Ouya Store design

MangoDown · January 2013

Hey Everyone!

As all of you I am as excited about Ouya as can be! Being an indie developer myself (Mango Down! with two of my friends) and studying the games industry's ecosystem, I came into contact with the people from Ouya on IndieCade where our game Catch-22 was showed.

We already decided to bring our game to Ouya, but having studied current app stores I also want to contribute in building a sustainable app store that offers the best for all parties (platform holder, developers AND end users). Because being indie is all about passing the torch for the next one, and Ouya is in my opinion as indie as can be. Especially with the open, positive attitude they have towards new ideas.

For many developers getting noticed is a big issue since we all know that getting featured is a matter of life and death for your game. Especially for small developers this is an issue which I believe can be solved partially from the inside of a platform, since they don't have big marketing budgets or inside connections to make that happen.

This makes discovering great games a pain for "customers" (hate that word because you start creating something for a human being, and afterwards he/she becomes a customer), and this is also a negative side affect for the platform holder.

My goals is to figure out and generate many ideas for the app store and to create sustainable solutions for the Ouya app store. And I would love to bring everyone in on this discussion and to crack some hard nuts that many of the present app stores are crippled by.

I'm looking forward to continuing this discussion with you and create some really great ideas for the platform that will benefit everyone that uses the Ouya platform!

Greetings,

Guus (Dutch for Gus)

brianbraatz · January 2013

simple quick thought- have a "I feel lucky" button kinda like google has-when you click it- it shows you a random game's "page"....

also-maybe the ability to vote up or down the game might be useful-but that comes with it's problems..

TassosNoDensetsu · January 2013

I'm not sure how they manage on amazon, but they always seem to show me stuff that I would like to buy.

So yeah, something like amazon where there is a "You my like blah" that is very often accurate"

^_^

SpoonThumb · January 2013

I think there is another thread on these forums where this got discussed before, but here is what I think ought to happen:

1. No Charts (Top 100 downloaded)

These entrench the position of big or established developers. Games already high in the chart get the most visibility and downloads, meaning you either need to get incredibly lucky or spend a huge amount of time/money on marketing to get into the top apps. If you already have popular apps, you can cross promote as well.

2. Personalised Recommendations

Amazon does this, as do other online retailers. Using your previous browsing and purchase history along with that of other users to do things like "People who bought this also bought..." "Other similar items" "Your Recent History" and quite a few more. Each serves a different purpose. The "Your recent histry" reminds you of things you were looking at, but perhaps for some reason didn't buy straight away. When you see it again, you think "oh, I wated to buy that, but forgot about it. I'll buy it now"

The limits are the limits of your imagination about how you can use the data at your fingertips

3. Gamified User Review System

Voting up and down reviews and reviewers, and being able to see reviewers other reviews and how they were scored

4. Better categories

Google Play categories in particular are useless and totally unhelpful to both developers and users. They still look like the categories that some google engineer quickly dreamed up because they needed something for the test / beta version

5. Transparent "Featured App"

Make it transparent what the procedure is for applying for a featured app slot, and what the criteria are for getting selected. Not just "one of the Apple team thought it was cool / has a mate who just made an app"

I could go on like this for hours. There are probably dozens more things I could add if you like?

But really, bricks and mortar retailers like walmart or best buy spend millions on how to lay out a store. People have whole careers on designing "customer experiences". Apple and Google seem to be oblivious to any of this. The apps stores are like giant warehouses where all the products are just in a big heap in the middle of the floor, and it's up to customers to just dig through and find what they want. The are total disaster zones.

Why do games companies spend millions on analytics when the markets they are relying on to get people to download the app in the first place have clearly never done any sort of analysis on their app stores

Delpee · January 2013

@MangoDown Dutch people in the house! Do you have a website?

I must agree with SpoonThumb, those are some great ideas! Hope some Boxer sees this :).

noct · January 2013

Great ideas SpoonThumb!

