The Tetris Comparison - Falling Blocks versus Wiggling Backbones

Started by DoctorSockrates

DoctorSockrates Lv 1

I appreciate the transparency you can give me and the insight behind some of the limitations. Keep up the good work; I'm already waiting eagerly for the full band strength slider to come to live.

Skippysk8s Lv 1

Sock's feedback
I think Sock has done a great job talking about how to categorize Foldit. As a team that tries hard to attract new players and bring them along, I most like the idea of giving some rewards along the way to players of various levels. The difference between alphatoxin and the beginner puzzles is enough to scare a newbie away :D
So thanks for keeping some small puzzles. They work better for our beginners and us small machine people. And giving rewards like various levels would be great. Us long time players don't need them, but I believe the game needs them to help nurture and grow new players. We need to teach them to apply tools in free form puzzles, how to spot what should be helix or sheet with given strings of residues, etc. It can take them a while to master basic skills like these – it took me a while. So a progressive path that rewards might help us retain more players
It might also help to add levels to the puzzles. Perhaps not everything should be "intermediate"…. that way we could signal to newbies which puzzles are most approachable. Steer them to revisits first, and let them attack alphatoxin down the road. Sock is a brilliant and wonderful exception, but I'd love for us to get some more players hooked

Why people play
One final note – there are a large number of players who are caretakers. We have parents, other relatives, etc. who have diseases that Foldit may attack. Alzheimer's, Parkinsons, ALS, muscular dystrophy, etc. keep many of us more involved than scoring well. We don't often travel or do other things as we can't. I'd recommend we get some feedback about this on the next survey or even a new one.

Skippy

DoctorSockrates Lv 1

Skippy, even I haven't even picked up how to spot common sheet or helix sequences yet. Big wake-up call, really. This would be a great side-series of smaller to mid-size puzzles waiting to be designed so that this skill can be embedded into player mastery if you ask me.

cherry39 Lv 1

I am a casual player of fold.it and up to my impression
there are some points which hinder fold.it to be more attractive to casual players:

  1. The average period till my efford is rewarded via given points is quite long.

  2. The level which has to be reached to gain more than
    the "Thanks for the participation" point is quite high.
    In other words you have to gain (at least)
    an end term rank of >100 to obtain a senseful amount of points.

  3. The number of actual playable puzzles is quite low.
    It would be fine to have at least one puzzle of each category active and playable.