The power of gamification: why I chose to show off English based tutorials in Japan

Daizen Ikehara: Today, I'm gonna talk about the power of gamification. So the reason I chose to show off the English based tutorials in Japan so once again, let me introduce myself. My name is Daisen Ikehara. I'm a developer for a company called Twilio. Here's my email.

So you can reach me out to the ikehara@twitter.com. Or I use the neri seventy eight as IDs for Twitter, Twitch, GitHub. So you can scan these QR codes and follow me on, you know, any channels that you wanna follow. So today, I have twenty five minutes. So I'm going to talk about what is Twilio, what is TwilioQuest, because this is going to be the base information before me talking about Japan.

Then next, I'm gonna talk about why I chose to show that this game in Japan. I don't know what I the last one is to the insight from the my experiment. What worked? What were not worked? I know I'm what's I'm gonna do next?

So if you have any question, you can drop the question in Slido. I think there's a q and a time so I can answer questions. So first one is what is Twilio? What is TwilioQuest? So my company Twilio provides a lot of APIs that empowers communications.

So we provide APIs for SMS, voice, email, video, chat, everything about our communication. Now we have the more than 8,000,000 developers sign up for their account. Also, have the 190,000 businesses, and we provide services over the 100 countries including Japan and Singapore or Australia in this region. So how Twilio works is very simple. Let's say the person sends text to Twilio phone number, then Twilio reaches the h t p request to your application.

You can write response based on the incoming message. So in this example, I write hi as a response, then actual hi tech is is sent to the the person's phone. This means you can program the your response or you can program your communication with the Twilio. So this is pretty powerful, Paltrum, I think. But we have a lot of products.

So this is the kind of one of the marquee slide I took from my corporate pitch deck. So we provide not only for SMS and the voice APIs too many stuff. So I joined the Twilio last October, and I was overwhelmed right away because I didn't expect that Twilio has so many stuff, you know, to talk about. So I needed to learn the things, not only for the SMS and voice, but also the other platforms or other channels. And the as I assure that other people have the same problem, you know, when you get to the Twilio platform.

You need to learn everything, but how? One answer is to we provide documentation. Our documentation team is pretty good, so we provide the a lot of information with the documentation. But like me, you know, I don't like read documentation. I don't really read documentation actually.

So whenever you wanna learn first things, you wanna get to like a SMS, I mean, quick start or you wanna see the demos. So even you have the great documentation, there's a program for new users to be onboarding. So my our developer education team decided to create a game based tutorial called a TwilioQuest. So you can download TwilioQuest at www.twitter.com/quest. It's a free download.

You can learn TwilioQuest on your Windows PC, Mac OS, or Linux. And there's no charge, so you can learn new things with this game. And I'm gonna show the couple of the screenshots from the TwilioQuest. So in the TwilioQuest, you move the your avatar with the red in the screen. You know, you move the player operator, and you are actually one of members of the special group.

And that group is trying to fight with the shadow organization called legacy system. So we use the Cloudper to defeat those shadow organization, And this is a training mission for the TwilioQuest. And you can choose any kind of the missions that are available in that game. So the TwilioQuest provides not only for the Twilio product tutorials, but also programming languages like JavaScript, PHP, or Python, or even GitHub. So you can learn how to use GitHub with the TwilioQuest.

So I think this is the powerful stuff for new users, especially when you get started on a programming. You don't have to learn about the Twilio. You can learn about the JavaScript or PHP. Actually, I've never used a Python or PHP before joining the company, but now I'm learning those languages with a TwilioQuest. And you can move the each mission.

There's challenges. And this is one of the challenge that we provide. So, you know, the there's a challenge for you and there's a rewards. So you can get experience points and also the items when you overcome the challenge. And you can tweak your avatar with the items.

So right now, my avatar has a green lightsaber, also the red jacket. We call that track jacket. And I have a red shoes, and I have a hole on my shoulder. So you can tweak your avatar based on the items that you get from challenges. So this is kind of the gamification.

You know, you learn new stuff and you get items that you can tweak your character. So I think this is working well. So if you wanna learn more about TwilioQuest itself, there's a talk last year at the developer con twenty nineteen. One of my colleagues, Andrew Baker, who leads the developer education team, talked about why we create this game, what happens in the future. So I highly encourage you to look at the these videos.

So now you know what the Twilio is and what TwilioQuest is. The main topic for today for me is to why I chose to show the TwilioQuest in Japan and what I did. Yeah. This is the fun part. First of all, me, I love games.

