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Is my first iOS game too hard?

2 points by dhissami ↗ HN
My first iOS game (http://appstore.com/frogtrip), which is free and has no ads, went live on the app store about 9 hours ago.

The good: the game is already in the top charts (Arcade & Action categories).

The bad: I've received feedback from some that the game is too hard.

Thing is, I designed the game to be extremely challenging. I did so knowing it wouldn't appeal to everyone. I want players to fight for every point.

But I'm wondering now, when is too hard actually too hard? If there is a line, is my game crossing it?

4 comments

[ 2.7 ms ] story [ 18.7 ms ] thread
codezero
It really depends. This reminds me of when I took a bunch of writing courses. I found that some people didn't "get" my stories, but the feedback they gave actually means that they experienced what I wanted them to experience when they read the stories. They didn't like it, but it's what I intended, so... it was a win, right?

So it depends on what you're going for. If you intended it to be really hard, and people say it's hard, you win. Now, if they are also giving it really bad reviews (few stars) and that affects you in some way, then you need to somehow integrate the difficulty into the game in a way that makes it clear to people.

You need to present the game as a challenge that not everyone is up to (maybe you already do, I haven't checked yet) but this should help make things more clear to people up front.

At the end of the day, people who type into text areas on the Internet are fickle and don't care about you, so don't take it too hard.

edit: just read your description. I think you should try changing it to a challenge, rather than a caution sign. Make it a call to action of sorts, see if people are up to the challenge rather than saying "you aren't up for it, don't bother."

dhissami
I appreciate the thoughts and advice. The app hasn't gotten bad reviews yet, so looks like the extreme difficulty is a win, at least for the time being. I changed the description to focus on the challenge. Thanks!
jeffmould
Challenging can be good. Look at flappy birds. Such as simple looking game, but so challenging it drew players in just to see if they could beat each other. Now if it is completely impossible that is a different story, but just enough challenge that makes players want to keep trying to beat their previous score or their friend's scores is a good combination. Look at the feedback flappy bird got, same situation where people complained it was too hard.

Kind of wish I had an iphone just so I could play it now :)

dhissami
One of the goals with my game was to slightly outdo the difficulty of Flappy Bird. Based on feedback, I know I outdid it, the question is by how much. One thing I do know is that the game is not impossible. Game Center leaderboard scores are slowly increasing.

Kind of wish I had an Android version so you could play it now. :)