Here's a bit of an oddball one, but I'd love to be able to get recommendations from specific users. In a nutshell, game recommendations ala Twitter. If a user recommends a game, it goes into their feed, and users following them can see it in a list. I find certain popular bloggers and youtube channel's tastes match up well with mine, and getting a direct feed right in the console store would be fantastic. It's one thing for an algorithm to recommend me something, it's another when someone who's opinion I trust does.

Borrow any and all good ideas from Steam as well. They let you know what you're friends are playing, purchasing, and recommending (though probably not as well as they should, it's a bit tucked away).

MangoDown · January 2013

Hey @SpoonThumb! Thanks for your input! Please post as many as you like and want since these things make a huge difference for the future of how app stores can be. The people from OUYA are very open about this since you probably have the feeling that it doesn't matter that much since they don't listen. These guys do!

I totally agree with you on point 2; personalised recommendations. In addition to @noct I thought of people or profiles (persona's) that you can follow. Allmost like a blog style where you can follow along with some people who allways seem to find the coolest games and news. Next to that, it's process many are already familiar with due to twitter, facebook etc.

Recommendations through algorithm sucks in my opinion because I have yet to find a system that truly shows me what I like since most if it is promoted junk. It needs to be a "clean" system that can't be manipulated. Next to that, if users go look for stuff that other people like they are likely to be more engaged and willing to try out new games and eventually buy it since their source is trusted because they chose to follow that person. Cause with other stores there isn't an alternative to that "genie", and you can easily look for other people who you find to have a similar taste and who you trust.

Everyone should be able to do this since I would love to follow along with some of my friends who have the same taste and interest as I do, as well as to follow some other gamers that seem to pick games I like. Player ratings could be based on involvement (like forums) where you have ranks for how many posts you do (platform side), and also by how many people follow you (end user side) and give you a thumbs up (likes / friends). If someone finds a game they like and want to share it with their friends, everyone in their list (or selection) gets that game in their recommendations list from which you can easily access and download the game. This could lead to more natural discoverability.

From within the store I would like to see a user generated section where the most "influential" people can post their picks, and where store recommendations can be featured alongside the games that are featured by OUYA. This way discovering people and games you like can be made more accessible and discoverable for new OUYA users, and a great source for scoring and finding gems that would otherwise be covered by successful games and huge marketing budgets. I think it's key to have part of the platform which can't be influenced or manipulated solely the numbers of downloads, the platform holders or developers alike, and that stand side to side with big titles and games.

Other stuff I have been thinking about is a hall of fame where games have been rated/bought so much, that they have established a prominent position as one of the best games on the platform. If you do make it into this section, then you will not be featured any more on other parts of the store and in turn make way for new games that could use that space to get discovered. It's like a natural ecosystem where some games just "die" in the store, but are allways remembered and honered in "heaven". This "heaven" does have a prominent place in the store so if you do get here, it's forever ;)

Allmost like birth > life > glorious death.

I know this discussion is not structured at all at this point but we need to start somewhere. @SpoonThumb and all others, keep in touch and let's keep this discourse ongoing! It's great to see many of you think likewise!

mjoyner · January 2013

I definitely like the idea of no up front "top 100 downloaded" list as a push mechanism for app/game selection.

Maybe limit the number apps a person can vote on in a day (up or down) to reduce votes for hire schemes.

Simple algorithm using apps that you voted for that other people also voted, showing apps they liked you haven't installed yet.

brianbraatz · January 2013

maybe your up and down votes could also get posted to twitter and fb?

raffibag · January 2013

Wow - this is all great stuff. We've actually have been discussing a lot of the ideas you are now floating around -- but are also getting some great ideas from this thread. Though we have big plans for our store, we agree that the key to its success will be the discoverability of new games and personalized recommendations. Mostly, our plan is to work with our devs and gamers to ensure that the store, as MangoDown put it, "offers the best for all parties." Can't wait to share with you some of the things we're working on (both for launch as well as for the longer-term -- when we have a larger data set to work with!).

MangoDown · January 2013

@raffibag That sounds great! I know you probably can't discuss things in detail on here but is there any way you could outline some topics that you guys are discussing a.t.m.? It would help us a great deal to give you guys some more input!

arcticdog · January 2013

The ability to respond to user feedback might be useful too. The review systems in other app stores lack this feature.