You can tell me that because I'm sitting on that gaming chair. Also, this is the screenshot from my favorite game called EverQuest. It's not TwilioQuest, but it's EverQuest. So this is MMORPC. I started this in February.

So the character has 20 years old. It's actually older than my son. So this is my first son, you know, born 20 ago. And you can notice that I played this game for five hundred thirty seven days. Doesn't it doesn't mean I started one and a half years ago.

It means I spent one and a half years of my entire life with this game. So, you know, the how much I'm into that game. So I love games. So I like the TwilioQuest concept, Twilio game itself. So this is the number one reason I chose to show off the game to the Japanese audiences.

Second one, in Japan, there are a lot of famous games available. So I had my assumptions. First one is the the concept of the game is well established and accepted by the audience in Japan. So there are famous games, Super Mario Bros, Zelda, Pokemon, Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest.

Speaker 2: So

Daizen Ikehara: people used to be playing game in the childhood or even some adults play games in Japan. So I know that people like game in Japan. So it could be biased, but as long as I saw the people around my side myself or people from the developer committee, I think the they like games. And second assumption from my side is people don't read instructions when they sell a game. So I ask you to think about when you get a new game staff, do you really need instruction book before you trying to play?

I don't. So I thought languages may not be a problem to play the game for Japanese audiences. So these are two assumptions, and I decided to show this game into the Japan. So I chose one of the conference conferences in Japan to show off the game. So it happened in February.

This is actually the last conference I went to physically, so it's been five months. So I chose to show the TwilioQuest to the audience in this conference. And what I did was to talk about the TwilioQuest in my session, the present the TwilioQuest at the booth, tweeting a lot about a TwilioQuest during the conference time. So I hope that people got interested in and people try to play. But there's a big big wall in front of me, a language barrier.

If you don't speak or read English, and even though my assumption is you don't read instructions when you play game, but the still that I thought language is one of the barrier that you need to overcome for people to play. So I decided to create a a Japanese mission just to understand how to play TwilioQuest. Because the TwilioQuest provides a basic mission for you to learn how to play TwilioQuest. So people don't read the instruction, but people learn from tutorial how to play TwilioQuest. Then the people can try other tutorials.

So the I thought, you know, this is not fair for Japanese people to let them read English tutorials to learn how to play TwilioQuest. So I created the Japanese version for the event specifically. Also, I create a new map for the event. The red wall actually replicates the event venue. So the the place where the the the was held.

So people feel the sympathy, you know, when they play the TwilioQuest. So these are my experiments experiments on what I did in February, and I can tell you what worked, what were not work, and I'm going to what's next. So first line is what worked. Actually, a bunch of people tried to play game. So this is a a leaderboard on the event.

So I set the event for two year quest so people can join the event during the event time. So I saw many people try the TwilioQuest. I didn't anticipate that what expect expect the those many people tried TwilioQuest because it's English based. You know, even though the Japanese based mission, everything is UI still English. So I I'm happy that I get this result with, you know, these people.

Also, two people actually completed every I mean, all missions in a base mission. So they drop by the booth to say to me, you know, the hey. I completed these missions. It's great. So I was very happy about that too.

So I now I know, you know, even it's English, if the concept or content is good, then I Japanese people play. But how about what's not worked? This is interesting one. So the I got three changes. First one is the regulatory compliance and the country specific limitations.

Because Twilio provides phone numbers to the people, in some countries that they need to provide their identity in order to purchase the phone numbers. Unfortunately, Japan is the one of them. So you need to provide driver's license or passport to Twilio to be reviewed with the, you know, your identity with the others. So it takes some time. Also, there are some capability some product doesn't support a Japanese phone number.

So the TwilioQuest got affected by those limitations. So I thought this is one of the blockers. And if I want to bring the TwilioQuest to Japan, I need to solve the problem. But I'm glad that I find out with this experiment. Also, language is still a blocker for many people.

I provided a Japanese basic tutorial, but people still expect the full Japanese version. So one of the player said to me, you know, it's great. I can wait for the Japanese version. So I was like, okay. I'm try.

So, yeah, there there's a expectation for the Japanese version in the market. So if you have the good content in English, good blog, good samples in English, you know, still you people want to have the Japanese version. So you need to deal with that in a Japanese country. Also, I found the side effects of games. So this was actually discussed even with the English one.

