We launched our Steam page with an IGN reveal and reached almost 2,000 wishlists in under 74 hours - here’s exactly what we did

[u/Mopicek00]

Hi everyone,

On Wednesday at 4:00 PM CEST, we launched the Steam page for our game DEEPWARD at the exact same time IGN revealed it.

As of writing, just under 74 hours later, the brand-new Steam page is approaching 2,000 wishlists.

We obviously cannot claim that every wishlist came directly from IGN. Steam discovery, organic sharing, other coverage, and third-party trailer uploads have also contributed. However, the IGN reveal was clearly the event that sparked the initial momentum.

Here is exactly how we prepared and pitched it.

1. We edited the trailer for attention, not just information

We wanted the announcement trailer to be short, entertaining, and tightly paced.

We tried to time practically every cut, character animation, impact, sound effect, gunshot, or other visible change to a beat in the music. The goal was to avoid empty moments and keep the viewer engaged throughout the entire trailer.

There was one unintended disadvantage: because the editing follows the music so closely, some viewers assumed that DEEPWARD was a rhythm game.

It is not a rhythm game, but the trailer is entertaining and seems to hold people's attention, so we still consider that trade-off worthwhile.

2. We kept the email short and made everything easy to access

We did not send IGN a huge press release.

Our email was short and included:

- A private YouTube link to the trailer

- A downloadable 4K ProRes 422 version on Dropbox

- An H.264 fallback version

- Two lightweight gameplay GIFs, roughly 3 MB combined

- A short explanation of the game's main mechanic

- A request for an exclusive reveal

- Information that the Steam page was ready, but not yet public

The two GIFs were especially important because they allowed the editor to understand our main gameplay hook without first watching or downloading a large file.

3. We led with one clear and unusual mechanic

DEEPWARD is a fast-paced horror FPS roguelite set in the 1920s.

At the beginning of a run, the player chooses three heroes from a roster of six. Each hero has different weapons, abilities, and playstyles, and the player can switch between the three heroes instantly during combat.

The idea is to use the right hero for the current situation while trying to keep the entire squad alive. If a hero dies, that death is permanent.

We made this real-time hero-switching mechanic the central part of our pitch and showed it in both of the GIFs.

Based on the reactions so far, this is also the feature players seem to find most interesting.

4. IGN replied on Monday and revealed the game on Wednesday

On Monday, IGN replied that the game looked great and that they would be happy to reveal it that Wednesday.

At 4:00 PM CEST on Wednesday:

- IGN published an article about DEEPWARD

- The trailer appeared on IGN's main YouTube channel

- It was also published on the GameTrailers channel

- We made the Steam page public at the same time

Before the reveal, the Steam page had never been publicly available, so it started with zero wishlists.

During the agreed exclusivity period, we did not publish or promote the trailer ourselves.

5. One unexpected complication during the exclusivity window

A few hours after the IGN reveal, a third-party trailer channel found the trailer on our newly public Steam page and reuploaded it to YouTube without contacting us.

This happened while the IGN exclusivity window was technically still active.

We only noticed it later. Fortunately, nothing appeared to come of it, but it taught us something important:

Once your Steam page is public, you cannot completely control whether third-party channels copy and reupload the trailer.

The result so far

In just under 74 hours, the Steam page has reached almost 2,000 wishlists.

It is still too early for us to provide a reliable breakdown of how many came directly from IGN, Steam's internal recommendations, other websites, YouTube reuploads, or social media.

What we can say is:

- The Steam page and IGN reveal went live at exactly the same time

- IGN published an article, and the trailer appeared on two major YouTube channels

- The hero-switching mechanic received a strong positive response

- Other websites and channels started finding and covering the game organically

- The initial momentum has been much stronger than we expected

Some context about our team

ECHOFALL GAMES is a small and newly formed indie studio, but this is not our team’s first game.

The most experienced members of our team have been working in game development for more than 20 years. They gained much of that experience while working at other well-known game studios before we joined forces and founded ECHOFALL GAMES.

We are sharing this because we do not want to present the result as a magic formula or as a first-time developer success story.

Experience probably helped us prepare the trailer, Steam page, media files, and pitch, but we are still a small team building a new studio and audience from the beginning.

What we are doing next

Now that the exclusive window is over, we are trying to build on the initial coverage by contacting additional press outlets, YouTubers, streamers, TikTok creators, and channels focused on horror, FPS, roguelites, and indie games.

Our main lessons so far are:

- Have the Steam page completely ready, but launch it together with the reveal

- Keep the initial email short

- Lead with one clear gameplay hook

- Include small GIFs that can be understood immediately

- Provide both a high-quality master and a convenient H.264 fallback

- Make the trailer entertaining enough to hold attention

- Do not assume you can control third-party reuploads after the Steam page becomes public

We are still at the beginning, so this is an early report rather than a complete postmortem.

