The Bookish Games: Feedback Results

Now that a couple of weeks have passed, it is time to discuss the results of the feedback we received!

Thirteen people were kind enough to submit the feedback form with each person having played at least one edition of The Bookish Games in the past. While that’s not a massive number, I’m happy with it. We’ve had over 100 people participate in The Bookish Games since its launch five years ago, but many of those players have been inactive since the relaunch. I’m assuming everyone who chose to fill the form out is still following along with the games, even if they’re just spectating, and as those are the people that will be affected by any changes that take place as a result of this feedback their opinions matter most to me right now.

Oh, but if you DID want to submit the feedback form and just forgot over the last few weeks, don’t worry, it’s still open and accepting responses. Visit this link and provide your input.

Twitter Account

I’m glad to see that the addition of The Bookish Games Twitter account has been appreciated by players so will definitely continue utilising Twitter for future editions of The Bookish Games.

Annoying players by tagging them in status updates on Twitter was one of my main concerns with the account, so I’m glad to see such a positive response for this question. I will continue to tag players during future updates, unless a player is using an alias. (As Beth mentioned in the comments of the last feedback post, tagging Twitter accounts connected with aliases would sort of defeat the point.)

As you can see, the responses to this question are a bit spread out with an equal percentage of players for and against blog post promotion. I think as a compromise I will take the middle option: I will promote the blog posts of The Bookish Games participants, but only if they mention The Bookish Games or relate to the theme of the current edition.

If you would like to keep up with what fellow participants are posting, I do create a public Twitter list at the start of each edition of The Bookish Games with all participants as members. Follow it! I devoted a section of my Tweetdeck to the Vicious list last game so I could keep track of all participants and see what was going on, I found it helpful.

I feel like I’m still at a little bit of a lost when it comes to this question. I have had concerns brought up to me in private, which is why I decided to include it in the feedback form, but it seems the majority of players aren’t bothered.  As I still am not convinced it’s the best option for the game, I’m going to sit on this one a bit longer.

Alias Option

As two-thirds of the respondents voted for some variation of “yes”, I will offer aliases as an option for the next edition of The Bookish Games. It might not be a permanent option for all future editions of the game though, we’ll give it a test run and see how it works first.

Inactive Players

Thank you to all who provided feedback to this question, as I know open-ended responses require more effort than just ticking an option!

Based on the responses above, I will double the comment minimum to four comments per Day and include an emphasis on the actual amount of time this game requires. I will also include some kind of tick box for prospective players to mark confirming that they are aware of the time commitment prior to signing up.

I also really like that last suggestion of posting player interviews in the lull between games in which players are able to candidly share their thoughts on The Bookish Games. It might not happen during this break as I’ve been busy with other projects and it’s almost time to launch sign-ups for our next edition, but I do plan on implementing it in the future. So whoever suggested that, thanks!

Replacment Players

I’ve always felt like players who were eliminated from the game shouldn’t be allowed to re-enter the Game, but it seems a majority of players would prefer that over anything else. As a result, I think there will now be a new option when players are eliminated from The Bookish Games: you can either choose to join the Spectator chat as usual where you can discuss the events of the game with spectators, other eliminated players, and the moderators OR you can be added to the replacement waitlist.

I like this option because I do believe it is better to return to the game without access to the Spectator chat page as discussion often revolves around things not noticed or commented on within the daily game chat. It also means that those who were eliminated during the first few Days or Nights would have a better chance of returning to the game, if they so desire.

Players who return to the game would be required to use an alias though, just to help limit confusion.

Smaller Games

I’m glad to see that for the most part players are happy no matter what the size of the player base. I think we will continue planning games with a similar player base for now, but may explore a smaller game option in the future.

Day/Night Lengths

As the game currently stands, I only have twelve hours to sort out everything between the end of a Night and the start of the following Day (update the graphics, write the blog post, contact elimianted players, let players with special powers know the results of their actions, update the current edition game page, schedule tweets, etc.). It can all be a bit much, especially when those twelve hours typically fall over the time I prefer to be sleeping. As a result I will be taking twelve hours from the Day, as suggested by a handful of players above, and shifting it to that “Twilight” phase to make it a little easier for us moderators.

With a full day devoted for mod-work, I am open to the idea of shifting the Day/Night phases to different days of the week. The actual deadline times will have to remain the same as they’re the easiest for me to ensure that I’m around when all the action happens, but if shifting the days would make it easier for players I’m down. Think about what day you’re most likely to be available for a chaotic deadline and vote in the poll below (all times are GMT):

The Next Edition

As mentioned in the previous post, Inge and I are planning a Nevernight edition so expect that in the near future, but thanks to your votes we will be launching the Bring Your Own Character edition first! I have a feeling it’s going to be super chaotic but also a lot of fun so am looking forward to it. Start brainstorming your characters/powers now, if you haven’t already…

It looks like the next edition of The Bookish Games will be here before you know it. We’ll start sign ups for The Bookish Games: Bring Your Own Character edition the first week of January with the games launching the week of the 13th.

And for those of you who submitted interest in and ideas for co-hosting a future edition of The Bookish Games, stay tuned! As we only tend to get through four games a year with our current player base, it might be a while before I can take you up on your ideas, but I have them all saved for future reference. You won’t be forgotten!

Until Next Time…

Thanks again for taking the time to fill out The Bookish Games feedback form, for those of you who did. I appreciate any and all feedback in order to make this the best experience it can be. And oh yes, I can’t wait for the madness to start all over again. It ended much too quick last edition.

If you haven’t joined our mailing list yet, be sure to sign up! I’ll be sending an email out with information for when the sign-ups for the next edition go live when it’s closer to the time, so it’s the best place to be if you want to get involved. (Or, you know, just follow The Bookish Games twitter account. I usually post everything on there too.)