How We Test Games

This page documents our testing process so that readers understand what has actually been verified about a game before they spend their time on it.

The checklist

Fourteen checks across four categories: performance (load time, frame rate on a mid-range phone, memory), input (touch, mouse and keyboard all behave identically), clarity (a first-time player can act within ten seconds without instruction) and fun (the second-run test, described below).

The ten-second test

Open the game fresh, on a mid-range phone, without reading anything. If a meaningful action is not possible within ten seconds, the game is either given a simpler opening or dropped. Most reworks come from this test.

The failure test

Lose on purpose, repeatedly. The failure state has to be readable: the player should know what went wrong. Games where losing feels arbitrary are reworked until the cause is obvious on screen.

The second-run test

Play once, stop, and ask whether you want to start again immediately. This is the check that decides whether a finished game is published at all. It is subjective, it is the only test that matters, and several complete games never made it past it.

Performance targets

Every game is expected to reach full frame rate on a mid-range Android phone, to load its first interactive frame in well under two seconds on a normal mobile connection, and to run without leaking memory across a ten-minute session.

What we do not claim

These tests check that a game works, is understandable, and is worth playing. They do not check whether it is original, whether it will appeal to you personally, or whether a game in a genre you dislike will convert you. That last judgement is yours.