User:Codyjcopeland/sandbox

GameTree is an online friend-finding and social networking application with over 200,000 downloads and a library of 120,000+ games to choose from. The app is focused on connecting users who play video and board games. GameTree uses personalized LFG matches based on psychology and user personality type as well as AI machine learning to improve user matches. The more information a user puts into the GameTree alogrithm, the smarter it becomes, and as a result more specific games and "matches" can be allocated.

History
GameTree was founded in April of 2016 by John Uke with the intent to curate the world's increasing number of choices, starting with gaming. With the plan of setting up his company in Kyiv, he was joined by Alex Naduev who became his first teammate and lead developer on the app.

Milestones... - When did the first users get into the app, When was open beta, changes in the logo, changes in team structure, team mate growth, high and low points.

GameTree grew quickly, where in 2018 11 members

GameTree was founded in April of 2016 by John Uke with the intent to ethically curate the world’s increasing number of choices, starting in gaming. John shortly after left San Francisco to continue building the company in Kyiv, Ukraine to save on high Bay Area prices. Upon arrival, John met Alex Naduev who became the first teammate and is still the lead developer to this day.

Though the team started working remotely, one team member was coming to the Ukrainian capital for a visit which resulted in an overnight assembly and first meeting of all 11 teammates. Since then, the team started relocating to the capital where GameTree’s development office is now headquartered. The app started to take off locally in Ukraine and Russia before organically spreading across the rest of the world. Since then, the community has earned a reputation as a non-toxic place to find not just people to play with - but actual friends, boasting a volunteer moderation staff of approximately 50 members.

Logo
GameTree’s logo is a tree that also resembles a hand reaching into a pile of gaming items, symbolic of the company’s purpose to help with discovery and selection in gaming. The font and style are meant to be friendly to encourage openness towards recommendations and engagement with friends and games. The background’s gradient represents a hero’s journey with GameTree giving users the tools to be the heroes in their own lives. The journey begins with everyday normality and citizenship (blue-gray), to initial challenges (dark blue), to growth and support resulting in counter intuitive mystical understandings (purple), to the final boss battle (red), to returning with enlightenment and friends (orange). GameTree’s motto “find your tribe” complements its tree logo and informal style.

Features

 * Discover games using in app algorithms
 * Find players that match your same personality type for a high-success matchmaking experience
 * Create and join sessions on demand, allowing players to host a room open for anyone to join.
 * In-depth personality and values test, that are used for finding players like the user.
 * A "Gamer DNA Model" to help gamers find exactly what they want to play.

An excerpt from the GameTree blog says that the people GameTree matches you with are not only near you, in your age range, and like the same games as you, but have compatible personalities too. They state this because the recommendations come from the application of the top frameworks in personality psychology they combining your data with statistics, correlations, and machine learning, so that you will meet people you want to be friends with.

Operation
Users can sign up utilizing their personal, or with a login through various Oauth logins such as Facebook and Google. From there, users are initially greeted with an onboarding process that consists of multiple pick and choose lists. These range from platforms a user would play on, to games a user players. Additionally, they have the opportunity to allot times they're interested in playing, upload their Steam (service) library, and upload an image for their GameTree profile.

From here users can explore the app freely. At the Core of GameTree lies its AI controlled Algorithm which curates every detail within the app itself. Below are the individual sections that you will find inside of GameTree.

My Games
In this section the user has the ability to segment out their games between "Played", "Wanna Play", and "Wishlist". This feeds into GameTree's algorithm, and allows them to select "Game Recommendations" to discover games that GameTree believes they would have interest in.

By clicking "Game Recommendations" the user is brought to that game's profile offering them a description of the game, reviews from other users, the opportunity to rate the game, and to see which of their friends already play it. GameTree's algorithm takes any information that was provided to immediately best match the user with what it believes to be a game they would enjoy.

Friends
In this section a user can see the list of all their connections, message them, send photos, start group chats and discover new players.

