And yet everybody loves this game. This is like some of the complaints against Facebook's website: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15368054 which ultimately amounts to "as a user, I am clueless about the decision tree being offered."
Good. Snapchat didn't explain anything, people figured it out. It adds to their curiosity. It doesn't need to be consistent to be successful, and it's not just survivorship bias.
All that matters is that the software solves a problem or taps into a user's need. In this case, this game taps into the need to satisfy curiosity.
EDIT: Ah right, people just want to complain. Go for it! Let's ignore the success that Snapchat represents with its inconsistent UI, or the fact that Facebook has ~2B users and an inconsistent decision tree, or that Git is the most popular version control software by far yet has an inconsistent interface. Ditto for Unix.
Ultimately, when we complain about things that are proven not to matter, it becomes hard to take the complaints seriously. If you can reach 2B users without a consistent decision tree, I think it's pretty safe to say that consistency simply is not an issue, no matter how much our cat-like desire for order and perfection believes otherwise.
The thread we're in is both a counterexample and rebuttal to every one of your points. The game is near the top of HN. Everyone loves it. I get that you're trying to argue against the idea that it represents good UX, and yet UX is an integral component of gameplay. This game was successful because it's fun and it had a good experience, just like HN.
> Everyone loves it. I get that you're trying to argue against the idea that it represents good UX, and yet UX is an integral component of gameplay.
I think the game has terrible UX but I also think it has compelling points (competition, bragging ["never completed"], brain teasers, a need to overcome frustration, etc.) that override the terrible UX.
I don't think I ever mentioned that the game would or should fail due to UX -- my primary point is that it doesn't represent a good user onboarding experience. The very things that make it a compelling game would make it a terrible onboarding experience.
Good. Snapchat didn't explain anything, people figured it out. It adds to their curiosity. It doesn't need to be consistent to be successful, and it's not just survivorship bias.
All that matters is that the software solves a problem or taps into a user's need. In this case, this game taps into the need to satisfy curiosity.
EDIT: Ah right, people just want to complain. Go for it! Let's ignore the success that Snapchat represents with its inconsistent UI, or the fact that Facebook has ~2B users and an inconsistent decision tree, or that Git is the most popular version control software by far yet has an inconsistent interface. Ditto for Unix.
Ultimately, when we complain about things that are proven not to matter, it becomes hard to take the complaints seriously. If you can reach 2B users without a consistent decision tree, I think it's pretty safe to say that consistency simply is not an issue, no matter how much our cat-like desire for order and perfection believes otherwise.
The thread we're in is both a counterexample and rebuttal to every one of your points. The game is near the top of HN. Everyone loves it. I get that you're trying to argue against the idea that it represents good UX, and yet UX is an integral component of gameplay. This game was successful because it's fun and it had a good experience, just like HN.