We have a good start here with the Facebook/Twitter implementation. It's an idea that has a ton of potential, especially for online leagues. As some others are mentioning, there are still some steps to be taken before this thing is ready to really take off. Here are a few suggestions:
- Allow users to edit wall updates/tweets before they get posted. This is a biggie. Right now, there's no customization possible. If users can't personalize their messages, they aren't going to be motivated to use the feature.
- Provide a blank template for users to create tweets/wall updates from within the game. Another huge one. Currently, OOTP can only send out wall updates/tweets about in-game news stories. Users are going to want more than that. They'll want to type up their own custom tweets and updates about things happening in the game. We shouldn't force them to leave the application to do that; it should be possible from right withing OOTP.
- Add player pictures/stats to Facebook wall updates. Solonor mentioned the possibility of adding graphics and stats to wall updates. That would certainly add some color and make the feature more attractive.
- Allow users to specify the Facebook/Twitter account to be used. Solonor also brings up a good point about not being able to direct OOTP to use a particular account. Adding a section into the Online Game Options where users can enter in account data would be helpful.
Above all else,
incentivizing the use of the new Facebook/Twitter feature by allowing users to customize their wall updates and tweets should be the top goal. Personalization is what gets people invested in OOTP leagues in the first place. You can be sure that users will want more than the "just the facts" headlines tweeted through OOTP; they're going to want to send off their own updates on events as they occur (e.g. "OMG, pujols just hit gm7 9th ning HR! he is king kthnxbye!").
As I said, there's a lot of potential here. This is the kind of feature that might get pooh-poohed at first because it sounds outside the scope of the game ("I came here for baseball, not social networking!"), but once it's kicking on all cylinders, I think a lot of people will be surprised by how much they enjoy its addition. I'm really excited about the possibilities that Facebook/Twitter support will open up after the feature receives a little more polish!