On Feedback
Ratings.
I've grown to hate that word, as part of this jam, since I started doing it 9 years ago. At first, the ratings seemed awesome! I could compare how well my entry fared against the likes of McPixel and whatever batshit insane(or surprisingly normal) thing Notch came up with. It gave me a sense of where I was in relation to these giants in the industry. It made me love game development even more, to know that I could go and comment some suggestion and word of praise on McFunkypants entry and get something meaningful in return, something that really helped me progress.
I'm not sure I could say when exactly that changed for me. It was probably a steady change over time, I think. As LD got bigger, as the culture around it changed, as we lost the involvement of some and gained it of many, many others, of course the culture and feel of the jam changed. I think that many knew it would, and much of that change is amazing(take the new site, for instance). If there's one thing that I haven't appreciated, it's the focus on ratings, which now feels like an almost gross word.
I don't just want to bitch and moan here, so let me talk about what I think we've forgotten:
Feedback.
To me, value in this community has mainly been the high quality feedback and encouragement that you could expect from fellow developers. I have learned so much from the comments sections of the entries, nearly as much as the actual game design/development itself! More than the scorekeeping, popularity contest, and rush for maximum ratings it seems to be trending towards, real feedback from other game developers brings value to the jam outside the pure fun and rush of building a game in 48/72 hours. With all that in mind, here's some quick guidance on providing quality feedback.
- Call out key interactions as you saw them! Knowing how players see key interactions vs how the designer intended them to come across is great for improving their interface/visual feedback loop.
- Provide helpful tips for common design/programming errors! Mentioning some pseudocode around directional vector-based movement to someone whose character moves faster on diagonals can save them a set of if statements or a switch in every 8-way movement system they write from now on.
- Help others understand why you didn't like their game! It can be rough to tell someone that you didn't enjoy something they spent the last weekend pounding away at if you emphasize incorrectly or use the wrong wording, but if done in a helpful, informative manner, it can help designers understand what about their game needs re-thinking or re-tooling.
- Don't point out bugs that others have already mentioned! The feedback section really shouldn't be a place for bug reports at all, and as feedback it is not very helpful (and least of all if others have mentioned it in the comments already).
- Encourage your comrades in arms! Gamedev is a battlefield, and LD is a chance to have fun and experiment. Above all else, keep in mind that everyone is here of their own accord, and engaged in the same awesome weekend as you. Keep it kind, spread the love, feel the joy of LD.
There are plenty of other things you can do to make your feedback the most quality thing in town, and it's always something to improve on! If you're conscious of the game you're playing and how it works and feels, you can communicate that to others to their benefit. Happy jamming!