Discover
The Discover section allows players to find new players and new games. The bulk of the section is comprised of various gaming sessions all curated based on the user's "My Games" list, and segmented by "Friend's sessions", "Local sessions", "My game sessions", and "All sessions". It is from here that a user can create a session for any game, choosing the time, dates, number of spots, location, and privacy status.

While utilizing the "Friends" tab users can find new players based on a filtration system that takes into consideration gender, game, personality type, time last online, age, distance from your location, and language. Results are filtered by GameTree's algorithm showing the user their best matches first.

Discussions
This section acts as a Web Feed for users where they can connect with everyone else inside the platform. There are three main options within this section. The first is the "My Games" section which allows users to see everything that other users are saying about games they are interested in, and post about them as well. Additionally, this area is used for LFG (Looking for group) functionality. The second section is the "Global" feed. Here users can see everything from people promoting their discord to memes & post. It exists as a general ground for everyone to communicate as they wish. Finally, the news section brings users curated gaming news based on their interests.

Profile
The profile section allows users to alter their profile, check on their achievements/level, take their Personality/Values/Gamer DNA tests, invite other friends, and change their settings.

Features like personality tests and Gamer DNA tests can be completed at any time and will influence experience within the app.

You can learn your personality type by taking the test on the free app. The personality type pages contain useful information about people of that type, including a general description, game recommendations, reasons why you would want to be friends with such people, how to make friends with them, and advice for them on making friends with people of other types. An extensive list of the personality types game tree uses can be found here. (?)

The Gamer DNA Model is usable by gamers for clarity about games they will enjoy playing and who to play them with. It is also useful for game designers to know the types of fun they are optimizing for. GameTree’s app uses a test with the Gamer DNA Model that is used with machine learning to connect players with the people they will enjoy playing with most. The model expands upon the famous Aesthetics of Play and Gamer Motivation models which are used in game design. GameTree’s is the first model useful for gamers themselves.

When in the app, users can add games to their "My Games List" that will be populated with the games they manually add, and will see news, posts, and sessions in the app for the games they specifically choose.

GameTree's Tests
GameTree's algorithm is at the heart of everything it does. To get a better understanding of its users, three tests are offered. These allow the algorithm to match users to different games and people on a deeper level.

Personality
The personality test offered here is based on the Myers–Briggs Type Indicator. The results of which are a description of the type that they have matched into, and a four letter "indicator" that expresses their personality type.

Gamer DNA
The Gamer DNA test gets down to the nitty gritty for users. This test looks much deeper than just video game genres like RPG or FPS. It evaluates the particular elements within these games that a user might care about. Some elements include "Discovery", "Aesthetics", and "Competition".

Values
The values test takes a hard look at the user as a person. It determines the types of things that users intrinsically care about beyond just the video game world, and adds another layer to improving the matchmaking system.

User Behavior
GameTree has a reported 230,000 downloads as of 2020.

As of February 1st, 2020 GameTrees age distribution lies heavily in ranges of age 18-22 at 32.4% and age 23-32 at  20.5%.

The leading selection of Genre on the friend finding app is Action, with 90.3% of users selecting it as a genre they are interested in, followed by Adventure at 68.3% and RPG at 65.8%.

Reviews
Review site TheGamer states that in a world dominated by social media, it was about time something like GameTree came through, and why they think GameTree will be a big topic in the future. Hunter, a writer from esteem.app also leaves a list of pros for the app personally including points like its easier for users to find the best possible teammates, and new games and it provides a better matchmaking service for people to group up and actually meet.

Gaminglyfe reported that GameTree is for everyone, not just serious gamers. The application allows for impressive matching across hundreds of thousands of games, even tabletop board games to role-playing games on consoles, mobile first-person shooter games to massively multiplayer online games on desktop. While review site ProductHunt.com also leaves an excerpt that GameTree allows you to spend less time searching and playing alone, and more time doing exactly what you want, having fun and playing with people we care about and new people that you can meet.