QuestNotes

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[quote][b]Warning: Third Party Account[/b] This mobile app requires you to create a third party "QuestNotes" account... there's no valid reason for this in a PC product when SteamWorks is available. This is often done to harvest private data and profile you, with potential sale and transmission of your private data to third parties. The developers will probably argue that you can trust them, but if they were trustworthy they wouldn't demand you create a third party account. This represents a considerable risk to gamers due to the privacy and security implications of developers that wish to bypass Steam and harvest user data. Remember, sometimes if the product is free, YOU are the product.[/quote] "QuestNotes" is not a game. Games contain meaningful gamelike interaction and game loops, which are absent in this software. Instead of being a game, "QuestNotes" is an unfinished and incomplete mobile app that attempts badly to compete with other virtual tabletops like Roll20 and so on... not a game in itself, but a set of tools for people to use to substitute for a face to face game of Dungeons & Dragons. And this one is deep in development hell and not even made for PC, it's a mobile app on Google Play (which in itself is a bit weird because everyone in Japan uses iPhones, I'm not kidding, it's crazy). For those unfamiliar with what actually makes something a game, a "game loop" describes the interaction and feedback a gamer has when playing a game. Tetris, for example, has a game loop where a random block appears, the gamer interacts with the block to position it, and then the game decides if that finishes a row or not, increases the players score if any rows were completed, then gives the gamer another block to position. Counter-Strike has a game loop where a player seeks another player, tests their skill against that player by shooting them or being shot, the computer rewards the player if they win, and then if the player survives, they repeat that loop. There's no loop here, no true interactive feedback. It simply is not a game, it cannot be "played". This has misleadingly been launched in the "Games" section of Steam instead of the "Software" section. This is a common mistake for developers who are new to Steam, or don't understand the difference between games and software which isn't a game. It seems this software published incorrectly as a game is simply lack of experience/knowledge of the correct process. Here's a link for the process to publish non-game software on Steam: [url=https://help.steampowered.com/en/wizard/HelpWithPublishing?issueid=925]Steam Developer Help With Software Publishing[/url] It's unfortunate this process was not known about/followed, resulting in a software application being published in the wrong place. Publishing things which aren't games on Steam in the Games section as games is misleading to gamers and somewhat harmful, because it pollutes the Steam marketplace and takes away visibility and market exposure for genuine game developers who do the right thing and make games for gamers. There are no gameplay loops in this software, no "gameplay", no meaningful game like interaction. It's a software application and as such has no merits as a video game for gamers. Because of this, I cannot recommend this non-game software as a game to gamers. Despite having no up-front cost, this failed to appeal to the 130 million+ gamers on Steam. SteamDB shows this peaked at less than 100 concurrent users, they couldn't even break three figures, and now there's basically nobody using it. Even though it's free. This is a dismal public reception, but it's easy to see why gamers rejected it. Some other notes: This is not free, the developer seeks to charge money for this through paid "plans" at some point in the future. Just like they put this in the "game" section when it's not a game, they put this in the "free" section when it's not truly free. Not good at all.