcade is simply emailing [email protected]

    We probably won't get back to you right away if at all, and I apologize for that. It's just that we're busy and we try to look at all games, but sometimes the queue is put on hold when things are busy (like major other announcements) since we can only review so many apps in a given time.

    - Screenshots and videos are always helpful.
    - We don't accept gift certificates for the games at this time.
    - We don't accept ad-hoc distribution for games that are in the app store, but may for pre-release titles for review purposes.

    Thanks,
    arn
     
  2. Little White Bear Studios

    Little White Bear Studios Well-Known Member
    Patreon Silver

    Aug 27, 2008
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    Hey Arn,

    The [email protected] address has had issues the two times I've tried to use it. Once several weeks ago, and once last week. Both times I used it, a few hours later, I'd get this sent back:

    Warning: could not send message for past 4 hours
    Connection refused by blakespot.com

    I tried emailing with my business address, and from my personal address, each of which use entirely different mail servers. No idea if you ever got any of the messages. If you'd like the full text of the failure message, let me know. Thanks.
     
  3. arn

    arn Administrator
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    Apr 19, 2008
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    yeah, the bouncing should be corrected. It was a problem with one of the email addresses that were in he distribution list. I should have gotten them all despite the bounces.

    arn
     
  4. Little White Bear Studios

    Little White Bear Studios Well-Known Member
    Patreon Silver

    Aug 27, 2008
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    Good to know. Thanks, arn.
     
  5. moopf

    moopf Well-Known Member

    Sep 16, 2008
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    arn, I just want to say a big thank you for providing touchArcade.com, reviewing games and generally doing a whole heap to help devs spread the word about their games.

    I think we all really appreciate all the hard work you're putting in.
     
  6. anadin

    anadin Well-Known Member

    Sep 15, 2008
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    Games Producer
    Melbourne, Australia
    I completely agree - I have watched toucharcade since before the store was here and it has been invaluable and a fantastic example of this type of site, great focus, impartial, good community, we find it very useful and I for one am looking forward to participating more in the future. Can I suggest you make this thread or at least the first post a sticky?
     
  7. dudehuge

    dudehuge Well-Known Member

    Sep 7, 2008
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    I agree with what they're saying. :p
     
  8. mjjw

    mjjw Member

    Sep 20, 2008
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    UK
    Do you have any criteria for which apps you feature / review or is it just based on which Apps you guys enjoy playing the most?
     
  9. arn

    arn Administrator
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    Apr 19, 2008
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    There's no hard and fast rule.

    Here's how it goes.

    - Big name apps, like Spore or Star Wars will obviously get reviewed due to the interest surrounding it. These will probably push off other reviews or games.
    - We likely consider reviewing the more expensive games, even less well known because good or bad, the review can be helpful due to the cost.
    - We tend to also get a lot of the smaller/cheaper unknown games, but unless we actually like them, are unlikely to write up a review for it. It's usually not worth pointing out a cheap/unknown app just to say we didn't like it.
    - We also try to mix up genres. A puzzle game is going to be harder to get our attention because of the sheer number of them. Apps that are relatively new or alone in their genres tend to draw attention.
    - Apps that have looked interesting in preview and we've covered we'll generally review.
    - Developer submissions help narrow down apps a lot, and of course screenshots/videos help catch our eye too.
    - Of course, we tend to notice those that participate in the forums. :)
    - I really feel like we're a bit behind, in that it's been a busy week or two, so I'm very behind in the emailed submissions.


    And Blake has a retro fetish in case you haven't noticed, so those will get covered. :)

    arn
     
  10. Zincous

    Zincous Well-Known Member

    Dec 23, 2008
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    Sacramento, CA
    Not listed, but I'm assuming standard procedure in that email would be to send the promo code for the game too?
     
  11. arn

    arn Administrator
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    Apr 19, 2008
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    Sure, promo code helps. I put an effort to try every game we get a promo code for, but in practice, I get behind.

    arn
     
  12. schooze

    schooze Well-Known Member

    Oct 11, 2008
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    Not to go off topic but is your game anything like Trism, when does it come out?
     
  13. brewstermax

    brewstermax Well-Known Member

    Don't mess with the retro fetish. I love retro games. Best kind. Which is why emulators pwn 99% of the games on the App Store.

