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Hello, tankers!

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We decided to dedicate this episode of the
V-LOG to just one topic.

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We’re doing this intentionally

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to show how much time and effort

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something almost invisible but very important
may take.

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Today we are going to discuss a contextual
tutorial.

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Let’s start with a bit of its history.

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If you want to skip to the present, here is
the timestamp.

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First attempts at creating a tutorial.

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When Tanki Online was created,

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teaching newcomers and showing them all the
features of the game

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was not even a topic up for discussion.

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New players were sent straight into battle

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with the only piece of advice being a small
message

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explaining how to control a tank.

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The next step on the way to a big tutorial
was adding helpful bubbles.

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Once you entered the Garage, you saw a first
bubble

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telling you that you could get crystal cashback
for buying some new equipment.

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This taught players that it is worth it to
upgrade their tank.

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Another bubble was able to send a player to
a battle to get even more free crystals.

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And, that was it - the entire interface tutorial.

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It was conceived as a temporary stopgap, but
remained in the game for a very long time.

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Stripped-down guide for newbies

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The first fully-fledged guide was a tutorial

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where a tank was in the hangar on a special
map.

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Once a player learnt how to drive a tank and
left the hangar,

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suddenly bots began to attack the player from
shelters,

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and the next thing to learn was

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how to press the spacebar button as soon as
possible

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until the enemy health bar was empty.

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Right inside the tutorial, the hull and turret
changed for each situation.

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And in the end, a player needed to jump gracefully
off a cliff

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and fight the Thunder Mammoth boss to finish.

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Russian YouTuber Waider even has a video

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that shows how to break this tutorial; it
got over 500.000 views!

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In fact, this tutorial was meant to be much
more complex.

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It was supposed to teach newcomers all the
different mechanics of each turret at once.

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And not just show how to shoot with each of
them,

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but to show shot range, how damage reduction
works,

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and how your projectiles can ricochet off
walls.

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Making such a tutorial would have taken a
lot of time

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so a barebones version was released.

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Many questions were left unanswered in it:

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why tanks attack you, why different turrets
are equipped

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and why the Mammoth Thunder boss is just a
regular tank in the real game.

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This tutorial didn’t show the game you entered
once you completed it.

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This format of teaching new tankers how to
play remained in the game for a long time.

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Long enough to understand that something was
wrong with it.

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It was decided to perform an A/B test.

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This is a well-known technique of dividing
an audience into 2 groups to compare results.

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The first group of new players were offered
to go through the tutorial

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and only then they could enter a real battle.

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Meanwhile, we immediately offered the second
group the chance to go to the Sandbox map

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and try it out for themselves in a real battle.

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Once we got all the data we found that…,

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far more players stay in the game if they
skip the guide.

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You open the game to play it, not to complete
a boring tutorial.

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Players from the second group that were sent
straight to battles

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stayed in the game for much more time,

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and it took much less time for them to understand
how everything worked.

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Mobile tutorial

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When Tanki entered the mobile game market,

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the game’s Android client got its own unique
tutorial, complete with bots.

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Based on the past experience, it was already
much more similar to real battles.

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A player’s first task is to learn how to
move around the battlefield,

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understanding how to shoot and blowing up
a couple of bots along the way.

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Next, as it works in mobile games,

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the player was asked to go through the stage
called

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"press all the required buttons, do all these
actions

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and only then will we let you play the game.

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Or just skip it all.

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But you will need to figure out how to play
yourself."

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Now we can summarize the first part.

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All those tutorials were teaching a player
basic skills in the game.

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Back then, there weren’t that many turrets
and hulls.

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But what about now?

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We have 12 hulls, 19 turrets, and a host of
drones, overdrives, and augments.

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We can no longer attract new players without
a completely redesigned contextual tutorial.

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Modern contextual tutorial

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Relying on 13 years of experience,

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we are making a new guide that will help a
player at any time

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as questions may arise at any rank.

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Questions such as why you need drones,

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what augments do in battles, or why you should
purchase Gold Boxes.

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You will be able to find answers to all these
questions in the game.

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Special help badges will appear above icons
in the Garage.

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They will always remain there.

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When a new mechanic is released,

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you will get a piece of advice on how to use it,

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which is useful for both new and experienced
tankers.

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Even if you have played Tanki before,

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but took a break for some reason, you can
easily come back

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as now this contextual tutorial can help you
quickly restore your skills

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and get comfortable with new features.

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You choose where, how much, and when to learn,
available at any time, anywhere.

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We will no longer take you by the hand and
show you all the features at once.

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Instead, we would encourage you to do so in
exchange for small gifts.

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Together with the release of the new contextual
tutorial,

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we will launch a permanent event for all newcomers!

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All players who created their accounts before
this update will also get access to it.

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For completing these missions you can receive
Containers.

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You can complete them at any time.

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In order to make this tutorial perfect —

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and you understand that it’s not easy to
get it right the first time —

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we need your help.

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In the forum, we will create a special topic

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where you can share your feedback with us.

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Hazel will be monitoring it 24/7 and will
read each message.

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With the first iteration, which will be released
from week to week,

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a good tutorial will be added to the game;

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and future updates will bring it to perfection!

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And that’s all for today.

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As always, subscribe, leave a like and a comment!

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See you next week.

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Bye![]