Ideas to improve the early game experience

[mike]

I have been playing a couple of weeks. I happily paid $10 to support Aussie gaming. In particular as i think this is a good underlying game. I also created 2 other accounts ( wifes phone etc) just to get more action. I brought all thr basic enhancements straight away. Some observations from my early experience that i hope lead to improvements:

1-Gameplay is very slow when u only have 2 stables (worse...1 if u dont register)

2-The starting horses are rubbish (of course) so its a grind to get going. Its pointless racing anything other than a 100% fit happy beginner horse. Even if they are perfect, its hard to find a race they can be competitive in...so i log in...and can achieve little...thats not gonna keep a new player interested.

3-Paying for the right to view my own stats or for the right to sell my horses makes sense (devs gotta make coin), but it doesnt make sense to have to keep repaying for the ongoing privilidge

4-new players cannot even see whats in city hall or the stud farm until they register. I cannot imagine a car dealer selling me a car sight unseen...so why do this?

5-when a new player finally earns enough coin to breed, they have to set free/sell a horse to create space, and then do nothing for two days. Thats ridiculous feature in a mobile game. Ik ppl will say buy another stable...why would i invest given the slow gameplay after already investing $10?

6-no chat/pm feature with in game friends

7-the prices i see for a new brush are hundreds of thousands of game dollars. This is not even within a bulls roar of reality for a new player

8-There is very little buy/sell or breeding activity at beginner levels. No one in their right mind wants to buy a group 3 rating 1 nag. Setting it free leaves the beginner with nothing, which pretty much ends the game if they had a winless nag in the first place ...i.e. lost customer.

Suggested improvements:
1-Halve the breeding time
2-Make the market and the ability to see ur own stats a one off purchase.
3-Nw players start with 2 stables, then get a 3rd when they register
4-make 5 game token a prize for group 3 maiden races only to give new players a taste of whats to comee
5-make the city hsll unlock aitomatically after the 2nd victory
6-halve the price of level 1-4 group 3 horses so new players can progress more early
7-add the ability to chat direct with friends in game. Great way to to encourage people to share tios and cooperate.
8-add a realisticaly priced brush so i have something to aim for. Tell me its gonna do say +50% on a standard brush so i can judge if its worth it...and work to get it.
9-Make the horse market free for the first 2 transactions to encourage activity.
10-Replace the setting a horse free button with a feature to retire the horse as a pet for a fixed $400 or to the knackery for $600. If they choose knackery, their remaining horses happiness goes down 10%

Great underlying game devs. Im interested in what you or the players think about these thoughts from a new player.

[mike]

I will add another couple of ideas.

How about increasing the limit of allowable equip changes for new players? As a new player, i am the bottom of the tree. I make noob errors. With merely two horses i breach my limit by trying to give out a couple apples and a shoe change to suit the upcoming races. So u let me take a shoe off...but i cant re-equip one? Its the same fareier:). if i race a level 1 horse naked, then im wasting my time = churn. Easily improved.

Related point...the above limit is because i dont have a specific achievement, yet the game doesnt actually show me what achievements are available, or the threshold to earn it, or my progress. How can i work towards something in the dark? I think the solution is to list the next achievement possible, show the progress as xx/xxx e.g. 23 wins of 100 required etc. If i tap on the achievement it should pop up a message explaining what the achievement/benefit is to help motivate me.

Stll playing, but its not easy to believe you can get through a laborious slow starting phase....even after spening real money to kickstart the game...and perhaps not using that money wisely (i totally wish i didnt waste tokens on the market...i have no sellable horses...i feel ripped off for thinking people might buy my "successful" horses when no-one does.

[Hooves Reloaded Admin]

Hi Mike, again, thanks so much for your feedback. I'll tackle the easy ones first and then the harder ones later (when its not nearly midnight!).

Point 4. We want to encourage players to sign in, everything in the City Hall is a purchase and players cannot initiate any purchases unless they have signed up with an account - that's why City Hall is not available. Ultimately the 'no sign in' option is just for players to see what the game is about before creating an account. Most of the menu options we have locked out to new players are ones that require an account to be set up.

Point 7. The brushes are actually quite advantageous, a horse's happiness does significantly affect its ability to perform on the track and better brushes are much more effective for both your horses and the friends horses you brush with them. We also want players to have something to buy with their cash as they progress through the game and obtain the achievements that are required to unlock them.

Point 6. We could possibly look at private messaging of some description but our focus is on optimal performance of the game at this point (this is proving to be an issue for older/slower devices) and this would add significant overhead and could possibly mean several players would not be able to load the game at all!

[Hooves Reloaded Admin]

I'm going to add the item about achievement progress to our 'suggestions' list.

[mike]

Cool. Rome is not built in a day. I look forward to watching this game evolve.

[Ragz]

Agree with all of mikes points. I used to p,at the old hooves of fire, so thought I would give this a whirl. Very slow and painful beginning. You are going to lose a lot of interest due to the lack of gameplay at the beginning, I have 2 horses, and have one third placing between them. So in about 30 races. I have won about $150. Now my horses are too tired. Why would I want to come back to play? Zzzzzzz ??