When trying to sell your game idea, a pitch can be a great way to stir up interest which also exhibiting the core idea of what your project is a about. For example, you could be a smaller indie studio trying to sell your idea to a larger company to get your game published, since you may not be able to afford to create the game within your own team. That's why it's important to follow various guidelines in order to deliver a good presentation which grabs the interest and attention of your audience, since you can have a lot at stake if you don't deliver one to the best of your abilities.
A big major sticking point compared to other pieces of documentation for a game, is that a presentation shouldn't be too 'wordy' and not just contain slides upon slides of text. As researched by journalist (Hyatt, 2012), presentations shouldn't have any more than 6 or 7 words per line on a single slide. This can cause your audience to drift off and lose interest, since they'll be wondering why you're just reeling off paragraphs from a board when they're clearly capable of reading it themselves. But seeing all this text will just put people off, especially if they're supposed to be reading it from a long distance, like the other side of the room. Likewise this text should be readable, (in a big, clear font to match the minimal use of printed words). It's all well and good filling up your slides with bright colours and imagery to catch the attention of the viewers, but if these decorations essentially detract from the message you're actually trying to give by being distracting and daunting, this makes it harder for the viewer to understand what's going on. Having pictures and colours there just for the sake of having them, can mean that they're doing more harm than good. Sometimes less really is more.
Your pitch also doesn't have to involve just a presentation, it can include other elements like role-playing/acting, diagrams, quizzes or hand-outs. Having someone stand up and reel off a PowerPoint presentation can get strenuous for both the presenter and audience, no matter how good your idea is. Constantly mixing up the flow of the pitch with a variety of things to keep the audience entertained a good rhythm going benefits all parties involved. As talked about by (Leung, 2014), asking questions is especially useful in a pitch as not only can you get feedback and advice from expert in things to improve on for your game (with a pitch being a great opportunity for constructive criticism), those asking the questions will also feel more engaged and involved with the project on a more personal level and get more invested into the idea as a result.
Another thing to note is that for a games pitch there are various things to consider so you're sure that you're giving enough relevant information to your audience. You don't want to pitch a load of irrelevant facts and trivia about your game, your pitch needs to have substance to it and do a good enough job and getting the core idea of your game across to your viewers. You want to communicate not only your game idea and why it's good, but specifically why it should be invested in. You should talk about what makes it unique and why/how it'll go on to sell well to make the publishers more money. You're not just selling the game, you're selling an idea and also a part of a business. As a general quote to go by: "You pitch should needs to provide an overview of your business along with all the key factors investors or buyers are going to looking for." (Smarta, 2016).
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