作者：Mike

为收集用户使用游戏的相关数据，我们利用了Pinch Media追踪，这是款全新的智能API，用于收集人们如何使用应用的数据。但忠诚的Pixelthis追随者无需对此表示担心，因为收集的数据不会以任何方式识别个人信息，事实上我们甚至无法看到个人用户在游戏中的进程。我们能看到的只是游戏中某部分内容的用户数量，使用各游戏版本的用户数量，每个国家的用户数量等数据。这些只是表层的内容。

我们收集了《Sheepish Lite》的相关数据，以下是我们获得的十大经验：

Sheepish Lite(from iphonecake.com)

1、游戏指南必不可少

47%的《Sheepish Lite》用户会时不时去查看游戏指南，但平均仅1.5次。根据目标用户的不同，这个数值会有大幅度的改变。十多岁的男孩很不喜欢阅读游戏介绍，所以你最好根据用户定位采取对策。

2、细致设定游戏难度

你不可过快地提升游戏的难度，因为会有流失用户的危险，特别是在精简版游戏中。最初我们发现，只有47%的《Sheepish Lite》用户会从第六个关卡玩到第七个关卡，数值下落非常严重！我们认为人们可能觉得关卡太难，因而没有继续进行下去。所以我们做了些许改变，现在数值是79%。

3、添加网站链接

我们在《Sheepish Lite》的“关于”页面中加上网站地址，16%的用户访问这个页面。我们认为可能是因为他们属于那类必须点击应用中所有内容的人，或者是因为他们正在寻在某些联系我们的方式，看看我们还发布哪些其他游戏。

4、巧用胜利页面

使用游戏的胜利页面来为游戏的完整版或其他游戏做广告。你的用户在游戏中取得胜利，很希望获得更多游戏，因而这是个吸引他们的绝佳时间。75%完成《Sheepish Lite》的用户在胜利页面上点击购买游戏。这主要用于游戏的精简版，因为人们付费玩游戏时不想受到广告的干扰。

5、提供其他吸引方式

这也是对精简版游戏而言。某些用户可能在1或2个关卡后就会觉得他们的生活已经离不开这款游戏了！（游戏邦注：本文作者对《帝国时代》就有这种感觉。）在可触及处为他们提供完整版的链接。《Sheepish Lite》最初只在胜利页面设置链接，只有15%的用户玩过游戏后购买，这还有很大的提升空间。自从在主页面增加购买按钮后，这个比例提升了14%。

6、无需为用户量下滑而担心

对于免费游戏来说，如果你看到大量用户没有进行到游戏的早期阶段，无需为此感到担心。所有的免费应用都将吸引大量的人，他们更喜欢免费下载体验游戏而不是付费。无论游戏是否满足他们的诉求，这些人都会下载游戏。当他们发现游戏内容不尽如人意时就会迅速离开。《Sheepish Lite》的玩家中，玩过第一个关卡的人只有49%玩到第三个关卡，多数人认为游戏并不适合他们。

7、确保支持老式设备

尽管《Sheepish Lite》用户中有60%的人使用的是最新的iPhone和iPod Touch，但我们也会兼顾剩下的40%。这意味着必须在老式设备上进行测试，你可能需要在线邀请某些人进行游戏测试。确保你的应用在老式硬件上平稳运行，这样就不会让人产生用户体验不良的印象。

8、并非所有用户都会升级应用

许多用户不想花时间下载和安装更新，尤其是当更新只有些许改变时。应该记住的是，更新意味着再次下载整个应用，而你的应用有可能并不是他们需要更新的内容。《Sheepish Lite》1.2已发布两周，1.1版本发布已是一个月前的事，然而依然有36%的用户使用1.0版本。

9、精简版有助于提高付费转化率

因为现在有如此多的应用供人们购买，毫无疑问用户想要在购买前先尝试下，即便是售价低于4美元的应用也有数千个竞争者。16%的用户点击购买《Sheepish Lite》，多数人只想购买精简版游戏。

10、为异于常人的用户着想

如果有些用户不习惯近距离体验手机应用的功能，你最好确保产品使用的字体大小能让他们看得清楚。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

10 lessons of iPhone game design courtesy of Sheepish Lite

Mike

In order to gather data about the usage of our games we use Pinch Media tracking, a brilliant and entirely free API that collects simple data about how people use your app. But loyal Pixelthis followers need not worry the data it collects does not identify individual users in any way, in fact we can’t even see the path that an individual user takes through the game. What we can see is how many users go to a particular part of our game, are running which game version, are from each country etc. And that’s just scraping the surface.

