We removed ten games

Blip Party had 60 games. As of today it has 50. This post covers which ten went, how we picked them, and what we're doing with the time that frees up.

How we decided

When a game ends, we ask how it went. You tap one of three faces, and if you pick the unhappy one you can tap a reason, like "too fast" or "boring". There's also a Help button in every room for anything longer. We read all of it.

The problem was that most games had only a handful of ratings, and some had none at all. That isn't enough to call a game bad. One unhappy vote after a rough night tells you about the night as much as the game.

So we looked at something clearer: which games people actually start. A few games get played every day. Ten had barely been picked at all over the last two weeks. Most of those had never been rated either, because a game nobody plays never gets to ask how it went.

The ten that are gone

• Flipbook: pass a drawing around and add one animation frame each.
• Mural: one shared canvas that everyone adds to, with no erasing.
• Cast: set a low-to-high range that you think catches a number.
• Parlay: guess a number, then bet on whose guess is closest.
• Couplet: finish a rhyme and vote for the best line.
• Backronym: make up what an acronym stands for.
• Gist: the whole room gives one player clues, and matching clues cancel out.
• Snare: give clues while other players set traps on the obvious ones.
• Mirage: one player sees a picture and gets a single clue to point you at it.
• Namedrop: describe a name freely, then in one word, then in emoji.

Some of these were good ideas, and Snare might have been the cleverest game on the site. But every game on the homepage is one more card to scroll past on the way to the game you came for. Each one also has to keep working. When we change how timers, rounds or Blips work, every game has to be checked again, and ten games nobody plays were slowing down fixes to the ones everybody does.

Party Mix only picks from the games that stayed, so a shuffle now lands on games people have already shown they enjoy.

What we're working on instead

The games people come back to most are Quiz Hero, Party Mix, Doodle Dash and Gridlock, then Imposter, Most Likely, Poll Star, Fibber and Never Have I Ever. That's where our time goes now. Your feedback already gave us a list to start from:

• Party Mix: after a drawing round, the results go by too fast to see everyone's pictures. That's first.
• Render: it got more unhappy ratings than any other game people play a lot. Last week we stopped the same pictures coming up every game and made rounds end as soon as everyone has guessed. We're watching to see if the ratings change.
• Poll Star and Oddball: players told us some Poll Star answers look made up and some Oddball words aren't real. We're going through both lists.
• Forgery: one player felt they had less time than their friends. We're looking into it.

If you miss one of them

Tell us. Use the Help button in any room, or the rating at the end of a game. If enough people miss a game, we'll look at bringing it back. The old guide pages for these games now take you to the full list.

Or browse all 50 games.