2012–02–16 Release Checklist and “Polish”

Originally posted on landoblog.com [now deprecated] on February 16th, 2012. Retrieved courtesy of Wayback Machine — Internet Archive.

What makes a great game? Many things, engagement, artwork, immersion, controls, difficulty ramping, positive feedback, and a million more things.

Now, what makes a successful game? I can tell you now, this is an entirely different question. First, let’s define what successful means. If success is specifically a financial success, then there are three key factors at play, at least for the mobile market.

• Discovery
• Retention
• Monetization

A number of things can be said about each, and sadly, nothing is really related to gameplay here. Indirectly, yes, but overall, a design for a blockbuster iOS game can be built specifically as a tool to make money. Now, this does not mean a game is bad, but it’s a lot more design and a lot less freedom than some other more traditional models.

Next question: what sets a great and successful game apart from the rest? My answer is polish. Polish is the extra 200 hours put into a project to make sure the colors are perfect, the button are aligned perfectly, the animation is exactly the right length. These are what a “great” game consists of, thousands of little tweaks to define an experience. these might include:

• Perfect spelling and wording with any text.
• Buttons that have all needed states (up/down/highlight/inactive).
• Transitions between different views that infer the meaning and structure of the game.
• Animations when part of a view changes, such as rotation.
• Background animation when in menus, related to game status, device orientation, etc…
• Background sound effects and music for game and menus.
• Startup animation from splash screen.
• Multi-orientation themed splash screens.
• Button click noises that are contextual.
• Tutorial that is self paced and interactive or otherwise unknown to the user.
• Text is always on a background or somehow differentiated element.
• No standard interface elements used directly without customization.
• Always anti-aliased text.
• No solid colors without a texture or gradient.
• All items have standard and expected interactions (swipe, taps, etc).
• Minimal language use, pictorial is preferred.
• Localized for words and images.
• Views animate together and hold some kind of form (like flipsides).
• Any waiting should have a progress indicator and description of what is happening.
• Processes should happen in background, never lock the app interface.
• Help text when needed.
• All navigation and help text is as short and concise as possible.
• Options for turning on and off sounds, etc…

This is a good start for polish, but separately, there is another list of minimum requirements for “polish” of the business requirements of a game:

• Multiple language checks
• All orientations available
• Working with/without network connection
• Reachability works properly
• Working on each device type/resolution
• Icon sizing correct for all possible uses
• Backgrounding of app
• Phone call interruption at any point
• Operation during phone call/VoIP/etc
• Compatible with devices with no gps ability
• App works with Location services, push notifications, and address book access disallowed
• I18n text input
• Auto rate functional and correct URL
• All analytics actions recording
• Crash reporting through email functional
• Crash reporting tied to analytics
• NSzombies deactivated
• Tested on previous OS versions
• Device restrictions are set
• Privacy policy written and posted for ads and analytics used

Executing every item on both checklists is the first way to ensure your (otherwise perfect) game has a fighting chance for a top spot in the app store.