So Tourio Quest is a game themed tutorial. So people like game. It's okay. But what if they wear a suit and wear tie and go to the office? Can they play the game inside of the office?

I don't think so. So if we we want to be pursue those developers or the people who wear suit, we need to take another approach, not like a Twilio request. So these three challenges challenges, I need to overcome or I found from the my experiment. So I think I have a few more minutes. So I'm gonna talk about what's next.

My future plan with with the TwilioQuest in Japan. First one, I started commentary blog post in Japanese. So in the event, I provided a Japanese tutor and missions, but also I provide I started providing the Japanese blog with the TwilioQuest, how to play a background story about a shadow organization, Also, how to sign up a Twilio account so that people can read my blog post and play English version of that TwilioQuest. Second one is I started the streaming from April. So like Mish, the, you know, previous speaker, I'm doing the streaming every Tuesday and every Thursday.

So every Tuesday, I set, like, a TwilioQuest night or a gaming Tuesday, and I'm sharing my playing with the TwilioQuest. So this is a screenshot of me learning the how to code PHP. And now I know the, you know, comparison values in the PHP is pretty it's very pain. So so I'm sharing my failure, my success during my streaming. So I hope everyone can see or people who who interested in that TwilioQuest can look at the what I do during the my play.

Also, I started supporting the community. So one of the user community for Japan for Twilio wanted to do online event in July. So it it happened actually two weeks ago. So I supported it, like, providing Zoom accounts or creating events for them and providing the swags kind of things. So there it was great time for, you know, everyone playing TwilioQuest.

So I want to expand that experience to more to Japan. So now I'm trying to new events. We're trying to support the community who wants to have the event with the TwilioQuest. So here here are my summary. So I talked about TwilioQuest and why I chose to show off the the game theme, the tutorials in Japan.

First one is game can help new users onboarding regardless of languages. So people don't read documentation. People don't like to read the instructions. So let them experience something fun and learn your stuff. So this is the one big success with the TwilioQuest, I believe.

Also, I confirmed well, I reconfirmed localization that any level is a key to success for small or big win in the country. So if I didn't provide the Japanese basic mission, I wouldn't have gotten that many people sign up for the event at the developer summit. So my advice for the other peers for the world, if you have the good content, get some help from the local, you know. It's it's okay for, you know, to have the local English contents or non Japanese contents, but have somebody write about that in Japanese. That works well for the first success.

Then after that, you can talk with your manager by talking with a company for the budget, for the localization. And the last one is to having that great tool to have fun with the video community. So I see the big success in Japan with the TwilioQuest, with the, you know, the language support or like a supporting community. So I see the big future with the TwilioQuest in Japan. So that's all for my talk.

And if you are interested in working with Twilio, actually, we have the developer Evangelist positions open in Brazil, France, and The US. So you can scan each one of them or everything all three QR codes and apply to the Twilio. And if you wanna know more about the Twilio and how the advantages work at Twilio, you can DM me or ask you to your developer advantage friends because we spread it all over the world, US or UK or everywhere, you know. One person in Melbourne as well. So if you have any question, please let us know.

And that's all for my talk, and thank you for having me. And have a great day or night or evening.

Speaker 3: Thank you, Have a

Speaker 4: great session. Thank you again. So, Taiji, please tell Daven what question do you have for Friday. Please take a look.

Speaker 3: Sure. Hey, guys, and thank you for your good presentation. And I can pick some question up for you. The first question is let me see. Okay.

Did you create to request as in house development? If yes, do you have, you know, also gaming program in Twilio? Oh, I see.

Daizen Ikehara: Yes. This, TwilioQuest was built in in house, and we have the team for TwilioQuest inside of the developer education team. And, lead programmer is I don't know if whether he is a game programmer, but he loves games. So yeah. His name is Kevin Winnery.

He sometimes, streaming on the Twitch as well. Yeah.

Speaker 3: Oh, I see. Oh, it's very interesting. The I I I also want to know, want to how should I say? Want to do hire to our team, the as a gaming programmer, the it's I think it's a good approach the ways gaming programmer, therefore, developer relations for our products. Because of the IBM products is a very enterprise and very yeah.

Conservative. Right? Yeah. But they need to rebranding.

Daizen Ikehara: Oh, okay. Yeah. Yeah. One good thing is actually Kevin Winnery was, one of the evangelist in the past. Then he rejoined the team as a gaming programmer.

