New Roku App

[vudu1979]

The new App seems to have been made for the 'look' and promotional concerns... with User functionality ignored completely.

It is simply less user friendly, imo.

The new app...

- Takes longer to show episodes of TV seasons;

- Will only show a limited number of user created lists, when trying to add a move or TV show to one of the lists;

- Rating Seasons / episodes is tricky at best;

- Sorting options seem to be even more limited that they were.

[Emissary35]

Also the details page for each TV episode is gone, so you can't read the full description or play the trailers anymore, only play the episodes directly from the season list, which does take much longer to load than before.

The worst in my opinion is that the player controls appear and block the start (and resuming) of every video for 5 seconds and you can't dismiss them, while also dimming the entire video making it harder to see. So dimming and blocking the beginning of every video! Nice work Vudu app designers! It's obvious the people behind this update gave no thought to the user functionality, they only looked at it from a design perspective but never actually sat down to see how it functioned for someone watching videos.

If they had done that, or beta tested it properly and read feedback they never would have released this terrible update. Fandango still hasn't officially responded to any of the topics on here complaining about the new app and they won't respond to my (and possibly others) support tickets on the matter when emailing customer support. This was never the case before, Vudu always responded promptly and did their best to resolve ticket issues. Now they don't seem to care and the ticket history page is gone from our accounts so we can no longer review old tickets like we could before.

Fandango is obviously a terribly run company with people that are completely unqualified making these decisions, they seem to care nothing about customer service or the loyalty of Vudu fans who have spent thousands of dollars on rentals and purchases over the past decade. Fandango just swooped in, acquired Vudu and are doing nothing but causing problems and ruining the user experience. The people that updated this app and the people who approved it for release should be fired, they are not fit for app design or making any decisions regarding them.

[vudu1979]

Additionally, when moving shows / movies from one list to another, they do not update correctly. They still show in the old list.

[jeremymc7]

Takes more clicks to do things than before as wel.

[Emissary35]

Everything about this app is worse, Vudu is still yet to respond to my complaint tickets which I sent over two weeks ago, nor to any of our posts here about or disapproval of the app. I know I won't be spending any more money renting or purchasing with Vudu because Fandango is ruining the service. They care nothing about customer satisfaction, they just continue to ignore us and force us to keep using their terrible new app design without an option to roll it back. Vudu was so much better off before the morons at Fandango took charge. New owners/management really can ruin a great product or service, Fandango is total proof of that!

[vudu1979]

Recap...


How bad is it? Well....

* Can't review individual episode descriptions.
* Can't rate individual episodes.
* Tricky to rate a full season, versus the entire TV series.
* Sort (filter) features seem far more limited, rather more inclusive.
* If you have more than a certain number of user created lists, when trying to add a something to a list, you are not shown all of your lists (it stops after so many lists and will not let you scroll down any further).
* It takes more clicks to get to things, than it did before.
* User created Lists do no update properly when changes are made. Example, move a Movie from List A to List B and the Movie is still showing in List A until you fully restart the App!
* Open a TV series and it takes a minute to 'load' and show you any thing (this was not an issue before).

I am sure others can add to the above list.

[Emissary35]

Recap...


How bad is it? Well....

* Can't review individual episode descriptions.
* Can't rate individual episodes.
* Tricky to rate a full season, versus the entire TV series.
* Sort (filter) features seem far more limited, rather more inclusive.
* If you have more than a certain number of user created lists, when trying to add a something to a list, you are not shown all of your lists (it stops after so many lists and will not let you scroll down any further).
* It take more clicks to get to things, than it did before.
* User created Lists do no update properly when changes are made. Example, move a Movie from List A to List B and the Movie is still showing in List A until you fully restart the App!
* Open a TV series and it takes a minute to 'load' and show you any thing (this was not an issue before).

I am sure others can add to the above list.

All great points! The two that annoy me the most is you can't get to the details page anymore to read full descriptions as you say, that page also had a trailer button for the episode, so you can't access trailers anymore. My biggest complaint is player control overlay blocks the first 5 seconds of every video when you begin playback and you have to wait for it to disappear.

[vudu1979]

I have additionally found that when I rate something, the rating does not remain in place.

[jeremymc7]

I haven’t had an issue with my rating not sticking.

But didn’t the old interface show you the Vudu rating only if you hadn’t reviewed. If you had then it showed you yours.

Now it appears the only way you can see your rating is to scroll down, the scroll right to ratings, Then go down to rating. Then click Rate and there you are.

it used to be so much easier to see your own rating. The great thing about that was if you rate everything you watch then it’s a good way of keeping track of what you’ve watched since Vudu doesn’t easily and considerately mark titles in a way to know if you’ve seen it before or not.

The new interface requires a lot for scrolling and clicking to see things that were so much easier to get to before.

Sigh.

[vudu1979]

I haven’t had an issue with my rating not sticking.

But didn’t the old interface show you the Vudu rating only if you hadn’t reviewed. If you had then it showed you yours.

Now it appears the only way you can see your rating is to scroll down, the scroll right to ratings, Then go down to rating. Then click Rate and there you are.

it used to be so much easier to see your own rating. The great thing about that was if you rate everything you watch then it’s a good way of keeping track of what you’ve watched since Vudu doesn’t easily and considerately mark titles in a way to know if you’ve seen it before or not.

The new interface requires a lot for scrolling and clicking to see things that were so much easier to get to before.

Sigh.

Yes -- I can see my rating for a short time. Leave app and when I come back, it's gone.

[vudu1979]

I have also noticed that most, if not everything, that I watched before the new app, no longer shows as watched.

The ratings and the 'watch again' were good ways to see what you have watched before (movies) or where you left off on a series (TV).

[vudu1979]

VUDU Fandango are you listening? It would be nice to hear a response, such as our concerns are being forwarded to the powers that be at VUDU Fandango.

Keep in mind, this App is your customers Portal to VUDU Fandango and the more user friendly and functional it is, the happier your customers are (they come back more, rather than go to other apps that are more friendly to their customer base).

[jeremymc7]

I’m thinking there are bigger things going on. Vudu being so silent since the sale from WM. Lack of phone support. Lack of Vudu staff in the forums.

The change in the app was actually a surprise given the lack of everything else lately.

[Toddwrtr]

And now they have added video previews that cannot be turned off, which cause my screen to go blank as it re-establishes an HDMI handshake to change resolution.

[Alan Smithee]

They at least found time to ban someone from this forum for complaining about it too much. Seems they wouldn’t have had to do that if they had just fixed what they were complaining about. As a longtime user I don’t have much faith left I’m afraid.