Game Design LESSON 2 Design Through Playtesting FocusPlaytesting

Game Design LESSON #2: Design Through Playtesting, Focus-Playtesting, and Radical Revision

TODAY: 1. Game Design through Playtesting and Focus Testing: principles and methods. 2. Radical Revision

PLAYTESTING PRACTICE: 1. Set up your game and chairs, clear the playspace! 2. Leave one team-member to run the game (practice explaining the game in 1 -2 minutes: flavor context, Goals, main game mechanics to achieve those goals). 3. All players stand gather on a side of the room. 4. Those running the games hold up fingers for the number of needed players. 5. Players choose games to play, sit down and begin (teacher may need to re-arrange a bit) • Only 15 minutes to play, so get right to it!

PLAYTESTING CHECKLIST: • Testing Set-up: be sure you have all parts. • Communicate to Testers the Plan: – Thank you for being here! – Game is broken: it is bad at being a game! – Ask them to talk out-loud while playing – Say you plan to be quiet, but will write notes • During Playtest: Take lots of notes: where they get stuck or confused, and what they enjoy. Only speak when they get too completely stuck to proceed! • Post-Playtest Debriefing: When game is done (or tried for 15 minutes), discuss highlights and problems. List 3 big change suggestions to explore. Thank your testers!

WHY DO WE PLAYTEST?

WHY DO WE PLAYTEST? • Creation is 1% inspiration and 99% revision.

WHY DO WE PLAYTEST? • Creation is 1% inspiration and 99% revision. • Our reality is not the only reality.

WHY DO WE PLAYTEST? • Creation is 1% inspiration and 99% revision. • Our reality is not the only reality. • Culture: common modes of consumption, presentation, or interaction.

WHY DO WE PLAYTEST? • Creation is 1% inspiration and 99% revision. • Our reality is not the only reality. • Culture: common modes of consumption, presentation, or interaction. • Testing is how we come to understand our Audience’s needs.

Accessing Audience • PRODUCT FIRST: We have a game we want to make, and must identify the audience that will enjoy that game. • AUDIENCE FIRST: We have an audience we want to reach and so we design a game to fulfill their interests.

Testing as Marketing Strategy

Testing as Marketing Strategy

Testing as Marketing Strategy

CREATING GAMES FOR A GAMER AUDIENCE • 30 years of game history and conventions to integrate in your game mechanics and interface. • Developers of games for core Gamer audiences need a level of knowledge of past games to understand the expectations of their audience • Testing can help illuminate Gamer expectations, but you also need to play many games. For example:

CREATING GAMES FOR A GAMER AUDIENCE

CREATING GAMES FOR A GAMER AUDIENCE Why can’t I punch something spiky?

CREATING GAMES FOR A GAMER AUDIENCE Why can’t I punch something spiky? Even something soft in the front, with only a few spikes on the head or the back?

Because Mario Bros defined/ruined spikes for everyone

GREYBOXING • When testing digital or tabletop games to decide if core mechanics are fun, avoid including much art: use simple forms so the audience can focus on the mechanic: “Greyboxing” • Good Mechanics = fun game. • Art+ Audio can create greater immersion, a more memorable experience, but cannot fix a mechanic (or game) that is not fun. FAIL FASTER • Do not spend a ton of time thinking or arguing about whether to include a mechanic: try it! See if it works, • You don’t need to try EVERYTHING, but if you have collaborators/stakeholders excited about an idea, don’t dispute the idea– try it out and see if it works. • Burn through a lot of bad or mediocre ideas as fast as possible to get to the good ones.

GAME DESIGN METHOD #2 a: PLAYTESTING Designing through playtesting is a way to put player experience first. Have an idea for a game? Don’t spend a lot of time obsessing about the design until you have tried it with players! 1. PREPARE A PROTOTYPE: Keep it simple (greyboxing) to quickly test ideas (failing faster) 2. OBSERVE OTHERS PLAYING YOUR GAME. Avoid influencing their experience, where possible. 3. LISTEN: Ask them to speak while playing and write down everything they say (and you see them do) which offers a new perspective on any aspect of gameplay or user interface. 4. INTEGRATE: Iterate your game mechanics and interface with this feedback in mind, while also listening to your own instincts. In other words, listen but do not treat all feedback as infallible.

