This week, we’re having the soft opening, with Jonathan and Mo, our instructors, trying out our game. Since we’ve just finished the first complete draft of our game on the watch, we’re eager for feedback during this round of playtesting.
For both sides of feedback, we received a lot of advice on both game design and UX.
UX Feedback:
We aimed for players to engage without external instructions, but at times, our playtest got stuck due to a lack of guidance. Here are a couple of observations from the playtest that caused the game to stall:
- When the host creates the room and then selects their name, the word strings are exactly the same, causing confusion as it seems like they’re doing the same thing again, rather than picking a different phase name.
- Typography changes resulted in some word strings not being fully displayed due to font size.
- Players were confused after customizing their name, feeling there were no other places to share their name, making the customized name experience incomplete.
- Role assignment didn’t adequately emphasize “Do not share your identity.” Accidentally revealing their identity required restarting the game.
- When the host picks the question prompt, others are unaware only the host can change the prompt, and all team members share the same prompt, leading to questions about whether they should share their prompt.
- In the voting session, after using the picker to vote for the speaker’s role, players felt it was counterintuitive as there was no confirm button, just waiting for the time to end.
- During both the storytelling and questioning rounds, players didn’t check their watch to see their heart rate, as there was no feedback when the heart rate increased, making it hard to discern this layer of communication.
- At the end of the game, players didn’t understand the significance of 1st and 2nd place, wanting to know each other’s roles.
Game Design Feedback:
- Players wondered how many Lie Tellers there were in total, questioning if there was only one Lie Teller.
- The first round of storytelling seemed too short, while the 2-minute question round felt too long, requiring adjustment to balance.
- Players easily forgot other players’ stories, especially with more players, making it harder to remember everyone’s story.
- It was challenging for players to know their final rankings, as they were unsure of how the scores were calculated.
- Players were confused in some game stages, unsure of what “Round 1” meant, as it didn’t offer game instructions or actions for that turn.
To address this feedback, our UX and game design teams have added more necessary instructions and interfaces to streamline the game. Firstly, to clarify each stage, we’ve created four otter illustrations that explain each stage’s actions, replacing the original text, making it easier for players to understand. Additionally, we’ve iterated on the counterintuitive parts, clarifying the confirm action to fulfill players’ intentions. Lastly, for game design, we’ve made the voting part an additional feature called “adding confidence,” where players can press either truth or lie multiple times, or long press to mark someone as 100% a lie teller if they’re certain.
Next week is our final core hour week, during which we’ll finalize the UI build on the watch, outline the presentation, and strive to wrap up everything perfectly!
