Playtesting

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Playtesting

• Game Design
• Vishnu Kotrajaras, PhD

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What is playtesting?

• Something a designer performs throughout the game
  design process, to gain insight into how players
  experience the game.
• The end goal
• To get feedback to improve your game.

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Playtesting and iterative design

• Test in every stage.
• The beginning stages are very important.
• Otherwise, you wont have enough time to make
  changes.

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Recruiting playtesters

• Self-testing
• In prototype stage.
• In order to get the core game mechanics.
• Continue to do self-testing throughout the life
  of the project.
• Confidants
• When the prototype is playable.
• Find friends outside the design team to test.
• You need to be there only to explain the game, do
  not intervene with their play. Make yourself
  invisible.
• Because personal relationship can ruin their
  judgement.

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YOU
Ideal playtester
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Recruiting playtesters (2)

• People you do not know
• Outsiders have nothing to lose or gain, so they
  will tell the truth.
• Ideal playtesters
• From any place in your local area.
• Schools, sport clubs.
• post your ads online or in newspaper.
• If you get enough people, turn down the ones with
  poor communication skill.
• asking questions during interview will help you
  on this.

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Recruiting playtesters (3)

• Target audience
• They provide much better feedback because they
  know your game type very well.
• Posting on gaming websites.
• Have testers sign a nondisclosure agreement to
  prevent them stealing your idea.
• Do not be afraid of someone stealing your idea.
  They cannot make it work as good as you.
• The risk is relatively low (in western
  countries).

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Do not forget to prepare

• Snacks and drinks
• Testers will feel they owe you something and will
  do better to provide you with their feedback.
• Make them more likely to return to test again.
  (so they can provide the information about how
  they think the game is progressing)
• But you must also keep fresh recruits throughout
  the process.

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A playtesting session

• Do not explain much.
• Let the testers play it out.
• Allow them to make mistakes.
• Provide answers when they get stuck.
• Ignore your ego and pride.
• Do not persuade testers to give good comments.
  (they will usually obey you because they are at
  your place). Otherwise you wont get an honest
  feedback.

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A playtesting session (2)

• Forgive them if they are too harsh. Communication
  skills are different for everyone.
• But tell everyone that there is no right or
  wrong. (It is like brainstorming.)
• No testers should ever criticise another tester.
• And remind them to always stick to the game.

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A playtesting session (3)

• Do not silence the testers unless absolutely
  necessary (such as he has very bad manners).
• Isolate him out, perhaps having him test alone.
• But do it as soft and polite as possible.

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Tips for a playtesting session

• Act as a researcher
• Welcome the playtesters and thank them for
  participating.
• Tell them that you are testing the game, not
  their skills. Any difficulties in playing the
  game will help you improve the design.
• Let them start playing. You take note.
• Include specific information when writing up your
  playtest. Record the date and time, who played
  and for how long.
• Ask them to talk out loud throughout the game
  about what they are thinking, questions they may
  have.
• Warn them that you wont be able to answer, you
  just want to know the questions.
• Do not help them in playing.
• When they finish playing, interview them or
  discuss with them to get additional feedback.
• Thank them and give out gifts.

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Structuring the session

• One-on-one
• You watch over their shoulders as they play the
  game.
• You take notes and ask questions along the way.
• Group testing
• Let them play together, you observe and ask
  questions.
• Feedback form.
• Interview after the session.
• Open discussion
• You take notes during the discussion.
• Free-form, or guided discussion. It is up to you.
• Mix the above.

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The Play Matrix (help testers)
Helps stimulating discussion and analysing
gameplay
blackjack
poker
civilization
warcraft
Tetris
unreal
football
tag
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Using the matrix

• Ask your testers to plot your game on the matrix.
• Ask players where they want to move the game to.
• Ask them what needs to be changed to move the
  game towards their preferred quadrant.
• This is a also a good chance to learn the type of
  players.
• Strategic
• Acton
• Gambler
• kids

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Taking notes

• Keep notes
• Otherwise, you will only remember what you want
  to hear.
• The notes must be filed chronologically, or
  entered into a database.

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Taking notes (2)

• There is a form
• See additional notes.
• Create your own questions as you get more
  experience.
• Questions can be geared towards particular areas.
• Rank your questions in order of importance.
• Do not ask too many questions.
• One-on-one interview is best for evaluating
  things.
• But if you cant, then organize group interview.
• Try to keep aggressive members from dominating.
• They do not have to agree on anything. Just let
  them speak their opinion.

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Example let a tester choose music

• Let the tester rank the music you chose for the
  game.
• Tell them to put boundaries on what is good, what
  is ok, and what is unacceptable.
• The ranking has to be detailed.
• Not just choices for the tester to choose which
  is better.

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Remember

• Do not lead testers.
• If they ask question, respond by asking them what
  they think they should do.
• Ask testers to think out loud.
• So you know why they get stuck, etc.
• Use feedback forms.

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What about quantitative feedback?

• Time it takes to read the rules.
• Time it takes to perform certain functions.
• Speed that a player gains a level.
• Asks testers to rank ease of use of certain
  features, from 1 to 10.
• Must have clear objectives that you want to find
  out before any measurement.
• So that you can design the stats to be measured
  accordingly.
• Never use quantitative feedback alone.

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Controlled situations

• You set parameters or events in the game so that
  you can test
• The end of a game.
• Rare events.
• Special situation.
• A particular level of a game.
• Feature(s).
• Loopholes.
• Dead-ends.
• Testing is not about being fair to testers or
  making sure they enjoy the game.
• It is about seeing what happens in every possible
  situation.
• This is the real reason behind many cheat codes
  in games. Yes, they are tools for testing in
  controlled situations.

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Example Monopoly

• To test the going to jail feature and see how it
  affects players who owns very little property
  versus players who own a vast amount of property.
• Start the game when the player is in jail.
• Play for 30 minutes, see what happens.
• Then repeat the experiment with a change in the
  players financial position.

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Well known cheats
contra
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Example of the usefulness of testing

• Age of Empires 2
• They want non-gamers to be able to pick up and
  play.
• But part 1 was difficult to learn, even for an
  expert gamer.
• Grandmother and middle age people testing, they
  do things right too after completing the newly
  developed tutorial.

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