Gym House / iOS

Showing up is the whole game.

Can a fitness app motivate without ever making someone feel behind?

My role: Design engineering

Design decision 1

Training you log, a house you keep.

Each workout you log moves a household of characters forward. The house is what you come home to, so the log has to stay quick and the house has to stay warm.

Designed for its own user

I train with it every day, so a clumsy log or a nagging screen gets fixed fast.

Not measured

This is design rationale from the build, not a retention result.

Design decision 2

Never guilt. Make it structural.

The design bible forbids sad notifications, decay and streaks. Time in the house only moves when you work out, so skipping two weeks leaves a quiet house instead of a reproach.

A rule, not a tone

Because the clock stops when you do, the kindness cannot drift back into guilt later.

Describe, never evaluate

Copy says what happened. It does not grade it.

A calendar that marks what happened: done, partial, rest. Nothing is marked missed.

Design decision 3

Something is more than nothing.

Any completed set counts as a session. A short day ends with a line that says so, and a rest day is treated as training in its own right.

At most two numbers

The summary shows a level and a month. Everything else is a person reacting.

Rest is a first-class day

It has its own card, calendar colour and ending.

Three of nineteen sets still ends in a character glad you came.

A rest day gets its own summary: "Recovery is training."

Design decision 4

Correct the log. Keep what you earned.

People change their mind: I trained after all, or that was only a warm-up. The record can be edited either way, but the house only ever adds. Nothing it has paid out is taken back.

The record is yours

Edit it exactly as it happened.

The memory is the house's

Revisions can raise XP, closeness and story, never lower them.

No "Are you sure?"

Every conversion reverses in one tap.

A workout turned into a rest day keeps its sets as "noted, not counted".

Design decision 5

When two saves disagree, you choose.

Progress backs up to the player's private iCloud. If the phone and the backup differ, the app shows both and lets the player pick, instead of silently deciding which history wins.

Conflict as a decision

The choice is explicit and plainly worded, because either save is real training. A local recovery copy is kept before the other is replaced.

Next research question

Do people understand the two options at a glance? The flow exists; clarity still needs testing.