Design Testing
For this round of testing, we wanted to test the appealability and gather feedback of our current map environment tiles. The main methods to test the appearance of our tiles is to conduct interviews and follow up with a think-aloud activity where users verbalise their take on the art. We will conduct the interview to gain background knowledge on their experience with game design and pixel art, then continue into the think aloud where they can speak openly about the art shown to them.
We conducted two interviews, each followed by a think aloud activity. All responses were recruited through word of mouth, by asking friends with game design experience. Respondents come from a variety of backgrounds, jobs, and levels of understanding and experience with pixel art. All user tests were carried out online via Zoom or Teams. The meetings went for about 20mins each. Each test session is recorded, and transcripts are generated using Google Forms. Negative user input and portions that generated confusion during testing were collected and documented.
Below are screenshots of all the interview questions through google forms.
First thing we asked was their name and background to we could see how much experience they have with game design and pixel art. We asked users to elaborate so we could weigh the feedback we got back according to user knowledge.
Next, we asked the user to evaluate the different types of pixel art provided. We did this so we can get some initial feedback on the appealability of detail vs simplistic pixel art.
The following questions were all related to the images created by Team 3 and were the answers given by users within the think aloud activity.
We successfully completed two interviews with a variety of experience amongst them. We have transcripts from the interviews on file however will take the key findings from each user to evaluate further.
User One
- Does a degree in IT at UQ and in their final semester
- Has done this course before and therefore has substantial experience with game design so opinion is weighted quite highly
- When comparing the different styles of pixel art, they believed the more detailed the art became, the less obvious it was to tell it was pixel art. This is an interesting observation because obviously the design guideline for this video game is isometric pixel art and being able to tell the game is pixelated is quite important
- Most important Think Aloud thoughts
I like the textures between the two water tiles. The night time tile especially has great depth while still be able to see the different pixels. The shell is a little wonky however I like how it has a pearl within the shell. Maybe if you had a shell with no pearl too and the shells with pearls are less likely, the pearl can become something that can be mined for currency within the game. (The user has knowledge on the game and has used this within her think aloud)
User Two
- High school teen who plays video games and watched anime a lot. Favourite game is sonic the hedgehog.
- Not so experienced with pixel art but plays many video games so would be an ideal user to test the game in the future
- Like the more detailed pixel art because it made everything more obvious what it was and gave a better impression as it was assumed that the artist was better because they could draw better. This observation is quite abstract in terms of our own art because we a student designers and don't necessarily have a lot of experience but still am able to provide plenty of detail in art with less pixels.
- Most important Think Aloud thoughts
Shouldn't you have multiple styles of seaweed tiles because with an isometric map, its gonna look weird if all the seaweed tiles don't change. Same with the rock and shell. Should have at least a left hand and right hand side view to put on opposite sides of the map. I like the shell drawing. When minimised, it looks like it has a lot of detail and has good shading. Water ripely tile is also cool
We are on the right track on providing appealing art and got some great initial reactions. We can use the feedback from these two interviews to confirm that our current pixel size is alluring to users and to stay with the pixel size moving forward. For the future, we can continue to expand on the art in different views and may discuss with studio one about using pearls within shells as another thing to mine and use as currency.
Images used within testing process
Within this round of testing, we wanted to assess how our users felt of the tiles in the day and night cycle. Following our previous testing, we conducted three interviews on our user group after showing them the four different day/night photos from out game.
Below are screen shots of the four photos used.
Day
Dawn
Dusk
Night
Below are the four interview questions asked:
- Can you describe with photo looks the most like day and why?
- Which photo would represent dawn to you and why?
- Can you describe how you feel about each time-of-day photo?
- What is your favourite time of day and why?
User One
17-year-old high school student who plays many computer games, notably:
- Roblox
- Arc
- Minecraft They have exposure to a lot of games that our game has taken inspiration from.
- The brightest looks the most like day. It is very bright compared to the others; it almost hurts the eyes with how different it is to the others.
- I would assume it’s the one just less bright than the daytime one.
- The difference between the two darkest is not that noticeable to me, the daytime photos do get the point across though.
- The dawn is my favourite, it’s not too bright and not too dark. I think the exposure works well with the colour pallet as well
User Two
15-year-old high school student. They play a lot of first-person shooter and virtual reality games. They used to stream these games so they have a very good knowledge of how games look and what works.
- The brightest one. I think that because daytime is usually the brightest in a day.
- I’m not too sure what you would consider dawn, it seems like a personal preference. I think of it as before light so the second darkest one is the one I think of as dawn
- The darkest two are very similar, so I would consider then night and ‘close-to-night’. The second brightest I like a lot. The brightest I feel washes out the colours on the map.
- The second brightest looks the best because it’s the one that doesn’t wash out or darken the colours.
User Three
20-year-old tradie who plays story-line games mostly when the has time. Like the aesthetic of games and really enjoys a beautiful game.
- I thought the second brightest was considered day, only because I hadn’t seen the first brightest yet. I am curious as to why there are two day-time colours.
- Oh, the second brightest then could be dawn. I don’t think it’s one of the darker two, they’re too dark.
- The brightest is too bright after seeing the second brightest. And the two darkest are very similar, I almost can’t tell them apart. Maybe more work needs to be done in separating the two. I think dusk and dawn are similar, but one should be warmer and the other colder. That’s just what I think of that.
- The second brightest. I think the others should be more centred around that one.
The difference between the time screens works somewhat well and communicates to users the time of day. However, to increase appeal, changes in the colour schemes of the screens need to be changed. Most notably:
- Day screen needs to be less bright
- Dawn and Dusk need to be more similar
This testing aimed to find out what people think sea stack looks like. The team showed several photographs of the sea stack and draw without looking at it. Through this progress, the team could find a general idea of what it looks like to people in mind.
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The photo that the team showed were:
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The three users drawn:
The result clearly showed, that every sea stack has multiple layer on it. Also, sea stack has random shape of it. Therefore, the team came up with a sea stacks.
Users were shown the picture of the island when it has straight border and after the shorelines were implemented. A few questions were asked –
Does it look like an island
Does it look like a shore that you’ve played in other games?
Does it look better than the before? Any improvements needed?
It does look like an island which has a shoreline but doesn’t quite look like from any other game.
Some of the merges look good but the island shouldn’t have a geometric shape like the picture does.
Colour of the land that merges with the sea doesn’t look the same as the other tiles in the land.
The before picture looks like a piece of land is floating (above the water but not on it).
The after looks like its on the water but apart from the extreme left and right edges, they don’t look properly merged.
The W and M on the top and bottom of the island have corners which look out of place.
A new version of merged tiles were added with the correct corresponding colors of the day and night tiles. The shoreline looked better than before but these are the following that need to be changed:
The inward corner pieces of the island must be changed as it doesn't fit in.
Need to design the shoreline in a way to make the island pseudo circular.