Why would they still need advertising?

When you go on youtube, you have hundreds of videos about "10 things you should know about F4" "5 tips to start" " how to survive" ... and the game isn't even out yet.

Like said before in this post, the franchise is solid and pretty much sells by itself.

Probably? It was confirmed as fact years ago

Before E3 a 8/10 club hopping party girl told me she couldn't wait for the next Fallout. I think this was in March. While she may be the atypical gamer that fact that I heard the same from several other people makes me confident that word of mouth spread like wild fire when it was announced. FO4 is going to sell. The hype was already real back then out of sheer anticipation.

My guess is that will leave the tv commercials until a month after launch to pick up any casual gamers that may have missed it or waited until after release for all the reviews.

As many have said before social media is completely saturated with Fallout 4 and many gamers will have already made the decision to pre-order or wait until a specific time. Fallout 4 has since it was launched been in the steam top sellers, so I am sure Bethesda are already celebrating exceeding their sales targets.

Social Media.

If they do any marketing at all, it will probably start the week of launch or just before. Most fans will already have it at launch and they will be able to stretch the advertising through the holiday season. Remember there is a big gift giving holiday the month after launch? That is when the best return on the dollar will come when they can reach the people who wouldn't ordinarily know about it before hand.... grandparents and such

Bethesda is *doing* marketing. Just not in a way some of you are used to. Keynote of e3? Now the game media is talking about it. If big media is talking about it, then you tubers are going to jump on the bandwagon too.

There's a massive, measurable social dialog going on about Fallout. That reach can be measured better now than when Skyrim came out, so why not leverage it?

TV and print are ancient media and their price hasn't dropped with their efficacy. To buy a TV spot on a big network is a preposterously huge expense. Meanwhile, Youtubers are already generating the same level of reach, more precisely targeted, for free.

Beth is probably paying Google/YouTube pennies on the dollar for preferential search ranking. Watched a YouTube vid on gaming EVER? Guess what just popped up in your recommendations.

I saw a vault-boy keychain hanging from the rearview mirror of a car a few weeks ago. That's all the marketing we can afford around here, poor country and all

So https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k3IlHBBGCIw just dropped. I believe it will be their TV spot/first real advertisemant.

You'll be seeing it on TV soon. Lots more coming.

Thanks for this Gstaff!

I was seriously beginning to get worried about the lack of information on the game. I don't think I have played a game in the past couple years that hasn't disappointed me on some level. Even MGSV which I absolutely loved was extremely disappointing with its extremely important to the story cut content.

I hope we'll see some actual in-game assets instead of these SPECIAL cartoons, because I want to really know what I'm buying.

Could always wait for the reviews...

I would, except for the fact that I pre-ordered since I got a deal for like $40 or $45 (can't remember) shortly after pre-orders started. I would seriously hate to throw away that deal on a brand new game.

Not to mention reviews have been BS lately. They're dropping 9s and 10s on games that while good, do not deserve to be considered a masterpiece.

You're looking at the marketing.

They show off just a little bit of footage or info and everyone on the internet gets all riled up and hype spreads through the masses. You'll see dozens of videos and articles on the little Beth reveals which are doing all the marketing for them.

Agreed, makes me think of MGS V where a lot of reviews were "The gameplay was amazing but the story was terrible and felt unfinished, leaving a lot of unanswered story threads. Final score 10/10 Flawless game!"

Not having watched TV (outside of, you know, wandering through a room when someone else has a football game/debate/Jeopardy on) since 2010, the idea of TV commercials for video games seems a bit odd to me.

No thanks, I don't want our money being spent on archaic media formats like TV just so the CoD crowd buys a couple more and demand FO5 to be without SPECIAL and dialogue because they didn't want to read stuff. Don't demand lose-lose scenarios.

You don't really need the COD crowd for that, Todd Howard takes care of everything step by step, first the attributes in Skyrim, now the skills in Fo4, you know sooner or later SPECIAL will fall.

Don't need it to be hastened any more than this. Game is already in Steam top sellers for months, only game to stay that way during 2015.

You know what I really enjoyed? the Oblivion countdown videos... if i remember correctly, they were 10-15 second clips released on Bethesda's page showing portions of gameplay. The main character running through an open field... another showing him talking to a slightly rude orc "i heard a rumor you're an idiot, any truth to that?" among others. one a day for the last week before release.

I do wish they'd do that again. it made the last week of waiting almost like having an advent calendar.. a tidbit a day!

They can't afford marketing, they blew the budget on development

Wait....

I still remember seeing the FO3 commercial on TV about 2 weeks before release playing that "..set the world on fiiiirrre" line from a classic song. Hope to have that same feeling of awe for the FO4 commercial.

How much TV marketing did Skyrim have? I seem to recall seeing a few commercials right at release and after, but certainly not HUGE marketing push.

I think the Wanderer Trailer just released today IS one of the potential TV commercials you may see.

Note that Hyping the game up too much before release is not a smart investment. Everyone that is going to pre-order already has done so and those that don't know about it will be marketed to in the Holiday season (when they can slap IGN 10/10 in the commercial). Don't worry, I doubt they will loose a sale because they don't want to blow their Marketing budget weeks before the game is actually available.

Yeah me too, i actually made a topic about them not so long ago, let's hope they will do something similair!

http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1538758-fallout-4-7-days-countdown/

Is this in reference to MGS: V by any chance?

Edit:

Just notcied ED-E 123's post. So yeah pretty much.

I liked The Phantom Pain (though I expected to love it), but it doesn't deserve its current metacritic or the appellation of a masterpiece.

ED-E 123 summarizes it excellently: "The gameplay was amazing but the story was terrible and felt unfinished, leaving a lot of unanswered story threads. Final score 10/10 Flawless game!"

I hate that story is now seemingly so negligible in a series extolled for its melodrama.