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Show HN: I built a word game. My mom thinks it's great. What do you think?

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Re: Show HN: I built a word game. My mom thinks it's great. What do you think?

#211

Post by redbell »

Y444 wrote: post #71

Product manager ex. game designer with a number of puzzle/word game in operation here. - Having a timer (urgency) is usually not a very good idea for thinky games. If you insist on having a timer consider making it count upwards. - Additionally as other commenters mentioned is the game is a time trial it needs an explicit “Start” button. Also stop the timer when user is not playing e.g. reading the rules. - There’s n…

>..you are very serious about monetizing it

Ads aside, I'm curious to know what you think would be a good monetizing strategy for this kind of games (simple, online): subscriptions, sponsorship, donations..?

Re: Show HN: I built a word game. My mom thinks it's great. What do you think?

#213

Post by eps »

tartoran wrote: post #110

For anyone interested in word games there's a very fun and free wordle like game I ended up playing daily for the past year, check out https://www.threemagicwords.app/ I'm not the author so this is not a shameless plug, just a good game that is playable on your phone without installing any app.

This is really good. Thanks for mentioning it.

Re: Show HN: I built a word game. My mom thinks it's great. What do you think?

#214

Post by 2muchcoffeeman »

Y444 wrote: post #71

Product manager ex. game designer with a number of puzzle/word game in operation here. - Having a timer (urgency) is usually not a very good idea for thinky games. If you insist on having a timer consider making it count upwards. - Additionally as other commenters mentioned is the game is a time trial it needs an explicit “Start” button. Also stop the timer when user is not playing e.g. reading the rules. - There’s n…

I think the timer exists since there are only so many 5 letter words. And you have just shown players the letters.

You can complete this by just starting words with the letters available of which there are only so many combinations.

Re: Show HN: I built a word game. My mom thinks it's great. What do you think?

#215

Post by genezeta »

cookie_monsta wrote: post #205
MrJohz wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fwiw, I am one of the other two people with Firefox on Android and am not having this issue, so it might be a question of screen size rather than browser?

The other guy checking in here. No problems with FF on Android for me either

Ok then. I'll assume it's something on my part.

Re: Show HN: I built a word game. My mom thinks it's great. What do you think?

#216

Post by godelski »

esperent wrote: post #185
godelski wrote: post #142

First off, I love the game. Your mom isn't just placating you. It is fun. Second, I think given all this advice a real clear example can be seen by looking at NYT's Wordle[0]. Instructions are the first thing you see and cover the puzzle. You then click start. Importantly, the instructions have an example. While the puzzle is extremely intuitive, an example can eliminate almost any ambiguity (intuitive for most peopl…

> Personally, I like the timer. Personally, I hate the timer. It makes me feel stressed. I guessed the first word then decided to stop playing because of the timer. It's clear while some people appreciate it, many people won't play the game if it has a timer. So, make it optional.

There's a 5 minute timer you can effectively guess all permutations in that time. Ignore the timer. The only real limitation is coming from you.

There needs to be some limit like how wordle limits the number of guesses. The timer is good in that it can put pressure in especially considering how simple the game is. The long length means almost everyone has enough time

Re: Show HN: I built a word game. My mom thinks it's great. What do you think?

#218

Post by Kiro »

linsomniac wrote: post #11

A coworker and my wife and I have recently been really enjoying https://bracket.city which is a crossword-clue inspired word game with daily puzzles. It does take a little while to figure out, I'd recommend starting off asking for hints fairly often to decrease frustration, but after a couple weeks my wife and I are on a streak of 3 days of scoring 100.

I thought this was way too hard. I didn't figure out a single word and even failed the tutorial. Seeing everyone loving it makes me feel really stupid.

Re: Show HN: I built a word game. My mom thinks it's great. What do you think?

#219

Post by Y444 »

redbell wrote: post #211
Y444 wrote: post #71

Product manager ex. game designer with a number of puzzle/word game in operation here. - Having a timer (urgency) is usually not a very good idea for thinky games. If you insist on having a timer consider making it count upwards. - Additionally as other commenters mentioned is the game is a time trial it needs an explicit “Start” button. Also stop the timer when user is not playing e.g. reading the rules. - There’s n…

>..you are very serious about monetizing it Ads aside, I'm curious to know what you think would be a good monetizing strategy for this kind of games (simple, online): subscriptions, sponsorship, donations..?

Unfortunately, I think ads is the most realistic way to go.

Sponsorships and/or donations would be a nice “beer money” bonus.

Subscriptions are PITA and too much hassle unless you’re doing them via some third party and they won’t bring a good amount of money at the “online daily puzzle in a browser” scale.

There are more exotic ways like licensing your puzzles to other sites, like online newspaper puzzle pages, Puzzmo is going in this direction IIRC.

Re: Show HN: I built a word game. My mom thinks it's great. What do you think?

#220

Post by jamesdhutton »

It was fun. Couple of suggestions:

- It gave me “TCAAN” which stumped me. Afterwards I pasted it into the Internet Anagram Server, which failed to find any acronyms for it. So I can say with some confidence I don’t think it’s a valid word. Suggest making sure you’re using a dictionary similar to Wordle’s one.

- The game should reveal the solution at the end if the player fails to guess any words.

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