Post by Paul Helman in What can we, as devs, do to help Itch.io expand?

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Reading the other comments really gets the creative juices flowing. My idea definitely builds on the 'thinking outside of the box' ideas.

Maybe a loyalty scheme of some sort would help retention on the platform. I'm thinking similar to the Xbox achievements type set up when you can earn badges as a developer and a customer which allow everyone to earn rewards, be it monetary or something else. For example, rate 5 games, earn the Mates Rates badge and earn $X to spend in the store. Then these accounts can use these badges to display next to their names on the forum/discord/etc as like a badge of honor.

I'm sure the idea would need refining but I'm thinking something like this would be more beneficial for indie devs who all want to support each other.

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jagames5 years ago (1 edit) (+1)

After reading some of the newer comments about achievements, it got me thinking about Stackoverflow's community system, where people have "reputation" points and how that helps build a community. Something similar to what you are saying about badges and a bit of free itch money or even extra exposure could be hugely useful. Nothing concrete, but I think there's something there. (Of course there's other similar systems like Reddit's Karma, but Stackoverflow came to mind because it's a fairly nice community. I do worry about ranking people, feels a bit off)

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CaptainD5 years ago

I do like this idea but sadly every system like this is open to manipulation to some extent. It would be difficult to verify the quality of someone's ratings / reviews. The idea is most definitely something worth exploring though - especially the badges idea.

GameJolt have an XP type system where you "level up" when you have enough, earned by various actions. Badges for specific things like "entered 5 game jams", "released 10 games", "rated 5 games" or something like that would be better to me. I'm just not quite sure about earning actual $ to spend in store though - I guess a lot depends on where these $ come from. Itch itself? A fund donated to by devs perhaps (a donation to make their games eligible to buy in this fashion perhaps?).

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Paul Helman5 years ago(+2)

It's all good feedback and I knew there would be flaws. Would be good to see if something like this could be implemented in some way shape or form. A report functionality would be needed for people absuing the system (and there will definitely be some!)

Maybe as a reward outside of montary value could be exposure opportunities for all people who have earned particular badges (like a reward based on loyalty). In October, all users who have the "entered 5 game jams" badge can recommend a game for the homepage. Probably needs to exclude their own titles to make it supportive to all community members

Not sure how we could make this all work, we would most likely need support from Itch to get something like this running.

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firecat5 years ago

i like the badge idea just like newgrounds but never a ranking system that locks people until something happens. Also no special gain power because of badge it just leads to trouble.

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