Game Feedback Form Template (Plus Google Forms Setup)

A game feedback form template saves you from the two classic mistakes: a form so long that nobody finishes it, and a form so vague that every answer is "it was fun". Below is a copyable template you can build in Google Forms in about 20 minutes, plus the setup details most templates skip: tagging every response with the build version, branching so bug reports and opinions do not get mixed up, putting a feedback button inside your game, and getting the link in front of players at the right moment.

This guide is about the form itself: the structure, the fields, and how to wire it up. If you want a bigger bank of questions to choose from, our playtest survey questions guide has them grouped by goal. Pick from there, then drop them into the structure below.

What a good game feedback form does

Before the template, three rules that decide whether a form is useful:

• It is short. Aim for something a player can finish in three to five minutes. Every extra required question costs you responses.
• It knows which build it is about. Feedback on a build you already patched wastes your time. The version should be attached automatically, not typed by the player.
• It separates facts from opinions. "I got stuck on the bridge" and "the art style is not for me" need different handling. Mixing them in one big text box makes triage slow.

Everything in the template follows from those three.

The template

Copy this structure into your form tool. Required questions are marked. Everything else is optional, on purpose.

Section 1: About this session

1. Build version (short answer, required). Pre-filled from the link, so players never type it. See the pre-fill section below.
2. How did you play? (multiple choice). Options for your platforms, for example Windows, Steam Deck, Mac, browser.
3. How long did you play? (multiple choice). Under 10 minutes, 10 to 30 minutes, 30 to 60 minutes, over an hour.
4. Did you reach the end of the build? (multiple choice, required). Yes, No, Not sure.

Question 4 is quietly the most important one in the form. If most people answer No, you have a drop-off problem to find before anything else matters.

Section 2: What happened

1. Where did you stop playing, and why? (paragraph). Only show this to people who answered No in question 4. See branching below.
2. Was there a moment you felt confused or stuck? Describe what you were trying to do. (paragraph)
3. What was the most memorable moment? (paragraph)
4. Did you run into any bugs? (multiple choice, required). Yes or No. Yes sends them to Section 3, No skips to Section 4.

Section 3: Bug report

1. What happened? (paragraph, required)
2. What were you doing just before? (paragraph)
3. How bad was it? (multiple choice). Cosmetic, Annoying but I kept playing, Had to restart, Crashed or lost progress.
4. Screenshot or clip link (short answer). Ask for a link rather than a file upload, because file uploads in Google Forms require respondents to sign in to a Google account, and that loses people.

Section 4: Overall

1. How likely are you to play the next build? (linear scale, 1 to 5)
2. What kind of games do you usually play? (checkboxes). Five or six genres close to yours plus Other.
3. One thing you would change (paragraph)
4. Can we contact you about your answers? (multiple choice) and an optional contact field.

That is 16 questions, but because of branching, a player who finished the build with no bugs sees around 12, and only 3 of those are required.

Customizing it per round

Keep Sections 1, 3 and 4 the same every round so you can compare builds. Swap the questions in Section 2 for whatever this round is testing: the tutorial, a new level, a boss, the economy. One focus per round gets you clearer answers than five.

Building it in Google Forms

Google Forms is free, players do not need an account to answer by default, and responses can go straight into a spreadsheet. Here is the setup.

Create the sections

Add your questions, then use Add section to break the form into the four sections above. Each section becomes its own page, which feels shorter to players than one long scroll.

Set up branching

Google Forms calls this Go to section based on answer. On a multiple choice or dropdown question, open the three-dot menu and turn it on. Each option then gets a dropdown for where it sends the player next.

For this template:

• Question 4 ("Did you reach the end?"): No goes to a short section containing question 5, Yes skips straight to the rest of Section 2.
• Question 8 ("Any bugs?"): Yes goes to Section 3, No goes to Section 4.

Branching only works on multiple choice and dropdown questions, which is one more reason to keep your gate questions simple.

Check the settings

In Settings, a few choices matter:

• Limit to 1 response. Useful for stopping duplicates, but it forces respondents to sign in with a Google account. For a public demo, leave it off. For a small private group, it is fine.
• Collect email addresses. Leave this off unless you really need it. An optional contact question in Section 4 gets you emails from the people who want to talk, without scaring off everyone else.
• Confirmation message. Change it from the default to something human, like "Thanks, this goes straight to the developer. Next build is coming soon." People who feel heard come back.

