I just released my game, and it’s not really going well.
The retention is about 7-5 mins average and I’d like to know how I can make the retention higher. I’m not really sure on what I should add or what I should remove.
How can I make the game more retentive?
Any general advice/feedback on anything at all about the game?
Have you tried advertising your game? if not people won’t find it easily.
Simulator games are usually boring and you have to afk while using an autoclicker in order to hatch eggs or in order to get points. Maybe adding badges will help, since users will have a goal.
There are currently 10,000 Robux in advertisements.
I will surely do that!
Having some badges will not make the retention sky rocket, but it will surely make it better.
Alright, I played the game. I have to be honest. While the idea is original, as far as I know at least, the gameplay is weird.
There wasn’t any sort of a tutorial, other than a quest where you have to walk on the other side of the map in order to receive it. The quest really doesn’t help you a lot, there were only arrows that were showing you where to go. I had to think for a while how to get the apples. Then, I figured that I had to go upside them and click them. This is hard, especially for mobile players. Also, not enough apples spawn, in my opinion. The game is tiring for the players, which makes them leave.
As I said before, simulators are afk games. By requiring the players to walk and do all this stuff, you actually destroy the game. All these games that require you to walk or make stuff other than clicking in order to get points, are usually not successful.
So I spent around 30 minutes picking apples and tomatoes, your game seems pretty well made. But either I’m playing the game incorrectly or something, progression felt a bit slow to me. The whole climbing ladder thing to pick apples was pretty creative but gets tiring fast.
I also kept going to the wrong fields, maybe consider putting up some billboard guis? Having to constantly walk between the quest guy and the fields was also VERY tiring for me, especially when the walkspeed is so slow when you first start off.
All in all, good game but I don’t really see 7 year olds getting excited to pick fruits and vegetables.
A good game requires good incentives for the players. I typically want to play a game and play for the next level, or that cool upgrade I can get for my gun or being max level and on top of the leaderboards. All those things are incentives and will keep the player playing your game longer.
I joined you game to check it out and I picked a few apples. I noticed that it got rather repetitive quickly and that I wasn’t feeling very rewarded for what I was doing, therefore, I left.
Here’s another great thing to keep in mind. If you take a look at an ad on YouTube, you have a five second wait timer before you can skip the ad on a video. The advertiser has about five seconds to grab your attention and form an interest to get you to keep watching their ad.
You say that players play your game for roughly 5-7 minutes on average correct? Why not use that knowledge and create a “wow” factor in your game that will grab a player’s attention within four minutes of launching the game.
Thank you everyone for your replies. This really helped me a lot!
What’s the reason why the servers are only 6 players each? I feel like it kinda makes it feel empty and if players want to play with friends, it may be a bit harder to.
Hey! I played your game for quite a while. First of all let me say, great job!
The game looks very nice! The GUI’s and the tutorial were very nice. The music and sound effects are really nice also.
I think increasing the number of players per server would be a good idea, along with adding another place where “starter players” can farm.
The pacing is a bit on the slower side, especially for a simulator game.
But these are all things that I feel can be easily improved.
I think you have a very nice game. I look forward to seeing your work in the future.
Keep up the great work, stay creative 
How many players would you suggest?
Keep in mind, if a player has 5 friends in, they get a bonus x1.25 luck for pets.
Making the server 20 will make the luck abused I think
What can I do to make the pacing faster? Any suggestions?
Because we recently revamped all the stats from the tools, backpacks and pets to go way faster than before.
I would say it would be nearly impossible to get that 1.25x luck with 6 players only allowed since you have to fill a server unless you get a private server. How would it be abused if it’s a feature where if you have 5 friends playing with you, you get 1.25x luck? Unless you want to make them to get a private server?
I honestly would add events, that catches more player, then make the game addictive. Instead of grand opening or release in the title add event, [legendary event] or something to make it look like a once in a lifetime kind of thing
How would you make this type of game addictive?
Alright I see it now. I will make the servers bigger.
add events, special gamepasses, add something that makes it interesting
The artwork is nice and was enough to keep me in the game for several minutes. Then I came upon free money lying around and was happy to grab it. After that I ran into several sections in sequence that wouldn’t let me in, and I started to get irritated. I think there is a psychology study on games somewhere that suggests the highest probability move for a new player with no obvious path is to move to the right. Anyway, I found the quest guy but didn’t realize right away that following his quest was the only way to really move forward. I made my way around to the orchard and figured out after a couple of tries that I needed to equip the tool in order to pick them. I made it to lvl 2 and admired the barns and scenery for a bit. I assume I needed to go get another quest in order to move forward, but I was ready to go by then.
How to improve it from my perspective:
It has quite a bit going for it. The art and interactive elements (that you can reach) all provide a good experience (as far as not being buggy). I think the comment from FracturedSkies about advertisers needing to grab your attn in a short span is apt. Maybe see if you can remove obstacles from starting players. Give them the first quest automatically or tell them where to get it as soon as they enter the fields. Give a warning if a player starts to pick apples without the tool loaded. Maybe open those higher level farms for browsing and have an NPC point a player toward the beginner plots if they start trying to pick or grow things. Also, it would be ideal to give the player a glimpse of what they are trying to achieve. Is the goal to have your own farm? Collect a bunch of pets? Finish all the quest lines and own the county? I didn’t really get a clear sense about that. It isn’t set up like a social game, so I didn’t get the feeling I should be inviting friends for hayrides. The speed of progression from 0 to lvl 2 was fast enough for me, but the game lacked an overall sense of urgency, which is probably key to keeping players racing along to the next thing in a game like this. It would probably help if a player (esp a new one) knew exactly what to do next and how much time they had to do it (maybe the applecart is heading to market in 3 min). Perhaps, find a way to surprise your players with something unexpected. Maybe some cows get out and need to be rounded up or a giant beanstalk sprouts in one of the fields for a short time and opens some sort of bonus level, I don’t know. Just thinking of something to set your game apart from other games where you collect coins and buy a bunch of pets.
For players who like this kind of game, what is this one giving them that the ones they’ve already invested in playing aren’t providing? Just a change of scenery? Granted, I didn’t stay long. Things may really pick up once a player starts to advance, but you have to get your players to that point. If it isn’t immediately obvious what players need to do and what they are striving to achieve once they enter, then you should consider hand-holding them for a bit. There’s a fishing simulator I played on for a bit the other day that did a good job of that. The progression wasn’t fast (it’s fishing after all), and there was plenty to do just wandering around the map for a few minutes, but after the “Go visit so-in-so at the tackle shop” and “Visit the old ship builder at the docks” prompts during the on-boarding phase, I had a clear sense of the starter objectives (and some longer range ones) and could choose to get right down to business or just explore.
It’s a good foundation and you may get more players organically as people learn how to get the most out of it and share that knowledge with friends. Focus on your on-boarding if you want faster results, imo.
It looks like a quality game. Congrats, and good luck moving forward!
I’m really thankful for what you written.
I will see how I can make the game get your attention in a short amount of time and more. Thank you so much for this valuable and detailed feedback.