Where players quit
Learning paths through this topic
How long can an unskippable-feeling cutscene be before players start skipping?
If many players press skip at second ten, the scene is too long or too slow, whatever you think of its quality. This entry shows how to read the skip button as a sign of patience and to cut the scene where people still stay.
Where do players end up after they change the difficulty, and who keeps flip-flopping?
Looking at what difficulty people start on says little. What matters is where they settle, and whether they hop between settings without finding a fit. This entry shows how to read both from the log of setting changes.
Was the last stretch without anything new unusually long for this player?
Players leave after long quiet stretches, but how long is too long depends on how fast that person usually unlocks things. A fixed number misjudges patient and quick players alike. This entry shows how to compare the final gap with the player's own earlier gaps.
Only some leavers answer the exit question: how to read the reasons without being misled
A one-click question when someone leaves tells you why, but the people who answer are not the people who leave. Newcomers close the window without a word while veterans love to explain. This entry shows how to weigh the answers so they match who actually left.
A faction wins most games, but is it too strong or just picked by better players?
If the best players love one side, that side wins a lot even when it is perfectly balanced. Fixing it by weakening it would only push people away. This entry shows how to compare each faction against what its players were expected to win.
How much of a session is spent at each game speed, and how much is spent paused?
Players who push the speed to the maximum may be eager, or they may be bored and waiting for something to happen. Counting the speed button presses tells you nothing; time at each speed does. This entry shows how to measure it and keep pauses out of play time.
Did the hint really help players, or would they have done it anyway?
After you add a hint that nudges players toward an action, more of them do it, and it feels like a win. But some had already done it, and others would have done it on their own. This entry shows how to measure the real lift against a fair comparison group.
Tell which horror puzzles make players leave the window to look up the answer
A puzzle that sends many players away to search for help is one they find unclear, and some never come back from that search. This entry shows how to spot such puzzles without watching anyone, only from how long the game window was out of focus, and what to do about the ones that never return.
Tell apart players who quit from players whose horror game crashed or lost power
Many sessions simply stop, with no goodbye from the game, and counting them as people who gave up blames the story for a bug or a dead battery. This entry shows a way to separate the two kinds of ending, and how to avoid calling a player who is still playing a loss.
Find the spot in a horror level where many different players die, not one who retries
A death map shows a bright spot where one stubborn player kept dying thirty times, and it looks like the hardest place in the game. This entry shows how to build the map so that a spot is bright only when many different people struggle there, and what to show next to it.
What do players do right after a game over screen: retry, menu, or just leave?
The moment after a death is where horror games lose or keep people, but the log only has scattered clicks. This entry shows how to turn them into a clear answer for each death, including the many players who simply close the window or wander off, and how fast the ones who retry do it.
A player hiding in a locker looks like they walked away: count playing time right
Horror games ask players to hold still, hide and wait, and a simple check for no input then marks the tensest moments as people being away. This entry shows how to count real playing time without punishing the moments the game itself asks for stillness.