Monday, April 03, 2023

I Finally Tried It On My Phone

Backgammon Galaxy, that is (that's a link to the "app" version -- their "straight" web version is here).

I don't recommend it. It's not the site's fault. A phone screen is just too damn small to fit a backgammon board onto and expect people's fat fingers to do a very good job of playing. I'd say an 8" tablet is the bare minimum to be able to comfortably play.

I'm really preferring that "app" version in general now, even though it still has some wrinkles that need to be worked out (the "chat" feature basically just has a few stock phrases one can click on, for example). Not on phone, but on desktop.

Matching up with people to play is easier. Instead of responding to a public invite or putting one up, you just choose to play a rating game, a "coin" game (you get 400 free "coins" every 12 hours and can bet on the outcomes of single games with no effect on rating), or "play a friend" by sharing a link.

If you choose a coin or rating game, it just matches you up with someone and off you go. For rating games, you can choose the match lengths (3, 5, or 7 games) and types (casual, normal, or speed), and once again it just matches you with an opponent.

The play is pretty smooth. It has the same bug as the web version, though, where it periodically just starts spewing very unlikely multiple doubles on the dice rolls.

One thing that has changed to make me like it less:

When the "app" version debuted, rating games were based entirely on outcome. You either won and gained rating points, or lost and lost rating points, without reference to an "error algorithm" that supposedly adjusts for "luck" by robbing you of your gain if you win the game but are deemed to have made more "errors" than your opponent.

Unfortunately, they've implemented the "error algorithm," but at least they've done so in a half-assed way: You still gain or lose rating points with a win or loss, regardless. But if the winning player supposedly makes fewer "errors" than the losing player, the winner gets, and the loser loses, more points.

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