1: Facebook

While fairly obvious, it’s amazing what the power of Facebook can do. Create a page for your game and make it your update and news hub.  Get all your friends to ‘like’ your page and make them make their friends do the same.  If your page reaches a certain number of followers you can change the page’s domain name to something resembling your game. Not only does this improve your search ranking when people look for your game, but it makes you look much more professional.  While not an app, the Minecraft Facebook page is an excellent example of what to do with a dedicated Facebook page: they let the community vote on certain content, provide news and talk to the community.

2. XDA Developer Forums

If your game is free, start ranting about it on the XDA forums. These forums are specifically designed for promoting and improving your game. If you are polite, follow their forum rules and get your presence known you could gain a huge following. Better yet, some will download your game and give you constructive feedback: the greatest thing an app developer could hope for.

3. Twitter

Twitter is a double-edged sword: it’s an incredible tool for spreading the word, but you need a fairly large following in the first place to do so effectively. Twitter is better used later in the marketing game, when your Facebook profile has gained some followers. Make sure your Twitter and Facebook profiles provide different kinds of information. For example, your Twitter page can tweet upcoming improvements while your Facebook page talks to the fans and provides in depth media coverage. NEVER copy and paste information from one medium to the other, it looks lazy and if people can receive the same information from Facebook or Twitter, why bother signing up to the other?  A good example of using Twitter to promote a game is the PopCap Games official Twitter page; the company creates hype for its new games but more importantly responds and talks to their community.

4. App Review Sites

Many would think this is the first priority, but the truth is if your game doesn’t have a large fan base most companies will not bother reviewing it. There are some great app review sites out there such as playandroid.com and androidtapp.com, beware though, if your game is not up to scratch be prepared for an honest review!

5. Your Existing Fan Base

By far the most important tip on the list, your existing fans should be your primary concern. Build a rapport with them, get them involved in your game, but most importantly: talk to them. These people are going to tell their friends about your game, if you have built a relationship with them they will say nothing but positive things. As an example, for our game, we let our fan base choose the next map pack theme and had them vote on different ideas. Things like these make your fans feel a part of your game, and if they feel like they are part of your game, they aren’t going to uninstall it in a hurry.

There are hundreds of other great ways to advertise your app, these are just the ones we had the most success in. If you want to see our game (shameful plug) check out: https://market.android.com/details?id=processing.android.test.turtleslide and tell us what you think.

If you have any other good methods share them in the comments below! Good luck with your app!

Apple has finally launched the App Store for Mac. It works just like the iOS version, with users being able to download applications from iTunes. If you buy or download a free app, it will immediately jump to the dock with an iOS-esque progress bar. Once the download completes, you can launch the app. Mac users can download the necessary updates right now. Strangely though, there seems to be lots of people trying to get them at the moment so you might want to take your time.

Apple has finally slapped a date on their Mac App Store. It will be released on January 6th and will be available to OSX Snow Leopard users in 90 countries at launch. The app itself will be free. Purchased apps will run on all the user’s personal Macs, with updates getting delivered directly through the app store. Developers keep 70% of sales revenue and aren’t charged for free apps. They don’t have to pay any hosting fees either.

“The App Store revolutionised mobile apps,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We hope to do the same for PC apps with the Mac App Store by making finding and buying PC apps easy and fun. We can’t wait to get started on January 6.”

We hope these silly app stores won’t catch on. We like finding and downloading things through other methods and controlling what we have ourselves. Apple needs to stop treating their users like babies and give them back control, but we all know that won’t happen.

Apple head honcho Steve Jobs has confirmed that Epic Games is working on their first game for Apple platforms. He was joined on stage at Apple’s press conference by Epic president Mike Capps today to show off “Project Sword”. It is a first-person action adventure game and will apparently offer “epic sword battles”. It will also support Game Centre.

Epic will be licensing Project’s Sword’s engine out for other iOS developers to use, so in essence what we saw was the big screen debut of Unreal Engine for the iPhone. You can play around with a demo of the castle environment featured in the Project Sword demonstration on your iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad right now by downloading it here.

Hulu has finally announced that Hulu Plus is coming to the PS3 in July and the 360 in early 2011. The $9.99 a month service is already available on the PC (preview invitation only at the moment), iPhone (as well as the iPod Touch and iPad thanks to the new Hulu Plus app) and other devices. Hulu Plus features full seasons of shows from ABC, NBC and Fox in HD. Find out more about the service on Hulu’s website.

The Xbox 360 version of Hulu Plus will be exclusively available to Xbox Live Gold members. It will support Kinect and Xbox Live Parties. If the service eventually comes to the UK we pledge to hold a Desperate Housewives viewing club, because you’re worth it.

Square Enix has announced that Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions will be released on the iPhone and iPod Touch on 15th September. The company hasn’t confirmed how much it’ll cost, but the game has appeared before: it was the 2007 PSP remake of the original Final Fantasy Tactics.

Zynga has released FarmVille for the iPad and iPhone. Previously, the supposedly addictive game was confined to Facebook and the rest of the web. It’s available for free on the App Store, and allows people to carry on their farm from their account or start a new one. Some items are exclusive to the normal web version, and others are exclusive to the App.

Ubisoft has released Might & Magic Heroes Kingdoms on the iPad App Store in France, Germany and the United Kingdom. The game is playable exclusively on the iPad in Germany and the UK for one week, with the first PC and Mac servers opening in June in these two regions. They are already operational in France, where the game is available already too. A PC trial of the game will take place next Friday, with the full release pencilled in for July 2nd.

Team17 has released Worms HD for the iPad on the App Store for £2.99. The developers have classed this release as a “console-style edition” of the game, and it apparently features the Holy Hand Grenade and the Concrete Donkey.

Martyn Brown, Studio Head of Team 17, said: “Worms is perfectly suited to a casual platform such as iPad, and it’s quite possibly the best ‘hand held’ Worms experience to date. Features such as the ability to pass and play (with the screen flipping for the other player) hark back to the game’s social roots. We look forward to delivering more titles for what has quickly become a popular gaming platform.”

Rockstar Games has released Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars Lite for the iPhone and iPod Touch on the app store. The release is basically a free demo of the full £6 version, and contains three levels of the game.

The new series of Sam & Max begins today, entitled the Devil’s Playhouse. The first episode has been released on the PSN, PC and Mac; called “The Penal Zone”. The dog and rabbit detective duo have to fight villains out for Max’s new-found psychic powers. Each new episode is released monthly, and season passes for the full give game series’ are available now for $34.95 on the PC and Mac. The episodes are also available for the iPad, with the first episode released back on the device’s launch for $6.99 on the App Store.

“With The Penal Zone launching on four separate game platforms, the new season of Sam & Max is the biggest episodic premiere in Telltale’s history,” said Telltale CEO Dan Connors. “This series has been about pushing boundaries, from humour and story to episodic gaming as a whole. The Devil’s Playhouse continues that tradition, and it’s easily the deepest, most visually stunning season to date. We can’t wait for players both new and returning to dive in.”

Sports Interactive have confirmed that Football Manager Handheld will be released on the iPhone tomorrow. It’ll cost £6.99 on the App Store, and will allow you to listen to your music collection while you manage your team to success (or not, as the case may be). The game includes 34 football leagues from 11 countries and allows you to customise tactics, formations, team and player instructions, training and transfers.