1. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Playtesting Tiffany Barnes tbarnes2@uncc.edu

2. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Assignment Read Chapter 8 of Game Design Workshop: Designing, Prototyping, and Playtesting Games By Tracy Fullerton, Chris Swain, Steve Hoffman http://www.tar.hu/gamedesign/

3. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Playtest/Final report Select playtesters: friends/classmates, not on team 5+ required; plan the playtest (see rest of slides) Observe playing your game –What is harder/easier than expected Interview them after –What was fun about the game –What could be improved: short & long term Improve the game based on comments! Read and follow directions on: http://www.cs.uncc.edu/~tbarnes2/GameDesign/project.html http://www.cs.uncc.edu/~tbarnes2/GameDesign/project.html

4. Fall 2006ITCS4230 What is Playtesting? The “most important” activity in game design It is NOT: –Just “play the game and gather feedback” might not reveal real issues with the game –Design review with team Need real players –QA and debugging –Focus group –Usability Testing

5. Fall 2006ITCS4230 What is Playtesting? It is –Getting insight into how players experience game –Informal/qualitative  structured/quantitative Somewhere along this continuum –Answers questions Is the game functioning the way you want? Internally complete? Balanced? Fun?

6. Fall 2006ITCS4230 When do we Playtest? Iterative Less fundamental changes as process progresses “Let’s wait till we have a beta product…Players will get the best experience” –NO!

7. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Steps in Playtesting Selection Recruiting Preparation Controls Analysis

8. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Recruiting and Selection Self testing –Reveal glaring problems Then testing with friends –Not objective Then test with strangers –Selection is important –Target demographics –…but widest selection possible (AOE II case study)

9. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Age of Empires II Case Study Graph of player Errors over time

10. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Running a playtest session Don’t talk too much –Use a script Let the user make mistakes/figure things out “It’s the game that’s broken, not you” Think Aloud –This practice has players talking constantly while playing –Can be distracting, but can give some good insight Interview/survey –Beware of leading questions

11. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Running a playtest session Don’t be defensive –Beware…testers will want to please you] –Really! Groups generate ideas Individuals evaluate Can use groups, individuals, or combination

12. Fall 2006ITCS4230 The Play Matrix Core aspects of all interactive experiences Stimulates discussion Have tester analyze gameplay using matrix Should your game be moved in the matrix?

13. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Play Matrix

14. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Running a playtest session Note taking critical –Video or audio recording Interview –Game specific questions needed –Don’t wear out your participant

15. Fall 2006ITCS4230 Playtest data Objective or subjective Quantitative or qualitative? What can you measure? –Develop clearly defined questions to answer with data Test control situations –New feature, special event, common technique, the end of the game