Grass Roots Efforts To Promote Wiz Development?

[iprice]

It's not about hero worship or ego-stroking or filling in tax-returns, but letting a developer know that a user has enjoyed (or not) a piece of FREE software that that someone has spent many hours working on. Simple as that. A process that takes as little as one minute. But obviously for people like you, that's too much of your oh-so busy life.

But obviously your "It's there, it's free, therefore I'll take it" attitude is the problem with the world today.

Whats a matter with having a little fun with your users?

WTF is that supposed to mean? The whole point of the games that the devs create is for the user to have fun, isn't it?

As for Google, that's a multi-billion dollar company. Many devs here are one-man armies, who would rather spend time creating games for ungrateful people like you than dull, soul-sucking websites that stroke their egos.

As for Kool-Aid - we don't get it in this country as far as I'm aware and I'm long past being a child.

And even if Orkie is pessimistic (as you say), that doesn't make him wrong.

If you wish to hurl abuse, then go for it. Just makes you look even more immature than I gave you credit for.

 

[mhadf]

Username password for a simple feedback form is getting to be too much for the download and run types.

Torrentz and blog commenting show that insecure systems are more likely to get people to respond with feedback (both good and bad). Requiring registration is beyond what some people will accept.
Putting in place a simple rating system (out of 10) will get more feedback than a requiring registration.

I registered on the forum, for help but also to properly thank the developers that have been working on projects for the Wiz. Most people won't.

If you set the comment form to require an email address and captcha and then send an authorisation email for the comment it will get more feedback than the current system. Yes I understand the limited of protection from SPAM, but that is where people that want to do something for the community can help.

 

[Alex.]

Bah, you're pathetic. Are you a developer or aren't you? If your users do not communicate: DO NOT BLAME YOUR USERS. A good developer, with a good title, will get feedback. Its proven. A fact.

You're all heart torpor. And what exactly would be a good title, or a good developer for that matter? Please tell us, I genuinely want to know.

Make it easier? Hell yes you can make it easier; put feedback *in the game*.. geeze. Forums, registration? Does your game just handle it all for your users, or do they have to make believe they're filing their taxes, just to gain the '[privilege]' of being able to worship their favourite developers?

A consistent portion of the people who download software are already registered on these forums or the archive, so leaving a little thank-you note would cost them only seconds - in return for the hours of hard work that went into making the software they like.

If every person who opened a topic asking for help or requesting a port would also take the time to say thanks for some of the things which were already done, things would be a lot better. Part of the fun in making freeware games is getting your users' reactions.

Putting in place a simple rating system (out of 10) will get more feedback than a requiring registration.

We had such a rating system on the GP2X and Gp32 archives, and a group of persistent idiots just kept giving their favourite emulators 10/10 and everything else, no matter the category, 1/10.

 

[Sphinxter]

You know what developers find attractive? Good quality well designed fully functioning hardware with adequate drivers. Produce that and they will come.

 

[torpor]

And what exactly would be a good title, or a good developer for that matter? Please tell us, I genuinely want to know.

Go to Android market place. Take your pick from any of the top-10 games. They all have tons and tons of feedback.

I've been involved in a few Android apps .. and we got thousands of great responses.

The fact is, you guys who say it will "never" happen just aren't being very creative about the issue. Don't worry .. some developer will come along and teach you a lesson, sooner or later.

 

[Alex.]

And what exactly would be a good title, or a good developer for that matter? Please tell us, I genuinely want to know.

Go to Android market place. Take your pick from any of the top-10 games. They all have tons and tons of feedback.

I've been involved in a few Android apps .. and we got thousands of great responses.

The fact is, you guys who say it will "never" happen just aren't being very creative about the issue. Don't worry .. some developer will come along and teach you a lesson, sooner or later.

You didn't answer my question!

Edit: Why are you so hostile? You've been here for nearly four years, can't you tell that we're all people working on stuff for fun and for entertaining others? Why do you feel the need to be so scathing?

 

[gruso]

I find the feedback topic an interesting one. I'd love to see measures in place to facilitate more of it. It was discussed at length over a year ago in the Pandora forum, but nothing really came of it. While torpor is being unnecessarily venomous here, I think he raises a valid point or two.

