Writing documentation for the games industry

Last week, I visited Gamescom in Cologne. Gamescom is the largest exhibition and trade fair for computer games in Europe, with over 335,000 people attending this five day event. We visited for social rather than business purposes, but it led me to reflect on the work we and others have done in writing documentation for the games industry.

Google adds conversational search-by-voice to Chrome’s Help

Google has updated Chrome in build 27 to include conversational voice search, and this feature extends to the Help pages. According to TechCrunch, it transcribes your queries in real time. It also lets you use natural language, asking Google straightforward questions and getting straightforward answers, both read back to you by dictation and in actual… Read more »

Even iPad users search for Help

One of the graphs posted in yesterday’s blog showed the number of people searching for IPad Help. Here is the graph: For a product that “just works”, there is an increasing number people searching the Web for iPad Help. However, part of that increase can be put down to the increasing number of iPad sales:… Read more »

Reducing app abandonment

At the UAEurope 12 conference, SAP’s Keren Okman quoted a shocking statistic: that the average mobile or tablet app* is used an average of just 3-4 times by a user. The issue of “app abandonment” is one that is likely to be of greater concern for software developers in the future, as they invest ever… Read more »

Does looking at online Help make users forget?

Over the weekend, Dr Chris Atherton suggested I look at “the doorway effect”. You may well have experienced walking through a doorway and then finding you’d forgotten why you’d stood up in the first place. Researchers at the University of Notre Dame have discovered your brain is not to blame for your confusion about what you’re doing in… Read more »