FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

what stops anyone from doing anything?

the prospect of having to do it

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

Just want to put this here because I was talking to Max about some other things with the site then priority of things got mentioned and it made me think about what I'd do about the non user friendly navigation.
[5:02:50 PM] Azlyn (Kayla): I think FFR needs a welcome page (aka splash page) that more easily navigates people to the most integral parts of the site
[5:03:05 PM] Azlyn (Kayla): like a link to the game, link to the forums and then link to profile and FAQ
[5:03:22 PM] Azlyn (Kayla): that way the new user isn't bombarded with a million links and no idea where to start
[5:03:27 PM] Azlyn (Kayla): just 4 key simple things in their face

This is something that's simple to do and can relieve the problem quickly without having to redesign everything right away.

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

I like this idea (along with halogen's). Makes it a nice and simple fix.

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

It goes beyond that, but I decided to not add it to my post in an effort to not make it even longer than it was.

- Restoring the old video chat would probably be a great way to retain users; players can show themselves playing the game, they can chat with friends, and interact with newer people as well.

- Creating a managed database similar to resonance would help things as well -- the keyword being "managed" -- create a list of artists that we have permission for (or more specifically, update the one in the back-end of FMAP) and tie it to that database so that users cannot upload songs unless they are tagged with an artist that we have permissions to. Anyone abusing these privileges could have their accesses revoked. Players can more immediately receive critique from their charts, and because it's managed in a way where we have permission for the content, content might flow into the game a bit more quickly (why just send it to the database and keep it unscored when you can put it back in game and have people fight for ranks and whatnot?).

- Fixing the multiplayer so that everyone automatically converges in a single spot rather than universal/legacy multiplayer is a huge thing, that way everyone can communicate/engage in a single area.

- Tying in profile chat + multiplayer allows users to mingle in multiple places. Having multiple groups of people able to talk with multiple groups of people increases the number of active users in a given place, and those spectating from the home page or somewhere else outside of those areas might feel inclined to pop in if there's a large number users online.

- Unrelated, but potentially neat if restored: what happened to MeTrivia?

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

Actually since this is focused around new user experience there's another thing I've talked about for a long time.

The amount of files in game is super crazy over whelming to a new person. My thought for solving this would also basically be more achievements which it seems xeno talks about a lot and that's to have levels of songs separated and unlockable. Basically a new person starts with the lower level stuff (rather than everything in their face) let's just say 1-10 for the example. They have to pass x amount of these files in this range to unlock the next level of files. (Just a quick example this could be done a bunch of ways with FCs, AAAs so on)

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

Hey, I like this idea. It can potentially tie into getting files into the FFR game itself more easily, but let's still distinguish the actual game from the database. I suppose I never thought of this before because I would've assumed such a database would be small and restricted. We have a lot of permissions now so it may not be a bad idea.

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

Not a bad idea, but do we want to have osu!/SM transplants have to endure that to get to the good stuff?

I think the Dance Genre accomplishes this by way of a suggestion; it is the default genre when loading the engine and contains the most new-user friendly songs.

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

I'm going to provide screenshots of the FFR homepage design/layout over the years below as a sort of user interface and design case study. Feel free to provide your input as well.

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

It's not like I'm suggesting they have to go through every single file in that range, like I said pass x of such range. Which for most would be easy and quick coming from another game.

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

if this were the case, would people who do not have an account setup have to unlock files as well? would the progress then save locally if they had to work towards unlocking files? if it saved to the account, they'd have to restart every time, and new players that just wanna play and not have to make an account would probably find it a hassle.

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

Well I mean really the goal is to get people to sign up and engage, which this also could help with because it's like well you got a taste, want to play more sign up kind of deal. Someone who's not going to make an account is unlikely to stick around imo.

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

fair enough. it would also eliminate a lot of alt accounts since more work just to get to the higher files.

(goodbye alt accounts, you will not be missed)

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

I actually love this idea. Far more than any token system I have. This brings sort of a "progression" to the game that makes it more open. Lets be real, we have nearly 2k songs. That's nuts. While I wouldn't lower the range down to 10, and instead have it go up to 20-30, just so the game doesn't seem to have only easy songs for new players. Increase the percentages of songs available as the total number of games played, where games played is gated by a minimum score. After the initial limit of 1-30, show that it goes from 1-99 by introducing higher tier songs. The more games played, the more public songs they have access to. Best part about it? It can totally replace the stupid "secret song" with credit lock out. It's a currency, something to spend. Not something you should be worried about keeping in your bank.

And in fact, this brings up another major idea. Instead, have it so user accounts can buy "packs" of songs with credits instead. The larger the pack, the more expensive. I believe that when songs are released, they should be at least somewhat related. All public, all token, all shop, ect. It also makes it easier to manage difficulties, releasing a wider variety of songs.

As for guest users, I'm not sure, but cookies may be used to hold their data. But we'd rather them register and say hi anyway.

Game progression is key for newer players, and that is what I'm for. Not simply just tokens only. For anyone who makes the argument that the FC bar and the AAA bar are more appealing, well... I'm sorry to say, but it's down right terrifying. Even for me. It's literally, "I have to do not only play 1700 songs, but FC them too? That's BS."

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

Haha yeah, the level of alts is a bit crazy.

Re: FFR: The New User Perspective And New FFR Ideas

It's an idea I've suggested for a long time but most of what I suggest gets brushed aside. The difficulty thing was just a quick example to throw out to illustrate my idea. There's a lot of ways it could be integrated.