    ;)
     
  14. le'deuche123

    le'deuche123 Well-Known Member

    Feb 5, 2009
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    I've noticed this about blake myself:) but I also know that if Blake chimes in on a game, it's usually pretty good. I would have never found vector blaster were it not for him:D
     
  15. InsolentDreams

    InsolentDreams Well-Known Member

    New problem with email [email protected]...?

    I just got a bounce/error when sending in our tip... it is summarized as follows... please take a look at what's wrong, maybe this was only temporary or maybe you haven't received mail for awhile? :)

    Let me know when its fixed, so I can send in our tip! ;)

    ----------------

    This message was created automatically by mail delivery software.

    A message that you sent could not be delivered to one or more of its
    recipients. This is a permanent error. The following address(es) failed:

    pipe to |/usr/bin/php /home/toucharc/emailtoforum.php
    generated by [email protected]
    (ultimately generated from [email protected])

    The following text was generated during the delivery attempt:

    ------ pipe to |/usr/bin/php /home/toucharc/emailtoforum.php
    generated by [email protected]
    (ultimately generated from [email protected]) ------

    PHP Warning: PHP Startup: Unable to load dynamic library '/usr/local/lib/php/extensions/no-debug-non-zts-20060613/apc.so' - /usr/local/lib/php/extensions/no-debug-non-zts-20060613/apc.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory in Unknown on line 0
    X-Powered-By: PHP/5.2.9
    Content-type: text/html

    (then my message was omitted from here...)
     
  16. arn

    arn Administrator
    Staff Member Patreon Silver Patreon Gold

    Apr 19, 2008
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    The error should be fixed, and it shouldn't have affected delivery for emails (which are sent to a few email addresses). But I didn't see one from "InsolentDreams" so feel free to re-email.

    sorry
    arn
     
  17. InsolentDreams

    InsolentDreams Well-Known Member

    Nope, still having problems...

    Just tried to re-send this "tip" in, our game comes out tomorrow... got this bounce...

    ----------

    This message was created automatically by mail delivery software.

    A message that you sent could not be delivered to one or more of its
    recipients. This is a permanent error. The following address(es) failed:

    pipe to |/usr/bin/php /home/toucharc/emailtoforum.php
    generated by [email protected]
    (ultimately generated from [email protected])

    The following text was generated during the delivery attempt:

    ------ pipe to |/usr/bin/php /home/toucharc/emailtoforum.php
    generated by [email protected]
    (ultimately generated from [email protected]) ------

    PHP Warning: PHP Startup: Unable to load dynamic library '/usr/local/lib/php/extensions/no-debug-non-zts-20060613/apc.so' - /usr/local/lib/php/extensions/no-debug-non-zts-20060613/apc.so: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory in Unknown on line 0
    X-Powered-By: PHP/5.2.9
    Content-type: text/html

    INSERT INTO vb_thread
    (title, lastpost, forumid, open, replycount, postusername, postuserid, lastposter, dateline, iconid, visible,
    attach, similar)
    VALUES
    ('Tips: Regarding our new iPhone app, iTrade...', 1241091835, 14, 1, 0, 'TouchArcade.com', 10868,
    'TouchArcade.com', 1241091835, 0, 1, 0, ''): 1<P>
    INSERT INTO vb_post
    (threadid, parentid, title, username, userid, dateline, pagetext, allowsmilie, showsignature, ipaddress, iconid,
    visible, attach)
    VALUES
    (10785, 0, 'Tips: Regarding our new iPhone app, iTrade...', 'TouchArcade.com', 10868, 1241091835, '--Apple-Mail-271-791616297
    Content-Type: text/plain;
    charset=US-ASCII;
    format=flowed;
    delsp=yes
    Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

    And yes, this is about our new iPhone app iTrade (link in sig) and the pr brief is at http://nerdtrade.com/pr/

    I am linking here because well, email clearly isn't working.

    Cheers
     
  18. InsolentDreams

    InsolentDreams Well-Known Member

    If you want help testing it...

    If you want help testing and debugging this, I'd be glad to re-mail you anytime... email me at andrew [at] neonsurge [dot] com.

    Cheers!
     
  19. arn

    arn Administrator
    Staff Member Patreon Silver Patreon Gold

    Apr 19, 2008
    2,445
    69
    38
    hah.... I was debugging it this afternoon. Last time, I'm pretty sure it's fixed. Please try again and let me know if not.

    arn
     
  20. InsolentDreams

    InsolentDreams Well-Known Member

    Great, seems I didn't get a bounce this time. I'll send in my tip now!

    Thanks!
     

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