Here's a recent anecdote.

https://twitter.com/shanselman/status/289110600766861312

Granted, game reviews are going to be highly opinionated most of the time, but to let a user know they're acknowledged for finding a bug and you're committed to making it right might be nice.

noct · January 2013

On the topic of user feedback, it would be nice if users were given the choice between writing a review and providing a rating.

Allowing both tends to result in immature users making demands in return for stars, and a well-written review is more informative than any attached star rating anyway.

VicariousEnt · January 2013

At the very least, please make sure the system can't be manipulated. The "black market" russian companies that manipulate your chart position for cash thing that has plagued the mobile phone market is discusting.

I like alot of the ideas here, but at the end of the day an indie dev's game's success is still going to come down to its quality and what kind of social media marketing can be mustered to get a strong performance out of the gate. If we could do something about the 30 day make it or break it time period that the Play store suffers from, that would be great though. Its also going to come down to how many games we have to compete with, the mobile market is pretty flooded as is. I'm sure theres a huge flood of phone game ports coming our way.

Also looking forward to hearing just how the $700 promotion for 1 year of marketing support is going to work (especially with something like 1000 of these packages out there).

SpoonThumb · January 2013

With player recommendations, again going back to Amazon, the idea of lists works because they tend to be constructed along a particular theme "Best sci-fi games" "Best Platformers" rather than merely "My Favourite Games". You don't know the person who made the "My Favourites" list, so how are you going to be able to judge if their taste in games is similar to yours?

Equally, lists get bumped up to the top are ones that include games you've already played or looked at in the search, so that again it can work as a sort of player-created "If you liked this, you may like that", rather than just what some algorithm thought you might like

noct · January 2013

SpoonThumb said:

With player recommendations, again going back to Amazon, the idea of lists works because they tend to be constructed along a particular theme "Best sci-fi games" "Best Platformers" rather than merely "My Favourite Games". You don't know the person who made the "My Favourites" list, so how are you going to be able to judge if their taste in games is similar to yours?

The same way I judge someone's taste via their blog/videos/etc., by looking for commonalities in what they like and what I like. Additionally, my suggestion was based on the idea that you *do* know the person, either because you know them directly, or because they're popular via some other channel (TotalBiscuit, etc.).

arcticdog · January 2013

arcticdog said:

The ability to respond to user feedback might be useful too. The review systems in other app stores lack this feature.

Here's a recent anecdote.
https://twitter.com/shanselman/status/289110600766861312

Granted, game reviews are going to be highly opinionated most of the time, but to let a user know they're acknowledged for finding a bug and you're committed to making it right might be nice.

Looks like Google is doing this:

http://www.droid-life.com/2013/01/09/google-adds-ability-for-all-developers-to-reply-to-comments-in-play-store/

Jack_Mcslay · January 2013

I think there could also be a userbase growth ranking.

For instance, say game A has 1000000 downloads total and game B has only 1000 downloads. Then, in a certain week, game A makes 10000 downloads while B makes only 100 downloads. Game A will rank much lower than game B because the user base grown only by 1%, while game B grew 10%. This will allow to show interesting new games while keeping stablished successes away from the top charts.

Hicsy · January 2013

edit: less angry rewrite
I admire the OP for a more formal thread created for store discussion, but could not disagree more with a lot of what followed. Forgive me for chopping but this didn't help in the OP
"Especially for small developers... don't have big marketing budgets... makes discovering great games a pain." (again @MangoDown i am not having a dig at you, just the subjective, un-referenced "suggestions" that followed)

It's almost as if the direction is already a case of "if the front page is all Angry Birds, Minecraft, and Command & Conquer it wont be fair to me". If you think about it; that's already contradictory - you are trying to BIAS front-page against big (important) partners - who believe it or not, have actually made great games. We are looking for ways to INCLUDE more informative choices, not just exclude the chart-toppers.

Firstly, please make sure you understand a basic sales funnel: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Purchase_funnel
Next you need to know what a landing page aims to achieve:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landing_page
I am not going to give specifics lessons on the above, to have weight in this conversation you need to understand the core concepts

Value:
This is not necessarily just a $$ figure, it is the VALUE a customer puts in a product for a future purchase. "i don't need it" - less value. "Thats cheaper than other options" - more value.

