Dized is now available on Early Access on both iOS and Android. Besides being an excellent way to show a slice of what we’ve been working on since the Indiegogo campaign, this backer’s-only demo serves a more practical purpose. With a closed group of people actively testing the app and sending us bug reports and feedback, we can look at what works, what needs changes and how to plan our next steps wisely.
The reception
Overall, it was heartwarming to see how much people enjoyed the concept, and how several were surprised by the quality of what we delivered.
Most importantly several users (more than we anticipated, actually) told us they would go out and purchase the game after seeing the Tutorial for it. This has been our assumption all along (people would try more games if they were easier to learn), so it’s great that we can finally prove it to publishers with some hard data.
Most popular requests
Besides some expected bug reports (no game element sinks in the grass now!), there were a bunch of feature requests that kept appearing in your feedback. The top 3 were:
A separate score tracker
As much as some people liked the Kingdomino score tracker, we learned that a majority of users would prefer to use it independently from the Tutorial. We think that’s a good idea, and we’ll implement similar tools in future games as digital expansions.
The flag for English language
We’ve got quite a bit of complaint about the language selection screen in the beginning, as we use the American flag to select English. While we have no desire to get into a turf war, we’d like to point out that the choice was made purely because most of our users are based in the US. The language we want to use in the app is International English, so we’ll need to figure out if a split flag represents a solution, or something else is required (our team currently includes a Canadian and two Brits, so this is going to be argued over).
Skip parts
Some of you are quite experienced with games and would like to be able to skip forward (or back) in the Tutorial more easily. While we are entirely convinced that this won’t be the case for more complicated games where being able to follow is crucial to understanding the gameplay, we already started to look at possible solutions to this problem. Ultimately, we might even have Tutorials that understand your preferences and change the pace of teaching according to who’s at the table.
Our priorities
Among the various praises, there were also requests to know the timeline for new game releases.
Before we get into that, there’s something we need to clarify: this app is still in development, and our target release window is Fall 2018. We know, we know: if you’re a backer you can download it and try it right now, so it must be finished, right?
Not exactly: app development is never really “over,” and that’s why your apps update every few days. We’re a small 15 person team, and there’s still quite a lot of work that needs to happen to make sure all parts of the app function as intended. Dized is more than Tutorials and Rule Lookup Tools, it also needs a robust account system, commerce tools for handling your credits and purchases, an adaptable interface for different devices, integrated add-ons and digital expansions with the game packages, not to mention all the social features that will enhance practically all of the previously listed features. While most of this stuff is not as flashy or exciting to communicate as a hot new game Tutorial, we still need to get it right for Dized to meet and exceed your expectations.
We’re happy to see requests for the Tutorial of Rising Sun or Scythe, but we are some ways away from delivering on all the latest, hottest games. It’s just a fact of our development and the tools we’re using to build high quality content for Dized. If you have a great game still in plastic wrap, please take it out and play it! You might have to read the rulebook for now… but we’re working hard to make that a thing of the past as soon as we possibly can. We want to serve players with a quality service and excellent content rather than rushing development to meet the street date of the hottest game, neglecting the foundations of Dized that will help it scale and grow into the service we envision.
Internally, we’re always looking at ways to make sure we develop the tools we need to speed up production on all the content you want.
In the coming weeks we’ll share more details, but for now, rest assured we’re working to make Dized a reliable, scalable reality, and the go-to place for all board gaming learning needs.
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