Hobo
The most effective marketing is one done by others for you, it isn't by definition or necessity done by the person selling the product.
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/marketing
In fact until the 90's the most common commercial was a format where the viewer was "eavesdropping" on another party who was praising said product.
Minecraft simply had a product that was good enough that people started talking about it and marketing it for them.
Myself? I never got that into it (much to the chagrin of my friends). Same thing with Portal (to my brothers everlasting disappointment in me I might add).
Teddy
I'm not saying I don't enjoy the game, I've said that several times now that I don't dislike it. I'm saying that with how the game is going it will be reviewed as fair. I have said, and continue to say, that the game could be polished into something great.
I'll clarify my pros and cons at the bottom of this topic.
I realize that this is "your baby" and you understandably love it as such; however, I will state again I am not attacking it. I don't dislike it, I've sunk some time into it. It has promise, I realize its an unfinished product, half the skills are not implemented, and tons of the game isn't in yet.
If I did dislike the game I wouldn't bother to spend any time posting on the forums about it I'd simply move onto something else. I only care because I fondly remember secret of mana, secret of evermore (ok not as much as SOM) and the others of that vein.
Try not to read into what I say with a negative spin, it is simply some constructive feedback for the game, and trust me, 99.9% of the triple A games could have used some. Looking at my steam time I've clocked more hours in this than most of the ones in my library.
This is a suggestions forum, not a I'm holding a gun to your heads make the changes forum. These are suggestions, things I feel could help the game.
I would also suggest that you read all previous posts before quoting one. As far as "toxic dude" goes, their is one troll on your forums, he clearly posted a trolling message which was reported and nothing was done to his posts after almost a week of waiting, so I respond to his kind in kind.
Very rarely does any indy game hit an eight or nine. And when they do it is for some genre changing innovation. Most indy games hit the 6 mark.
My vast experience? I'm an old school gamer, you name it I've more than likely given it a go.
As far as any influence I might have on the gamer world, I'll leave that up to your imagination
Now forgive me if I'm wrong, and I do hope that I am,
but from the size of the world map the current game is roughly 1/3rd of the complete game. It looks like we will have 3 more dungeons with one unlock being a nature grow plants into ladders, one unlock being a swim or jump small gaps, and one I don't have a clue about yet.
Then one can assume a final dungeon, and maybe (hopefully) a secret dungeon (or two, three? FOUR!?).
Which would give a single run casual gamer roughly 7-10 hours of game play. Pretty standard.
Monsters are being colour pallet swapped already, but thankfully they get new abilities as they put on their war paint.
Skills are basically in the game with passives left to come,
So that aforementioned and promised pros / cons list?
Pros
Secret of mana esq
Battle system
Art design / Monster design (really fits the retro style of the game well)
General look and feel of the game
Cons
Games in beta
Content isn't all in yet
Will appeal to a niche old school market (and hey Disgaea did it, and I love that series)
Multiplayer - In that it is limited by IP who you can play with making it more difficult to others (granted I do tend to find that non-friends in games are usually not those whom I enjoy playing with so maybe this is more of a pro)
Neutral
Story
Menu's (its my fault but I tend to hit the X instead of Z at times or vice versa or whatever)
Well ok I'm not going to get too into them because of the stage of development it is at. But basically the only cons for the game are ones that are being worked out.
The suggestions I have are polish.