Tourney BLINDS UP Tournament Manager for iPad/iPhone Review (2 Viewers)

[Trihonda]

Looks like apple tv is on sale for $69 each. Would someone be able to hook up or connect an iPad to two Apple tvs a the same time? Also. Will the orig iPad work with apple tv? My kids/wife have iPad twos, but I hate to need their iPads for poker nights... Plus, I want to have th control/program on my iPad, not theirs...

 

[Trihonda]

Can someone advise that if I buy this app on iTunes (like a lot of other apps) that it'll be available across my other devices? I often purchase an app, and my wife and kids have access to it as well (but not stored data)...

Thoughts are I'd like to buy the app, play around with it on my ipad 1st gen, then possibly use my wife's ipad to finalize a structure and use for the tourney (displayed on my wall mounted flat screen). .

 

[Blinds Up]

I haven't looked yet, but I assume that monoprice would have a cable like this (at a much lower price).

I searched for weeks before buy a $49 cable to Apple (which probably costs less than $5 to produce...), but unfortunately, I did not find anything, anywhere...

Can someone advise that if I buy this app on iTunes (like a lot of other apps) that it'll be available across my other devices? I often purchase an app, and my wife and kids have access to it as well (but not stored data)...

Thoughts are I'd like to buy the app, play around with it on my ipad 1st gen, then possibly use my wife's ipad to finalize a structure and use for the tourney (displayed on my wall mounted flat screen). .

In-app purchase is related to an Apple account, so if you log in on your second iPad with the same Apple account with which you purchased the app, you will retrieve it, don't worry

 

[Forest@Farmington]

I am creating my first test tournament. When I went in to set the prize pool I used auto generate. It populated 2 prizes for the 8 person tournament.. I then added a 3rd prize and I do not know how to delete or change the auto generated. Any advice?

 

[Trihonda]

All, in for the pro version, and could not be happier. Never will use TD again. I also picked up an Apple TV for $69, amd it works flawlessly p, even on my older iPad.

Set up a few tourney structures to test, and it displays nicely. Very well done!

Rather than using a multi room setup with two Apple TV units (not sure this would work anyways), I'll simply have the iPad in one room, and the TV in another. Easy!

 

[SixSpeedFury]

Will there be any Android support? I'm jelly....

 

[Redbelly]

I am creating my first test tournament. When I went in to set the prize pool I used auto generate. It populated 2 prizes for the 8 person tournament.. I then added a 3rd prize and I do not know how to delete or change the auto generated. Any advice?

Not sure if this is similar to what happened to me...

I had everything set up for my season tournament... (I had NOT populated the tournament with players yet)... I mistakenly hit Generate Prize Pool and it generated 4 percentages... I then decided I wanted to set up my own hard payouts based on dollars. I swiped rt to left to get rid of the generated structure. Then went to construct my own payouts. I encountered a frustration (self induced) when I kept plugging in a $ figure but it never gave me the "place" (1st, 2nd, etc...). (I actually plugged in a dollar figure and hit save to "hopefully generate a "place" and it would crash!) Turns out you HAVE to have players entered into a particular tournament in order to generate a prize pool of your own! Once I entered the players I could generate a pool and BOOM! HAPPY FACE!

Most issues I've encountered have been me not understanding the details of the app... the App itself is almost never the problem. Once I figure it out the App performs flawlessly!

Hope this helps!

This app is awesome![emoji41]

 

[Trihonda]

Some of the mockups I made

 

[Forest@Farmington]

Not sure if this is similar to what happened to me...

I had everything set up for my season tournament... (I had NOT populated the tournament with players yet)... I mistakenly hit Generate Prize Pool and it generated 4 percentages... I then decided I wanted to set up my own hard payouts based on dollars. I swiped rt to left to get rid of the generated structure. Then went to construct my own payouts. I encountered a frustration (self induced) when I kept plugging in a $ figure but it never gave me the "place" (1st, 2nd, etc...). (I actually plugged in a dollar figure and hit save to "hopefully generate a "place" and it would crash!) Turns out you HAVE to have players entered into a particular tournament in order to generate a prize pool of your own! Once I entered the players I could generate a pool and BOOM! HAPPY FACE!

Most issues I've encountered have been me not understanding the details of the app... the App itself is almost never the problem. Once I figure it out the App performs flawlessly!

Hope this helps!

This app is awesome![emoji41]

I didn't think of trying the swipe. Like you do with an email or text message you want to get rid of. Works like a charm. You are right human error app does it.
Thanks

 

[Redbelly]

Just an FYI that BlindsUp! has Version 1.5 available for upgrade. Biggest thing for me is the ability to change the HEIGHT as well as the width now. Other minor bug fixes.

Cheers!


HD

 

[Trihonda]

Here are some shots of it in action. For the record, I'm using an older iPad and Apple TV to wirelessly project the app to my TV. I'm thinking I'll keep the iPad close to one table, and use the Apple TV in the other room. Two rooms, one app

 

[Forest@Farmington]

Looking good. I don't have an event coming up so I won't put it in action for a while.