So it might be a different story to hiring a pure pro, gaming programmer, but still, it's good to have one someone, you know, who focuses on TwilioQuest itself.

Speaker 3: Ah, I see. Interesting. Okay. So, yeah, I'd like to ask you the one more question from Slido. Okay.

How had to develop business being changed clearly by spreading to request quite different between US and Japan.

Daizen Ikehara: So I need to clarify though. Yeah. Deborah business, we don't talk about business, but, we can say the, the user base or the sign ups or retention. So with the TwilioQuest, we can get the many sign ups, you know, all over the world. And during this pandemic, people are staying at home.

So the number of the the users of the TwilioQuest actually increased quite significantly. Even I got the stats from Japan, I noticed that we have increased the number of their sign ups or sessions on the TwilioQuest page. So I don't think that business is directly related to the TwilioQuest because we don't sell product through the pro that TwilioQuest. More like we provide a tool that people can learn new things with a fund, and they happen to be customer sometimes somewhere. So that's the our strategy, I believe.

Speaker 3: See. So the I also think the lead to Zio, US and Japan, it's a pretty different, culture they have. So, you as you said that in your presentation, in Japan company, the it's hard to play the game in office. Right? But the US company, for of, US or almost US IT company, the accept to play any games during during the the business time as a having break.

Right? So it's very different culture. So the this question is a very good point, I think.

Daizen Ikehara: Yeah. Let me add one more thing. Mhmm. I recognize the the difficulty for Japan. A a lot of the Japan companies don't allow the employees to play game during the work hours.

Speaker 3: Uh-huh.

Daizen Ikehara: So I created the, you know, classic style tutorial for Twilio

Speaker 3: I know.

Daizen Ikehara: For the those business people so that, you know, our sales team can use that material. You know, we we can use Twilio case for hackers. So think, you know, in Japan, there's a, you know, the two types of the content require, not one. Right. But I would say this is not the only for Japan.

Even in The US, you know, people come to the two year event. Pip people want to learn new things, but people didn't expect that playing game. So we got some complaints too. So we need to figure out the best way to serve those, you know, several types of developers.

Speaker 3: I see. Okay. Yeah. I I I thought that it's the like the same situation. In Japan over over twenty years ago.

And we have we had the Excel based margin game because of this. So yes. It it it seems like it it it is it's done it doesn't seem like game program. But, actually, it's a margin game you know, because it looks like they're just Excel spreadsheet. Yeah.

It's very similar situation I thought. Yeah. Anyway

Daizen Ikehara: That's true.

Speaker 3: Yeah. Okay. So the way and we have no more question on Strider two. The order showed do you have any question more? Or if you have.

Speaker 4: Yes. Yes. You you have more five time five minutes.

Daizen Ikehara: Oh, I I just finished too early.

Speaker 3: Okay. Okay. Yeah. No. No.

No. I I I mean, what actually the if you have a few more questions, you can ask Daisy the your question.

Speaker 4: Ah. Yeah. It it's okay. So so I have another question.

Speaker 3: Okay. It's okay. Okay. It's okay. Sorry.

Okay. Okay. Let's let's move to the the cross, the Dyson session. And thank you again, the Dyson.

Speaker 2: I have a question

Daizen Ikehara: Thank you.

Speaker 2: For Dyson.

Speaker 4: Oh, yeah.

Speaker 3: Thank you.

Daizen Ikehara: Oh, actually, Wattaro has a question.

Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Please.

Speaker 2: Please. Sorry. We have five more minutes.

Speaker 3: Okay. Thank you, Dyson. May I ask a Yeah.

Speaker 4: Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2: You have any plan?

Speaker 3: Go ahead.

Speaker 2: Sorry. Daisen, do you have any plan to expand this kind of gamification to more or update annually?

Daizen Ikehara: Do you mean by updating TwilioQuest or updating contents?

Speaker 2: Updating TwilioQuest and yeah. Maybe the newer version of Twilio will come out, then the the content must be updated. So it was a maybe a February versions, and then maybe the next one gonna be February or February version will come out?

Daizen Ikehara: Yeah. That's a good good question. Thank you for asking. Actually, we are updating every few weeks. So it's more like a static game and a static content.

We have the mechanism that we provide updated contents to the users. So we broadcast updates to the, you know, each users like a social game. You know, we have the updates. We have a new scenario. So in that initial version, there was no PHP per PHP missions, but we added that to the TwilioQuest in May.

So the I think it's keep evolving, and I hope one day we have the Japanese version as well.