Quick play: Remaining tasks for full scale release

[smoogipoo]

Quick play will be released to all users in the next release. This is an aggregated tracker for issues brought up through multiple channels.

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Todo

• Make quick play redownload locally modified beatmaps #35393
• Fix stage not advancing if users leave during beatmap download stage osu-server-spectator#342
• Preview next song in quick play #35367
• Fix quick play "view beatmap" not showing beatmap overlay #35399
• auto download in quick play on each round goes earlier than the actual beatmap selection
• Adjust quick play stage times osu-server-spectator#335
• Play sound when match is available even when queueing in background #35496
• should be able to view map details (HP, AR, OD, length etc), either hovering Star rating or displayed in the card
• currently can't report / block, the dropdown is too short and kicks you back to the top if you scroll (Several improvements to quick play chat input #35432).
• users not in your queued ruleset are showing up as bubbles
  • smoogi: On internal discussion, this isn't an important work item for the time being but we'll either want this or want to display # of users in the queue.

Needs more discussion

• easy to miss the timers as they're on the bottom, maybe they should be moved up top. (Add very simple countdown timer for quick play stages #35433 makes it more prominent already)
• random beatmaps being selected for players who don't make a choice feels strange, i.e. in Overwatch quick play if only one person votes on a map, that map is chosen. (Remove auto-selection when no user pick osu-server-spectator#343)
• impossible to tell how close you are to finding a match
• make the "queue in background button" instead be the one to cancel the queue and everything else puts it on background

Needs investigation

• if 2/3 players pick map A and the third player picks map B, it looks like a 50/50 chance for either map.
  • smoogi: RNG at play, working as intended

Needs a lot of work

• hovering over avatars shows offline users

[hburn7]

Quick play feedback

Using this space to organize all of the things I've seen so far as it seems like this is the "megathread" for quick play issues. Either removed or expanded upon any duplicates from the OP.

Bugs

• Matchmaker sometimes finds a match instantly after queuing, but this never results in a lobby being played. Either there's a bug or someone didn't accept the match each time this happened to me. (Fix dangling quick play states osu-server-spectator#338)
• Users have bubbles even though they are offline. Some users appear to be in the queue permanently. (Fix dangling quick play states osu-server-spectator#338)
• Extremely long queue times even when numerous users are online and in the queue (I gave up after 40 mins of waiting while writing this [osu!]).
  • smoogi: I believe this is also fixed by Fix dangling quick play states osu-server-spectator#338
• Rankings displaying incorrectly. In a lobby with 6 players, "7th" may be assigned to the user in 6th place if the previous 6th place user leaves early. (Show quit quick play users rather than removing them #35470)

UX

(Urgent, imo):

• Beatmap selection timer is too long at one minute. I think 40 seconds is more appropriate. (Reduce round start and user pick stage times osu-server-spectator#340)
  • Long waits between rounds drives me away from wanting to queue. I also think the timer should complete instantly/quickly once everyone has voted. (Resolved: Fast forward countdown after all players select a beatmap osu-server-spectator#344)
• Need to be able to 'skip' beatmap intro lead times similar to traditional multi/solo play.

(Not urgent):

• "Click to join" notification should automatically join the lobby for you on the quick play screen, rather than requiring user input to do so.
• The bubbles feel very random right now. Visuals should more accurately represent the state of the matchmaker. Seems very random right now. I will see users in the lobby who were not seen as bubbles in the queue screen.
• Phasing in and out of groups of bubbles should probably go. Is this here to show what is happening in the queues for other modes? Is it a requirement to not overload the server by displaying everyone at once?
• Having a static reference image of the user's profile and a duplicate bubble orbiting feels strange. Maybe the static user image can be used as a reference point that other bubbles "magnetically" attach to as the matchmaker forms the lobby? I think this "magnetic" behavior would function better than overlaps as well in general.
• Not obvious what the bubble size variance represents. What is the difference between a tiny bubble and a huge one?
• Queue notification does not appear mid-map, meaning it will likely be missed by anyone playing casually in solo waiting for their match.
• More often than not, the matches fail to take hold after "waiting for all players". Maybe people are missing notifications due to the aforementioned point?
  • smoogi: I believe this to be fixed by Fix dangling quick play states osu-server-spectator#338
• Map selection timer should be extended by about 7-10 seconds, should end early if everyone selects a map. (Adjust quick play stage times osu-server-spectator#335)
• Cannot click on user icons to view profiles in the results screen, contrary to solo UX.
• Chat UX feels kind of weird but I don't have more constructive feedback than this at the moment. Click to chat and other mentioned issues would probably help this feeling.