Trust:

The best way for best way to obtain trust is from past experience, or past experience from an already trusted source. Sorry @SpoonThumb, you have already missed the point here - suggestions will NEED to be made! If a customer does not already know a title, or if friends have not suggested it then there HAS to be an "Editors Picks" pane - leveraging trust of the "OUYA" name. Ratings are OK, but can't be part of the mainstream system (later).

Availability:

This is not just the MagicFruitCo™ case of "It might run out, so buy now", or "Buy her gold because it's rare". Direct content-delivery means product is delivered almost instantly - highly available. Too many options or too many steps is therefor reducing availability; will lead a customer to take "the easy option" (not buying, or buying the cheapest / generic / highest ranked).

Call-to-arms
Ideally there will be a raving customer demanding to buy something - but for the 99% it means there will need to be a prompt for purchase. This will get the customer to evaluate what they have just seen and make a purchase decision. More than 3 choices starts to get too hard, and most people can only process 7 things at a time.

SO?
OUYA's main importance is Speed / Ease. Without leveraging the availability of "right now" service, the value and everything else goes out the window and users start to stop or make "boxed decisions" (ill just get the chart-topper, or I'll buy another time). This also means that OUYA must have ability to purchase easily - so the default button on game's landing page is 'install' and maybe optionally one publisher-set 'default' purchase button - the rest hidden in a subfolder
Reviews are great at establishing trust, but this is still trust of OTHERS (last priority). The free demo already assists priority #1 - themselves. Friend's purchases/suggestions is the next most trusted and the "Editor's Picks" is the next best as OUYA is already trusted aswell.
Charts are a great fall-back and this doesn't have to be "most downloads" as recently mentioned.

bluecollarart · January 2013

Hicsy said:

This also means that OUYA must have ability to purchase easily - so the default button on game's landing page is 'install' and maybe optionally one publisher-set 'default' purchase button - the rest hidden in a subfolder

This sounds like a really great idea. I'm also interested in your ideas about charts. You mentioned that charts don't need to be "most downloads". What sorts of alternatives do you have in mind?

Hicsy · January 2013

Edit: Sppeelng
My suggestion:

!!! Get rid of "Store" this was mistake #1

I see 2 "Landing pages" in the sales funnel - the Dashboard, and the "game page" ("app page"). Both should be dynamic, based on where the user came from and what they already own.

The user can set preference to have "Games" or "Apps" for the default Dashboard page containing:
1/ This is where "suggestions" start (maybe 50% of space)

2/ Social feed 25% (recent friend purchases, recent notifications, achievements(later))
3/ Most recent used game(app) link

4/ a button each for "my games/apps" and "browse more games/apps".

The idea here is that the shopping experience has started straight away (wide funnel). If a user then chooses to press "browse more games/apps" then you can narrow your funnel with categories, friend's games, more suggestion types & charts.
If the user has just returned from a game/app then obviously the "landing page" will be of that category and SOME suggestions will be based around that last used product (more content if available otherwise similar items)

The Game Page / App Page will be a page for that game. If the user does not have this installed it will show the generic sales page:

- The Header with multimedia thumbnails underneath

- A review score summary (links to further reviews)

- Badges (top developer, new release, special etc)

- Game overview (# players etc)

- Install Button (main focus)

- Default purchase button

- Link to more purchases
- An about game section

- Related Suggestions (last)
If the user already has it installed then put more emphasis on web links, expansion packs / subscriptions, upcoming achievements... as well as rate/feedback/recommend/uninstall buttons.

The feedback ideas mentioned seem good (youtube style suggestions + rankup/down) but too much info will turn customers away - hence i think should be a sub-menu/section
Lists/Charts could include Trending, Newest, Top Downloads, Top Rated, Editor's Picks, Friend's (and followed) Favourites (compiled automatically from their suggestions and ratings), A-Z Games, A-Z Genres, Addons for games you own, and others suggested in this thread like: recommended for you - The top suggestions based on games/apps you use already or that other users bought with similar interests

noct · January 2013

Hicsy said:

edit: less angry rewrite
I admire the OP for a more formal thread created for store discussion, but could not disagree more with a lot of what followed. Forgive me for chopping but this didn't help in the OP
"Especially for small developers... don't have big marketing budgets... makes discovering great games a pain."

