As the first version of Trivially began to take shape, one thing quickly became apparent: kids love to play with it. Even if they didn’t have a clue as to what a “Blue Orpington” is/was, or perhaps aren’t even reading yet. With younger kids, part of the appeal may be in the fact that they get to play with the bigger kids (and adults), even if their only strategy is to keep choosing “C” on the Trivially Remote, because it’s their favorite letter. With older kids, the fun might be come from the fact that it’s just another way to score some screen time, or perhaps to show off a bit with their friends.

Whatever the reason, it was interesting to watch and a great source of feedback. But it was also surprising, in terms of what I learned (although, in retrospect, I shouldn’t have been surprised that there was plenty to learn about how (differently) 7 or 13 year olds see the world). It usually only took about 30 seconds before the kid players/testers started coming up with ideas… “Can I choose my own avatar?”, “You need to work a multi-level maze into this thing”, or “How about a remote-control music app?”.

Some pretty inspiring ideas! I’d like to think that it had something to do with the interactive/multi-user/multi-display aspect of CrowdGame :), but something tells me that it has more to do with the level of connection that most kids have today with games, and what happens when someone just asks them what they think…

This line of thinking led to the first-ever CrowdGame “Kidsourcing Event #1”, held this weekend at Hyperbotic Labs World Headquarters: What would happen if you get a bunch of 13 year olds in a (soundproof?) room, with some free pop and a bag of pretzels, and asked them to freewheel a bit on your game, or asked them to come up with some trivia questions, or asked them what new games they’d like to see?

Again, it was pretty inspiring, and a lot of fun. Some of the ideas where similar to what we’ve bounced around before, but with important (read: more funner) differences, while others were pretty off-the-wall… and therefore really cool to hear about. Some of the ideas were “big” - potentially representing entirely new products - and some were a little smaller… for instance, I hope to roll in some of the excellent trivia questions we mashed up into a Trivially over-the-air update soon.

Thanks, Bryan, Tristan, and Carl, for participating!

Today we made available updated and new trivia questions, for all Trivially fans!

This is a free update… as we create more questions, or improve existing ones, we’ll make them available to all Trivially fans.

To take advantage of this update, first make sure that your iPad - where you installed Trivially Console - is online (connected to the Web via wifi or 3G).

The Console will, after a short while, detect the update - either while on the start page, or when the app is first opened, or after a game is completed.

On the Start Page, watch the “message marquee” at the bottom (just above where the critters appear), which displays messages like “Waiting for Trivially Remotes”:

or “Touch here to rate Trivially at the App Store… thanks!” 🙂

Once your Trivially Console detects that the update is available, this message will appear: “A Trivia Update is available! Touch here to install”:

When you see it, touch the message on the screen. The message will change to: “Starting trivia update. This will only take a moment”.

During this time, you won’t be able to start a new game (but don’t worry, it should only take 10 seconds or so), as Trivially Console downloads the new and updated trivia and installs it.

When that’s done, you’ll see this:

And that’s it! Trivially Console has updated its trivia database, for an even more awesome trivia experience!

So, if you have an iPad and at least one other i-device… an iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad… give it a try!

Click here to browse to the Trivially Console in the App Store, and install it on your iPad.

Then click here to browse to the Trivially Remote, and install it on your other device. Get your friends to install the Remote on their devices also. Then you can have a Trivially party.

We’re very excited that these apps are now publicly available. We hope you have fun with them. Please send us your feedback and thoughts - we’ve love to hear from you. Or if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to contact us. Note that we offer a toll-free number in addition to an email contact form.

A note about using the Remote: please ensure that each device on which you’ve installed Trivially Remote has either WiFi or Bluetooth enabled, but not both. There’s a known issue with iOS that may hamper your fun if both WiFi and Bluetooth are enabled… just one or the other, please! The iPad on which Trivially Console is running can have both on, as needed.

Enjoy…

 

If you’ve received a promo code to CrowdGame Trivially, you might want to know how to use it!?

It’s actually easy… once you’ve done it.

If you’re viewing this on the computer on which you have iTunes installed, click this link. Your browser may prompt you to ensure that you actually do want to launch iTunes - click “launch” or “yes” if so.

Or follow these instructions:
1: Open iTunes on your computer
2: Navigate to the iTunes Store, by clicking on “iTunes Store” on the left-hand menu bar
3: Look for “Redeem” under “Quick Links”, on the right side, near the top.
4: Enter/paste your promo code and click “Redeem”.
5: You may be prompted to enter your iTunes password. The rest should be familiar to you…

Thanks for playing Trivially! We’d love to hear your feedback!!