7DRL - web vs. native vs. ssh?

[ido]

As the 7DRL challenge nears upon us, I am wondering what I can do to make sure the maximum amount of people give my 7drl a go.

In the poll you will find 5 options, pick as many option as you want in case you are as likely to play a 7DRL in more than one form (assuming all else is equal).

Personally I vote for the two web versions, as it allows me to try out a game quickly without the need to mess around with copying files or running installers.

How about you?

[getter77]

Had to go with native executables/installers as I'm wary about online only things getting "lost" with time faaar more easily, and not being at all in the know on SSH.  Given the choice between the good though, I almost always prefer simple unpacks to games that need to install though.

[AgingMinotaur]

Games that can be played in the browser, I might give a go as long as they sound remotely interesting. A lot of browser games I'll only play once or twice though, thinking "neh" or "yeh" to myself before moving along. This also goes for games that I find quite good, and might have played more if I had them installed locally.

For more in-depth games, I prefer a local executable (or installer), for the reasons getter mentions, as well as because of the fact that I may now and then not be online (or on a slow line). Again like getter, I don't use ssh, and I'm not about to learn how to do so just to play a game (unless it sounds uniquely awesome).

For a 7DRL, web-based seems ok to me, but the thought of a more serious or exstensive game playable only through a web interface is a turn-off for me personally.

As always,
Minotauros

[XLambda]

I personally have nothing against a web-based game. It saves me some work if it's playable via browser or if the developer has put it on a server I can ssh into. Easy to do, no setup necessary.
A plus for every game is if it's available for download. I often go to places where no WLAN is available, and if I can play the game offline, it's even more awesome. But that's just awesomeness, not a must-have.

[Darren Grey]

As the 7DRL challenge nears upon us, I am wondering what I can do to make sure the maximum amount of people give my 7drl a go.

Maximum number of people or maximum numbers of roguelikers?  Because this poll will only answer the latter for you    Quite clearly a html5 thing will get more exposure overall since people are more willing to follow a link from Twitter or Reddit and play your game for a minute.  But I'd maybe argue that you'd get more interested people from the downloads.

[ido]

Maximum number of people or maximum numbers of roguelikers?  Because this poll will only answer the latter for you 

This is specifically about the 7drl challenge, so it's mostly about roguelike players.

Quite clearly a html5 thing will get more exposure overall since people are more willing to follow a link from Twitter or Reddit and play your game for a minute.  But I'd maybe argue that you'd get more interested people from the downloads.

Again, this is for a 7drl - I'm not searching for hardcore fans that will play my game for a year. We're talking dozens of games, most of which are honestly not very good. That means that good or not any particular 7drl really benefits from every person giving it a shot.

It's about easing the barrier of trying out the game more than anything, so that if my game is good at least it gets a chance of getting noticed in the crowd.

[guest509]

  Ido I'm going to play your game no matter what. But I'd like it if I could just download the zip. I tend to download a couple of games at once and try them all out. The ones I don't like I delete but the ones I do like I put in my 'games' file and come back to it when I need a game fix.

An installer can work as well as I'll just put the shortcut into my games file. But I prefer a .zip or .rar.

[Ancient]

Executables or SSH. Web based games are discouraging to play. Most dreadful cons of web stuff is requirement to install unity or Java, the stuff in browser tends to get slow or my favorite browsers (Opera, Midori, Arora) get unsupported. If I am going to spend my time playing a 7DRL it should work so in-browser games get tried last if at all.

Note in my case source code with makefile provided is equal to native executable. This stands even if language used for development is something exotic.

[ido]

Note in my case source code with makefile provided is equal to native executable. This stands even if language used for development is something exotic.

Yeah, that's the case with many linux users and only them, pretty much

[flend]

I think browser is a great format for a short 7DRL - when there might not be a lot of game, it's good to lower the barrier to entry as much as possible. Nowadays, having to download, unzip and choose where to put a game is a big barrier (compared to installers, mobile phone markets, steam etc.)

Personally (if I get around to it this year) I'm aiming for Android, simply because I want a fun short roguelike that's compatible with my aged phone.

-flend

[pat]

web based is ok but for some reason i don't take games in that format as seriously, ssh is ok but a bit annoying because i don't use it often, and worst of all is installers, an executable in a folder i can extract easily without anything else happening imho

[purestrain]

I prefer a native executable or a flash/java game - though android is much more preferred by me :-)

[NeedsFoodBadly]

Well, Java/Flash/HTML5 are certainly more convenient for people that want a quick fix but rarely have I seen browser playable roguelikes implemented as well as downloadable ones such as say, DoomRL (before or after the graphic update) for example.

If you want people to download your game then you really need to provide some good teaser/color text, a list of game features and some good screenshots.  Having no screenshots of your game, even if it is ASCII based is often off-putting for people.  Even if you're doing an ASCII based RL, try sprucing up your game UI or even using a graphical UI surrounding your ASCII game to pique people's interest.

Also, implementing a simple to use, streamlined and efficient UI will also get people's attention. 
If people have to read a 300 page Nethack-ish manual (The Spoilers were actually misnamed.  They should have been called INSTRUCTIONS) to figure out how to play your game that's also going to put them off.