 

[bivey]

I'll be putting this into action Friday. Wish there was a remote from my iPhone though.

 

[Redbelly]

I'll be putting this into action Friday. Wish there was a remote from my iPhone though.

Sorry I won't be there! My other league starts that night!

Think the remote is coming.

I'm going to try the appleTV to mirror my iPad that way I can keep the iPad at my seat.

 

[bivey]

Sorry I won't be there! My other league starts that night!

Think the remote is coming.

I'm going to try the appleTV to mirror my iPad that way I can keep the iPad at my seat.

I thought about that too. Have fun with league game!

 

[Trihonda]

I'm going to try the appleTV to mirror my iPad that way I can keep the iPad at my seat.

I'm also hosting a game this Friday. Having trouble filling it up, as literally HALF of my regular go-to players can't make it. Getting close, but still a struggle. I hate it when the only date I have available is a date that seems to work for nobody else.

I'm going to move the Apple TV to my second room, where the wall mounted TV is raised up higher (it's normally our workout room), and then just use the ipad at the main table. That way I can make adjustments to eliminated players, movements, etc...

With that, I hate bringing something new out during a game (untested). I think I'll set up a fake tourney, then just run it while watching TV. Every commercial break, I'll eliminate a fake player, adjust, etc... It will just give me practice, so that I'm not "learning the functionality" on the fly.

 

[Trihonda]

Here is my workout room in (Poker) mode. The AppleTV and my iPad connect even though they are in a different room and a good 50 to 60 feet apart. My test run worked great. even the audio transmits and plays out of the TV.

 

[bivey]

Very nice set up

 

[orsonberger]

Nice APP , screens are great, much better than tournament director, may not upgrade to 3. and test this French application

 

[Trihonda]

No reason to ever use TD again.

 

[Trihonda]

For the record, have two table tourney scheduled for Friday (it filled up), so I'll post an update after. I can't foresee any issues, as my test run worked great.

 

[Trihonda]

Had our first game, and the Blinds Up app was a big hit! People really liked it. I'm sure I'll have more feedback down the road, but the one nagging issue I found was that if there are bustouts and player movements, it's very common to "pause" the clock. However, player movements are possible with the clock paused, but NOT bustouts...? I found this annoying, as one table would be shouting "we lost two players!!!", and I'd pause the clock, but then would have to unpause for a bit to actually mark them as "busted"... then back to pause to facilitate movement... Is there a reason bust outs aren't possible with the clock paused?

Otherwise, well done!!!

My players also put in a request for more voices... "Sharon" was ok... but some wanted a male voice, and some were even requesting someone with a British accent (kinda liked that request myself).

 

[Redbelly]

Thanks!
Mines next week so very helpful!
I would post your question on the BlindsUp forum or better yet shoot Julien a PM.

In my games, and I think that of most tournaments, the clock is not paused for balancing of tables.

 

[Blinds Up]

Yep, some friends already told me it's annoying that we cannot bust out a player when clock is paused. I do not remember why I did this. I will remove it in the next version!
Very nice installation with TV on the wall !

For the voices, well... I made the voices (english with Sharon, french with Laurence) through a professional actor studio, it means that Sharon is used to record TV and radio advertising, etc. She is a pro and it costs me money to ask her to record blinds amount
The studio purposed me a male voice, that's conceivable to put into in a next release. But as it costs me some hundreds of dollars, I will probably put this as an extra feature, some kind of in-app purchase like layouts and structures.

For the British accent, wow... I was not knowing that Sharon has a specific accent. What is it? American? I will also ask for the studio for a voice with "british accent"...

Redbelly: I read every post of this thread since I receive an email when a reply is posted, so don't worry

 

[SixSpeedFury]

@Blinds Up, will there be Windows/Android support anytime soon?

 

[12thMan]

Yeah, when is the android version coming for the more civilized folks out there...?

 

[Toby]

Android! Android! Android!

App looks great. I hope it does make it to Android...

 

[Mental Nomad]

Yep, some friends already told me it's annoying that we cannot bust out a player when clock is paused. I do not remember why I did this. I will remove it in the next version!

Form follows function. Happens all the time in application design. You were probably thinking that bustouts happen during play, and play does not happen when the clock is paused... forgetting that when the clock is paused, all tables still must finish the current hand, which may provide a bustout.

If you're responsive to the feedback, your very good app will get better and better. Good luck!

 

[tigon]

Any recommendations for an android app or browser app? I love the custom chip feature since I don't have any ideas for labels yet on my LDs.

Does blindsup make the custom chip images transparent or do you have to make it yourself? Text with an outline would be a good option to have as well looking at trihonda's picture.

 

[Blinds Up]

I spent 12 months to develop it (including 5 months at full-time, ie. ~60 hours per week), so I need the project to meet more success on iOS before porting project on Android... Furthermore, I cannot develop for Android at the moment because I do not have enough time and I need to improve the iOS version: I never reached the bottom of my "to do list" for this app!
The next step I'll do is probably building a browser app, with account creation to retrieve tourneys created in the app, and vice versa. But don't expect this before months