Wednesday 23 September 2015

Crazies End



2 Week Crazies Event

I hope you liked the 2 week crazies event I ran for you over the last couple weeks. Today is the final day, so get all that extra stuff in while you can. I also would like to say I'm back 100% from my time off now, so give me a couple days to get up to date with everything and we'll get this ball rolling...

Enjoy,
Ash

Friday 4 September 2015

Reign Of Blood MOBILE



Reign Of Blood Mobile

It is finally time for a decent and usable mobile version of Reign Of Blood. I proudly announce the open beta of Reign Of Blood Mobile. This will be quite a lengthy post on the journey of getting this done, so get comfy.

Why Now?

The general shift to mobile devices has become too obvious to ignore. People aren't keeping up buying new PC's, but are keeping up with phones. And after doing some analytical work on the traffic Reign Of Bood gets, a few months ago, I saw this.



I could no longer ignore the fact Reign Of Blood isn't mobile friendly. This time 6 months ago it was Desktop 65%, mobile 28% and tablet 6%. Which means people are using their mobiles more and more. And if you're a mobile user, you'll know it can be frustrating, or near impossible to play fully on a mobile device on the desktop version. So what happens? People don't bother.

The Goal


The goal of Reign Of Blood Mobile is create a mobile version of the game which works on as many mobile and tablet browsers as possible, is as fast as possible, with using as little data as possible. The reason it took so long to get this going is because you can't just shrink down all the current pages into a little screen, doesn't work, each page needs to be reformatted for the new size. A lot of work, but well worth it for sure.

The Interface

I gave you a sneak peak last week on what the main home page looks like, and here it is again. This is screen you'll come to when you login. Keep in mind that designing for a mobile interface, there will be some navigational differences to make the game possible on a smaller screen. So your home page is essentially the main hub to all other features and pages.



On a few pages i've added some hidden sections, when you see those little down arrow icons next to "More Stats", you can click that link to show extra content, as you see here.



The structure of the layout is fixed, meaning you can't zoom in. Which makes playing a lot easier so when you double the tap the screen, it doesn't annoyingly zoom you in. You can see the battle pages below fit perfectly and make it super easy to attack, go back and attack again.



The battle shows and you can easily to see the outcome, and use back buttons on the top and the bottom for easy navigation back to where you were (more on that in a bit.)



And finally just to show you, an example of the daily quests page.



Navigational Flow

One of the main things I focused on, as well as making it look acceptable on a smaller screen, is the general flow of the game. You play a bit differently using mobile instead a mouse, so the general flow has to change. In regards specifically to vampire battles. The way to do your battles on mobile is different so I did several things to make it "flow" as well as possible. There is always the heal option at the top of each page (notifications too), and the back button is smart and takes you back to where you were. If you were on the 'vampire below my power' page, it'll know that and take you back there, if you were on your enemy list, it would know and take you back there, even after you 'finish them' and heal. I have also made the top Reign Of Blood logo and link back to your home navigation screen.

Notes & Restrictions 

This is currently an unfinished beta product. And there are some restrictions and exclusions at this time. These include:
- HTML is turned off on all pages
- Desktop access to it is blocked
- Not new player friendly at the moment, no tutorial
- You can't signup on mobile
- No image uploading (yet!)
- Only Paypal accepted payment method for packs
- No links to standard quests yet

Getting To It

Like last time, if you didn't know the URL of where mobile was, you wouldn't even know about it. After the beta (or when we have a stable beta) I will put a script on the homepage which detects your browser, if you're on a mobile, it'll show you the mobile interface, and will of course give you the option to login to the mobile site, or the regular desktop site. That'll be pretty sweet.

For now though, for those who want to help test (on mobile devices only):

Go to: http://reignofblood.net/m

There will be a link at the bottom of the page to make suggestions, report bugs and give feedback. The thread you can also find here.

This is still a work in progress, although 90% of the game is currently on it. I intend to continue to improve and work on it as feedback comes in. Thank you for patience, and thank you to those who will help make this better.

P.S. The AP Rage event is active on mobile too.

Enjoy,
Ash



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