It's almost as if the direction is already a case of "if the front page is all Angry Birds, Minecraft, and Command & Conquer it wont be fair to me". If you think about it; that's already contradictory - you are trying to BIAS front-page against big (important) partners - who believe it or not, have actually made great games. We are looking for ways to INCLUDE more informative choices, not just exclude the chart-toppers.

Not exactly. I believe the intent is to bias the store away from lists based on metrics that are either arbitrary and unfair (Apple's picks), or based on sales, a metric that stagnates lists because the list itself directs more sales to those titles.

Furthermore, a large problem with sales based lists is the fact that they completely ignore the fact that even popular preferences vary based on demographics. It's biasing sales towards the intersection of many sets, and it gets successively worse as demographics who's needs are not being met make fewer purchases.

The goal of a good store is to help people find products they would want to buy, and will be satisfied with. Remember the OUYA store doesn't charge for downloads and all games come with playable portions. We want those download queues full! People should never have to stare at the same stagnant lists of titles and walk away empty-queued.

Hicsy · January 2013

@noct Yeah I totally agree - but i think the generic lists and charts still DO have a place, just nested further in the store. But my issue is that i think all the main pages actually DO need to be influenced by OUYA's marketing team. If they're unfair then its something to be brought up with them, but "editors pics" could just as easily be independent top-rated reviewers suggestions etc.

oohh i just thought of another category:
"Unrated" "Undiscovered" @noct

This could even be a wildcard that randomly pops up in areas such as main screen

It could be en entire category, or just a single completely random game that has not been rated/reviewed yet. Obviously if there are none at that moment unrated/untried then it could throw up a random title that has less than 100 installs and <30% thumbs down's

The idea is to entice players to try something new (why not, its free!) - and it totally plays hand-in-hand with the weighted-reviewer thing (rate lots of random games, get a badge)

noct · January 2013

@Hicsy I like your dashboard idea!

Might I suggest though, instead of "Unrated", perhaps a more positive name like "Undiscovered" would evoke more interest.

WillzZz · January 2013

Steam has the right of it, I'd say. Rotating deals (the onus is on us for this). Perfect granularity for categories. Friend recommendations. Showing how many friends own a particular game. Top sellers. New releases. Coming soon. All of those within categories as well.

Good games should rise to the top. And they do. It's up to you as a developer to promote your game through whatever means possible. Set up reviews with game review sites. Visit forums. Ask players to beta test your game. Get yourself a marketing budget somehow. Even if it's small, that doesn't mean you can't get the word out.

Not at anyone, just in general: Don't make excuses! If your game is good and you work hard you will be discovered! Learn about metrics, funneling, A/B Testing, Acquisition Costs/ARPU, and anything you can. Marketing is an enormous and important field, don't just say you can't/won't do it. You're setting yourself up for failure, even if you get some initial users you need to understand how to keep that ball rolling if you can.

Last but not least, a list with random titles is a great approach to a platform designed for indies and designed to promote free trials. However, I disagree with the general sentiment on sales lists (Good games sell often for a reason), but agree that they become stagnant. I like "weekly" and "daily" lists sometimes, they can change things up more easily. Also, it's up to Ouya to write software which diminishes the ranking value of a sale over time. A sale today should be worth more in ranking score than a sale yesterday, the day prior, etc.

erf · January 2013

One thing that helps a lot with app discovery on iOS is being able to jump straight to a game's page from a website via a special store URL. Essentially, if someone saw a game they liked for the OUYA, it would be nice if they could bookmark it in some way to easily download when they get to their console, whether it is from an OUYA branded web store or from an external site.

