{"id":408,"date":"2009-12-17T18:49:59","date_gmt":"2009-12-17T17:49:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/?p=408"},"modified":"2019-11-06T17:45:03","modified_gmt":"2019-11-06T16:45:03","slug":"how-real-world-game-usability-testing-is-changing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/2009\/12\/17\/how-real-world-game-usability-testing-is-changing\/","title":{"rendered":"How real-world game usability testing is changing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Recently I visited a global game publishers&#8217; usability lab in London to help out for a day, and participated running UX tests on the current revision of an upcoming game. The experience was extremely educational, and enjoyable, and changed my perception of integrating usability within an established company. Unlike the academic settings in which I have previously been working on usability, this companies position as a global entertainments company demands that the needs of the business is taken into consideration as well, and this has an affect on how usability is tested. The role of usability and user experience in game design is changing, and this could be clearly seen.<\/p>\n<p><b> What\u2019s testing usability of games like in the real world? <\/b><br \/>\nCompared to an academic approach, as we have been working towards in our course based at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.verticalslice.co.uk\/\">Vertical Slice&#8217;s labs<\/a>, there are a few differences to how large companies typically evaluate the user experience of a game.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Companies      will often consider usability testing a \u2018stage\u2019 near the end of the game      design process<\/li>\n<li>A      business will tend to have a wider focus when it comes to analysing player      data (taking a \u2018breadth\u2019 look at the data, rather than the \u2018depth\u2019).<\/li>\n<li>This      translates to a testing the game with multiple players at the same time,      and observing their play session live looking for problems.<\/li>\n<li>When      a problem is found, a business will focus on how to fix the problem, not      why the problem exists<\/li>\n<li>The      business wants results. Now!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div align=\"center\">\n<div id=\"attachment_413\" style=\"width: 302px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-413\" src=\"http:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/12\/boss-yelling.png\" alt=\"NOW!\" title=\"boss-yelling\" width=\"292\" height=\"380\" class=\"size-full wp-image-413\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/12\/boss-yelling.png 292w, https:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/12\/boss-yelling-230x300.png 230w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 292px) 100vw, 292px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-413\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">NOW!<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><b> Why does this difference in testing game usability exist? <\/b><br \/>\nTo understand the reasons for these differences, you have to understand the demands that the \u2018business\u2019 places on their usability specialists. In short, they want to fix the maximum amount of problems, and fast. Working in video games often means tight time frames, and the demand for instant feedback and results. This of course comes down to money \u2013 time that programmers are left idle is a wasted expense, and also there is a large degree of pressure to ship the game on schedule, and not lose momentum built up by marketing to competitors. The \u2018waterfall\u2019 methodology used by many businesses divide the design process into stages, and usability testing will appear as one of the later stages.<\/p>\n<p>Alan Cooper, in <em>The inmates are running the asylum<\/em>,\u00a0 argues that these demands are based on false premises, and looks to the failed early 90\u2019s attempts to design popular PDA\u2019s as an example of why being \u2018first to market\u2019, at the expense of a more user friendly product, is not always the most successful game plan. But, nonetheless, these are the demands put on real world usability labs.<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\"><div id=\"attachment_414\" style=\"width: 340px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-414\" src=\"http:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/12\/now-watch.png\" alt=\"wait, when did we want the results again?\" title=\"now-watch\" width=\"330\" height=\"285\" class=\"size-full wp-image-414\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/12\/now-watch.png 330w, https:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/12\/now-watch-300x259.png 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 330px) 100vw, 330px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-414\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">wait, when did we want the results again?<\/p><\/div><\/div>\n<p><b> What effect does this have on the results?<\/b><br \/>\nThis \u2018wide angle\u2019 mass testing approach imposed on labs has several advantages which are of interest to businesses.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Major      issues, such as problems that most people will encounter, can be seen      easily as you will have a room full of people complaining about it.<\/li>\n<li>Simultaneous      testing means you get the opinions of a large data-set quickly<\/li>\n<li>It      is cheaper to the business than a deeper integration of usability into      every step of the process.<\/li>\n<li>Any      sort of usability testing has to be applauded, as it\u2019s been shown to      generate a better product, improve customer relations and cause a      post-launch reduction in troubleshooting and maintenance costs<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>But, equally the approach forced by the demands of a business has several disadvantages:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A      \u2018lets just fix it\u2019 approach means that you won\u2019t learn about the causes of      problems found, and can lead to the same problem being created in the next      project.<\/li>\n<li>A      business with the attitude of \u2018sending it for usability testing\u2019 near the      end of the development life cycle limits the amount of changes that can      feasibly be made to a game or product.<\/li>\n<li>\u2018Finer      grained\u2019 problems, that the player may not be aware of, but that would      show up on an close analysis of their play session, will likely be missed.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><b> How should it be done? <\/b><br \/>\nThis companies&#8217; usability lab is an expert in the field, and so conduct a range of usability tests at different stages in the development process. And this is the correct approach, meeting business demands for fast, cheap results, by changing the nature of usability testing.<\/p>\n<p>Rather than simply being a \u2018stage\u2019 of the process, as you will often see in typical \u2018waterfall\u2019 project management methodologies, usability and testing the user experience should be ingrained in every aspect of game design, even before the first line of code is written. By doing smaller scale testing, but more frequently throughout game design, we can overcome the disadvantages that the traditional method imposes upon us.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Time      becomes less of an issue, as it runs concurrently to programming and game      design<\/li>\n<li>More      problems will be found, but at a more manageable pace<\/li>\n<li>This      means that each problem found can be focused on in more depth, leading to      a deeper understanding of their root causes<\/li>\n<li>Problems      will be found with enough time to fix them<\/li>\n<li>Larger      problems will be found, and fixed earlier, reducing bug fixing time.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>My impressions from working with this global game publisher and distributor was that this is the direction they are heading, and as market leaders, I imagine that it\u2019s a direction that most companies involved in game design will soon be following.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Recently I visited a global game publishers&#8217; usability lab in London to help out for a day, and participated running UX tests on the current revision of an upcoming game. The experience was extremely educational, and enjoyable, and changed my perception of integrating usability within an established company. Unlike the academic settings in which I [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[117],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-games-user-research","grve-entry-item","grve-blog-item"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v15.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How real-world game usability testing is changing - Steve Bromley - User Research<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.stevebromley.com\/blog\/2009\/12\/17\/how-real-world-game-usability-testing-is-changing\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How real-world game usability testing is changing - Steve Bromley - User Research\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Recently I visited a global game publishers&#8217; usability lab in London to help out for a day, and participated running UX tests on the current revision of an upcoming game. 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