What do you mean by that? I don't think it makes much sense to generalize criticism about groups of people, because people are just so different. Even if there are statistical commonalities in these that differentiate them from others, the differences between individuals of a group will always be bigger than these commonalities.
I've come to the conclusion that you need to actually put something playable in front of a bunch of people who don't know you, to properly gauge how compelling your game is. Ideally a vertical slice where with the necessary polish to convey the feel of the end product.
Let them play and watch. Listen to their feedback, but don't put too much weight on it. Players usually can't account for the limits of a prototype, even if it is a vertical slice. Also they usually can't quite pinpoint what made them like or dislike something, but they will want to give you feedback. Just note what they say and try to figure out later what the underlying issues might have been. More importantly, you need to watch them play. Ideally you want a setup where there are a bunch of games, like at a gamedev gathering, or at least something else to do, where people can freely decide to play your game or not and don't feel forced to do so. Seeing how they interact with the game on their own terms, seeing how long they play, whether they get their friends to play it as well, is the true litmus test.
To have a successful indie game, I believe, it needs to capture people on its own, just by it's presentation and gameplay. And it needs to deliver such a memorable experience that people will recommend it to their friends and talk to each other about it.
Ooof, Lemmy really hates clickbait titles, huh? Changed it to the DeArrow title in the hopes that more people give it a chance this way. I usually just take the current video title, but I guess that just doesn't work here.
I think most here are too generous with the term addiction.
I had to uninstall Hearthstone years ago, because I compulsively played it multiple hours every single day, despite not really having fun playing it anymore. It was either grinding to get cards or tilting on ladder. That's what I would call an addiction.
Edit: After Hearthstone I played a lot of Slay the Spire and after that Marvel Snap. Never more then I enjoyed it, so I wouldn't count those.
I listen to one weekly news podcast (Lage der Nation), that focuses on the most important topics for where I live, which includes big international events.
Getting an update on the relevant happenings once a week, feels way healthier than reading what's going horribly wrong somewhere multiple times a day.
I had to unfollow and unsubscribe a bit on mastodon and Lemmy to reduce the amount of news I see there, but now it's tolerable.
However, I still have to take breaks, when I feel my mental health isn't up for it.
I doubt that. As long as social media algorithms can capture the attention of children, most won't bother with learning more about computers.
The reason previous generations did, was because there weren't so many ways to distract yourself. To play games on the first computer I had access to I had to use DOS. There was no way around it. Now people don't, so they won't.
What do you mean by that? I don't think it makes much sense to generalize criticism about groups of people, because people are just so different. Even if there are statistical commonalities in these that differentiate them from others, the differences between individuals of a group will always be bigger than these commonalities.