07 May 2025
Free Games Games

Mobile App for drinking game, include many cards and user choose ...

...randomly

Confidence
Engagement
Net use signal
Net buy signal

Idea type: Swamp

The market has seen several mediocre solutions that nobody loves. Unless you can offer something fundamentally different, you’ll likely struggle to stand out or make money.

Should You Build It?

Don't build it.


Your are here

Your idea for a mobile drinking game app falls into a crowded space. Our analysis identifies this as a "Swamp" category, meaning there are already multiple similar solutions out there, none of which have really taken off. The presence of 6 similar products suggests moderate competition, but the low average number of comments (2) across these products indicates low engagement. This suggests people try these apps, but don't really stick with them or feel compelled to talk about them. There isn't enough signal in user comments to gauge whether they want to use or buy similar products, but the general lack of engagement implies they are not highly desired. To be blunt: many have tried, most have failed, so you're facing an uphill battle to create something that truly stands out and captures a sustainable audience.

Recommendations

  1. Before investing significant time and resources, deeply research why existing drinking game apps haven't achieved widespread popularity. Explore user reviews, identify pain points, and understand what's missing from the current offerings. Look for common themes in user complaints or feature requests that could inform your strategy.
  2. If you decide to proceed, avoid a general-purpose approach. Identify a niche audience within the drinking game community that's currently underserved. For example, a specific age group, interest group, or type of social gathering. Focus on creating a tailored experience that resonates strongly with this niche and is markedly different from the competition.
  3. Consider if you can provide your card content to a third party. Look at partnering with bars, breweries, party supply stores, or event organizers. Offering a branded, curated deck or experience could provide a more direct route to your target audience and offer recurring revenue through licensing or merchandise.
  4. Examine problems adjacent to drinking games that could be more promising. Instead of focusing solely on the game itself, explore solutions for party planning, social icebreakers, or interactive entertainment that complements the drinking experience. This could open up new revenue streams and reduce direct competition.
  5. Given the competitive landscape, it might be wise to shelve this idea and focus your energy on a more promising opportunity. Continuously evaluate your idea against other potential ventures, and be willing to pivot or abandon it if it lacks traction or faces insurmountable challenges. There are other options that could be more lucrative.
  6. Look at the positive user feedback from Drunkdeck, where users like the suitability for various occasions. Explore offering tailored decks for different events (birthdays, holidays, etc). The user feedback there also includes offering different language options, make sure to add that to your app.
  7. Use LLMs to generate content but be careful. A user of I ported the tabletop card game Anomia to mobile reported that the LLM generated cards are too specific. Make sure to use guardrails in your prompts to avoid this issue.

Questions

  1. What are the specific, unique features or content that will differentiate your app from the existing drinking game apps and compel users to choose yours over the competition? How will you prevent users from just using your app once, and then forgetting about it?
  2. Given the low engagement observed in similar apps, what innovative marketing strategies will you employ to acquire and retain users, and how will you measure the effectiveness of these strategies? How will you make sure your app goes viral?
  3. How will you monetize your app effectively? Will you use in-app purchases, ads, subscriptions, or a combination of these, and how will you balance monetization with user experience to avoid alienating potential users?

Your are here

Your idea for a mobile drinking game app falls into a crowded space. Our analysis identifies this as a "Swamp" category, meaning there are already multiple similar solutions out there, none of which have really taken off. The presence of 6 similar products suggests moderate competition, but the low average number of comments (2) across these products indicates low engagement. This suggests people try these apps, but don't really stick with them or feel compelled to talk about them. There isn't enough signal in user comments to gauge whether they want to use or buy similar products, but the general lack of engagement implies they are not highly desired. To be blunt: many have tried, most have failed, so you're facing an uphill battle to create something that truly stands out and captures a sustainable audience.

