Below I went completely overboard with my wishlist, but if I were to provide a piece of critique:
At the start of the game, where you ask the player to pay $15 for playing the remainder, the player has no idea what they’re buying. Are they buying the same amount of content again or is there much, much more to come? Luckily it’s the latter, but I think you’ll sell far more licenses if you were to announce that the $15 get’s you another 50 times (or something) more content.
I love this way of paying developers by the way, as it keeps the game fair, ad-free and straight forward. Much better than in-app purchases.
Ok, here’s my 5 cent ( times 25 😄)
• Have Clans! There is no better way to retain players than via Clans, as they feel connected to their Clan mates. I start to feel a bit lonely in the game.
• Once you have Clans, you can sell cosmetic upgrades. Nobody is going to pay for cosmetic upgrades if they cannot show it off to their friends, right?
Plus: Clan members could exchange materials they need.
• Have a Global Leaderboard
• Give rewards for EVERYTHING
Each reward creates dopamine in the brain, which will make the player play more. Even for the simplest accomplishments: reward the player.
• I noticed that the "celebration" once a task is completed is quite weak. Show fireworks all over the screens with sounds of people celebrating!
• Have an arena to show-off your character development thus far.
• Add smaller quests, to hand-in to NPCs in the villages. Quests can be as simple as: “Destroy 100 trees”. You get the achievement when you do, but with mini quests you have something else to aim for.
• This is a big one to code, but some of the best games out there have a game-wide market mechanism. This can just be a market for players to buy and sell goods they need, but many players also enjoy just "playing" the market: buying and selling gear to earn gold.
• At the moment you can buy and sell items, but the difference in buy- and sell price seems quite extreme. Play around with the balance and see what happens.
• Character development.
Players start to identify with the avatars they control, so give them a voice and more cosmetic options.
• Offer an increasing award for each consecutive day the players signs-in, but reset it when a player misses a day.
• Offer a prize for inviting friends
• Sprinkle some "secret codes" around the internet, which can be shared in the Clans, which makes players feel like they're ahead of other players.
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