The sad fact is, the current system (comments in the archive + forum threads) isn't giving you guys enough feedback. Most people don't consider themselves beta testers or even regular forum posters. They might think you and your game are fabulous, but they're more likely to tell ten mates than tell you. They don't even know their feedback would be valued - seriously! People just want to play games. They're not bad or selfish people, it's just that its doesn't enter their mind to give feedback. So put it in their mind. Mandatory login for the file archives would be a good start. User download history would be the real kicker.

I used to grab 5-10 new things from the archive, install, and test over the course of a day (on trains, at work). I'd have to list the new apps somewhere, so later on I could get online, find each one again, and leave a message. It's a fair bit of messing around, and 99% of people won't do it. But give them a history/nag list when they log in to the archives to grab their next download, and feedback will increase tenfold.

I guess it's a matter of whether or not the archive software is capable of it.

 

[Exophase]

I can understand wanting feedback, but I'm a little puzzled at wanting thanks more than money. Not that everyone needs money, but isn't someone willing to spend money on something (when there are so many other things they could be buying instead) a pretty significant indication that they think the game is worth something?

As far as leaving comments goes, maybe it doesn't happen as much as people would like because doing so is not very direct. Most people don't download things from release threads, don't bother with posting on gp2x.de because they know it's not really routinely read (I don't routinely read it anyway) and aren't going to come here and make a topic for it because that's just too much. People say thanks for emulators, but it's often because it's balanced off with a complaint about their favorite game not working or a feature they must have not being present. People have less to ask for with games, unless it's outright broken.

That, or a lot of people downloaded it and just didn't like it. Sorry, but that's a risk you take. When you make an emulator that risk isn't there (unless the emulator sucks) because people already have a guaranteed use for it in mind when they grab it. They have a better chance of being satisfied with it than with just about anything else they can download, or if they don't care about the platform they won't bother. Even the bad things about it can be pretty objectively spelled out by others in advance. It's much easier to post "this emulator is too slow" or "everything played great!" than to give a conscientious review of a game, which is what asking for feedback sorta is.

 

[DaveC]

And what exactly would be a good title, or a good developer for that matter? Please tell us, I genuinely want to know.

Go to Android market place. Take your pick from any of the top-10 games. They all have tons and tons of feedback.

I've been involved in a few Android apps .. and we got thousands of great responses.

The fact is, you guys who say it will "never" happen just aren't being very creative about the issue. Don't worry .. some developer will come along and teach you a lesson, sooner or later.

Well maybe Android based systems are much more abundant than GP2X, Wiz,Pandora etc are. I am sure there is more feedback for iPhone apps too. That is a little unfair though, GPH handhelds can't compete in popularity to Android or PSP and DS for that matter.

I do agree there should be more feedback than there is though. Look at the homebrew section, there are a grand total of three topics there and none are game related. If you look there you would think there were no HB games. Many times people will post their game release in "news" but that gets bumped off the list pretty fast. This would mean it is "off the radar" pretty quickly. I think personally that if HB releases were announced in the HB section, they would stay longer and get more action. If a topic for each game was opened in the HB section it would be pretty easy for us to make comments, and even notice the games/apps more.

On and by the way to some suggesting it, I think mandatory registration is a TERRIBLE idea to DL apps. I know I hate it and it is annoying. More usernames, more passwords to remember, and a list of information to give out. I say meh to that.

 

[gruso]

I know, mandatory login is a pretty hateful thing. Perhaps an alternative is to ditch the login requirement, open up comments to all visitors, and generate cookie-based history lists.

And that's the advantage that appstores have - you're always signed in. Which makes comparisons to this scene and the Android market pretty unfair.

 

[aavina2]

I just bought the Wiz last night, and have read through this thread. I'm planning on eventually developing for it after playing with it for a bit. After reading this thread, I also plan on giving feedback on the games/apps I download and play. Just letting you guys know there's at least one person that cares

 

[Sphinxter]

Oh c'mon, user feedback never wrote a stinking game and if fan adulation is the sole motivator no game would *ever* be written period. Nobody codes for glamour and hero worship except the extremely delusional, shit just aint gonna happen. GPH assumed their usual posture of head up ass and ruined the thing in the design phase with a bad choice of parts and then damned it with every step they took to make it work. Is it that surprising gp2x developers aren't flocking to it? Don't blame a non-existent handheld either, the wiz situation is all purely on GPH, they could have done it right but they didn't. Want lots of feedback either use a good panel of qualified testers who give regular reports or write some really bad software, otherwise forget about it.