Recommendations

  1. Before investing significant time and resources, deeply research why existing drinking game apps haven't achieved widespread popularity. Explore user reviews, identify pain points, and understand what's missing from the current offerings. Look for common themes in user complaints or feature requests that could inform your strategy.
  2. If you decide to proceed, avoid a general-purpose approach. Identify a niche audience within the drinking game community that's currently underserved. For example, a specific age group, interest group, or type of social gathering. Focus on creating a tailored experience that resonates strongly with this niche and is markedly different from the competition.
  3. Consider if you can provide your card content to a third party. Look at partnering with bars, breweries, party supply stores, or event organizers. Offering a branded, curated deck or experience could provide a more direct route to your target audience and offer recurring revenue through licensing or merchandise.
  4. Examine problems adjacent to drinking games that could be more promising. Instead of focusing solely on the game itself, explore solutions for party planning, social icebreakers, or interactive entertainment that complements the drinking experience. This could open up new revenue streams and reduce direct competition.
  5. Given the competitive landscape, it might be wise to shelve this idea and focus your energy on a more promising opportunity. Continuously evaluate your idea against other potential ventures, and be willing to pivot or abandon it if it lacks traction or faces insurmountable challenges. There are other options that could be more lucrative.
  6. Look at the positive user feedback from Drunkdeck, where users like the suitability for various occasions. Explore offering tailored decks for different events (birthdays, holidays, etc). The user feedback there also includes offering different language options, make sure to add that to your app.
  7. Use LLMs to generate content but be careful. A user of I ported the tabletop card game Anomia to mobile reported that the LLM generated cards are too specific. Make sure to use guardrails in your prompts to avoid this issue.

Questions

  1. What are the specific, unique features or content that will differentiate your app from the existing drinking game apps and compel users to choose yours over the competition? How will you prevent users from just using your app once, and then forgetting about it?
  2. Given the low engagement observed in similar apps, what innovative marketing strategies will you employ to acquire and retain users, and how will you measure the effectiveness of these strategies? How will you make sure your app goes viral?
  3. How will you monetize your app effectively? Will you use in-app purchases, ads, subscriptions, or a combination of these, and how will you balance monetization with user experience to avoid alienating potential users?

  • Confidence: High
    • Number of similar products: 6
  • Engagement: Low
    • Average number of comments: 2
  • Net use signal: 10.0%
    • Positive use signal: 10.0%
    • Negative use signal: 0.0%
  • Net buy signal: 0.0%
    • Positive buy signal: 0.0%
    • Negative buy signal: 0.0%

This chart summarizes all the similar products we found for your idea in a single plot.

The x-axis represents the overall feedback each product received. This is calculated from the net use and buy signals that were expressed in the comments. The maximum is +1, which means all comments (across all similar products) were positive, expressed a willingness to use & buy said product. The minimum is -1 and it means the exact opposite.

The y-axis captures the strength of the signal, i.e. how many people commented and how does this rank against other products in this category. The maximum is +1, which means these products were the most liked, upvoted and talked about launches recently. The minimum is 0, meaning zero engagement or feedback was received.

The sizes of the product dots are determined by the relevance to your idea, where 10 is the maximum.

Your idea is the big blueish dot, which should lie somewhere in the polygon defined by these products. It can be off-center because we use custom weighting to summarize these metrics.

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I ported the tabletop card game Anomia to mobile

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Anomia is a trivia card game where players take turns drawing cards: when two symbols match those two players race to name an example of a thing in the other person's category. It's a very chaotic party game with lots of shouting.We built this because me and my friends wanted to play the card game but we didn't always have the deck. But hey, everyone always has their phone and a phone is roughly card-shaped.The backend is all Rust + Axum and the app is React Native. We use websockets to sync the phones in real-time.It's a party game so you'll need ideally 3-8 people to play.Would love feedback so please give it a try and let me know how it goes!

Users find it easy to add custom decks and are seeking advice on LLM prompts. The launch has been congratulated.

The LLM-generated cards are too specific.


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The Product Hunt launch received positive feedback, with one user congratulating the team. Another user inquired about the app's advantage over random generators in making choices.


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