UI

• Not possible to know whether still in the queue without opening notifications tab when queuing in background. Notification bell should have some indicator so that users know they are still queued.
• Bubbles barely visible above the top of the navigation menu at the top of the screen (there must be some teeny gap such that the menu bar isn't flush with the top of the screen).
• When queuing in the background, removing the running task notification by clicking the X cancels the user's queue without a confirmation.
  • In fact, it may be best to not use the notification menu for this at all. Why not a small menu at the top center (copying Overwatch design)?
• Should ideally be able to see user global rank without having to click on their profile in the lobby.
• Some spacing issues where usernames are clipping behind their avatars?

Minor improvements

• Allow users to quickly tag beatmaps in the results screen?
• Potentially introduce a setting which enables automatic acceptance of the queue and automatic removal from gameplay into the quickplay lobby should the match be created successfully.
  • Shouldn't this be the default behavior anyway? Overwatch's "While you wait" system is identical to playing solo while in queue. Requiring the user to confirm they are there when the queue pops only adds friction.

Personal gripes

• I take issue with the fact that two users voting for one map does not increase the likelihood of that map being played (edit: the server actually does take this into account). The current animation doesn't really support this, so one way around it is to line up the user icons and animate over them instead of the map cards. Each user icon could be enlarged and placed atop the beatmap card. Their border would then be highlighted instead of the beatmap. Then whichever user is landed on, the beatmap they voted for is selected.
• The random map selection animation leaves a lot to be desired. Maybe more variance can be added in the animation to give users the feeling that it is truly random. The current animation feels like it operates the exact same way each time which leads me to feel like it's not as random as it could be, regardless of whether the server is selecting it truly randomly.
• I don't like random maps being introduced to the RNG selection process when users do not select anything. I think the only case where RNG should interfere with the selection process is if nobody votes for any maps, then one is selected at random.
  • Consider a random map selected at the extremes of the difficulty range, this is bad.

Beatmap rotation

Re smoogi's message in the osu! server:

But since people prefer a wider variety, we'll need a strategy for adding beatmaps/retiring them. I'm all ears if you have thoughts on how to continue doing it going forward.

Of course, this one lies with the team. I am of the opinion that quality will go down if this becomes automated, especially after mods get involved. Players have complimented the pool quality from what I have seen, so I would assume they would do the same if there is a noticeable drop in quality. This is especially the case should the system evolve to be competitive.

I think I would expand the pool to about 100 beatmaps. Maybe less for other modes where there is less frequency of play. It's not hard to find good maps to put in the pool by hand, at least for osu!. To me, it makes sense to give beatmaps a maximum lifespan and rotate unpopular beatmaps out early. There are also beatmaps that are too popular, such that people are sick of them; these may be rotated earlier too. I think it's reasonable for this to be done manually, if the size of the pool is kept <= 100 maps. I also think it could possibly increase retention as there will frequently be something fresh to play in quick play.

While I probably would be able to find consistent helpers for this, it's up to the team if they want to take on the risk of having someone outside the team be in charge of the curation for this, or if it should be automated, handed to someone else, etc.

Final thoughts

Really glad this is on tachyon for testing and I'm very excited about the future of the system. It's awesome and gives me a reason to play osu! again.