Basically, if I manage to get some press for one of my dumb little games, it would be nice to let people queue it up for download when they get home while they are reading about it.

noct · January 2013

erf said:

One thing that helps a lot with app discovery on iOS is being able to jump straight to a game's page from a website via a special store URL. Essentially, if someone saw a game they liked for the OUYA, it would be nice if they could bookmark it in some way to easily download when they get to their console, whether it is from an OUYA branded web store or from an external site.

Basically, if I manage to get some press for one of my dumb little games, it would be nice to let people queue it up for download when they get home while they are reading about it.

+1000

Or even better, initiate the download automatically. I use this all the time on the Play store.

SpoonThumb · January 2013

Categories and charts are two of the biggest problems when it comes to existing games stores because both create barriers to entry for developers

Charts really distort the market with its self-reinforcing mechanic of more downloads = higher in the charts = more visible = more downloads. It's bad for the vast majority of developers for obvious reasons, but it's also bad for consumers because they get less variety and more games that are designed to get maximum downloads rather than designed to sell on the quality of the gaming experience

Categories are not a problem in themselves, but the problem is who sets the categories. What category would you put a game like Civilisation on Google Play? Brain & Puzzle? Action & Arcade? The ever nebulous 'Casual'?

Lists are one way to let people create their own categories and groupings (though I'm sure not the only way)

WillzZz · January 2013

Who sets the categories, how about any gamer with common sense? I'm quite certain that's not a problem. Civ is a strategy game. Is there any doubt? Being bad at organizing does not mean organization is bad. Google play was designed for casual games and mobile apps. Steam was designed for games. Ouya was designed for games. I pointed at steam because their categories make sense. Yes, there are genre straddling games, which is why games are tagged for multiple categories.

Your point on charts is correct, but that's up to the chart maker and the presentation of the data. In the most basic of examples, a top sales chart is very self-reinforcing. In the right hands, you can display the data in a much more useful manner.

The underlying principle I'm sure you're referring to, however, is still a problem. As human beings we will naturally be inclined to show more interest in items being displayed "First". Whatever method chosen, something will show "first". While the aforementioned "Random" page is the fairest, it doesn't necessarily provide our users with what they're looking for the quickest. And to increase sales, you need the fastest route from showing items to purchase to clicking buy. That's why the most popular games are shown first. It perpetuates itself, but it also increases revenue for that site/app/company because it's easier for the average user to find what they (on average) were looking for.

In any case, I refer to Steam as the best example of how to do it "right". I never feel compelled to buy New Releases on the front page I am not interested in, although I understand they're popular. Deals routinely suck me in to trying games I may not otherwise have purchased. And perhaps most importantly, I can easily find other games through categories and search tools which "make sense".

VicariousEnt · January 2013

I'm sure they will let us decide what category our game fits into best during the submission process (or at least take our input), lets just hope they come up with some good categories. The google Play store is horrible for this, worst categories ever. For instance there is no category for something very specific like RPG, RTS, Fighting, Platformer etc. The categories are setup to cater to casual gamers, pretty much all of the traditional gamer categories get clumped into just "Arcade & Action", Racing, Sports Games and "Brain & Puzzle". Very unfriendly to traditional gamers.

"Undiscovered" @noct

This could even be a wildcard that randomly pops up in areas such as main screen

It could be en entire category, or just a single completely random game that has not been rated/reviewed yet. Obviously if there are none at that moment unrated/untried then it could throw up a random title that has less than 100 installs and <30% thumbs down's

Good idea, but it should be for a game with good reviews and low number of downloads I'd say. Very few titles remain unreviewed completely (again in regards to the Play Store), but there are lots of well reviewed games with very low number of downloads because they failed to get a strong marketing push out the door. Star ratings on the Play Store and such don't mean alot, games I would consider mediocre at best often get 4 or 5 star ratings, but at least the 0-2 star rated games are usually total wastes of time (often soft core crap, or buggy or amateur as could be) and don't deserve to be "discovered".

WillzZz · January 2013

Would be interesting to allow anyone with dev credentials and those with approved media credentials to have our own list(s), where we can't rate our own games of course. "Recommended by devs" or "Recommended by dev reviews" but with a catchier title ;)

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Ouya Store design

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!!! Get rid of "Store" this was mistake #1