 | List of suggestions | 2/6/06 5:14 PM |
Here are some suggestions I have for PlayRozz, in order of importance:
The site needs to be retaining more players. Many players are discouraged when seeing how seemingly complicated the game is.
My suggestion is to have a special help page for players who just joined or redo the current help files. The current help files are hard to navigate, contain duplicate information, and are not that newbie friendly.
I suggest that the newbie help page be an example game with a commentary on what is happening. I think this would be *immensely* more helpful than the current files.
Direct players who just joined (perhaps through the email validation link) to the newbie tutorial. Also have a big link on the main page for the tutorial. I believe having such a page would greatly help retain players.
When you cancel a game it shouldn?t count as a loss.
A sanity check to test for erroneous commands would be helpful.
Resizable windows would be very nice.
Game statistics for each game ? like how many units were used, how many strikes were made, how much money was earned ? stuff like that.
Also, the picture does not show up in the email notification for me.
Thanks for a fun game! |
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| 2/6/06 5:47 PM |
Very good suggestions, IronFire. It:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;s great to see this kind of input, and it:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;s motivating as well.
You couldn:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;t have said it better that many players are discouraged by how complicated the game seems. Believe it or not, the help page is actually better than it used to be, but it falls far short of retaining players (who have shown enough interest in the game to at least sign up) while still explaining the rules. Our solution-in-the-works in very close to what you propose: it:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;s a flash video explaining the game in simple, friendly terms. (Development is a little slow because we:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;re essentially pro-bono.)
Will fix the cancelled game thing. BTW, the idea has been to give players the option to reset the win/loss ratio at any time.
The sanity check on commands is tricky from a technical standpoint: one idea would be to submit the commands through a :%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot;dummy:%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot; copy of the game to see what result the game engine would have if none of other players submitted commands -- that might catch some of the more common errors, though of course it would also flag some OK ones as failed. Still, that might be a good route to go ...
The game board on a maximized window is quite impressive: I think it would help retain some people. I:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;m hoping to eventually have an applet that retains and manages the game info, history, chat, etc., so we won:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;t need those other frames. That:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;s basically what:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;s holding up the resizing at this point.
Game statistics. Yeah, that would be cool. A big part of this project is actually an underlying object warehouse it uses (rather than a database) -- so, some things that would be very easy with a database become a little trickier, but give rise to exactly the sort of enhancements we want to add to the warehouse. Consider it ON TAP. 
Does the link for the picture show up if you copy it to a browser?
Matt |
| 2/7/06 3:59 AM |
Woot, I figured out how to get the picture to show, it was a browser problem
Everything you said made sense, you definetly understand what I:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;m thinking. Good luck on development! |
| 2/7/06 12:26 PM |
| Something else that would be nice is the ability to give a specific game a name/title when you create it. |
| 2/7/06 2:27 PM |
We:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;re definitely on the same wavelength. Mike had made the same suggestion and a name property has been added to actual game objects -- just hasn:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;t yet been implemented in the website. Planning to roll that in when get around to the game invitations.
Keep :%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;em coming -- can only make the site better when people realize their suggestions can actually get implemented!
Matt |
| 2/8/06 5:25 AM |
Cool! Another idea: The main page shows the last active game (recent activity). It would be neat if it displayed the last 5 or so active games (just the game number, not the picture).
In the same vein, while the current game lookup method is better than nothing, a master game index page would be sweet! You could have the option to sort the games by game number, scenario type, number of players, round length, specific players, ect. That would rock house!
Another idea I had (not sure its good or not), is instead of having the commands saying RED/INF and GREEN/ARMOR just make it a red INF and a green ARMOR. I:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;m not sure of your software limitations, but that would be a nifty feature that would cut down time figuring out what happened.
(The sanity check is great btw! I can rest assured my moves won:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;t scew up lol) |
| 2/8/06 5:47 AM |
Oh, and a real-time button for the main play page would be nice.
Last edited by IronFire, 2/8/06 5:47 AM |
| 2/8/06 6:05 AM |
Last five or so active game numbers is an easy one.
Nice idea on a master game index -- I:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;ll plant that somewhere on my todo list.
Not sure what you mean by the :%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot;RED/INF:%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot; versus :%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot;red INF:%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot; as a feature: do you mean for easier reading in the history panel? The game engine uses the slash (and the other token characters) to interpret the command, so it:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;s not easy to get around on the command-preparation side of things. In the history, it would be easy to parse it out differently, but a drawback would be players thinking that was a valid notation, or thinking :%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot;that:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;s not what I entered!:%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot; Anyone else have thoughts on this?
BTW, I realize when reading your initial list of suggestions that you meant game statistics for the game just finished, which should actually be easier to implement than overall game statistics.
Real-time chat on the play page is on the TODO list; a related thing is having observers in game chatter (right now, they can chat, but don:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;t get the automatic refresh).
(I guess I should move the REPLY TO POST box up, especially if I:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;m going to have the responses in reverse order.)
Matt |
| 2/8/06 6:15 AM |
| About the red INF, yes I mean in the history panel. Instead of seeing :%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot;RED/INF:%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot; you would see :%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot;INF:%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot; that was red. Like you said there are drawbacks, so I don:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;t know if its good idea. |
| 2/8/06 6:38 AM |
| Oh, I see -- the :%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot;INF:%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot; actually colored red. That would be nice, even if it were :%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot;RED/INF:%.%.gs.%.%.%:quot; colored red. I:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;ll see what it would take (not that it would be difficult, but it would involve a little more than might be expected). |
| 2/8/06 6:54 AM |
Sweet.
The email notification feature is very helpfull, btw. Although when I get an email telling me their has been chatter, it would be nice if the it displayed what the chatter actually was.
And do you plan on setting up cookies in the future, so you don:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;t have to log in each time you visit the site? |
| 2/8/06 7:21 AM |
Yeah, I:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;ve been meaning to add cookies, but there always seems to be something popping up with a higher priority (like fixing the trap, patriot things exposed in game #304). When we were starting out a few months ago, I was posting a TODO list on the main page, but it was making things too cluttered.
Emailing the actual chatter from the forums is simple enough. The only thing about chatter from the games is that you only get an email on the first new chat ... where there may be multiple chats after that. Soemthing to consider, at least. |
| 3/6/06 6:49 AM |
To lessen newbie confusion?
I suggest making the standard item catalog more accessible. I:%.%.gs.%.%.%:#039;d say place it on the main help page under Practice Exercises and Other Help Topics.
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