Pokennection 1.0.0 released: Initially I Thought My Players Were Bots
I Thought My Players Were Bots
Yesterday I added accounts, analytics, cloud saves, and leaderboards to Pokennection.
And that’s when I realized something weird was happening.
People were actually playing the game daily.
Not just random visits.
Not just someone opening the page once.
Actual players returning every day.
At first, I genuinely thought it was bots.
For the last few days I kept noticing strange things happening:
- more people joining the Discord
- weird spikes in activity
- players staying longer than expected
- repeated sessions from similar users
And honestly?
I couldn’t understand what was going on.
Pokennection started as a small browser experiment inspired by Pokémon connections and puzzle games.
Something fun.
Something weird.
A side project.
I never expected people to actually get invested in it.
If you want to try it yourself:
👉 https://www.pokennection.com
The Moment It Started Feeling Real
Yesterday I added:
- accounts
- cloud saves
- analytics
- leaderboards
- an unlimited mode
And the funniest part is that unlimited mode wasn’t even originally planned.
A user on Discord suggested it.
At first, Pokennection was mostly about streaks:
you fail once, your run ends.
But as more people started joining the Discord, I realized something weird had clearly happened somewhere online.
People weren’t just visiting anymore.
They were discussing the game.
Giving feedback.
Suggesting ideas.
Wanting more ways to play.
And honestly, I decided to lean into it.
So I implemented unlimited mode:
a mode where players can continue infinitely and compete for high scores on global leaderboards.
And almost immediately people started grinding it.
The leaderboard started filling with actual users.
Real usernames.
Real scores.
People grinding.
People competing.
Some probably cheating a little 😂
But still:
real people.
And seeing that felt surreal.
That was probably the moment the project stopped feeling like a random side experiment and started feeling like an actual community project.
Wait… Infrastructure?
The funniest part is that my first reaction wasn’t excitement.
It was panic.
Because if the users were real…
that meant my infrastructure problems were also real.
I recently migrated the game to a more robust server setup, and suddenly I started noticing how many things I originally built “just for fun” would become expensive very quickly if people actually used them.
So I ended up spending a lot of time:
- optimizing requests
- reducing unnecessary usage
- improving caching
- lowering costs
- fixing bad architectural decisions
- trying to make the game sustainable
Which is honestly a very weird and exciting problem to have.
Trying To Figure Out Where It Spread
So naturally, I tried to figure out where all these people came from.
And the answer was…
I still have no idea.
The only clue I found was a random Tumblr post from TWO YEARS AGO when I first made the website.
That’s it.
No huge creator.
No viral tweet.
No big Reddit post.
Nothing obvious.
Just people somehow finding the game.
Internet is weird.
The Most Motivating Part
What surprised me the most wasn’t the traffic itself.
It was seeing people actually care.
Watching users compete on rankings.
Seeing Discord activity.
Watching players return daily.
Reading feedback.
Seeing people spend time inside something we made.
That changes how you think about development.
Now I already have ideas for:
- future updates
- new modes
- connected systems
- social features
- other connected games
- integrations with our upcoming Steam game
And honestly?
That’s probably the coolest part.
This Is Bigger Than Just One Game
At the same time, we’re also working on a bigger Steam game at Staytiny Games.
And now I’m starting to realize Pokennection might become something else entirely:
- a community hub
- a competitive playground
- a universe connected to future projects
- a way to discover players who enjoy the kinds of games we want to make
Which is kind of crazy considering this all started as a weird little browser game experiment.
I Still Don’t Fully Understand It
I still don’t know exactly how people found the game.
I still think some of the traffic is bots.
But now I also know there are a lot of real players there too.
And honestly?
That’s enough motivation to keep going.
Internet is weird sometimes.
Play Pokennection
👉 https://www.pokennection.com