UPDATED 10:25 EST / MAY 21 2015

NEWS

QuizUp trivia app relaunches as a social network

Over the last year or two, social media has been slowly creeping into gaming, with some games like World of Warcraft even getting built-in Twitter integration. Now, mobile app QuizUp seems to be doing this process in reverse, as the popular trivia game relaunches itself with its own built-in social networking features.

Since launching in 2013, QuizUp has already become one of the most popular trivia apps, with over 33 million users on the service and about 7 million games played each day. Plain Vanilla Games, the Icelandic game studio behind the app, believes that improving the app’s social features will make it easier for users connect with people who share similar interests.

“We found that people were making friends through QuizUp,” Thor Fridriksson, Plain Vanilla Games founder and CEO, told TechCrunch. “When you are able to choose your topic, you are really describing one of your interests and interacting with someone who has that in common with you. So it makes sense for that to develop into a friendship or in some cases even marriage.”

QuizUp’s new social network

 

Some of the new features include built-in chat and the ability to follow other users. Following makes it easier to challenge friends or people you have played before, and you can also search for new friends by filtering users by age, location, and interests.

“Facebook isn’t really for meeting new people,” Fridriksson said. “We want to compliment Facebook as the network where you can meet new friends.”

The 12,000 different trivia categories now have a new forum-like UI that lets you create new threads or upload pictures, and other users can like or comment on them. This gives QuizUp users the ability to form niche communities based around specific subjects like history, music, or even Disney princesses.

QuizUp is available on iOS and Android, and a new desktop version is now available as well through QuizUp.com.

Screenshot via QuizUp.com

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