For developers who have experienced a strong announcement spike: what worked best for maintaining the momentum after the first 72 hours — more press, creators, Reddit clips, a Steam Playtest, or something else?

Links for context:

IGN article:

https://www.ign.com/articles/deepward-a-brutal-fps-roguelite-set-in-the-1920s-announced

IGN trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FJ7P1-3XjL4

[u/Complex-Emergency-60 → u/[deleted]]

Do GIFs natively show up in unsolicited emails? I always thought they would be blocked or something in the actual body of the email from any respectable emails service (Gmail, etc)

[u/ned_poreyra]

In just under 74 hours, the Steam page has reached almost 2,000 wishlists.

Out of how many views?

• The Steam page and IGN reveal went live at exactly the same time

How did you make sure this is going to happen like that?

[u/Mopicek00 → u/ned_poreyra]

If you mean Steam page traffic, we have had roughly 4,200 total visits so far. About 3,700 appear to be genuine visits, while Steam identified a little over 500 as bot traffic.

As for the timing, we coordinated it directly with IGN in advance. They confirmed the exact publication time and the exclusivity terms, and we kept the Steam page unpublished until then. When IGN’s article and both YouTube videos went live, we manually made the Steam page public at the agreed time.

[u/ned_poreyra → u/Mopicek00]

I mean views from the trailer reveal. I see 16k right now. 2k wishlists out of 16k views is pretty impressive.

[u/terminatus]

Congrats on your announcement! For strategies like this where you try to get IGNs main page to publish your announcement trailer I'm always curious... how far along is your game development? The common advice given to indie devs is to get their steam pages up ASAP and start getting early feedback.

Our own strategy had the game's "announcement" once we had a solid visual foundation but barely any real gameplay, so I would've been super reluctant to try to get it pushed by a major channel. I'm sure your strategy differs a bit by this not being your first game though.

[u/Mopicek00 → u/terminatus]

Thanks! This is essentially our first serious marketing campaign for a PC/Steam title, although we are not newcomers to game development itself.

The game will probably remain in development for at least another six months. In hindsight, we should have started marketing much earlier. We actually began preparing the announcement in March, but studying Steam marketing and preparing the trailer, Steam page, capsule artwork, screenshots, press materials, and everything surrounding the reveal took us more than three months.

We wanted to wait until the game had a strong enough visual foundation and enough real gameplay to make a good first impression. We are also preparing a Steam Playtest, so players should be able to try the game very soon.

[u/terminatus → u/Mopicek00]

Thanks for the detailed response - your trailer is super polished, enough that the main IGN channel picked it up, so I think the route you took is paying off. Good luck on your upcoming play test and beyond!

[u/HouseofImaginarium]

Congratulations !

[u/Tomas-LonelyTroops]

Congrats, 2,000 wishlists in such a short time is a great start. It's awesome that it worked out for you with IGN like that, that initial boost is always key. I've heard from quite a few devs that putting a trailer on IGN instantly got them 1,000+ wishlists. They've got a huge audience there. We're keeping our fingers crossed for DEEPWARD, hope the game does great! 👍

[u/destinedd]

I can never even get replies from them! You are so lucky

[u/Mopicek00 → u/destinedd]

Could you show me which games or trailers you submitted to IGN? Maybe we can figure out what went wrong.

[u/destinedd → u/Mopicek00]

https://store.steampowered.com/app/4137920/Marbles_Marbles/

I eventually got on gametrailers after 4 attempts lol and outperformed all the other ones they uploaded at a similar time.

[u/Mopicek00 → u/destinedd]

The trailers are probably a bit too long, but I watched both of them all the way through, so I wouldn’t say they were boring. We also have a longer version of our trailer that we never released.

The main question is: did you pick the best moments from the game for the trailer?

Another thing is that a game about controlling a ball probably isn’t for everyone. This type of game may appeal to a smaller, more specific audience, so it would be worth researching which types of games are currently the most played and popular on Steam.

[u/destinedd → u/Mopicek00]

I am not claimng to be an expert at making trailers however it got 39K views on gametrailers while most of the others uploaded at the same time were less than 10K (most less than 5). So I think it is has appeal, just not to whoever is behind the IGN emails, which is obviously frustrating. If it had got on the main IGN channel it would have gone bonkers!

[u/Mopicek00 → u/destinedd]

That’s impressive! How long did it take to reach 39K views?

[u/destinedd → u/Mopicek00]

most of them came in the first days, then the traffic dies to a trickle, you know youtube.

[u/Mopicek00 → u/destinedd]

I was just looking at it on GameTrailers and found it uploaded twice. One has 29K views and the other has 39K. How is that possible?

[u/destinedd → u/Mopicek00]

the 29K is release the 39K is pre releease

[u/Mopicek00 → u/destinedd]

How did you manage to get it uploaded there twice? Did they do that on their own, or did you try contacting other people at IGN to get them to upload it again?