Improve Game Search Accuracy

📋 Summary

Improve LaunchBox search so it handles exact titles, punctuation, short titles, and close spelling variations more accurately.

❗ Problem

Search results can sometimes be too broad or miss expected matches.

For example, searching for a title without punctuation may not find the same title with punctuation, while searching for a very short game title can return every game containing that letter.

This makes it harder to quickly find specific games, especially in large libraries.

💡 Proposal

Improve search matching and ranking behavior.

Search should better support:

• Exact title matches

• Titles with or without punctuation

• Very short game titles

• Common spelling mistakes or close variations

• More relevant result ordering

For example, searching for Alien Resurrection should still find Alien: Resurrection, and searching for D should provide a way to find the game named D without returning every title that contains the letter D.

🧩 Use Cases

• Find a game even if the user omits punctuation

• Search for a one-letter or very short game title

• Surface exact title matches before loose partial matches

• Reduce irrelevant results in large libraries

📦 Benefits

• Faster game discovery

• Better search experience for large libraries

• Fewer missed results from punctuation differences

• More predictable search behavior

• Less frustration when looking for a specific title

⚠️ Considerations

Search should balance fuzzy matching with precision. Exact matches and strong title matches should be prioritized, while broad partial matches should be ranked lower or require longer search terms.