GENERAL PLAYTESTING, ROUND 2 1. EACH TEAM: choose one member to be Play-Runner: stay and observe the playtest. 2. Everyone else moves to the side of the room. 3. Play-Runners raise one hand showing the number of Playtesters they need for their game, and update as Playtesters sit at their tables. 4. When they have everyone they need, Play-Runners give a concise explanation of the gameplay and the Playtesters play the game, verbalizing their experience as they go. 5. Play-Runners observe, and take notes, and try not to interfere but help if players are stuck on a rule.

GENERAL PLAYTESTING, ROUND 2 EACH TEAM: Return to your group, discuss the playtest, decide what major change/s your team will try out in the next playtest.

GAME DESIGN METHOD #2 b: FOCUS TESTING What does it mean to test with a focus?

GAME DESIGN METHOD #2 b: FOCUS TESTING 1. IDENTIFY A SPECIFIC PLAYTESTING GOAL: What about your game do you want to improve? Do you want to change how long it takes to play, how awesome a player type feels to play, the balance between players, the use of assets, etc? 2. DEFINE PARAMETERS: How will you keep track of the thing in the game you want to improve? 3. OBSERVE OTHERS PLAYING YOUR GAME. Avoid influencing their experience. 4. LISTEN: Ask them to speak while playing and write down what they say and do related to the parameter you want to improve. 5. INTEGRATE: Iterate your game mechanics and interface with this feedback in mind.

FOCUS-PLAYTEST DESIGN EXAMPLE: Dragon Day Care “Nurturing” card game by Jason Wiser

Three cards types: Egg, Love, and Poach 3 -6 players sit in a circle, draw a hand to lay down Egg cards and then play “Love” cards on them to hatch eggs into dragons. Play “Poach” cards on each other to interfere or steal eggs. When one player has a dragon of each color the game ends, and player with most hatched dragons wins. Lots of terrible egg puns!

Dragon Day Care Focus-Playtesting Goals: Speed-up gameplay and dragon hatching PLAN: Multiple days of playtests, make changes between each to playtest rule adjustments. Time each game and frequency of egg hatches! SOME TESTED VARIATIONS: • Adjust deck balance: number of each card type (increase love cards) • Reduce number of Love cards needed to hatch an Egg (from 8 to ? ) • Remove most devastating Poach cards and overly- complicated Love cards (that took longer to read/understand/play)

Coolest Innovation: Stack Eggs A Playtester asked: Is there a benefit to stacking eggs of the same color? And we decided there could be! If a single egg needs 4 love to hatch, an additional egg adds 2 more Love for a total of 6 (rather than the 8 they need separately). To balance the reward we added a risk: a poach card that normally effects one egg will impact all eggs in a stack.

PLAYTESTING ROUND 3: FOCUS TESTING 1. EACH TEAM: choose one member to be third Play -Runner, who stays, implements the chosen changes, and observe the playtest. 2. Everyone else moves to the side of the room. 3. New Play-Runners raise one hand showing the number of Playtesters they need for their game, and update as Playtesters sit at their tables. 4. When they have everyone they need, Play-Runners give a concise explanation of the gameplay (including new features) and the Playtesters play the game, verbalizing their experience as they go. 5. Play-Runners observe, and take notes, and try not to interfere but help if players are stuck on a rule.

PLAYTESTING ROUND 3: FOCUS TESTING 6. AFTER PLAYTEST: Teams re-meet to discuss results, and post a response to the team homework post on Piazza: What changes were testes and the apparent results. It is worth noting that a proper focus test will include many run through with many groups, to get data that includes varied perspectives and player abilities (casual gamers and “Rules Lawyers”). XKCD, in memory of Gary Gygax

Design Method 3: Radical Revision Question: What is Radical Revision?

Design Method 3: Radical Revision Question: What is Radical Revision? Revision that explores complete overhauls of your ideas: Dangerously sweep away all of the sweat and blood you have shed so far and imagine impossible new directions. You don’t have to follow those paths—you just need to give yourself the chance to consider them, to permit those ideas to percolate and enrich your games.

