SRG Update #19

The past month has been a flurry of ‘devil is in the details’ work.

There are a lot of features in a game that are easy to overlook as a player, but really critical to the experience. These are often simple things that give you a feeling of ‘completeness’ in the work itself.

For example, I almost always play phone games muted. As a result, I did not feel it a priority to port over the SFX/music and related code/UX until quite recently. The game does feel more real as a result. Surprising, I know.

Another simple tweak that is easy to forget as a developer is the addition of tutorials. After all, you wrote the game – you know how to play it. As a player, however, the friction from that lack of intuitiveness may be enough to get you to close the game. Everyone is looking for reasons not to invest their attention in a thing.

Beyond the actual craft of building the game, I’ve been trying to understand the challenges of meeting GDPR requirements, even though the game doesn’t presently collect any data whatsoever. Eventually I’ll want analytics, and as a small developer I will likely have to rely on some ad-serving service. Both of these can create interesting compliance complexities.

All that said, except for a flurry of new tickets created by recent playtesting, I’m definitely in the home stretch. Yay!