Valve Sets New Restrictions on Steam Store Pages - Ends Spamming of Game Trailers

[T0@st]

The Steamworks Development team has announced some welcome changes to how game trailers get displayed on product pages - users have provided feedback about the frustrating process of having to navigate through lots of videos (as many as 12!) before reaching game screenshots. Valve's storefront UI designers introduced the adjusted system yesterday: "These changes include new logic that determines the order of trailers and screenshots, plus the ability to specify a category for each trailer to show to players." Game developers will face a brand new restriction: "Starting today, a maximum of two trailers can appear in the row of thumbnails to the left of screenshots. Any remaining trailers will be displayed after the screenshots, resulting in a default view for players that always has a mix of screenshots and trailers in view." This a welcome change and effectively ends the frontloaded spamming of trailers in screenshot galleries.

Product page managers will need to be more selective with their choices of headlining footage: "You are welcome to upload as many trailers for your game as you wish, but it is important to select the order of your trailers to prioritize the ones you think will be most useful to potential new customers. You can specify the order of your trailers in the 'Edit Store Page' section of Steamworks, on the 'Trailers' tab...Ideally you'll want to give players a good look at the gameplay of your game in as short a time as possible. We recommend that your first trailer be one that features primarily gameplay, clearly demonstrating what the player will be doing in the game and how they will be interacting with the world you've built. Save your company logos or narrative storylines for further into your trailer once you've gotten the interest of a player.



The new trailer categorization system was implemented yesterday, and bits of media were automatically rearranged. Valve suggests that lazy page managers should step up in their promotional efforts: "If you haven't paid a lot of attention to the order of trailers on your store page, you may wish to take a look now to see if the first two trailers provide players with the best look at your game, and make adjustments."

The Steamworks Development team signs off and reiterates that it has done the right thing by reacting to user feedback: "We have found that it wasn't clear to developers how best to manage trailers in order to provide the best experience for players. Many games have collected a great number of trailers over their lifetime of development and have made it harder for prospective customers to find the screenshots. At the same time, we know that players are interested in understanding a little more about the trailers they are watching. This update is intended to address both of these issues and help players more quickly learn about games they are interested in."

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[AusWolf]

Cool, but the "do not auto play videos" tickbox is still the most useful thing.

 

[DeathtoGnomes]

trialers are useless hype void of actual game play, those that get suckered in by said trailers usually come out highly disappointed once they actually play the game.

 

[chrcoluk]

Yeah I wouldnt have an issue with them if they had actual gameplay in them, if their game is so good then show the gameplay.

 

[TechLurker]

trialers are useless hype void of actual game play, those that get suckered in by said trailers usually come out highly disappointed once they actually play the game.

This is why I usually skip the first trailer, and look for the actual gameplay trailers (which some games have, and some don't; the ones that don't are a warning sign). Being able to see it in actual gameplay tells me more than the same generic plot animated, and which is also in the game's summary.