Jake Steinerman 👾🎮🕹️

Platforms like Spatial.io & Roblox prove UGC fuels infinite replayability & fosters vibrant communities. This two-way street empowers players to shape the game & provides devs with invaluable data to make data-driven decisions. UGC is a revolution driven by players, and it's here to stay.

Incorporate mechanics directly into the tutorial. Imagine a puzzle game. Instead of explaining drag-and-drop mechanics, design the first level to require players to solve a simple puzzle by dragging elements. This way, they grasp the concept intuitively while progressing in the game.

Don't treat all players as one group. Segment your player base by demographics, playstyle, in-game behavior, and spending habits. This allows you to identify trends and tailor strategies for specific player segments. For instance, high spenders might respond better to exclusive content offers, while new players might benefit from more in-game tutorials.

Working from home, or even at the office, it’s important to change your environment. Fresh space means fresh perspective. Go for a walk around the block, pop into your nearby coffee shop for a quick burst of energy, or even move over to your couch (but resist the urge to turn on Netflix)!

I've started to find tools that can take your projects and tasks list and automatically put these tasks as events on your calendar for you. This not only blocks off the time to allow you to focus, but makes the tasks actionable, versus saying "I'll get to it later!" I just started using the app Motion, and its been pretty effective!

The tools you choose can also determine the type of experience you want your users to have. For example, do you want them to be able to reach out and grab things with their hands (instead of controllers)? Do you intend for your experience to be mixed reality, where the digital world is blended with the physical one (characters can hide under a table, or monsters bust through your walls)? If so, you likely need to use native development tools that take better advantage of a device's hardware, like hand and room tracking. If you want a more simple experience, like viewing 360 video, that can be done with more basic SDKs like WebXR. The benefit of those is that they're more accessible on a wider range of devices.