The domain registration fee is typically between $10 and $15 per year (depending on your registrar), followed by the required hosting package (unless you make your own server, though that is beyond my knowledge). Shared hosting packages typically cost anywhere from $3.50 - $10 /month. I currently host 3 websites, so I am paying about $100 per year. If I chose to host only one website, I would be looking at about $50 / year.

Prices vary, my personal endorsement goes to 1&1, though I have no particular preference.

Yeah, Wordpress does it at a reasonable price.

Okay, I can muster fifteen bucks.

I've always found that making any form of feature easier to use, or making it take less time to use, helps to increase people using the feature and thus increases the number of people revisiting.

After all my talk of Universal Gaming Database, I cannot believe someone would mention it.

http://ugdb.com is another great site to add your content to. N4G is kinda odd these days, unless your article is about cosplay, a developer bitching, or about something for free it wont get as popular as real news.

Hey Stew! Long time no see! I'd second the above comment. Get a .com through wordpress. Though if you're thinking long-term, you might want your firstnamelastname.com or something.

Also, posting links with snappy headlines on Reddit is a good way to get quick bursts of site hits, but it doesn't necessarily equate to steady traffic after the inital burst.

I bought a domain through Wordpress.

NewEngGamer.Com.

Now I'm just gonna keep plugging away I suppose.

And yes, N4G blows. I had a couple of hits there last week that led to some really good traffic days, but most of that was just fanboys yelling at me. GameGrep has gotten me more consistent, if lower level traffic and I have posted a few on Digg. I'll try the others you guys mentioned.

I'm not looking to become world famous here, or even make any money (though that would be nice). That said, it would still be cool if people were reading what I was writing you know?

It's always a big motivator to know that people read your work. Similar to you, I write through my own enjoyment more than anything. I've found that my website makes for a fantastic resume / portfolio (and it has gotten me a few nice jobs), so why not, right?

I'll check out UGDB and GameGrep :)

After checking out both UGDB and GameGrep, I'm going to have to give it up for GameGrep. The people are much more willing to read features and non-news posts, as opposed to N4G where they are completely disinterested. UGDB lets a lot of garbage through - also similar to N4G - to the point where I kind of have to read the news with "what are their sources?" in the back of my mind.

Perhaps a new thread is in order? One with a list of respectable sites for posting our features/reviews/news.

 I would suggest for people to try to increase their sphere of influence which will help drive traffic. It would also be recommended that you have an easy domain name thats easy to find. You should also make sure you have quality content. If you have forums you need to make sure they are moderated