DEVLOG 13- Usability

Usability describes the difficulty of games for the players. If the objectives and basic understanding of a game is easier than another game, then the game has a higher usability. Jason Schklar demonstrated an exercise where he gave out different games to groups of people. (Schklar 4:19-5:25). The catch was, not only had those groups not played that specific board game before, but he also didn’t give them instructions on how to play. This exercise was to test games’ usability and how easily their game could’ve been played with all the pieces included. A huge hint were the types of boards that the games came with. Some were designed like a race or a maze so players were able to figure out the main objective. Games should have a “pick up and play” accessibility with the Gold Standard being the overarching goal. The Gold Standard is “... iterating on the board and pieces themselves,” for players to learn how to play your game faster (Schklar, 11:20). Another way to allow players to learn about the game faster are score cards. This way, players know they are competing with each other for the most points in order to win and the scorecard might explain how to gain some of those points through pictures, words, or symbols. We are striving to make our game achieve the Gold Standard by including how to gain points and the extra aids that can help you achieve them on every card, as well as the location to move to. Our characters will have their names on it and be color coordinated. Lastly, the items that you can buy to make a few extra points and take on tasks easier will be clearly labeled with the price and a picture of the item. We need to figure out a way to design the starting pieces for players to know before starting without the manual. For example, each player will start with 5 coins and 2 task cards. Although you can have as many task cards in your hand as you would like, when you discard the cards (don’t use them) those points are subtracted to your score. This encourages all players to use their task cards and move around the board. In the Zach Hiwiller reading, the beginning of the article started with “the designer must frame decision points in a way that is conducive to generating or maintaining flow for the player,” which is the hardest part of our game (Hiwiller, P1). Unfortunately, we haven’t figured out a way to communicate this with the players without utilizing the manual.