Publish it

Google Forms now has an explicit Publish step. If the form is not published, people with the link cannot open it. Click Publish, check who can respond, and then copy the responder link. Test it in a private browser window before you share it anywhere.

Send responses to a sheet

In the Responses tab, link the form to Google Sheets. A spreadsheet makes it easy to filter by build version, sort bug reports by severity, and count how many people stopped at the same place.

Pre-fill the build version

This is the trick that makes the form actually work across rounds.

Google Forms can generate a pre-filled link. Open the three-dot menu at the top of the form, choose Pre-fill form, type a value in the build version field (for example 0.4.2), and click Get link. You get a URL with the version already filled in.

Look at that URL and you will see a parameter like entry.123456789=0.4.2. The number is the ID of your build version question. Now you can:

• Change the version in the link each time you ship a new build.
• Generate the link from inside your game, so the version is always correct.

In your game code, build the URL from the form's base link plus entry.YOURID= and your version string, then open it in the player's browser. Every response is tagged automatically, and nobody has to remember which build they played.

You can add other hidden context the same way, like platform or the level the player was on when they opened the form.

Put a feedback button in the game

Valve's own Steam Playtest documentation mentions that many developers put a big "feedback" button right on the main menu. That is the single best placement, because it is where players land when they quit or finish.

Good places for the button:

• Main menu. Visible every time the game starts.
• Pause menu. Catches people mid-session, right when something bugs them.
• End of the build. A "Thanks for playing, tell us what you think" screen when they reach the end of a demo or Playtest is where you get your most thoughtful answers.

A few details make a difference:

• Pause the game when the form opens. Nobody wants to die while writing a bug report.
• Attach context automatically. Build version at minimum. Platform and current level if you can. Players are bad at remembering which version they played.
• Make it skippable. A button the player can ignore gets better answers than a popup they are forced to close.

If you want feedback without the player leaving the game at all, some developers post directly to a Google Form from code using the form's response URL and the same entry. IDs. It works, but it is a bit fragile because the IDs change if you rebuild the form. Opening the pre-filled link in a browser is simpler and good enough for most indie demos. Dedicated in-game feedback tools also exist if you want screenshots and system info captured automatically.

Where to share the link

A form nobody sees collects nothing. Put the link everywhere a player might be when they finish playing:

• Steam announcements for a demo or Playtest. Say what you want feedback on, not just "let us know what you think".
• Your Steam community hub. A pinned forum post with the link.
• Your itch.io page, right under the download button.
• Discord. A pinned message in a dedicated feedback channel.
• Your game's description or readme if you are sending builds by direct download.

Timing matters too. Ask right after people play, not a week later. If you are running a demo during Steam Next Fest, have the form live before the fest opens. Our Next Fest demo feedback guide covers how to handle the flood of responses during the event.

Mistakes to avoid

• Asking "Did you like it?" first. It anchors everything after it. Put behavior questions (did you finish, where did you stop) before opinion questions.
• Making everything required. Players abandon forms with ten required fields. Three or four required questions is plenty.
• One giant comments box. You get a wall of text that mixes bugs, opinions and feature requests. Separate them with sections.
• Forgetting the version. Without it, you cannot tell if a reported bug is from today's build or last month's.
• Changing the form every round. If the core questions change, you cannot compare builds. Keep the skeleton fixed and only swap the round-specific questions.
• Not reading responses quickly. If people report the same bug for three days and nothing changes, they stop reporting. Check responses daily while a build is live.

Turning responses into decisions

Once responses come in, sort them in the sheet:

1. Filter by build version so you only look at the current build.
2. Count the "No" answers to "Did you reach the end?" and read where those players stopped. Clusters at the same spot are your top priority.
3. Sort bug reports by severity, then by how many people reported the same thing.
4. Read the "confused or stuck" answers last, looking for repeats. One person confused is a note. Four people confused at the same door is a design problem.

Pick the top three issues, fix them, ship the next build, and update the version in your link. Then test again with fresh people. If you are not sure how many responses you need before acting, see how many playtesters you need.

Getting people to fill it in

A form is only as good as the players who see it. If your demo or Playtest does not have many players yet, post your game on Get Playtests. It is free, with no credit card, and reviewers play your build and leave written, video or livestream reviews. Use the same core questions from your form as the posting's focus areas, so reviewer feedback lines up with what your form collects and you can compare it side by side.