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What's your favorite onboarding design?
over 5 years ago from Nick Bernian, Lets do this
Raphael Loder, over 5 years ago
For more information on this, see Design Club - Super Mario Bros: Level 1-1 - How Super Mario Mastered Level Design.
Be careful about applying these rules mindlessly, as some of them are relying on the fact that you're right at the beginning of a game and restarting is easy. I don't necessarily think this applies to software or even enterprise software. Often you only get one chance.
I'm always a fan of the "ease them into it" approach. Video games are great at this. Think about World 1-1 in Super Mario Bros.
You first are on a screen with nothing. You try to go left, you're blocked. You go right, there's more to the map.
You then encounter an enemy. You tap nothing, you die. You tap the A-button, you jump over the enemy and live.
Hey look, an intriguing question mark box. You just learned to jump and wonder if you can jump into that box. Whoa! Something fun came out.
And on and on.