Game List

I would love to see this page with a 60 second timer or something that would automatically refresh the page to detect new games. I also think the title should say "12 games awaiting your turn" so that you can see it on the taskbar when the window is minimized.

For less overhead utilize ajax.

This kind of feature encourages users to keep your site open all the time.

Taking it a step further, if you go afk on any page for 5 mins and you're logged in and not in a game you're automatically forwarded to the game list.

I think it is a good idea, and I will keep this here and eventually add something to ajax check your games for you and update you.

As for the afk thing though, you might be reading a forum post for longer than 5 mins, or even typing something on the forums.

Then come up with a solution for the forums...

Perhaps when you click on a textarea it stops the countdown.

I don't think people will like being forced to move to a page though. They could be looking through the members list, or maybe they were reading the forums, so they didn't select something, or maybe they were studying a game.

The only time it might be worth it is if they were actually away from their computer, but even then, they could have left the page on something they were looking at. The idea of forcing them to change the page to the game list might seem innovative but I don't know how people will feel about that.

Perhaps later we can add it as a non-default option

Don't force people to automatically change pages. If they want to go see the games page, they can go click the games button.
It would just get annoying to be redirected to the game page just because I haven't clicked anything in a while...

It could be a customizable setting:
- 5 minutes
- 10 minutes
- 15 minutes

Have it by default to display a "Would you like to be forwarded to the game list? Yes or no". After 60 seconds of not doing anything it forwards you there.

When analyzing suggestions and whether they would be worth anything or not, try not to think of the exact suggestion, think of what the suggestion is accomplishing. It's accomplishing a method of people forgetting about the game being in a tab and working in another window. When the title changes, or window flashes by the game list being shown to, a member will be reminded that the game is open. That brings their attention back from whatever else they were doing and back to the game. What does the site or game gain from that? It gains more consistent players. If it permanently increases the consistency of players by 5% that's a big deal, if you ask me.

Sometimes when the idea isn't ours it's hard for us to see the options available, or even the goal. However, I do see what you are getting at. I agree the idea of alerting a member when there is a game is a good one and we will add that.

For the changing of the page we can just have the pop-up in the top right corner fixed saying there are games that's their turn, and they click it to take them to perhaps the first game on the list rather than the games list. Or have 2 options in the pop-up, go to the game itself, or the game list. Then have a non-default option to automatically take them to the game list or game after a certain amount of minutes.

A little popup box up in the corner would work. As long as it doesn't force the person to change windows. And there would need to be a way to turn off the notifications, for the people that just find it annoying to be constantly reminded.

Just a little tiny box that comes up in the corner, sort of like the popup boxes from when I'm playing my turns. Just something like "you have a turn to play in one of your games [go to the game] or [ignore]"

Just make sure that box doesn't completely interrupt whatever I am doing. It should be big enough to notice, but not so big that it distracts me from what I'm doing if I'm doing something important.

I am wondering could that put too much load on the server ajaxing every 10 seconds no matter where you are on the site? Of course not now, but when we have 1000+ members?

You could set it to 30 seconds if you wanted. But when you're having 1000 members you'll have premium accounts to cover costs of a more advanced server. Thus you'll be able to implement features like this even better.

i'm not sure the whole timer to refresh and detect new games would really be worth it, don't think most people are going to be on a single page long enough to need to be reminded of a trn, and if they are on a page that long they're clearly doing something with it, so they're not going to be going directly to their turn anyway. 

On the other hand, having the title show your number of turns to be taken/an optional pop up would be great. 

i agree it would be nice,, but at the same time, it would be a lot of work on the server, I suppose we'll cross that bridge when we get to it though