Two years. Phew. I actually never thought that Questlog would be the thing it is now after two years. The idea started as a simple Excel-Replacement. Now it’s a small community.
I used other services before I started Questlog. But their limitations in the free tier always annoyed me. Why am I restricted in the number of lists I could create, when I don’t pay? That doesn’t make sense for me. Playlists just use a few bytes in the database if it’s a huge playlist it’s maybe one or two Kilobytes. Other limitations bothered me too and then I just wanted to do something for myself.
Oftentimes when I build stuff for myself I do this in public. Not the “Build in Public” trend where I write about every thought, like it’s common in the webdev space. Just not as a completely closed project. Domain, registration and I write sometimes about the project. I don’t really advertise anything.
And still we are at ~450 users now. That’s mind blowing for me. As I said multiple times, I never expected more than 10 users.
How Questlog developed in year two?
In 2024 my main quest was to work based on your feedback. So I added many smaller or bigger features and changes that were directly influenced by the feedback I got on Mastodon.
But one feature was cooked in the background and it was definitely a surprise hit. In June I launched the Events page of Questlog. There you find many events in form of Livestreams where games are shown. It was right at the beginning of the Summer of Games where the Event page launched and according to your feedback this was the perfect timing.
The Events there go back to May of 2001 with a PlayStation event and go to the recently aired Xbox Developer_Direct 2025. On these pages you can see all games and videos that got shown during the event and easily add them to your lists.
In March you got a completely new Profile page with the option to add links to your other online profiles. These links support the Webfinger Protocol so if you link for example to you Mastodon profile and from there to you Questlog profile you get a nice verified link indicator.
When I developed this I delayed everything because I thought “Hey, if users can add their Steam profile link, shouldn’t I also implement a Steam import?”. Well, I did and you used it pretty extensively. Many of you imported over 9,700 games collectively via Steam this way.
In September the Reviews got their first big overhaul based on your feedback. Instead of a star system it’s much simpler with Like, Dislike and Neutral. It’s also possible to add the platform you played the game on etc.
In the background, hidden from all of you I’ve completely rewritten my Admin Panel. It was based on Laravel Nova before but now uses Filament PHP and I can manage everything much easier now.
The last update was one I wanted to do for a while now. The ticket for this was actually written before I launched Questlog. It’s just a small thing but adding games directly from a Playlist or Status page is something I really enjoy and I think it’s good for the onboarding experience too.
Some smaller improvements were
- Better similar games
- Indicators if a game got canceled
- Many design, UX and Accessibility improvements
- Improvements on game updates
- Many many Performance improvements
- Store Links for games
What can we expect in year 3?
Currently I work on the second big rework of the reviews. After I simplified the voting many of you wrote much more reviews than before. I had Markdown in my head for a while but now it’s a user request too. So the priority is much higher now.
Instead of bringing one big update I want to make multiple smaller updates that add Markdown, multiple platforms per review, a section to write positive and negative bullet points, drafts, spoiler markings and more. And the option to add one link to the review if you have your own blog or site where you write about games but also want to review a game on Questlog. No need to write something twice if you have the content already on your own platform.
When I implement Markdown for Reviews it opens the door for another feature I wanted to do for a while. Notes on games. Private notes or Public notes. This is just in the idea state, but imagine something where you write down stuff you want to remember. Or Guides for segments of a game. The possibilities here are pretty extensive. So we will see what I can make out of it.
One big oversight are still the missing filters in status lists and Playlists. This is more of a design thing than a backend thing. From the backend side it’s just two lines of code as I built my filter system modular. But it has to fit and the sidebar on profiles actually makes this much harder. So maybe there has to be a bigger redesign before I can do this.
These sections on the home page or on game pages with 8 games next to each other or 9 games in three rows… I think they’re useful but especially on mobile it’s too much space. So I want to make sliders out of this. Maybe with more than 8-9 games. But sliders can be an accessibility nightmare so I have to see how I’ll implement this.
Questlog has one thing that pretty much every gamer wants: A dark theme. But it has only a dark theme. And that’s quite odd, right? But most importantly it isn’t accessible for everyone. The partner of my best friend can’t use Questlog because they can’t focus on the white text on dark green. So I will add a Light Theme to Questlog.
Maybe this blog needs a light theme too…
I want to improve the search. Why not being able to search for Playlists, Studios, Events and more? This will definitely come sooner rather than later.
The core feature of Questlog is still in its first iteration. Logging a game. Internally it’s a play status. I want to rename it to Logs. Because you log a game as finished. You log a game as want to play etc. And when I do this you will finally be able to add a date to a finished game. And the platform and playtime. I think this should be a main focus this year.
Community functions like follow users and seeing what they’re playing right now seems like an obvious feature. But I have to do it right because your privacy is my highest priority and I want you to feel safe on Questlog. So this will need a bit of planning.
Onboarding is another big topic for this year. If you find Questlog per chance and register then you have to discover everything on your own. Many people don’t have an avatar because they don’t know how. Some users have multiple playlists but no games on them. And others log 10 games and stop there. So I not only have to make Questlog easier to use but also add a simple onboarding after you login. A help page is probably a good idea too.
But my most anticipated feature will be one that will be a bit bigger. A completely new feature: Screenshots.
I want you to be able to upload screenshots to a game, like them. Maybe comment them? Mark them as spoiler because nothing is more annoying than spoilers for games you still want to play. I have many ideas for Screenshots and I’m in the planning phase right now, but I want to release this in the first quarter or at least it the first half of the year.
And most important: Questlog will stay ad-free and tracking free. Not only this year but forever. I hate ads and tracking so much and I just don’t want to track anyone. Everything I need to know about Questlog and what you do there is stuff I can see in the database because it’s stuff you do actively on Questlog. I don’t want to know how many visits I have. How long you are on Questlog and how many pages any user visits. I just want you to have fun and use a useful tool.
Thank you!
Really. Thank you for your ongoing support and feedback. Especially the feedback is extremely motivating.
A special thank you goes to the few people that support Questlog on Ko-fi. I develop this app completely on my own without any help in my free time. It is free and will stay free. I don’t want to lock features behind a paywall (Screenshots though will probably limited to a certain amount as these will definitely increase the cost of Questlog, but more on this when I know more) and I don’t really need your money. But every months I get 3-5€ from some of you I have to smile and I’m just happy for your support. Thank you! 💚