Why am I building this?
The website is only accessible to those who have used it before. This may be intentional (especially from the home screen) but as you progress, I believe there are some tiny changes that could make a big difference:
Who am I building it for?
When will it be used?
Where will it be used?
How could I measure it?
The really.boring.website allows you to play the game of categories with friends (or strangers) online.
In the game, a random letter of the alphabet is visible at the top left of the screen, and beneath that are rows of category descriptions for which you have to think of a word that matches the description. The word you input must begin with the letter at the top of the screen.
The game is played by creating a room (public or private) with 2 or more players. Once the leader clicks start, a timer of 90 seconds is set and everyone has 90 seconds to complete the game.
Once the game is up each player is given the opportunity to vote on the other players words and give or deduct a point for each word. The player with the most positive points wins.
I like playing the game but I’ve noticed there’s always a bit of a learning curve for new players. It’s not a steep curve but those who have played the game before often have to explain what the game is about to newcomers and I believe there are ways this can be improved.
Start or Enter a Room
Once you have entered your preferred username, the game asks you to “Enter a Room Name”, if you are new to the game, you may not realise that you could also start a new room via the same field. So I would change it to “Start or Enter a Room” and the placeholder in the field will be “Room Name”
Join Public Room
If you do not want to start a room or if you do not have a room name, you can join a public room which is displayed in the lobby. However, there is a little UX issue. You can only realistically participate in a game with status “waiting”. This means games with status “voting” will only make you an observer as you cannot participate in a game in the voting stage.
I believe that though the status of each room may be good, players should only be able to join games they can participate in. This can be indicated with a “Join” link or button.
Brief Instructions on how to play
In the lobby of the game, before you choose to play there is some information provided to the right of the screen. It currently includes a player’s logs (though nice to see, is not useful). I believe this side of the screen should include a brief set of instructions on how to play.
The right side of the screen also includes the developer’s updates which I think is useful.
Starting the game
In the popular game Among Us, when a user chooses to start the game, a splash screen is shown to all other players indicating the game is about to start. This is quite common amongst most games.
I believe this will be useful in really.boring.website as it will allow everyone to be ready and start at the same time. I believe a simple 5 second countdown should do the trick.
Timer for Voting
Once the timer for the current game is 0:00, each player gets the chance to vote on the other players’ words. A player can choose to subtract points, reward points or abstain from voting. One major point of pain is how long a vote should take and who is in charge of clicking “Next”. I believe a timer here would suffice.
If a timer is set for 30 seconds, it allows people to discuss (if on a call) as well as give them ample time to vote. If a person is designated to click next then it often requires the designated player to ask if everyone is fine with going to the next question. This is often tedious and cumbersome. I believe players will benefit highly from a timer.
Restart
In certain situations, players may not be ready to start even though they have indicated they are ready. This can often occur if there is a malfunction or the player is distracted by other worldly things. In this case, players often have to leave the room in order to start again. A restart button would be beneficial for this use case.
A restart button is also beneficial for other use cases, but I thought the above was the most compelling one.