Design Method 3: Radical Revision What should you change? Playtesting can help us understand where our game is more fun and less, and to identify when players get stuck or bored. Change those parts in a big way, rather than small incremental ways, for more productive development. Like being asked to guess a number from 1 -1000, where answers will tell you if you guess is too high or too low. Are you going to start with guessing #1 and then guess #2?

Design Method 3: Radical Revision What should you change? OF COURSE NOT. Start with 500, then split the difference again and again. GO BIG with your guess-jumping. Same with Game Design changes! We want you to keep something from your first game, but unless players were wild with excitement about it, try MASSIVE changes. FOR EXAMPLE: What if you kept the way your characters move, but change the victory and lose conditions? Or what if you added assets that could be used to help balance poor dice rolls, or mess with other players? WHAT IF YOU CHANGED A CORE MECHANIC? Read this list of mechanics for inspiration (also in the course site): https: //boardgamegeek. com/browse/boardgamemechanic

Design Method 3: Radical Revision What should you change? Instead of a race to get your one pawn to the same end, what if each player had multiple pawns, and the goal was to control the most regions of the board (“AREA CONTROL mechanic”)? What if you added a BETTING / WAGERING or VOTING mechanic, or ways to PLACE TILES that changed the board, or asked your players to sing or tell stories? What if instead of dice-based movement, you gave each player points to distribute among multiple actions, to trade randomness for choice and strategy? What if you made your game COOPERATIVE, or TEAM-BASED? What if it took your core mechanics into a NEW STORY / ART SETTING, that then inspired big changes to the core mechanics?

Fire Hose Games: Fall 2008

Fire Hose Games: Fall 2010

Builder Brawler #1: Initial 2 D Prototype:

Builder Brawler #1: Initial 2 D Prototype:

Builder Brawler #2: 3 D Build-out:

Builder Brawler #2: Building materials from shattered enemies:

Builder Brawler #2: Moving screens, long boss fight:

USER TESTING: Lukewarm responses: “Somewhat fun” Tried to fix with better art, but just wasted time. We didn’t know what “really excited playtesters” looked like.

Builder Brawler #3: Competitive weaponized tower- building using pieces from beaten monsters. Just a mini-game?

Builder Brawler #3: Just a mini-game? Nope. HUGELY positive responses. We refocused on this direction, scrapping a year of development.

Builder Brawler #3: Build-out of multiple competitive levels.

Builder Brawler #3: Build-out of multiple competitive levels.

Builder Brawler #3: Campaign Mode

Builder Brawler #3: Campaign Mode

Design Exercise #2 a: Radical Brainstorming! 1. Review notes from playtesting. Where did players get stuck/confused? Where did the game drag? Where was there less awesome? 2. ID at least one core idea in your game to radically reposition in new modes of play. 3. Consider a mechanic: how players move, gather assets, interact with other players. Look for opportunities to streamline play. 4. Focus more on big changes rather than smaller tweaks.

DUE NEXT WEEK HOMEWORK #2: With your first team, radically revise your first game based on usability testing. Type your design document: • 1 typed page of instructions (3 -sentence game idea, goal, materials, gameplay rules) • 1 paragraph of notes on your revision • board design, set-up photo and win photo. Post to Piazza and print to bring with board and pieces to class for playtest! ALSO: See course site for assigned reading, and reference reading for radical revision write-up.

IN DETAIL, FOR NEXT CLASS: Please bring a physical copy of your game, ready to test at 6 pm! By class, please post digital copy to Piazza: INSTRUCTIONS and IMAGES. Make sure the names of all your team members (including yourself) are listed in the Piazza post body, not just the attached rules. INSTRUCTIONS (1 page) should include: • Game Name and Creators at top. • Short summary of game (can include flavor text) including the goal • List of Materials and Steps for Set-up • Steps for play, including win state • (second page, 1 -2 paragraphs) Discuss your Radical Revisions and how this game relates (if at all) to the reading • Image of the final board (which you are welcome to modify as much as you want from the originals), photos of set-up and a win-example. Please be clear and concise! Read your writing out loud to revise, and remove repetition and grammar errors. Make sure the entire team gets to see it and help revise it for clarity. And have fun!

Have a Splendid Week! And don’t forget to email with questions: Instructor: JASON WISER Jason. Wiser. Art@gmail. com Available daily by email.