Here are 10 specific lessons we’ve learned from the data we’ve collected from Sheepish Lite:

Lesson 1: Include instructions

Although gameplay should be intuitive as possible users will find it frustrating if they can’t easily find help when they do require it. 47% of Sheepish Lite users have accessed the instructions at sometime or another but they only head there on average 1.5 times. This figure will vary wildly depending on your target audience; teenage boys are highly unlikely to read instructions so you better make things intuitive for them!

Lesson 2: Set difficulty carefully

You don’t want to ramp the difficulty up too quickly and risk scaring off users, particularly with a lite version! Initially we noticed that only 47% of Sheepish Lite users who attempted level 6 moved on to level 7 which was rather a severe drop! We determined that people were finding that level too difficult and hence not continuing so we made some changes and now the figure is 79%, which equals 29% less pitchfork wielding Sheepish players!

Lesson 3: List your website somewhere in the app

We have our web address listed on the About page of Sheepish Lite and 16% of users have visited that page. We figure this is either because they are the kind of people that must click on everything (you know who you are!) or because they were looking for some way to contact us to see what other games we had produced.

Lesson 4: Use your win screen wisely…

Use your win screen to advertise the full version of the game or your other titles. Your users have just completed what was hopefully an enjoyable game and are hungry for more so this is a brilliant time to hook them. A massive 75% of users who have completed Sheepish Lite clicked on the buy button on the win screen. This applies mainly to lite versions as people playing paid games don’t want to pay to be bombarded with advertising.

Lesson 5: … but also provide other hooks

Again mainly for lite versions; some users might decide after 1 or 2 levels that this is a game they can’t live without (like me with the first Age of Empires)! Make life easy for them and provide links to the full version in readily accessible places. Sheepish Lite initially had links only on the win screen and since only 15% of people play right through this left a large proportion without an easy way to purchase should they want to. Since adding a buy button to the main screen we get 14% more users clicking through to buy than we might have otherwise.

Lesson 6: Don’t be concerned by user dropoff

For free games don’t be worried if you find that large numbers of your users aren’t progressing past the early stages of the game. All free apps will attract a large number of ‘freetards’: people who are much happier downloading free crap (don’t get me wrong not all free apps are crap!) instead of paying a small price for a quality product. These people will download your app regardless of whether it appeals to them and when they find out that it’s all rainbows and unicorns instead of zombies and grenade launchers will quickly run for the hills! Of all the people who attempt level 1 of Sheepish Lite only 49% of them progress to level 3, most of these will have decided the game just wasn’t for them.

Lesson 7: Make sure to support older devices

Although 60% of all Sheepish Lite users are running on the latest iPhone and iPod Touch hardware that still leaves 40% that you need to look after. This means testing on older devices which you may not have access to, in which case you may need to bring the community onboard for some beta testing. Make sure your app runs smoothly on the older hardware and you’ll avoid the bad press that comes from a poor user experience.

Lesson 8: Don’t assume all users will update your app

Many users can’t be bothered taking the time to download and install updates, especially if the update contains only minor improvements. Remember that updating means downloading the entire app again and chances are yours is not the only one they have that needs updating. At the time of writing Sheepish Lite 1.2 has been available for two weeks and v1.1 was released a month earlier than that and yet 36% of users are still running v1.0.

Lesson 9: A lite version leads to conversions

With so many apps available for people to purchase it is little wonder that users want to be able to try before they buy, even though most apps cost less than $4 there are literally thousands to choose from. 16% of users have clicked one of the buy buttons in Sheepish Lite and many of those would never have brought the game if there was no lite version. Furthermore with downloads of lite versions being so high 16% still equates to a large number of new customers!

Lesson 10: Cater for the users who use their devices in odd ways

If, like our friend at Ars Tehnica, your users insist on holding their device at arms length at all times you better make darn sure you are using text sizes that consume all of the already limited screen real estate… (Source: Pixelthis)