Overview
NextUp was the first thing I designed and built end to end: a tournament platform that read the bracket and coordinated competitors by text message, automating one of the most stressful parts of running a gaming event.
Problem
Running large gaming tournaments, the hardest job was finding registered competitors across multiple stations as people wandered off-site. Even with staff, tracking everyone and all the scores was error-prone and stressful.
Constraints
- Competitors are mobile and easily distracted across a venue
- No app download for competitors; a phone number had to be the only thing they gave
- Attempt to have games record themselves without organizer influence
Approach
Organizers entered participant names and phone numbers and linked their existing bracket. When the tournament started, NextUp texted the competitors due to play; they replied with a W or L to report the result, the bracket advanced, the next match went out, and anything that disagreed was flagged for the organizer to verify rather than resolved silently.
Key Decisions
Coordinate competitors by text message
| Reasoning | Alternatives |
|---|---|
| Text reaches people anywhere in or near a venue with no app to download; a phone number was the lowest-friction thing to ask of a competitor who just wants to play. | On-site displays and PA announcements A dedicated mobile app |
Flag disputed results for a human instead of deciding them
| Reasoning | Alternatives |
|---|---|
| An event runs on the organizer’s authority. The system’s job was to remove the legwork, not to overrule the person everyone in the room trusts. | Auto-resolve conflicts by rule |
Result & Impact
NextUp ran several tournaments with real early success and interest, and I was proud of what it did for organizers; with something more resilient underneath it could have become a real product. But a mid-event failure with no backup of the results forced a replay, and I sunset it. There was no way I could debug the problem with my limited understanding of backend technologies at the time.
Learnings
- Anything that owns a live event needs a way to recover from failure on day one
- A good experience isn’t a product without something resilient to stand on, which I didn’t have yet
- Designing for the person running the room, not just the people using the thing, is what made it useful
The story behind it
During my years after high school, I was deep in competitive video gaming, traveling to local tournaments and some across state lines, and eventually becoming a well-known organizer who hosted some of the first international gaming tournaments with significant prizes. That firsthand experience is exactly why I knew the pain NextUp set out to fix.
The whole idea lived in a text message: it told a competitor they were next up to play, which is where the name comes from.
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