ID:138283
 
Tom mentioned that maybe we should start posting on a few gaming boards to pull people in...

I think this is a great idea, as having more players/programmers will inspire us and hopefully help move things forward. And in the last couple of months we've added a bunch of new games for people to check out.

The first impression is critical in these things. If something doesn't work, or there are no games to play, or whatever, we lose that potential programmer/player candidate forever.

SO! How about we set a date a couple of weeks in the future when we'd like to start doing some publicizing, and in the meantime do some housecleaning to ensure a good experience. Maybe 12/15 would be a good date.

In the meantime, we could all look over the games we have out to do the following:

- Finish those playing instructions! My logs show me that the typical person logs into a game for a couple of minutes, then logs out never to return. This of course might be a comment on the game itself, but I think it's frequently because they don't know how to play, it's not immediately obvious, so they leave.

- Fix that scoring! Yes, this means YOU.

- Add live hub support! Here is all it takes to have your game register on the live hub when the first person logs in:

#include

var/GameHub/hub // The hub connection opened by first player.

mob/Login()
if(!hub)
hub = new("OnlineGames.Arcade.DragonSnot")
hub.manager = src
hub.OpenLink()

// That's all you need!
// But here's some extra stuff that suppresses text allowing the player to close the link.
GameHub
HandleLinkUp()
// Overriding the "close link" option message.
return

HandleLinkDown()
// Overriding the "link closed" message.
return

- Write a tutorial! If you have time or inclination, this is an incredibly helpful thing to do. If you don't have time or inclination, don't sweat it.


For myself, this translates to:

- Write up instructions for Living & Dead and add live hub code.
- Add instructions to DragonSnot, see if DDT can get the next level completed.
- Release BaseCamp library.
- Finish savefile tutorial.

I know this might seem a bit like work, but we've all put an awful lot of time into getting where we are. It would sure be nice to do that extra bit of polish that means people keep coming back to BYOND.

My wish list for Dantom:

- New key behavior. Whatever it takes to make key generation simple while not allowing people to log into everything as Guest.

- Player hub. I believe this is in the works...

What do people think?
On 11/29/00 6:08 pm Deadron wrote:

SO! How about we set a date a couple of weeks in the future when we'd like to start doing some publicizing, and in the meantime do some housecleaning to ensure a good experience. Maybe 12/15 would be a good date.

Sounds great to me, Deadron. I especially like the notion of people writing tutorials for the incoming masses; commented source code is probably just as good or better. It looks like you have quite a bit of stuff on your slate; I wish you the best of luck!

My wish list for Dantom:

- New key behavior. Whatever it takes to make key generation simple while not allowing people to log into everything as Guest.

Good point. I think that a mere interface adjustment should suffice: when the user first runs DS and is connected to the 'net, we can make "New key" the default and display a simple text message to indicate the functionality. In fact, we could even just boot up the "New key" dialog. That might be best.

- Player hub. I believe this is in the works...

Yes, that's the plan.

I would like to spend some time revamping the website and trying to make everything look more professional. Partly this entails reorganizing the links to seamlessly integrate the hub; that is certainly do-able. The more difficult component is redesigning the look and feel of the pages themselves. Unfortunately my sense of design is pretty amateurish so I may have to recruit some help.

I think I'd also like to have a screenshot gallery somewhere, to give people an idea of some the things y'all have done. So if you have any that you'd like to see displayed, go ahead and give me a link or email them to me.
In response to Tom H.
On 11/29/00 11:30 pm Tom H. wrote:
Good point. I think that a mere interface adjustment should suffice: when the user first runs DS and is connected to the 'net, we can make "New key" the default and display a simple text message to indicate the functionality. In fact, we could even just boot up the "New key" dialog. That might be best.

Automatically going into the new key dialog would be perfect.


I think I'd also like to have a screenshot gallery somewhere, to give people an idea of some the things y'all have done. So if you have any that you'd like to see displayed, go ahead and give me a link or email them to me.

Yeah that would be really good. Hmm I wonder if we can get a good screenshot from the insane Santa game (I'm thinking of giving up my mantle for making odd/blasphemous games to Guy...)

Definitely some good DragonSnot shots will be available.
In response to Deadron
Yeah that would be really good. Hmm I wonder if we can get a good screenshot from the insane Santa game (I'm thinking of giving up my mantle for making odd/blasphemous games to Guy...)

I prefer the term "disturbing", myself. :) If all goes well, I'll gather screenshots from Sidewalk Santas and Cribbage tonight (and hopefully add the final touches to SS, since tomorrow is the deadline for the 4K Challenge!).

Also, I like the "spring cleaning" idea. I owe SpaceTug at least a couple more hours of effort, and Cribbage would definitely be improved by more tutorial info and some basic room-navigation instructions.

And then... I have some big plans! (But don't get too excited; I've had big plans before.)
On 11/29/00 6:08 pm Deadron wrote:
- Add live hub support! Here is all it takes to have your game register on the live hub when the first person logs in:

#include <hublib/gamehub.dm>

Ohhh... I was darn confused until I responded to your post and saw the stuff in angle brackets. By the way, folks, it says "hublib/gamehub.dm".

Z
On 11/29/00 6:08 pm Deadron wrote:
Tom mentioned that maybe we should start posting on a few gaming boards to pull people in...

By the way I just looked at my logs and found that there are a number of players trying out the games -- most of them that tried DragonSnot also tried L&D (to my surprise they spent more time on L&D).

I have been totally busy, and having something tonight and tomorrow taking up time, but I did manage to do these items on my spring cleaning list:

- Write up instructions for Living & Dead and add live hub code.