Boutiques

I know that a lot of you have been asking for Boutiques to return. I hear you. When they were removed in February, I briefly touched on what led to that decision, but I want to paint the full picture in detail. Something important to note is the role that designs play in the core gameplay loop of the site. Designs serve as the reward for playing and doing well in games. When a user wants a design but can't afford it, they join a game. Their other main option is to purchase Koinz. When Boutiques were introduced, it added a third option: simply trade an old design for a new one. As innocent as that sounds, it resulted in a lot of behind-the-scenes damage to the site. As mentioned before, the incentive to join games dropped, but there were a few other major impacts that I haven't touched on. Shops. The Shops Game has a fixed scarcity imposed on it. It pumps out 1,064 designs a week for our ~500 daily users. This means the average user earns ~2.1 designs a week. This is a sweet spot. It's attainable enough for casual players to feel rewarded, but not too abundant that designs hold no value. Boutiques removed this fixed scarcity because everyone could sell a design, not just shop owners. The result was a plummeting economy, and designs lost over 80% of their value. The biggest consequence of a broken Kovaze economy, and one I seldom discuss, is the impact on the site's revenue. Designs generate almost all of the site's revenue. They allow us to keep the site free to play while still covering server costs, marketing, development, freelancers when we need them, and the work required to keep the site running and growing. It's why I'm always cautious with shops update - because it always has a direct impact on how much Kovaze earns and is able to spend on itself for the next month. As much as I love Boutiques as a developer, they're quite risky from a business standpoint, and it's equally my job to ensure this business, our website, thrives. Does that mean Boutiques are never coming back? Not necessarily! It just means that if they did come back, they wouldn't be exactly as they were before, and that changes to Boutiques and Shops (which are coming!) need to be very carefully risk-assessed. I'm hoping this blog was able to provide some useful insight, and I really want to do more of these in the future (even though it took me 4 hours to write this lol). I firmly believe that transparency with the community is crucial to sparking meaningful feedback and discussions. I can't expect you suggest how something can be solved when I haven't told you what the issue is! Can't wait to hear from all of you!